The Simple Past Tense
In German, there are two differents tenses in the past: The simple past tense and the perfect tense.
The simple past tense expresses facts and actions in the past
In spoken language, the perfect is used almost exclusively, except with some verbs.
Examples of the German Simple Past (Präteritum):
- „Das Wetter war schlecht.“
- „Er machte Urlaub.“
- „Wir hatten Glück.“
When do we use the Simple Past?
On paper the German Simple Past (Präteritum) is used like the English Simple Past.
For completed actions in the past:
- „Er war letztes Jahr in Deutschland.“
- „Ich ging gestern ins Theater.
For facts and conditions in the past:
- „Das Wetter war gut.“
- „Deutschland wurde 1990 Fußballweltmeister.“
That´s on the paper… But in the spoken language we use the perfect almost exclusively. That´s possible because there is no real difference in meaning between German Simple Past and Perfect. The bottom line is that you could use either Simple Past or Perfect Tense. There won´t be a difference in meaning. But Simple Past tense will sound strange for most people. In the spoken language Simple Past is mostly used with modal verbs, to be (sein), to have (haben) and „werden„. One easy reason for this: They are more complicated and irregular in Perfect Tense than in Simple Past. That´s why we use them in Simple Past Tense!
Conjugation: German Simple Past
Conjugation: Regular Verbs
You have to conjugate regular verbs in simple past like this:
| Person | kaufen | Ending |
|---|---|---|
| ich | kauf- | -te |
| du | kauf- | -test |
| er/sie/es | kauf- | -te |
| wir | kauf- | -ten |
| ihr | kauf- | -tet |
| sie/Sie | kauf- | -ten |
Special Characteristics
If the verb stem ends in „d“ or „t“, add an „e“ before the ending
Example „arbeiten“:
- „ich arbeitete“,
- „du arbeitetest“,
- „er arbeitete“, …
Conjugation: Irregular Verbs
For irregular verbs, there is a vowel change and oftentimes they use the simple present ending for plural and no ending for 1st and 3rd person singular.
But: 1st and 3rd person singular are ALWAYS identical, for all verbs.
Examples:
| Person | sein | haben | werden |
|---|---|---|---|
| ich | war | hatte | wurde |
| du | warst | hattest | wurdest |
| er/sie/es | war | hatte | wurde |
| wir | waren | hatten | wurden |
| ihr | wart | hattet | wurdet |
| sie/Sie | waren | hatten | wurden |
Bad News!
50% of all verbs are irregular!
Even some Germans don‘t know the conjugations of all verbs in the simple past.
They try, when possible, to avoid using them.
Perfect or Simple Past?
|
|
Word Order: German Simple Past Tense
The word order is the same as in the simple present:
Regular Main Clause:
| Position 2 | ||
|---|---|---|
| Er | hatte | ein Pferd. |
| Position 1 | ||
|---|---|---|
| Hatte | er | ein Pferd? |
Further Information:
- The 2nd Past tense in German: German Perfect Tense
- The German Past Perfect: German Past Perfect (Plusquamperfekt)
- Construction of the past particple: The Past Participle
- Talk about the future: German Future 1, German Future 2
- Talk in present: German Present Tense
- General German word order: The Main Clause
- Some verbs get seperate, when we conjugate them: Seperable Verbs
- How to conect two sentences with each other? Conjunctions and Conjunctional Adverbs
- What is a modal verb? What is special with modal verbs? German Modal Verbs
- Some verbs always require a certain case: Verbs with complements
Do you like EasyDeutsch?
Use the comments under each lesson for feedback! I love feedback! Also if you think I could do better... I want to know it! And if you like it I am glad and hope that I can continue to help you with hints, advice and simple explanations in the future as well. Follow me on Facebook and Twitter. I will share daily exercises as well as helpful links with you. If you subscribe to my Youtube-Channel you can practise your listening and writing skills with dictations.
[easy-social-like facebook="true" facebook_url="https://www.facebook.com/EasyDeutsch" twitter_follow="true" twitter_follow_user="EasyDeutsch" google_follow="true" google_follow_url="https://plus.google.com/b/103119812796307817812" youtube="true" youtube_chanel="UCluY2ph0_l4rwlYEz_xHM6g" pinterest_pin="true" skin="flat" counters=0 align="left"]Get all the updates and my famous articles secret straight to you mailbox! Subscribe to the EasyDeutsch Newsletter:
[thrive_leads id='6616']If you like it, I am sure your friends will like it as well! Share EasyDeutsch with them and learn together!
Wishing you success and happy learning,
Jan
