"There was/were"

Question

I'm wondering how to use "Hubo" or "Habia" (and for that matter "Hubiera") properly to give meaning to "There was/were". Are there contexts in which one is more suited over the other?

Habia and hubo follow the same rules as imperfect and preterit, I'll let someone who can explain this better post an answer. - Fredbong, Aug 13, 2011

Answer 1

había = there is, there was

hubo = there is, there was

Spanish does not differentiate between the existence of one object and several ones. So what's the difference between those forms? The first one is imperfect, which means that you recall the moment when you could have thought "There is/are... something", disregarding the boundaries of its existence. The second one is preterite, meaning that there was/were (something) for a period of time, after which it "stopped being". Obviously, the latter tense is not very common, unless you say things like "Then, there was a sudden bright light, which disappeared a second later", where "hubo" must be used for what I just explained.

"Hubiera" is a mental representation of something you can't (or don't want to) declare as being what you think it is real. Obviously, it is used for hypothetical scenarios that never existed or maybe never exist, like "If there was no suffering on this planet..."

or, more formally, "If there were no suffering ..." - samdie, Aug 13, 2011

Answer 2

I copied this extract from my copy of "Breaking out of beginner's Spanish" by Joseph J. Keenan (also know as The Spanish learner's Bible )

The imperfect and preterite forms of haber are había and hubo, respectively. Había is the more commonly used of the two. Había veinte personas en el coche = There were twenty people in the car. Hubo is for something that was there all at once or not for long. Hubo un choque en la carretera = There was an accident on the highway. Remember never to use Habían or hubieron for "there were", regardless of the number of persons or things involved: Había una monja en la lancha and Había dos monjas en la lancha.

Awesome, thanks. - tomsky, Aug 13, 2011

no problem :) - patch, Aug 13, 2011

Man I've got to get a copy of that book. Geez luuuuuueeeeeeeez. - Fredbong, Aug 13, 2011

Strange that Haber remains in 3rd person singular form when used ... It's almost the opposite to the passive mood with verb conjugation on passive object's number, not implicit subject :) - tomsky, Aug 13, 2011

Answer 3

Strange that Haber remains in 3rd person singular form when used ...

Haber, when used to denote the existence or presence of objects, serves an impersonal function, which is one of its principal uses (the other being the auxiliary for perfect tenses). The noun(s) that haber denotes the existence for are complementos directos (direct objects), not subjects, that's why haber doesn't follow the noun's number (this in turn is a property of a subject, ej: él tiene, ellos hablan -> the verb is conjugated according to its subject.)

Ej: Había un gato.

Había dos gatos. (not habían)

The R.A.E. Diccionario Panhispánico de Dudas (D.P.D) states that when using haber, it is possible that the nouns for which it denotes their existence be replaced by direct object pronouns, thereby proving that they are indeed direct objects. Here are proofs they provided:

Hubo un problema = Lo hubo; No habrá función = No la habrá.

If problema and función are subjects, these 2 sentences would not be possible.

That makes sense, thanks for clearing that up :) - tomsky, Aug 13, 2011