{"id":3063,"date":"2011-12-14T14:30:04","date_gmt":"2011-12-14T14:30:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/?p=3063"},"modified":"2011-12-01T10:13:36","modified_gmt":"2011-12-01T10:13:36","slug":"german-tenses-in-use-prateritum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/german-tenses-in-use-prateritum\/","title":{"rendered":"German tenses in use: Pr\u00e4teritum"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Pr\u00e4teritum<\/em><\/strong> is equivalent to the English Simple Past <\/em>tense, so to speak. But usually, the Pr\u00e4teritum<\/em> is not used in everyday language in German. It is rather used as a literary language. Germans commonly opt for the Perfekt<\/em><\/strong> in their speech in order to refer to the past \u2013 which will be discussed in my upcoming post. Nevertheless, let\u2019s have a closer look to the Pr\u00e4teritum,<\/em> as it is important to know how you form sentences in the Pr\u00e4teritum<\/em> with the verbs haben<\/em><\/strong> (to have) and sein<\/em><\/strong> (to be).<\/p>\n

I often compare the Pr\u00e4teritum<\/em> with the English Simple Past<\/em> tense, as the sentence formation for both tenses are similar in the two languages, and because both tenses refer to completed actions of the past.<\/p>\n

Examples:<\/p>\n

Ich trank eine Tasse Kaffee. \u2013 I drank a cup of coffee.<\/p>\n

Ich a\u00df einen Apfel. \u2013 I ate an apple.<\/p>\n

Ich sang ein Lied. \u2013 I sang a song.<\/p>\n

Ich ging Einkaufen. \u2013 I went shopping.<\/p>\n

Just like in English you need to know a particular past form of the verb, which is called imperfect form for German verbs. German imperfect verb forms can either be regular (weak verbs) or irregular (strong verbs). Additionally, you need to conjugate the imperfect verb form according to person and number.<\/p>\n

It would go beyond the scope of this post to list several imperfect verb forms but, at least, I would like to discuss the two German verbs that are commonly used in the Pr\u00e4teritum<\/em>. These are the verbs \u2018haben\u2019 (to have) and \u2018sein\u2019 (to be).<\/p>\n

Just like in English, the German verbs haben<\/em> and sein<\/em> can be both full verbs and auxiliary verbs. You use these verbs with the Pr\u00e4teritum<\/em> when you want to say what you possessed or have possessed something and when you want to say where you were or have been to.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

1. Ich hatte einmal einen Hund. \u2013 I once had a dog.<\/p>\n

2. Ich hatte heute Morgen keine Zeit. \u2013 I didn\u2019t have time this morning. (lit. I had no time this morning.)<\/p>\n

3. Ich war gestern im Kino. \u2013 I was at the movies yesterday.<\/p>\n

4. Sie war vergangene Woche bei einer Freundin. \u2013 She was at a friend\u2019s place last week.<\/p>\n

5. Ich war schon zweimal in Deutschland. \u2013 I have been twice to Germany.<\/p>\n

6. Ich war noch nie in der Schweiz. \u2013 I have never been to Switzerland.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Here are the conjugated imperfect verb forms of the German verbs haben<\/em> und sein<\/em>, which may help you to form further sentences.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

haben = to have (hatten-had)<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
<\/td>\nSingular<\/strong><\/td>\nPlural<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
1st<\/sup> person<\/strong><\/td>\nich hatte(I had)<\/td>\nwir hatten(we had)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
2nd<\/sup> person<\/strong><\/td>\ndu hattest \/ Sie hatten(you had)<\/td>\nihr hattet \/ Sie hatten(you had)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
3rd<\/sup> person<\/strong><\/td>\ner\/sie\/es hatte(he\/she\/it had)<\/td>\nsie hatten(they had)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

 <\/p>\n

sein = to be (war-was\/were)<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
<\/td>\nSingular<\/strong><\/td>\nPlural<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
1st<\/sup> person<\/strong><\/td>\nich war(I was)<\/td>\nwir waren(we were)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
2nd<\/sup> person<\/strong><\/td>\ndu warst \/ Sie waren(you were)<\/td>\nihr wart \/ Sie waren(you were)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
3rd<\/sup> person<\/strong><\/td>\ner\/sie\/es war(he\/she\/it was)<\/td>\nsie waren(they were)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

 <\/p>\n

In conclusion, Germans hardly use the Pr\u00e4teritum<\/em> in their speech. The only two verbs that are commonly used in this tense are: haben<\/em> (to have) and sein<\/em> (to be).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Pr\u00e4teritum is equivalent to the English Simple Past tense, so to speak. But usually, the Pr\u00e4teritum is not used in everyday language in German. It is rather used as a literary language. Germans commonly opt for the Perfekt in their speech in order to refer to the past \u2013 which will be discussed in…<\/p>\n

Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":54,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[95194,155],"class_list":["post-3063","post","type-post","status-publish","hentry","category-language","tag-prateritum","tag-tense"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3063","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/54"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3063"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3063\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3066,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3063\/revisions\/3066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3063"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3063"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3063"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}