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¿Dónde vivía el rey de España?

¿Dónde vivía el rey de España?
Where did the king of Spain live?
From Lesson 144:The imperfect tense for -er and -ir verbs (-ía)·Spanish (Spain)

Breakdown of ¿Dónde vivía el rey de España?

de
of
vivir
to live
dónde
where
España
Spain
el rey
the king

Questions & Answers about ¿Dónde vivía el rey de España?

Why is it vivía instead of vivió here?
Vivía is the imperfect tense of the verb vivir (to live). We use the imperfect here because we are asking about an ongoing situation in the past ('where did he use to live?' or 'where was he living?'), rather than a single completed event.
Doesn't vivía also mean 'I lived'? How do we know it refers to the king?
In the imperfect tense, the endings for yo (I) and él/ella/usted (he/she/you formal) are exactly the same: -ía. Because the sentence specifically mentions el rey (the king), context tells us the subject is 'he'.
Why isn't the word rey capitalized?
In Spanish, titles and positions like rey (king), reina (queen), or presidente (president) are written with lowercase letters unless they start a sentence. Only proper names and places like España are capitalized.
Where is the word for 'did' in the Spanish sentence?
Spanish doesn't use helper verbs like 'did' to make questions. Instead, the past tense meaning is built directly into the verb vivía (lived / used to live). You just put the question word Dónde (Where) directly in front of the verb.

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