The Portuguese verb saber has two different meanings. Most of the time, it means 🧠 to know, but did you know in certain contexts it can also mean 👅 to taste?
O António sabe o caminhoAntónio knows the way
O bolo sabe malThe cake tastes bad
Saber is conjugated in the 3rd person singular in both sentences, so it’s written exactly the same, but with an entirely different meaning. In the first example, saber means to know, i.e. António has the knowledge; he knows the way to get somewhere. In the second example, saber means to taste. It’s all about the flavour.
So how do you know the difference? Well, that will depend on the context itself, i.e. the situation you’re in and the rest of the phrase.
Conjugation of the Verb Saber
Before we go any further, let’s first review the verb saber in the present tense:
Indicativo
Vocês sabem nadar?Do you pl. know how to swim?
- eu seiI knowindicativo > presente tu sabesYou sing.,inf. knowindicativo > presente ele / ela sabeHe / She knowsindicativo > presente você sabeyou formal knowindicativo > presente nós sabemosWe knowindicativo > presente eles / elas sabemthey knowindicativo > presente vocês sabemyou pl. knowindicativo > presente
Now we need to tell you about an unusual exception to this conjugation: the 1st-person singular. When the meaning has to do with knowledge, it stays the same:
Eu sei como escrever essa palavraI know how to write that word
Não seiI don't know
However, when it refers to taste / flavour, you use saibo instead of sei:
Eu saibo a salI taste like salt
This may seem a bit odd to mention, because we don’t usually tell people what we taste like! (But maybe you’ve been working out or swimming in the ocean all morning and you’re covered in sweat or saltwater?) Remember that this only applies to the 1st-person singular in the present tense (presente do indicativo), so you don’t need to worry about changing any other conjugations.
Now let’s see it in the simple past tense (pretérito perfeito):
Indicativo
Ele não soube como responderHe didn't know how to answer.
- eu soubeI knewindicativo > pret. perfeito tu soubesteYou sing.,inf. knewindicativo > pret. perfeito ele / ela soubeHe / She knewindicativo > pret. perfeito você soubeyou formal knewindicativo > pret. perfeito nós soubemoswe knewindicativo > pret. perfeito eles / elas souberamthey knewindicativo > pret. perfeito vocês souberamyou pl. knewindicativo > pret. perfeito
Expressions with the Verb Saber
The verb saber comes up in a number of Portuguese expressions. For example:
- As férias foram ótimas, mas souberam a poucoThe holidays were great, but they felt too short
- A more literal translation would be …but they tasted too little, however the implied meaning is that the vacation time / holidays felt like they went by too quickly and the person wanted more time. You could think of it as the feeling of only getting a quick “taste” of the holidays and then they were gone.
- O jantar foi bom. Soube a pato!The dinner was good. It tasted divine!
- Literally: It tasted like duck!
- Saber a pato can also mean that someone else paid for your meal (which, being free, must have tasted even better!)
Note: You can also add the reflexive pronoun -me, if you’re speaking for yourself and want to add some emphasis.
Here’s one more common expression with a seemingly contradictory translation:
- Sei lá!I don't know!
- A more literal translation would be I know there, but the meaning of this phrase is actually quite the opposite. Sei lá is basically a more emphatic way to say I don’t know, as in I have no idea or Oh, I don’t know… Depending on the tone, it may also suggest that they don’t care to know anyway, almost like saying Who knows?
- Here’s an example of how it could come up in a casual conversation:
- 👨🏾🦱 Ainda tenho imensas coisas para fazerI still have a lot of things to do
- 🧔🏻 Imensas coisas… tipo o quê?Lots of things... like what?
- 👨🏾🦱 O quê… sei lá… queria cortar o cabelo, precisava de ir buscar umas fotografias que mandei revelar...What… oh, I don’t know… I wanted to get a haircut, I needed to go pick up some photographs I had developed...
What About Conhecer?
Just to make it harder on you 😇 , there’s another verb that also means to know: conhecer . This verb is often confused with saber, but the difference becomes more clear once you hear them both in context. Now that you know more about saber, read on to learn how it differs from conhecer: Saber vs. Conhecer
And do we use saber for knowing (how to speak) a language? Could you say “Eu sabia alemão, mas ultimamente me esqueci (de?) muito.”?
Yes, you can also use ‘saber’ to talk about languages you know 🙂 (Instead of ‘me esqueci de’, we’d say ‘esqueci-me de’).
Thank you, so if I’m saying “lately I forgot lots of it” how and where do I use the “de”?
“…mas ultimamente esqueci-me de muito”. However, ‘ultimamente’ doesn’t go very well with the simple past in Portuguese. We’re more likely to say something like “já me esqueci de muito” (the order is reversed due to the direct influence of “já”) or “[ultimamente] tenho-me esquecido de muito” (‘ultimamente’ tends to go with this compound past tense, which usually corresponds to the present perfect continuous – I have been forgetting).
yes, you’re right, whar I was saying it was a bit clunky 😉 i thought afterwards the perfect gives a better sense of something happening over a period of time. Thank you for clarifying the problematic “de” that helps a lot.