esquivasteis

Esquivasteis is the second-person plural form of the verb esquivar in the pretérito indicativo (simple past) in Spanish. It means “you all dodged” or “you all evaded” and is used when speaking to a group of people titled with vosotros in Spain. The form signals a completed action in the past performed by multiple subjects.

Esquivar is a regular -ar verb in its conjugation. In the pretérito, the complete paradigm for this verb is: yo esquivé, tú esquivaste, él/ella/usted esquivó, nosotros esquivamos, vosotros esquivasteis, ellos/ellas/ustedes esquivaron. The vosotros form, esquivasteis, is characteristic of Peninsular Spanish and is generally not used in Latin American dialects, where ustedes would take esquivaron in the past tense.

Usage and nuances: Esquivar means to dodge, avoid, or evade something, either physically (a ball, an obstacle) or figuratively (preguntas, responsabilidades). Esquivasteis emphasizes that the action was completed in the past and involved multiple people addressed as vosotros. In contexts with ustedes, the corresponding past forms would be esquivaron.

Etymology and related forms: The verb esquivar comes from the Spanish lexeme esquiva, with a derivational suffix -ar for infinitive verbs. Its exact etymology is traced to Romance languages and shares similarities with words in other Iberian and Italian languages that convey avoidance or dodging. The past participle is esquivado, and the gerund is esquivando.

See also: esquivar, pretérito, vosostros usage, conjugation patterns in -ar verbs.