Versteigerte

Versteigerte is a German verb form derived from versteigern, which means to auction off or to sell at auction. Specifically, versteigerte is the simple past tense (Präteritum) used for the subject in the past, as in er versteigerte das Auto gestern or ich versteigerte das Gemälde heute. The past participle of versteigern is versteigert, which is used with the auxiliary verb haben to form perfect tenses (ich habe versteigert) and with werden in the passive voice (das Gemälde wurde versteigert).

In usage, versteigerte appears in narrative or report contexts where the action of auctioning is described as having occurred. It denotes that ownership or title to an item was transferred through a bidding process in the past. The related noun is Versteigerung, meaning an auction or auction sale, and the passive construction es wurde versteigert is common when the agent performing the auction is not specified.

Etymologically, versteigern combines the prefix ver- with steiger, the root of steigern meaning to increase or raise; the sense is thus to raise the price through an auction. The prefix ver- often marks completion or result in German separable or non-separable prefixes, here conveying the act of auctioning off something. A related verb is ersteigern, meaning to acquire something by bidding; its past tense is ersteigerte, used for the bidder’s action rather than the seller’s.

In summary, versteigerte is the past tense form used to describe items that were auctioned, while Versteigerung denotes the auction event itself, and versteigern is the act of conducting such an auction.