Grammatical tense: Difference between revisions

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{{More citations needed|date=October 2016|talk=References by section}}
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{{Grammatical categories}}
{{Grammatical categories}}
In [[grammar]], '''tense''' is a [[grammatical category|category]] that expresses time reference.<ref name="Fabricius-Hansen"/><ref name="Comrie">{{cite book |last1=Comrie |first1=Bernard |title=Aspect: An Introduction to the Study of Verbal Aspect and Related Problems (Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics) |date=1976 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge |isbn=978-0521290456 |page=6|quote="the semantic concept of time reference (absolute or relative), ... may be grammaticalized in a language, i.e. a language may have a grammatical category that expresses time reference, in which case we say that the language has tenses. Some languages lack tense, i.e. do not have grammatical time reference, though probably all languages can lexicalize time reference, i.e. have temporal adverbials that locate situations in time."}}</ref> Tenses are usually manifested by the use of specific forms of [[verb]]s, particularly in their [[grammatical conjugation|conjugation]] patterns.
In [[grammar]], '''tense''' is a [[grammatical category|category]] that expresses time reference. Tenses are usually manifested by the use of specific forms of [[verb]]s, particularly in their [[grammatical conjugation|conjugation]] patterns.


The main tenses found in many languages include the [[past tense|past]], [[present tense|present]], and [[future tense|future]]. Some languages have only two distinct tenses, such as past and [[nonpast]], or future and [[Nonfuture tense|nonfuture]]. There are also tenseless languages, like most of the [[Varieties of Chinese|Chinese languages]], though they can possess a future and [[Nonfuture tense|nonfuture]] system typical of Sino-Tibetan languages.<ref name="Huang">{{cite book |last1=Huang |first1=Nick |editor-last=Tao |editor-first=Hongyin |title=Proceedings of the 27th North American Conference on Chinese Linguistics |chapter=On syntactic tense in Mandarin Chinese |date=2015 |publisher=UCLA |location=Los Angeles |pages=406–423 |volume=2 |url=http://ling.umd.edu/~znhuang/materials/NACCL27%20proceedings-nhuang-vAug15.pdf |access-date=2017-01-08 |archive-date=2017-10-11 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171011015548/http://ling.umd.edu/~znhuang/materials/NACCL27%20proceedings-nhuang-vAug15.pdf |url-status=dead }}</ref> In recent work [[Maria Bittner]] and [[Judith Tonhauser]] have described the different ways in which tenseless languages nonetheless mark time.<ref name="Bittner">{{cite book |last1=Bittner |first1=Maria |title=Temporality: Universals and Variation |date=2014 |publisher=Wiley-Blackwell |isbn=9781405190404}}</ref><ref name="Tonhauser">{{cite journal |last1=Tonhauser |first1=Judith |title=Cross-Linguistic Temporal Reference |journal=Annual Review of Linguistics |date=January 2015 |volume=1 |issue=1 |pages=129–154 |doi=10.1146/annurev-linguist-030514-124923 |language=en |issn=2333-9683|doi-access=free }}</ref> On the other hand, some languages make finer tense distinctions, such as remote vs recent past, or near vs remote future.
The main tenses found in many languages include the [[past tense|past]], [[present tense|present]], and [[future tense|future]]. Some languages have only two distinct tenses, such as past and [[nonpast]], or future and [[Nonfuture tense|nonfuture]], while some languages make finer tense distinctions, such as remote vs recent past, or near vs remote future. There are also tenseless languages, like most of the [[Varieties of Chinese|Chinese languages]], however, these languages do refer to time in different ways.


