208. Common Irregular Verbs - Present, Imperfect & Past Participles

208.  Common Irregular Verbs  -  Present, Imperfect & Past Participles

Further to recent information on how verbs work in the past tenses, we need to look at a table of what are usually called the Principal Parts of Verbs. This table always includes the Infinitive, the 3rd person form of the Present Tense, the Imperfect Tense, the Past Participle and Meaning of course. For Regular Verbs, we do not need a table as such because they always 'behave' in a consistent pattern but by way of example let's set up a table to see how they would work and then move on to a few of the more common Irregular verbs.

Infinitive        Present        Imperfect        Past Participle     Meaning
sagen               sagt               sagte              gesagt                     say
hören               hört               hörte              gehört                     hear
kaufen             kauft             kaufte             gekauft                   buy

Before adding the Irregular Verbs, you may wonder why the 3rd person form of the verb is used. The reason for this is that an Irregular Verb in the Present Tense is usually only irregular in the 2nd and 3rd persons and then works like a regular verb in the other forms of the verb.  So... let's make up a list of some of the most  common verbs. Also verbs with an  '*' use  'sein' in the Perfect Tense and not 'haben'.

Infinitive        Present        Imperfect      Past Participle    Meaning
sein *              ist                war                  gewesen              (to) be
haben              hat               hatte                gehabt                 have
werden*          wird            wurde              geworden            become
wollen             will             wollte              gewollt                want to
sollen              soll              sollte                gesollt                be supposed to
mögen             mag             mochte            gemocht             like
können            kann            konnte             gekonnt              be able to, can
dürfen             darf              durfte              gedurft                be allowed to, may
müssen            muss            musste             gemusst              have to, must
essen               isst               aß                    gegessen            eat
trinken             trinkt           trank                getrunken           drink
sehen               sieht            sah                   gesehen              see
gehen *           geht             ging                 gegangen            go, walk
fahren *           fährt            fuhr                  gefahren             go (transport)
laufen *           läuft             lief                   gelaufen             run
sterben *          stirbt            starb                gestorben           die
bleiben *          bleibt           blieb                geblieben           stay
fliegen *           fliegt            flog                 geflogen             fly
nehmen            nimmt          nahm               genommen        take
stehen              steht             stand                gestanden         stand
liegen               liegt             lag                    gelegen             lie
sprechen          spricht          sprach              gesprochen       speak
lesen                liest              las                    gelesen             read

This is not an exhaustive list by any means and for further information you probably need to consult a dictionary or a good text here. The previously mentioned Leo German English website will also be helpful. A couple of things to note, however .... Separable Verbs such as 'aufstehen' do not usually get included in tables like this because this verb has 'stehen' as its stem. Only stem verbs are normally included. Next time I will use the above table to look at how the Past Tenses are used in the different contexts such as Conversation and Literary uses.

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