Appendix:Spanish verbs
Spanish verb conjugation is one of the most complex aspects of Spanish grammar due to a relatively high degree of inflection, even compared to related Romance languages.
Spanish verb conjugations are separated into three finite moods (indicative, subjunctive, and imperative)[1] and a few non-finite forms. Regular verb conjugations are in three groups, by infinitive endings (-ar, -er, and -ir). These groupings are similar to the tripartite system found in Galician and Portuguese (-ar, -er, -ir), Italian (-are, -ere, -ire), French (-er, -ir, -re) and other Romance languages.
Non-finite forms
[edit]Each verb has an infinitive, a gerund (functionally quite different from the gerund of English grammar), and a passive perfect participle (past participle) that can further inflect for number and gender. Some verbs also have a present participle, generally considered to be an adjective derived from the verb rather than a form of the verb itself.
- Infinitive: hablar (“to speak”)
- Gerund: hablando (“speaking”)
- Past participle: hablado (“spoken”)
- Present participle: hablante (“speaking; speaker”)
Finite forms
[edit]The finite forms are grouped into seven distinct “simple tenses” (in a general sense of “tense” that refers to a specific time and a specific mood, although most modern grammars consider many of these forms as products of a tense and an aspect) and seven “perfect tenses”. The perfect tenses use the auxiliary verb haber along with the past participle. Other compound forms such as the present progressive are not considered to be an official conjugation of the verb.
Pronouns
[edit]Each of the finite “tenses” is conjugated according to the person and number of the subject. Nominative forms of Spanish pronouns often serve as the subject of such verbs. Frequently, though, the form of the verb makes the person and number of the subject clear. Thus, the subject pronoun is usually dropped altogether, except when used for emphasis or contrast:
- Implied: Soy de España. (“[I] am from Spain.”)
- Emphasized: Él es de Portugal, pero yo soy de España. (“He is from Portugal, but I am from Spain.”)
For most native speakers, the unnecessary use of these pronouns often sounds extremely foreign, so something like "Yo me levanté, yo me lavé los dientes y yo me vestí" (I woke up, I brushed my teeth and I got dressed) would sound extremely weird in most dialects, where the first "yo" would probably be omitted in most cases, and the other two would never be used unless a comical effect is sought.
However, there are certain contrastive cases where the pronouns are practically compulsory. For example, when listing or introducing several people, each one requires a pronoun (or other demonstrative) to separate this person from the rest. Thus, in a sentence like "Ella se llama María; yo (me llamo) Javier" (Her name is María; mine is Javier), that "yo" cannot be omitted unless the topic is being suddenly changed.
The 2nd person formal singular pronoun usted (abbreviated as Vd.) (“you”, literally, “your grace”) and its plural form ustedes take verbs conjugated in the third person. This is similar to the English practice of using third person verb forms with Your Majesty, Your Highness, and your Honor:
- Usted habla. — Third person singular form of hablar, literally, “Your grace speaks.”
- Ustedes hablan. — Third person plural form of hablar, literally, “Your graces speak.”
The use of usted and ustedes is very common in Spanish and is the equivalent of speaking on a last-name basis in English.
In Spanish, there is another pronoun, vos, used in place of tú. The use of it in speech is known as voseo in Spanish. Its use and conjugation is the same as for tú except in the present indicative, present subjunctive and the imperative.
- Vos hablás. — Second person singular (vos) present indicative form of hablar, "You speak"
- ¡Hablá! — Second person singular (vos) imperative form of hablar, "Speak!"
The vos form of a verb is always regular, except in the verbs ser and ir:
- Vos sos argentino — Second person singular (vos) present indicative form of ser, "You are Argentinian"
- Vos vas a Argentina — Second person singular (vos) present indicative form of ir, "You are going to Argentina"
In all parts of Latin America, as well as the Canary Islands and parts of Southern Spain, vosotros is not used, as ustedes is used in both formal and informal contexts.
