Introduction to the Past Subjunctive

Remember how, in our last lesson, you were asked to pay special attention to the present subjunctive conjugations of our Italian main verbs avere and essere? The reason for this is that these conjugations will serve as a foundation to past subjunctive conjugations.

As with our regular passato prossimo, the past subjunctive uses avere or essere as an auxiliary verb—this time in their present subjunctive forms—to the past participle of a given verb. (Please refer to our lecture on passato prossimo to review regular and irregular past participles).

	Nuotare	Arrivare
...che io	abbia nuotato	sia arrivato/a
...che tu	abbia nuotato	sia arrivato/a
...che lui/lei/Lei	abbia nuotato	sia arrivato/a
...che noi	abbiamo nuotato	siamo arrivati/e
...che voi	abbiate nuotato	siate arrivati/e
...che loro/Loro	abbiano nuotato	siano arrivati/e

Credo che lei abbia nuotato tutto il giorno. I think that she swam all day. Maria è contenta che tu sia arrivata! Maria is happy that you arrived!

Verbs that require essere as an auxiliary verb, naturally, care about gender and number, as we’ve seen with the regular passato prossimo. In other words, they must agree with the gender and number of the subject. (This does not apply to avere verbs).

Sembra che Maria e Giulia siano rimaste a casa. It seems that Maria and Giulia stayed/remained at home.

Any reflexive verb in the past subjunctive must use essere as their auxiliary verb:

Pensiamo che la bambina non si sia sentita bene. We think that the little girl did not feel well.