Intermediate German: A Grammar and Workbook

(Tina Meador) #1

Patterns of stem vowel changes


Many irregular and mixed verbs follow certain patterns when changing
their stems in the simple past and the present perfect tenses. The five
most common patterns are:

Infinitive Simple past Past participle
ei – i – i leiden litt gelitten to suffer
reiten ritt geritten to ride
schneiden schnitt geschnitten to cut
ei – ie – ie bleiben blieb geblieben to stay
scheinen schien geschienen to seem, to shine
schreiben schrieb geschrieben to write
i – a – u finden fand gefunden to find
singen sang gesungen to sing
trinken trank getrunken to drink
ie – o – o fliegen flog geflogen to fly
schließen schloss geschlossen to close
verlieren verlor verloren to lose
e – a – o brechen brach gebrochen to break
sprechen sprach gesprochen to speak
sterben starb gestorben to die


  • For more details on modal verbs in the simple past tense, see
    Unit 7.

  • For information on separable verbs in the simple past tense, see
    Unit 8.

  • For a list of irregular verbs, see pages 215–17.


Exercise 12.1


Write out the full simple past tense of the following verbs for all persons:
ich,du,Sie,er/sie/es,wir ihr,Sie,sie.

1 wohnen; 2 fragen; 3 arbeiten; 4 reden; 5 kommen; 6 schreiben;
7 nennen; 8 gehen.

Unit 12: The simple past tense 93

111


2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9


1011


1


2


13


4111


5


6


7


8


9


2011


1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9


3011


1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9


4011


1


2


3


41111

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