You're already familiar with past participles that don't change their form and are used as part of compound verbs in certain tenses, such as the present perfect, and to construct the passive voice.
Examples:
Wir haben die Zahlen im Internet gesucht.
Die Zahlen werden im Internet gesucht.
The following chart gives you an overview of how to form past participles.
| separable | inseparable | |||||
| regular verbs | gesucht | zugehört | besucht | |||
| irregular verbs | geholfen | angefangen | verstanden |
Many participles can be used as adjectives to describe beings, things, actions and conditions. They provide more information about the noun, giving details about the nature, circumstances or passive actions that happened in the past.
As an attributive, the participle precedes the noun it modifies and is inflected just like an adjective.
Examples:
Es geht um diese vier verfluchten Zahlen.
Wo genau ist der gesuchte Ort?
A relative clause can be used in place of the past participle. In that case, the relative clause is often formulated in the past or present tense.
Examples:
Es geht um diese vier Zahlen, die verflucht (worden) sind.
Wo genau ist der Ort, der gesucht wird?