Indicative
[edit]The indicative mood has simple tense forms and corresponding perfect, continuous, and perfect continuous forms, as in English. However, in traditional Spanish grammar, continuous forms are ignored, and only the simple tenses and their perfect versions are considered as tenses.
Simple tenses
[edit]The Spanish indicative mood has four “simple tenses.” As opposed to English, which has just one past tense form, Spanish distinguishes between the preterite and the imperfect aspect. The preterite describes an event with a beginning and an end, but the imperfect describes a context without indicating its beginning or end. Within traditional Spanish grammar, the preterite and imperfect forms are considered separate tenses, with aspect controlled by auxiliary verbs, but modern grammar studies consider the preterite and imperfect to be different aspects of a single tense.
- Present (presente), e.g.: hablo (“I speak, I am speaking”)
- Imperfect (pretérito imperfecto or copretérito), e.g.: hablaba (“I used to speak, I was speaking”)
- Preterite/Simple past (pretérito indefinido), e.g.: hablé (“I spoke”)
- Future (futuro simple), e.g.: hablaré (“I shall/will speak”)
- Conditional (condicional, formerly potencial), e.g.: hablaría (“I would speak”)
Besides the future tense, alternative constructions are often used to indicate a future event:
- With ir (“to go”) + a (“to”) + infinitive: Voy a hablar. (“I am going to speak.”)
- With temporal adverbs like mañana (“morning, tomorrow”): Mi padre llega mañana. (“My father is arriving tomorrow.”)
- Immediate future with estar a punto de (“to be about to [do something]”) + infinitive: Mi padre está a punto de llegar. (“My father is about to arrive.”)
- With ya (“already”): Mi padre ya llega. (“My father arrives soon.”)
Spanish present tense verbs often express future actions, although the future tense does so more explicitly. The future tense can also express some uncertainty about the present and immediate future:
- ¿Qué hora es? Serán las tres. (“What time is it? It's (probably) about three.”)
- ¿Quién llama a la puerta? Será José. (“Who is at the door? It'll (probably) be José.”)
As with the future tense, the conditional can express some uncertainty that is not indicated by the corresponding imperfect verb form:
- ¿Qué hora era? Serían las tres. — “What time was it? It was about three (I think).”
- ¿Quién llamaba a la puerta? Sería José. — “Who was at the door? It must have been José.”
Perfect forms
[edit]Spanish perfect tenses are always formed with haber (“(auxilliary verb) to have”) (unlike some other Romance languages, which use different auxilliary verbs based on the main verb) followed by the masculine singular form of the passive perfect participle:
- Present perfect (pretérito perfecto), e.g.: he hablado (“I have spoken”)
- Pluperfect (pretérito pluscuamperfecto), e.g.: había hablado (“I had spoken”)
- Past anterior (pretérito anterior), e.g.: hube hablado (“I had (just) spoken”) (when...)
- Future perfect (futuro compuesto), e.g.: habré hablado (“I shall have spoken”)
- Conditional perfect (condicional anterior), e.g.: habría hablado (“I would have spoken”)
The past anterior indicates that an action occurred just after another, with words such as cuando (“when”), nada más (“no sooner”) and en cuanto (“as soon as”).
Continuous forms
[edit]Similar to English, Spanish uses the copula—estar (“to be”)—with the gerund to express continuous activity:
- Present continuous (presente continuo), e.g.: estoy hablando (“I am speaking”)
- Imperfect continuous (pretérito imperfecto continuo), e.g.: estaba hablando (“I was speaking”)
- Simple past/preterite continuous (pretérito indefinido continuo), e.g.: estuve hablando (“I was speaking (for a while)”)
- Future continuous (futuro continuo), e.g.: estaré hablando (“I shall be speaking”)
- Conditional continuous (condicional continuo), e.g.: estaría hablando (“I would be speaking”)
- Perfect continuous (pretérito perfecto continuo), e.g.: he estado hablando (“I have been speaking”)
- Pluperfect continuous (pretérito pluscuamperfecto continuo), e.g.: había estado hablando (“I had been speaking”)
- Past anterior continuous (pretérito anterior continuo), e.g.: hube estado hablando (“I had been speaking (for a while)”)
- Future perfect continuous (futuro compuesto continuo), e.g.: habré estado hablando (“I shall have been speaking”)
- Conditional perfect continuous (condicional anterior continuo), e.g.: habría estado hablando (“I would have been speaking”)
Note: the past anterior continuous (pretérito anterior continuo) is rarely used in modern Spanish.
