Is I gave di or dió?

Question

I have an old course (Living Language Conversational Spanish) that teaches that there is an accent on the last letter of di (I gave), dio (he/she/it gave) fui (I went) and fue (he/she/it went). I have not seen this in any other course. Is it that the law has changed or is this a peculiarity of Castilian Spanish as opposed to Latin American Spanish? Or is it that Living Language simply has it wrong?

Dio sin tilde is he/she/it/ud gave - 003487d6, MAR 21, 2010

Thanks for the confirmation. Living Language obviously has it wrong. - Leonard-Jones, MAR 21, 2010

Answer 1

Di. is i gave.

Answer 2

Back in the late 50's or early 60's the R. A. E. revised the rules for "diacritical" accents (tildes that do not reflect pronunciation but serve a grammatical purpose). Books published before (or around) that time may reflect the older usage.

Thanks for the info. Leonard. - Leonard-Jones, MAR 22, 2010

Answer 3

Di = I gave. No accent mark. I associate "dio" with Ronnie James Dio. Makes it easier to remember. I have some random associations with some words.

I do the same thing. I used to have a problem remembering when to use fui and when to use fue. I solved it by remembering that fui sounds like me, so it's the first person singular. - Leonard-Jones, MAR 22, 2010