debías

Debías is the second-person singular form of the Spanish verb deber in the imperfect indicative. It expresses obligation, duty, or expectation in the past, and can also denote a habitual action in the past. It is commonly used to indicate what someone was supposed to do, what was generally expected of them, or what was owed in a past context.

In addition to simple past obligation, debías is often used in conjunction with other verbs to express a past expectation or non-fulfillment, as in the periphrastic construction debías haber hecho, meaning “you should have done [it].” Example: Debías estudiar para el examen. (You were supposed to study for the exam / You should have studied for the exam.)

Conjugation in the imperfect is:

yo debía, tú debías, él debía, nosotros debíamos, vosotros debíais, ellos debían.

Etymologically, deber comes from Latin debēre, meaning to owe or to owe a duty, which underpins its use to indicate obligation or necessity.

Usage notes:

- Debías describes past obligation or expectation rather than a completed past action, which would more directly use the preterite debiste or the perfect debe haber estado.

- It can convey a sense of moral duty or social expectation, depending on context.

- In some regions, synonyms like tenían que or debían might be used to express similar ideas in the past.

Debías is a common form across Spanish varieties and remains a standard way to refer to a past expectation or duty addressed to the person addressed by tú.

---