The distinction between habitual actions and current activity is less strict in Spanish than in English:
- hablo (“I speak”) (a habit or a current activity)
- estoy hablando (“I am speaking”) (stressing the current activity)
Subjunctive
[edit]The subjunctive mood is most commonly used to express the speaker’s opinion, wish, doubt, emotion, or judgement about the unlikelihood of a hypothetical event. There are, however, plenty of other situations when it is used.
Simple tenses
[edit]- Present subjunctive (presente de subjuntivo), e.g.: Quieren que yo hable (“They want me to speak”)
- Imperfect subjunctive (imperfecto de subjuntivo) (-ra form), e.g.: Si yo hablara (“If I spoke”)
- Imperfect subjunctive (imperfecto de subjuntivo) (-se form), e.g.: Si yo hablase (“If I spoke”)
- Future subjunctive (futuro de subjuntivo), e.g.: Cuando yo hablare (“When I speak”)
Perfect forms
[edit]- Present perfect subjunctive (pretérito perfecto de subjuntivo), e.g.: Cuando yo haya hablado (“When I have spoken”)
- Pluperfect subjunctive (pluscuamperfecto de subjuntivo) (-ra form), e.g.: Si yo hubiera hablado (“If I had spoken”)
- Pluperfect subjunctive (pluscuamperfecto de subjuntivo) (-se form), e.g.: Si yo hubiese hablado (“If I had spoken”)
- Future perfect subjunctive (futuro compuesto del subjuntivo), e.g.: Cuando yo hubiere hablado (“When I shall/will have spoken”)
Continuous forms
[edit]- Present subjunctive continuous (presente de subjuntivo continuo), e.g.: Cuando yo esté hablando (“When I am speaking”)
- Imperfect subjunctive continuous (imperfecto de subjuntivo continuo) (-ra form), e.g.: Si yo estuviera hablando (“If I was speaking”)
- Imperfect subjunctive continuous (imperfecto de subjuntivo continuo) (-se form), e.g.: Si yo estuviese hablando (“If I was speaking”)
- Future subjunctive continuous (futuro de subjuntivo continuo), e.g.: Cuando yo estuviere hablando (“When I shall/will be speaking”)
- Present perfect subjunctive continuous pretérito perfecto de subjuntivo continuo), e.g.: Cuando yo haya estado hablando (“When I have been speaking”)
- Pluperfect subjunctive continuous (pluscuamperfecto de subjuntivo continuo) (-ra form), e.g.: Si yo hubiera estado hablando (“If I had been speaking”)
- Pluperfect subjunctive continuous (pluscuamperfecto de subjuntivo continuo) (-se form), e.g.: Si yo hubiese estado hablando (“If I had been speaking”)
- Future perfect subjunctive continuous (futuro compuesto de subjuntivo continuo), e.g.: Cuando yo hubiere estado hablando (“When I shall/will have been speaking”)
The subjunctive is often used with a conditional verb:
- Desearía que estuvieses aquí. — “I wish that you were here.”
- Me alegraría mucho si volvieras mañana. — “I would be very glad if you came back tomorrow.”
The present subjunctive is formed from the stem of the first person singular present indicative of the verb. Therefore, for an irregular verb like salir (“to leave”) with the first person salgo (“I leave”), the present subjunctive is salga, not *sala. The use of the imperfect subjunctive is determined by tense of the main verb of a sentence, not necessarily the tense of the subjunctive verb itself. The -ra and -se forms are always interchangeable without any changes in meaning.
