You also already know the irregular verbs. When you learned the present perfect tense, you learned that the past participle of irregular verbs ends in -en and that there is often a vowel change in the verb root.
The root vowel of these verbs also changes in the simple past:
schreiben: Johann Wolfgang Goethe schrieb viele Gedichte und Theaterstücke.
Unlike regular verbs, with irregular verbs, there is no -(e)te- inserted between the root and the personal ending. In the first- and third-person singular, there is no personal ending.
The verb is conjugated like this:
| Singular: | |
| 1st person | ich schrieb |
| 2nd person | du schriebst |
| 3rd person | er/sie/es schrieb |
| Plural: | |
| 1st person | wir schrieben |
| 2nd person | ihr schriebt |
| 3rd person | sie schrieben |
| Formal: | Sie schrieben |
Be aware that the verb root of irregular verbs in the simple past and in the past participle can be the same, but are often different: schreiben – schrieb – geschrieben, but: finden – fand – gefunden. These so-called root forms have to be memorized for each irregular verb.
In a few cases, one or more consonants may also change:
kommen: Nach seiner Italienreise kam Goethe 1778 zurück nach Weimar.
gehen: Goethe ging gerne spazieren, weil er sich für die Natur interessierte.
essen: Goethe liebte gutes Essen und aß gerne Fleisch.
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Grammatical terms in German: regelmäßig: A grammatical form is regular when it follows a pattern that can be applied to other words. unregelmäßig: Irregular forms must be memorized because there is no general rule to help us work out the correct form. Irregular forms are different from the majority of forms and/or have characteristics that do not follow the rule. |