No había sonido alguno.

English Translation

there was no sound

I can’t find any example where no and alguno go together. Shouldn’t this be ninguno?

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This usage of “alguno” is for emphasis. You can detect this because “alguno” occurs after the noun. To me, a better translation would be “There was no sound at all” or “There was no sound whatsoever”. Otherwise “No había sonido” would work just fine as a translation of “There was no sound”. Cheers!

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Just for the record, that would be “ningún sonido”.

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Hi
It would be ningún sonido or sonido ninguno.

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Hi No había sonido is a completely different sentence. I believe the use of the adjective after the word is for emphasis but I have never seen alguno in a negative sentence. Just as one wouldn’t say No tengo algo.

There is a vast body of literature showing that these are all common variations of expressing “There was no sound”. Here are several examples from the literature but there are many others. Cheers.

There was no sound, which I really loved. No había sonido, lo que me encantó. – There was no sound it was just dark. No había sonido y era simplemente oscuro. – There was no sound it was completely quiet. No había sonido alguno, todo estaba completamente en silencio. – There was no sound at that point. No había sonido en ese punto. – There was no sound except from within me. No había ningún sonido excepto dentro de mí.

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