preteritum

Preteritum, also known as the simple past in some languages, is a past tense used to express actions or events that were completed in the past. The term derives from Latin praeteritum, meaning “gone by.” In grammars that mark tense primarily through verb inflection, the preterite is a finite past tense form that typically does not require an auxiliary verb.

In languages with aspect, the preterite often signals a punctual, completed event at a definite time, as opposed to the imperfect, which describes ongoing, habitual, or background past actions, or the perfect, which relates past actions to the present. The exact usage and terminology vary by language; some call this tense pretérito, Präteritum, or preteritum.

Examples and regional variation: In German, Präteritum is commonly used for narration and is formed by inflecting the verb (for example, ich ging, wir gingen). In Swedish, the preteritum functions similarly (jag gick). Danish and Norwegian use præteritum/preteritum to mark past actions (for example, jeg talte in Danish, jeg snakket in Norwegian). In English, the closest equivalent is the simple past (I walked). In Spanish, the corresponding category is pretérito, with forms like hablé or comí, but Spanish grammar typically does not use the term “preteritum.”