Tenses generally express time relative to the [[TUTT (linguistics)|moment of speaking]]. In some contexts, however, their meaning may be relativized to a point in the past or future which is established in the discourse (the moment being spoken about). This is called [[Relative and absolute tense|''relative'']] (as opposed to ''absolute'') tense. Some languages have different verb forms or constructions which manifest relative tense, such as [[pluperfect]] ("past-in-the-past") and "[[future-in-the-past]]".
Tenses generally express time relative to the [[TUTT (linguistics)|moment of speaking]]. In some contexts, however, their meaning may be relativized to a point in the past or future which is established in the discourse (the moment being spoken about). This is called [[Relative and absolute tense|''relative'']] (as opposed to ''absolute'') tense. Some languages have different verb forms or constructions which manifest relative tense, such as [[pluperfect]] ("past-in-the-past") and "[[future-in-the-past]]".
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==Uses of the term==
==Uses of the term==
In modern linguistic theory, tense is understood as a category that expresses ([[Grammaticalization|grammaticalizes]]) time reference; namely one which, using [[grammar|grammatical]] means, places a state or action in time.<ref name="Fabricius-Hansen">{{cite book |last1=Fabricius-Hansen |first1=Catherine |editor-last1=Brown |editor-first1=E.K. |editor-last2=Anderson |editor-first2=A. |title=[[Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics]]|chapter=Tense |date=2006 |publisher=Elsevier |location=Boston |pages=566–573 |edition=2nd}}</ref><ref name="Comrie" /> Nonetheless, in many descriptions of languages, particularly in traditional European grammar, the term "tense" is applied to verb forms or constructions that express not merely position in time, but also additional properties of the state or action – particularly aspectual or modal properties.
In modern linguistic theory, tense is understood as a category that expresses ([[Grammaticalization|grammaticalizes]]) time reference; namely one which, using [[grammar|grammatical]] means, places a state or action at a time relative to that of the utterance.<ref name="Fabricius-Hansen">{{cite encyclopedia | first=Cathrine | last=Fabricius-Hansen | author-link=Cathrine Fabricius-Hansen | title=Tense | editor-first=Keith | editor-last=Brown | editor-link=Keith Brown (linguist) | encyclopedia=[[Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics]] | edition=2nd | location=Amsterdam | publisher=Elsevier | year=2006 | volume=12 | pages=566–573 | isbn=0-08-044299-4}}</ref><ref name="Comrie_Aspect">{{cite book |last1=Comrie |first1=Bernard |title=Aspect: An Introduction to the Study of Verbal Aspect and Related Problems | series=Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics |date=1976 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge |isbn=978-0521290456 |page=6|quote="[T]he semantic concept of time reference (absolute or relative), ... may be grammaticalized in a language, i.e. a language may have a grammatical category that expresses time reference, in which case we say that the language has tenses. Some languages lack tense, i.e. do not have grammatical time reference, though probably all languages can lexicalize time reference, i.e. have temporal adverbials that locate situations in time."}}</ref> Nonetheless, in many descriptions of languages, particularly in traditional European grammar, the term "tense" is applied to verb forms or constructions that express not merely position in time, but also additional properties of the state or action – particularly aspectual or modal properties.


The category of [[Grammatical aspect|aspect]] expresses how a state or action relates to time – whether it is seen as a complete event, an ongoing or repeated situation, etc. Many languages make a distinction between [[perfective aspect]] (denoting complete events) and [[imperfective aspect]] (denoting ongoing or repeated situations); some also have other aspects, such as a [[perfect aspect]], denoting a state following a prior event. Some of the traditional "tenses" express time reference together with aspectual information. In [[Latin grammar|Latin]] and [[French grammar|French]], for example, the [[imperfect]] denotes past time in combination with imperfective aspect, while other verb forms (the Latin perfect, and the French {{Lang|fr|[[passé composé]]}} or {{Lang|fr|[[passé simple]]}}) are used for past time reference with perfective aspect.
The category of [[Grammatical aspect|aspect]] expresses how a state or action relates to time – whether it is seen as a complete event, an ongoing or repeated situation, etc. Many languages make a distinction between [[perfective aspect]] (denoting complete events) and [[imperfective aspect]] (denoting ongoing or repeated situations); the former may employ a [[perfect (grammar)|perfect tense]], but such a relationship between aspect and tense may not be simple. Some of the traditional "tenses" express time reference together with aspectual information. In [[Latin grammar|Latin]] and [[French grammar|French]], for example, the [[imperfect]] denotes past time in combination with imperfective aspect, while other verb forms (the Latin perfect, and the French {{Lang|fr|[[passé composé]]}} or {{Lang|fr|[[passé simple]]}}) are used for past time reference with perfective aspect.