The future tense of the subjunctive is obsolete in practice, found today mostly in old texts and legal documents. In other contexts, it is usually replaced by the indicative form, except in certain fixed expressions, including venga lo que viniere (“come what may”), sea lo que fuere, and the proverb allá donde fueres, haz lo que vieres.
Imperative
[edit]The imperative mood has five forms, but only the second person (familiar) forms are distinct from the subjunctive. The second person singular imperative form coincides with the third-person singular indicative form for all but a few irregular verbs. In formal writing, the second person plural imperative is always the same as the infinitive but with a -d instead of an -r.
- ¡Habla! — “Speak!” (informal singular, corresponding to tú)
- ¡Hable! — “Speak!” (formal singular, corresponding to usted)
- ¡Hablá! — “Speak!” (informal singular, corresponding to vos)
- ¡Hablemos! — “Let us speak!” (corresponding to nosotros)
- ¡Hablad! — “Speak!” (prescribed plural corresponding to vosotros, rarely used in casual speech)
- ¡Hablar! — “Speak!” (common plural corresponding to vosotros, not accepted by the Real Academia Española)
- ¡Hablen! — “Speak!” (plural corresponding to ustedes; see Appendix:Spanish pronouns for regional formality details)
For negative commands, the subjunctive is used instead, e.g.:
- ¡No hables! — “Do not speak!” (informal singular, corresponding to tú or vos)
- ¡No hable! — “Do not speak!” (formal singular, corresponding to usted)
- ¡No hablemos! — “Let us not speak!” (corresponding to nosotros)
- ¡No habléis! — “Do not speak!” (plural corresponding to vosotros; see Appendix:Spanish pronouns for regional details)
- ¡No hablen! — “Do not speak!” (plural corresponding to ustedes; see Appendix:Spanish pronouns for regional formality details)
Object pronouns
[edit]The object pronoun is placed after the infinitive, gerund, and positive imperative, and before other forms. Exceptions are made in poetry for scansion. Pronouns are agglutinative, with the following phonetic modifications:
- If le or les precedes lo, la, los, or las, it becomes se (e.g. envía + les + la → envíasela – "send it (feminine) to them").
- If a form ending in -mos is followed by nos, the s drops, resulting in -monos (e.g. vamos + nos → vámonos – "let's leave"). The s also drops before se, and thus -mose- (e.g. Démoselo – "Let's give it to him").
- If a form ending in -d is followed by os, the d drops, resulting in -aos, -eos or -íos (e.g. lavad + os → lavaos; poned + os → poneos; salid + os → salíos).
- Except for id ("go"), which either keeps the d or replaces it with r (thus, idos and iros are both accepted, while íos is considered incorrect).
Accent
[edit]The word stress remains the same when pronouns are suffixed. The written accent is thus added, kept, or removed as needed to mark it when it falls on a non-default syllable, according to the general rules.
- quitar = "to remove"; quitarle = "to remove from you (formal singular) or him/her"; quitárselas = "to remove them (feminine) from you/him/her"
- acercad = "bring close (imperative informal plural)"; acercaos = "bring yourselves close, draw near"
- vamos = "let us go"; vámonos = "let us leave"
- lave = "wash (imperative formal singular)"; láveme = "wash me"
- lavé = "I washed"; laveme = me lavé = "I washed myself"
- vio = "he saw"; violo = lo vio = "he saw it"
Examples
[edit]Most Spanish verbs fall into one of three regular conjugations, based on the last vowel of the infinitive form, which always ends in -ar, -er, or -ir. Verbs ending in -er or -ir follow similar conjugation patterns and -er verbs are far more common. Like English, some of the most common verbs are irregular (e.g. ir, "to go") but most are predictable.
