Se prometieron amarse

Se prometieron amarse
 

¡Hola!

I would appreciate it if you could comment on my analysis of ‘se prometieron’:

In the key the translation of ‘They promised to love each other.’ is given as ‘Se prometieron amarse.’

Is it the case of the passive reflexive with the pronoun se to be used reciprocally: They promised each other to love each other?

I have a hunch that the verb ‘prometer’ needs a pronoun which is to be combined with a complementary infintive for this sentence to be made complete.
But ‘se’ can’t be a direct object, can it?

Thank you.

"Se prometieron amarse"* looks utterly agramatical to me. I would be surprised and dumbfounded if some Spanish speaker uses it.

prometieron amarse (el uno al otro)

se hicieron la promesa de amarse por siempre

(el uno al otro) may be added to strengthen the notion it's a couple's thing, and it's the norm when a man and a woman or two men are the subject, cis or trans in both cases. In this times of gender paraphernalia you may find "enlighted" souls, the ethernally nagging lovers of buenismo saying nonsensical things like "el uno a la otra" which is unidirectional and defeats the purpose.

el uno <---al----> otro
el uno --- a la ---> otra

but, you know ... el lenguaje inclusivo ... no, el lenguaje inclusive ... no, le lenguaje inclusive... ne, le lenguajo inclusiva ... Oh, s***!!

In daily speech, you may find this formula for reasons of emphasis. The speaker choses to use a redundant reflexive pronoun to state clearly that the promise was made to each other and not to anyone else. Of course, it's more elegant to say "prometieron amarse", but then the fact that they made a promise to each other to love each other is not as romantic. :D


The direct object with the verb "prometer" is the promise made, rather than to whom the promise was made. ;)
- Prometieron amarse.

Thank you all for your detailed replies.