Italian Consecutio Temporum (indicative, subjunctive, conditional) - Tenses Agreement - Lesson #5 

Written explanation and exercises: learnamo.com/consecutio-tempor...
Other videos on the subjunctive:
Present and past subjunctive morphology: • CONGIUNTIVO PRESENTE e...
Imperfect and past perfect subjunctive morphology: • CONGIUNTIVO IMPERFETTO...
When to use the subjunctive: • Come e quando usare il...
When NOT to use the subjunctive: • Quando NON usare il CO...
If you want to be always updated on new content that we publish day by day, follow us on:
Facebook: / learnamo
Twitter: / learnamo
Instagram: / learnamo
English subtitles written by our great student Hosam Elshazly! 😍
By "consecutio temporum" we mean the verb tense agreements between the main clause and the subordinate clause.
To choose the right verb tense in the subordinate clause, you need to know 3 elements:
- what the verb of the main clause takes
- tense and mood of the verb of main clause
- temporal relationship that we wish to establish (anteriority, contemporaneity, posteriority)
So che sei stato bravo (past perfect) ANTERIORITY
So che sei bravo (present) CONTEMPORANEITY
So che sarai bravo (simple future) POSTERIORITY
1) In this case, the verb of the main clause ("sapere") takes the indicative and is present, therefore the temporal relationship established with the verb of the subordinate clause will be related to the present:
Credo che tu sia stato bravo (past subjunctive) ANTERIORITY
Credo che tu sia bravo (present subjunctive) CONTEMPORANEITY
Credo che sarai bravo (simple future indicative!) POSTERIORITY
2) In this case, the verb of the main clause ("credere") takes the subjunctive and is present, therefore the temporal relationship established with the verb of the subordinate clause will be related to the present:
Sapevo che eri andato a Roma (trapassato prossimo) ANTERIORITY
Sapevo che andavi a Roma (imperfect) CONTEMPORANEITY
Sapevo che saresti andato a Roma (conditional past!) POSTERIORITY
3) In this case, the verb of the main clause ("sapere") takes the indicative and is imperfect (= past tense), so the temporal relationship established with the verb of the subordinate clause will be related to the past:
Credevo che tu fossi andato a Roma (past subjunctive) ANTERIORITY
Credevo che tu andassi a Roma (imperfect subjunctive) CONTEMPORANEITY
Credevo che saresti andato a Roma (conditional past!) POSTERIORITY
4) In this case, the verb of the main clause ("credere") takes the subjunctive and is imperfect (= past tense), so the temporal relationship established with the verb of the subordinate clause will be related to the past:
What happens, instead, if in the main sentence there is the conditional mood??
Vorrei che tu fossi stato più buono (trapassato subjunctive) ANTERIORITY
Vorrei che tu fossi più buono (imperfect subjunctive) CONTEMPORANEITY/POSTERIORITY
5) In this case, the verb of the main clause ("volere") takes the subjunctive and is in the present conditional, therefore the temporal relationship established with the verb of the subordinate sentence will be related to the present:
To distinguish whether it's contemporaneity or posteriority, the context must be considered.
Avrei voluto che tu fossi stato più buono (trapassato subjunctive) ANTERIORITY/CONTEMPORANEITY/POSTERIORITY
6) In this case, the verb of the main sentence ("volere") takes the subjunctive and is in the conditional past, so the temporal relationship established with the verb of the subordinate sentence will be in relation to the past:
For contemporaneity as well for anteriority and posteriority, when in the main clause there is a verb in the conditional past, we use the same time (trapassato subjunctive): to distinguish the temporal relationship we must consider the context!
Be careful!!
However, to express ANTERIORITY and CONTEMPORANEITY (both with respect to the present and with respect to the past) all this doesn't apply if the subject of the main clause and the subject of the subordinate clause is the same!!
In this case, the infinitive is used...
BUT!!
To express POSTERIORITY (both in relation to the present and in relation to the past) the infinitive isn't good, even if the subject is the same → so the rules of tenses considered before must be followed.