The following three conjugation tables illustrate the patterns used by regular Spanish verbs.
| infinitive | hablar | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| gerund | hablando | ||||||
| past participle | masculine | feminine | |||||
| singular | hablado | hablada | |||||
| plural | hablados | habladas | |||||
| singular | plural | ||||||
| 1st person | 2nd person | 3rd person | 1st person | 2nd person | 3rd person | ||
| indicative | yo | tú vos |
él/ella/ello usted |
nosotros nosotras |
vosotros vosotras |
ellos/ellas ustedes | |
| present | hablo | hablastú hablásvos |
habla | hablamos | habláis | hablan | |
| imperfect | hablaba | hablabas | hablaba | hablábamos | hablabais | hablaban | |
| preterite | hablé | hablaste | habló | hablamos | hablasteis | hablaron | |
| future | hablaré | hablarás | hablará | hablaremos | hablaréis | hablarán | |
| conditional | hablaría | hablarías | hablaría | hablaríamos | hablaríais | hablarían | |
| subjunctive | yo | tú vos |
él/ella/ello usted |
nosotros nosotras |
vosotros vosotras |
ellos/ellas ustedes | |
| present | hable | hablestú hablésvos2 |
hable | hablemos | habléis | hablen | |
| imperfect (ra) |
hablara | hablaras | hablara | habláramos | hablarais | hablaran | |
| imperfect (se) |
hablase | hablases | hablase | hablásemos | hablaseis | hablasen | |
| future1 | hablare | hablares | hablare | habláremos | hablareis | hablaren | |
| imperative | — | tú vos |
usted | nosotros nosotras |
vosotros vosotras |
ustedes | |
| affirmative | hablatú hablávos |
hable | hablemos | hablad | hablen | ||
| negative | no hables | no hable | no hablemos | no habléis | no hablen | ||
These forms are generated automatically and may not actually be used. Pronoun usage varies by region.
| infinitive | comer | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| gerund | comiendo | ||||||
| past participle | masculine | feminine | |||||
| singular | comido | comida | |||||
| plural | comidos | comidas | |||||
| singular | plural | ||||||
| 1st person | 2nd person | 3rd person | 1st person | 2nd person | 3rd person | ||
| indicative | yo | tú vos |
él/ella/ello usted |
nosotros nosotras |
vosotros vosotras |
ellos/ellas ustedes | |
| present | como | comestú comésvos |
come | comemos | coméis | comen | |
| imperfect | comía | comías | comía | comíamos | comíais | comían | |
| preterite | comí | comiste | comió | comimos | comisteis | comieron | |
| future | comeré | comerás | comerá | comeremos | comeréis | comerán | |
| conditional | comería | comerías | comería | comeríamos | comeríais | comerían | |
| subjunctive | yo | tú vos |
él/ella/ello usted |
nosotros nosotras |
vosotros vosotras |
ellos/ellas ustedes | |
| present | coma | comastú comásvos2 |
coma | comamos | comáis | coman | |
| imperfect (ra) |
comiera | comieras | comiera | comiéramos | comierais | comieran | |
| imperfect (se) |
comiese | comieses | comiese | comiésemos | comieseis | comiesen | |
| future1 | comiere | comieres | comiere | comiéremos | comiereis | comieren | |
| imperative | — | tú vos |
usted | nosotros nosotras |
vosotros vosotras |
ustedes | |
| affirmative | cometú comévos |
coma | comamos | comed | coman | ||
| negative | no comas | no coma | no comamos | no comáis | no coman | ||
These forms are generated automatically and may not actually be used. Pronoun usage varies by region.
These forms are generated automatically and may not actually be used. Pronoun usage varies by region.
Notes
[edit]- ^ Traditional linguistics often categorizes the conditional as a separate mood from the indicative, thereby having four moods. This article uses the modern classification.
See also
[edit]- Wikilengua, the portal on spanish language
- Category:Spanish verbs
Spanish verbs on Wikipedia.Wikipedia - Spanish conjugation on Wikipedia.Wikipedia