The category of [[Grammatical mood|mood]] is used to express [[Linguistic modality|modality]], which includes such properties as uncertainty, [[evidentiality]], and obligation. Commonly encountered moods include the [[indicative mood|indicative]], [[subjunctive mood|subjunctive]], and [[conditional mood|conditional]]. Mood can be bound up with tense, aspect, or both, in particular verb forms. Hence, certain languages are sometimes analysed as having a single [[tense–aspect–mood]] (TAM) system, without separate manifestation of the three categories.
The category of [[Grammatical mood|mood]] is used to express [[Linguistic modality|modality]], which includes such properties as uncertainty, [[evidentiality]],<ref name="evident-mira">{{cite book | first1=Ferdinand | last1=de Haan | chapter=Evidentiality and mirativity | pages=1020–1046 | editor-last1=Binnick |editor-first1=Robert I. |title=The Oxford handbook of tense and aspect |date=2012 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-538197-9}}</ref>{{rp|1030}} and obligation. Commonly encountered moods include the [[indicative mood|indicative]], [[subjunctive mood|subjunctive]], and [[conditional mood|conditional]]. Mood can be bound up with tense, aspect, or both, in particular verb forms. Hence, certain languages are sometimes analysed as having a single [[tense–aspect–mood]] (TAM) system, without separate manifestation of the three categories.
The term ''tense'', then, particularly in less formal contexts, is sometimes used to denote any combination of tense proper, aspect, and mood. As regards [[English language|English]], there are many [[Uses of English verb forms|verb forms and constructions]] which combine time reference with [[continuous aspect|continuous]] and/or perfect aspect, and with indicative, subjunctive or conditional mood. Particularly in some [[English language teaching]] materials, some or all of these forms can be referred to simply as tenses (see [[#English|below]]).


Particular tense forms need not always carry their basic time-referential meaning in every case. For instance, the [[historical present]] is a use of the present tense to refer to past events. The phenomenon of ''[[Counterfactual conditional#The grammar of counterfactuality|fake tense]]'' is common crosslinguistically as a means of marking counterfactuality in [[Conditional sentence|conditionals]] and wishes.<ref name="Iatridou">{{cite journal |last1=Iatridou |first1=Sabine |date=2000 |title=The grammatical ingredients of counterfactuality |journal= Linguistic Inquiry |volume=31 |issue = 2|pages=231–270|doi=10.1162/002438900554352 |s2cid=57570935 |url=http://lingphil.mit.edu/papers/iatridou/counterfactuality.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180724025930/http://lingphil.mit.edu/papers/iatridou/counterfactuality.pdf |archive-date=2018-07-24 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref name = "prolegomena">von Fintel, Kai; Iatridou, Sabine (2020). [https://semanticsarchive.net/Archive/zdjYTJjY/fintel-iatridou-2020-x.pdf Prolegomena to a Theory of X-Marking] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200715025503/https://semanticsarchive.net/Archive/zdjYTJjY/fintel-iatridou-2020-x.pdf |date=2020-07-15 }}. ''Manuscript''.</ref>
The term ''tense'', then, particularly in less formal contexts, is sometimes used to denote any combination of tense proper, aspect, and mood. As regards [[English language|English]], there are many [[Uses of English verb forms|verb forms and constructions]] which combine time reference with [[continuous aspect|continuous]] and/or perfect aspect, and with indicative, subjunctive or conditional mood.<ref name="CamGEL"/>{{rp|306–308}}
 
Particular tense forms need not always carry their basic time-referential meaning in every case. For instance, the [[historical present]] is a use of the present tense to refer to past events. The phenomenon of ''[[Counterfactual conditional#The grammar of counterfactuality|fake tense]]'' is common crosslinguistically as a means of marking counterfactuality in [[Conditional sentence|conditionals]] and wishes.<ref name="Iatridou">{{cite journal |last1=Iatridou |first1=Sabine |date=2000 |title=The grammatical ingredients of counterfactuality |journal= Linguistic Inquiry |volume=31 |issue = 2|pages=231–270|doi=10.1162/002438900554352 |s2cid=57570935 |url=http://lingphil.mit.edu/papers/iatridou/counterfactuality.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180724025930/http://lingphil.mit.edu/papers/iatridou/counterfactuality.pdf |archive-date=2018-07-24 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="prolegomena">{{Cite journal | last1=von Fintel | first1=Kai | last2=Iatridou | first2=Sabine | author-link2=Sabine Iatridou | title=Prolegomena to a theory of X-marking | date=8 August 2023 | journal=Language and Philosophy | volume=46 |pages=1467–1510 | doi=10.1007/s10988-023-09390-5}}</ref>


