Gelaufen

Gelaufen is the past participle of the German verb laufen, which means to run, to walk, or to move by foot, and also to operate or function in some contexts. As a participle, gelaufen is used to form perfect tenses describing a completed running or walking action. For example: Ich bin drei Kilometer gelaufen (I ran three kilometers). The corresponding simple past tense is lief, so the related forms include Ich lief, Wir liefen, etc., while the compound tenses use gelaufen.

In the Perfekt and Plusquamperfekt, gelaufen typically appears with the auxiliary sein, since laufen is an intransitive motion verb. Example: Wir sind im Park gelaufen. In a subordinate clause, one can say: Nachdem ich gelaufen war, trank ich Wasser. This reflects the common pattern that motion verbs take sein as the auxiliary in perfect tenses.

Etymology and related forms: Laufen belongs to the Germanic family of verbs and is irregular. Its past tense is lief, and its past participle is gelaufen, formed with the prefix ge- and the stem lauf-. The participle gelaufen has cognates in other Germanic languages, such as Dutch gelopen (from lopen) and English run, though the exact forms differ by language.

Usage notes: Gelaufen is primarily a literary and standard German form used in written and formal speech. In everyday spoken German, speakers frequently use the simple past with laufen or periphrastic constructions to convey the same meaning, but gelaufen remains the standard past participle in perfect constructions.