Whose in Spanish: ¿de quién es? and cuyo
To ask whose something is, Spanish uses ¿De quién es...? and never cuyo. Cuyo is the linking word, as in Manuel, cuyo papá es ingeniero. It agrees with the thing owned rather than with the owner — cuyo, cuya, cuyos, cuyas. In speech almost nobody uses it; people split the sentence in two instead.
Draft copy. Every claim needs a native-speaker check before publishing — the byline is what makes this citable, so it has to be earned.
Two jobs, two different words
English uses whose for both of these:
- Whose phone is this? — a question.
- Manuel, whose father is an engineer… — a link between two ideas.
Spanish splits them. The question is ¿de quién?. The link is cuyo. Using one for the other does not produce an accent, it produces a sentence nobody can parse.
The question: ¿De quién es…?
Literally “of whom is it”.
- ¿De quién es este celular?
- ¿De quién son estas llaves?
- ¿De quién es la chompa que está en la silla?
Two things to watch.
The verb agrees with the thing, not the owner. One object → es. More than one → son. ¿De quién son estos zapatos?
Plural owners get ¿de quiénes? — used when you are asking a group. ¿De quiénes son estas mochilas? thrown at a room of schoolchildren. It is optional and people often just say ¿de quién?, but it exists.
What you cannot say is ¿Cuyo es este celular? That is not a modern Spanish sentence.
The link: cuyo, cuya, cuyos, cuyas
Cuyo joins two pieces of information about the same person or thing.
Manuel, cuyo papá es ingeniero, es mi amigo.
The agreement is the part everybody gets wrong. Cuyo agrees with what comes after it — the thing possessed — not with the owner it refers back to.
| example | |
|---|---|
| cuyo | Manuel, cuyo papá es ingeniero… |
| cuya | Manuel, cuya mamá es ingeniera… |
| cuyos | Manuel, cuyos hermanos viven en Piura… |
| cuyas | Manuel, cuyas hermanas viven en Piura… |
Manuel does not change in any of those. The word after cuyo does, and that is what decides the ending. Same with things: el hotel, cuya piscina es enorme; esa casa, cuyas ventanas son azules.
Nobody says cuyo
This is the part the textbook leaves out. Cuyo is written register. It lives in contracts, news reports, essays and exam papers. In conversation in Lima you will go weeks without hearing it.
What people say instead is two sentences, or a different structure altogether:
| Written | Spoken |
|---|---|
| Ese es Juan, cuyo hermano es doctor. | Ese es Juan. Su hermano es doctor. |
| La casa, cuyas ventanas son azules, es de mi tía. | La casa de las ventanas azules es de mi tía. |
| El profesor, cuya clase es a las ocho… | El profesor que tiene la clase de las ocho… |
So: learn cuyo well enough to read it and to get it right when you write. Do not go hunting for chances to say it. If you find yourself building a sentence around cuyo mid-conversation, stop and use a full stop instead.
One thing to avoid entirely: que su. Juan, que su hermano es doctor is a real thing people say and it is considered an error. Two sentences is the safe repair.
Try it
- ¿___ es este celular?
- Manuel, ___ hermanas viven en Trujillo, es mi vecino.
- Esa casa, ___ ventanas son azules, es de mi tía.
- ¿De quién ___ estas llaves?
→ 1 De quién · 2 cuyas · 3 cuyas · 4 son.
Related
- Possession with de: Spanish has no apostrophe s — the everyday way to say whose something is
- The 9 Spanish question words, with examples for each
- Mi, tu, su — and este, ese, aquel — the su that does most of this work in speech
Topics Asking questionsPeruvian Spanish
De quién, or cuyo?
Seven on asking who owns what, and on the agreement that makes cuyo so easy to get wrong.
-
1How do you ask “whose phone is this?”
Answer
¿De quién es este celular? — Questions about ownership use *¿de quién?*, literally “of whom”. *Cuyo* never opens a question in modern Spanish.
-
2Manuel, ___ hermanas viven en Trujillo, es mi vecino.
Answer
cuyas — *Cuyo* agrees with what follows it, not with the person it refers back to. *Hermanas* is feminine plural, so *cuyas* — Manuel has nothing to do with it.
-
3El hotel, ___ piscina es enorme, queda en Miraflores.
Answer
cuya — *Piscina* is feminine singular, so *cuya*, even though *hotel* is masculine. The owner's gender is irrelevant every single time.
-
4¿De quién ___ estas llaves?
Answer
son — *Ser* agrees with the thing owned, and *llaves* is plural. *Estar* would ask where the keys are, not who they belong to.
-
5Which of these would you actually hear in a conversation in Lima?
Answer
Ese es Juan. Su hermano es doctor. — *Cuyo* is correct but belongs to writing — in speech people simply start a second sentence. The other two options are not possible in any register.
-
6Esa casa, ___ ventanas son azules, es de mi tía.
Answer
cuyas — *Ventanas* is feminine plural, so *cuyas*. Look forward to the noun, never back at the house.
-
7“Ana's book” in Spanish is:
Answer
el libro de Ana — Spanish has no apostrophe s — possession runs backwards through *de*. This is also the structure that replaces *cuyo* in most spoken sentences.