We will not give innumerable tables in this article, no doubt, useful, but for most students tiring and giving the impression that the grammar of the German language can only be “clever” by the teeth.
Therefore, here we will tell you in paragraphs and in simple terms, everything you need to know about the conjugation of German verbs.
Conjugation of verbs in German is accompanied by a change in the form of the verb according to:
- Persons (I, you, you, we, he, she, they).
- Numbers (singular, plural).
- At times (present, past, future).
Verbs in the Russian language change in the same way, so such a variety should not surprise us. It is enough to get acquainted with exactly what forms the conjugation of German verbs gives.
In order to conjugate, you need to determine the initial form of the German verb:
If in Russian it ends in “-t” (doing, cooking, running), then in German “-en”.
mach en - do
koch en - cook,
heß en - call,
lauf en - run.
In order to form another form of the verb, you need to fold -en and add a new ending to the base.
mach-
koch-
heiß-
lauf-
The first person is me and we
Everything is very simple: if you are talking about yourself alone, add the concise ending “-e” to the base, if you are not alone, then the ending “-en”.
I do - Ich mach e ,
We do - Wir mach en .
As you can see, in the plural of the first person, the form of the verb, in fact, does not change. She is the same as the initial one.
The second person is you and you
It is the second person that we use if we turn to someone. It's the other way around, for some reason the plural has been awarded a simpler ending. And if you turn to one interlocutor, then decorate the base of the word with flowery "-st". Compare:
You do - Du mach st ,
You do - Ihr mach t .
The third person is he, she, they
For the third party, two endings “-t” (singular), “-en” (plural) are used.
He does - Er mach t ,
She does - Sie mach t ,
They do - Sie mach en .
As you can see, here in the plural form of the verb also does not differ from the initial.
Remembering all these endings is also difficult because they repeat each other's friend. In fact, for the formation of 7 verb forms, only four endings are used: “-e”, “-en”, “-st”, “-t”.
At this point, many have a logical question: does the word base (mach-, koch-, heiß-, lauf-) do not change in the conjugation of German verbs? Indeed, in Russian, conjugation of verbs often implies a change in the stem (it doesn’t, I do it)?
Conjugation of German verbs: subtleties
Indeed, in German there are special cases of a change in the
basis of a word. Pay attention to verbs that end in a consonant, a duplicate ending. How, for example, to conjugate the word
biet en (to offer), because adding the ending “-t” to the basis of
biet is hardly possible? How to write "you offer"?
In these cases, the ending is diluted with the letter “-e”.
Ihr biet t - no, they don’t write like that.
Ihr biet et is the right option.
This rule also applies to other words that will sound dissonant with standard endings, for example, begegn en (to meet). Its base ends in –n. Agree, pronouncing –nt is not so simple. And in this example, before complex –n there is one more consonant, so it turns out “–gn”. Thus, without dilution, the sentence “you meet” would look like this:
Ihr bege gnt
Three consonants in a row is too difficult to pronounce, moreover, the word is widespread and clearly deserves a simple pronunciation. Therefore, it will be correct:
Ihr begegn et
Irregular Verbs
Conjugation of verbs in the Russian language often occurs with alternating vowels (and consonants) in the root. For example, lag - lodge . In German, there are also irregular verbs whose conjugation involves changing the vowel in the root, in addition to adding the ending.
These verbs are really more convenient to perceive in tables - keep them handy. The fact is that irregular verbs are the most common. Therefore, although it is necessary to know them by heart, you should not devote too much time to cramming them. Read, analyze, translate original texts more, referring to tables of irregular verbs. They will be repeated often enough so that you can learn them without difficulty, while mastering the structure, vocabulary and other aspects of the German language.
The most important irregular verbs are sein - to be, haben - to have, werden - to become. You need to learn their conjugation by heart, which also does not cause any particular difficulties, because these verbs are used both as independent and auxiliary ones (in various complex forms of verbs), and are very common in any tasks in the German language.
After you thoroughly study the conjugation of verbs in the present tense and learn to use their various forms, the peculiarities of conjugation of German verbs in the past and future tenses will not seem complicated.