Queríamos

Queríamos is the first-person plural imperfect indicative form of the Spanish verb querer. It expresses a past or ongoing desire, intention, or preference and is commonly used to describe what we wanted at a given moment or over a period in the past.

Morphology and usage: The verb stem is quer- and the imperfect endings are -ía, -ías, -ía, -íamos, -íais, -ían. For the nosotros form this yields queríamos, with the accent on í to indicate the stressed syllable. Examples include: “Queríamos ir al cine” (We wanted to go to the cinema) and “Cuando éramos jóvenes, queríamos ser astronautas” (When we were young, we wanted to be astronauts). The imperfect form is often used to set background in narration, indicate habitual past desires, or describe states of mind that persisted over time.

Relations to other tenses: Queríamos contrasts with present tense queremos (we want) and with the conditional form querríamos (we would like). The imperfect is appropriate when describing past feelings or intentions that are not bound to a single moment.

Etymology and scope: Queremos derives from the Spanish verb querer, itself from Latin quaerere, meaning to seek or want. Queríamos is standard across Spanish-speaking regions and appears in both formal and informal contexts.

See also: Conjugation patterns of querer, imperfect indicative in Spanish, and related moods such as the conditional, where querríamos expresses a hypothetical preference.