The trapassato remoto (remote pluperfect) is a compound tense formed by the passato remoto of an auxiliary verb (avere or essere) plus the past participle. It expresses an action that had been completed before another action in the remote past, and it is typically used in formal, literary, or historical writing with conjunctions such as dopo che, appena, quando, subito che, and una volta che.
1. Dopo + past infinitive
The most frequent and natural replacement for the trapassato remoto is the construction dopo + past infinitive. This structure is concise, elegant, and avoids the complexity of the remote pluperfect.
- With avere (transitive verbs):
- Dopo aver finito il lavoro, andò a casa. (After finishing the work, he went home.)
- Dopo aver detto quelle parole, si pentì. (After saying those words, he regretted it.)
- Dopo aver letto la lettera, scoppiò in lacrime. (After reading the letter, she burst into tears.)
- Dopo aver attraversato il ponte, si fermarono. (After crossing the bridge, they stopped.)
- With essere (intransitive verbs):
- Dopo essere uscito di casa, incontrò un vecchio amico. (After leaving the house, he met an old friend.)
- Dopo essere arrivati alla stazione, comprammo i biglietti. (After arriving at the station, we bought the tickets.)
- Dopo essere saliti sul treno, cercarono i posti. (After getting on the train, they looked for seats.)
- Dopo essere partito in ritardo, cercò di recuperare. (After leaving late, he tried to make up time.)
- With reflexive verbs (using essere):
- Dopo essersi lavato, andò a letto. (After washing himself, he went to bed.)
- Dopo essersi alzati presto, fecero una lunga passeggiata. (After getting up early, they took a long walk.)
- With negative form:
- Dopo non aver ricevuto risposta, insistette. (After not having received an answer, he insisted.)
- Dopo non essere stato invitato, non si presentò. (After not having been invited, he did not show up.)
2. Una volta + Past Participle
Another common alternative is the construction una volta + past participle, which functions similarly to dopo + past infinitive but carries a slightly different nuance: it emphasizes that the action is a precondition for what follows, often with a sense of “once this has happened, then that followed.”
- With transitive verbs (past participle alone):
- Una volta finito il lavoro, andò a casa. (Once the work was finished, he went home.)
- Una volta letta la lettera, scoppiò in lacrime. (Once the letter was read, she burst into tears.)
- Una volta presa la decisione, non tornò più indietro. (Once the decision was made, he never went back.)
- Una volta completata la missione, ripartirono. (Once the mission was completed, they left again.)
- With intransitive verbs (past participle agreeing with subject):
- Una volta arrivato a casa, telefonò. (Once he arrived home, he called.)
- Una volta usciti dal cinema, si avviarono verso il ristorante. (Once they left the cinema, they headed toward the restaurant.)
- Una volta scesi dal treno, cercarono un taxi. (Once they got off the train, they looked for a taxi.)
- Una volta entrata in sala, si sedette. (Once she entered the room, she sat down.)
- With passive meaning:
- Una volta pagato il conto, uscirono dal ristorante. (Once the bill was paid, they left the restaurant.)
- Una volta accolta la richiesta, procedettero. (Once the request was accepted, they proceeded.)
3. Two passati remoti joined by E (And) or Simple Sequence
The simplest and most colloquial alternative is to avoid the pluperfect entirely and use two passati remoti in sequence, connected by the conjunction e (and) or simply placed one after the other. In this construction, the temporal sequence is understood from context rather than marked by a specific tense.
- With [e (and)]:
- Si alzò e uscì senza dire una parola. (He got up and went out without saying a word.)
- Aprì la porta, e vide una scena che non avrebbe mai dimenticato. (He opened the door and saw a scene he would never forget.)
- Finì di lavorare, e tornò a casa. (He finished working and returned home.)
- Ricevette la notizia, e partì immediatamente. (He received the news and left immediately.)
- Without conjunction (asyndetic sequence):
- Si alzò, uscì. (He got up, went out.)
- Arrivò, vide, vinse. (He came, saw, conquered.)
- Parlò, nessuno lo ascoltò. (He spoke, no one listened to him.)
- Si avvicinò, bussò, nessuno rispose. (He approached, knocked, no one answered.)
- With explicit temporal markers:
- Prima mangiò, poi uscì. (First he ate, then he went out.)
- Dapprima esitò, poi accettò. (First he hesitated, then he accepted.)
- In un primo momento rifiutò, ma poi cambiò idea. (At first he refused, but then he changed his mind.)
In the examples both sentences’ subject [the person, thing, etc. who does the action] must be the same.