Words by Pat Eggleton
When you learn a language at school, it is normally three years before you can say anything about the past. This is rather restricting for your conversation, so today Italy Magazine is going to break the mould!
Before we look at the main past tense, we want to say a little about irregular verbs.
In our previous language articles we have looked at the auxiliary verbs avere and essere and you will need these to form the past tense. We have also looked at regular verbs in the present tense in Italian but many of the verbs you will want to use are irregular. Any Italian grammar book will list these and you should learn the forms by heart.
Now we will begin our look at the perfect tense or passato prossimo in Italian. This tense translates both “I did” and “I have done” .
With most verbs, you form this tense with the present tense of the verb avere and the past participle [the part of the verb that ends in – ed in regular verbs in English].
Forming the past participle:
- are verbs: take off – are and add – ato
parlare –-> parlato
- ere verbs: take off – ere and add – uto
vendere -–> venduto
- ire verbs: take off – ire and add – ito
finire –-> finito
So the perfect tense of parlare is:
ho parlato – I spoke / have spoken
hai parlato – you [informal] spoke / have spoken
ha parlato – he / she / you [formal] spoke / have spoken
abbiamo parlato – we spoke / have spoken
avete parlato – you [plural] spoke / have spoken
hanno parlato – they spoke / have spoken
Now see if you can form the perfect tense of vendere and finire.
The good news about irregular verbs in this tense is that the auxiliary verb – for this week, avere - stays the same. You just have to learn the past participles.
Here are the past participles of some common irregular verbs:
-
aprire (to open) --> aperto
-
avere (to have) --> avuto
-
bere (to drink) --> bevuto
-
chiedere (to ask) --> chiesto
-
chiudere (to close) --> chiuso
-
correre (to run) --> corso
-
dare (to give) --> dato
-
decidere (to decide) --> deciso
-
dire (to say) detto
-
fare (to do / make) --> fatto
-
leggere (to read) --> letto
-
mettere (to put) --> messo
-
perdere (to lose) --> perso / perduto
-
potere (to be able) --> potuto [plus infinitive]
-
scrivere (to write) --> scritto
-
vedere (to see) --> visto
Have fun forming the perfect tense with some of these verbs.
We will tell you more about the perfect tense next week.
