I'm having problems with 2 parts of this sentence.

Question

Full sentence- " El chica se llamaba Peter Augustus Duchene y la moneda que llevaba no era suya, sino que pertenecía a su tutor, un viejo soldado llamado Vilna Lutz, que lo había mandado al mercado a por pescado y pan.

1) sino que pertenecía a su tutor= but belonged to his tutor. Why the imperfect? Is expressing ownership in the past always done in the imperfect?

2) que lo había mandado al mercado= that he had sent to the market, or, that he was sending to the market,or, that he sent to the market. Why imperfect???? is it because that is how you express "had" in the past tense in spanish?

El chica?? "que" can also mean "who" sino que often translated as "but rather" - 0074b507, Aug 14, 2011

Answer 1

I'll let someone else answer the question about the imperfect, since I'm not so good at explaining that. But I will tell you that "tutor" in this context does not mean someone who tutors. It means "guardian". Vilna is Peter's guardian.

Answer 2

The preterite is generally used for past actions which are seen as completed often happening at a certain point in the past.

If you're not talking about an action that has been completed in the moment that you're referring to or if you're not focusing on the beginning or end of an action you should usually use the imperfect. So when you're referring to ownership the imperfect is the generally the best bet.

Did the action of being the owner suddenly happen at the moment you're referring to? Was that a completed action? No you probably don't know when he started to own the item, the person was still the owner at the moment you were referring to and being the owner was an ongoing state rather than a sudden completed action - for these reasons use the imperfect. I hope that makes some sense

Also for the 'had sent' bit -

the past perfect In Spanish is formed by using the imperfect tense of the auxiliary verb "haber" with the past participle.

The past perfect tense is

used when a past action was completed prior to another past action

but you don't always need to state that one action was completed before another - it can just be implied.

Thes link may also be helpful - some thoughts from Lazarus & The Past Perfect