==Possible tenses==
==Possible tenses==


Not all languages have tense: [[tenseless language]]s include [[Chinese language|Chinese]] and [[Dyirbal language|Dyirbal]].<ref name="Comrie1985">{{cite book|last=Comrie|first=Bernard|author-link=Bernard Comrie|year=1985|title=Tense|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=0-521-28138-5}}</ref>{{rp|50–53}} Some languages have all three basic tenses (the [[past tense|past]], [[present tense|present]], and [[future tense|future]]), while others have only two: some have past and [[nonpast]] tenses, the latter covering both present and future times (as in [[Arabic]], [[Japanese language|Japanese]], and, in some analyses,{{which|date=February 2021}} [[English language|English]]),<ref>{{cite book |last1=Kosur |first1=Heather Marie |title=A Form-Function Description of the Grammar of the Modern English Language: Book 1 (Level 7) |date=November 18, 2021 |publisher=Rock Pickle Publishing |location=Illinois |isbn=979-8769812316 |pages=80–88, 258–268}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Kosur |first1=Heather Marie |title=A Form-Function Description of the Grammar of the Modern English Language: Book 2 (Level 8) |date=November 18, 2021 |publisher=Rock Pickle Publishing |location=Illinois |isbn=979-8769826191 |pages=21–25}}</ref> whereas others such as [[Greenlandic language|Greenlandic]], [[Quechua languages|Quechua]], and [[Nivkh languages|Nivkh]] have future and [[Nonfuture tense|nonfuture]].<ref name="Bittner"/><ref>{{cite book |last1=Nedialkov |first1=Vladimir P. |last2=Otaina |first2=G. A. |last3=Geniushene |first3=E. S. |last4=Gruzdeva |first4=Ekaterina |title=Syntax of the Nivkh language: The Amur dialect |date=2013 |publisher=John Benjamins Pub. Company |location=Amsterdam}}</ref> Some languages have four or more tenses, making finer distinctions either in the past (e.g. remote vs. recent past) or in the future (e.g. near vs. remote future). The six-tense language [[Kalaw Lagaw Ya]] of Australia has the remote past, the recent past, the today past, the present, the today/near future and the remote future. Some languages, like the Amazonian [[Cubeo language]], have a historical past tense, used for events perceived as historical.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Morse |first1=Nancy L. |last2=Maxwell |first2=Michael B. |title=Studies in the languages of Colombia 5|chapter=Cubeo grammar |date=1999 |publisher=The Summer Institute of Linguistics and The University of Texas at Arlington |location=Arlington, TX|page=45}}</ref>
Not all languages have tense: [[tenseless language]]s include [[Chinese language|Chinese]] and [[Dyirbal language|Dyirbal]].<ref name="Comrie_Tense">{{cite book|last=Comrie|first=Bernard|author-link=Bernard Comrie|year=1985|title=Tense|publisher=Cambridge University Press |series=Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics |isbn=0-521-28138-5}}</ref>{{rp|50–53}} Some languages have all three basic tenses (the [[past tense|past]], [[present tense|present]], and [[future tense|future]]), while others have only two: some have past and [[nonpast]] tenses, the latter covering both present and future times, as in [[Arabic]],<ref name="Ryding_Arabic">{{Cite book | first=Karin C. | last=Ryding | title=A Reference Grammar of Modern Standard Arabic | location=Cambridge | publisher=Cambridge University Press | isbn=978-0-521-77151-1 | pages=442, 608}} Also {{ISBN|978-0-521-77771-1}}.</ref> [[Japanese language|Japanese]],<ref>{{Cite journal | first=Silvia P. | last=Gennari | title=Tense, aspect and aktionsart in Spanish and Japanese | journal=University of Maryland Working Papers in Linguistics | year=2001 | url=https://eventcognition.org/resources/MWP2.pdf | via=York Brain, Language and Cognition Lab | access-date=22 October 2025}}</ref> and [[English language|English]];<ref>{{Cite book | first=Robert I. | last=Binnick | title=Time and the Verb: A Guide to Tense and Aspect | location=New York | publisher=Oxford University Press | year=1991 | isbn=0-19-506206-X | page=8}}</ref><ref name="CamGEL">{{cite book | author-link1=Rodney Huddleston | last1=Huddleston | first1=Rodney | author-link2=Geoffrey K. Pullum | last2=Pullum | first2=Geoffrey K.|title=[[The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language]] |date=15 April 2002 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge |isbn=978-0-521-43146-0}}</ref>{{Rp|208–212}}<ref name="SIEG2">{{Cite book | author-link1=Rodney Huddleston | last1=Huddleston | first1=Rodney | author-link2=Geoffrey K. Pullum | last2=Pullum | first2=Geoffrey K. | last3=Reynolds | first3=Brett | year=2022 | title=A Student's Introduction to English Grammar | edition=2nd | location=Cambridge | publisher=Cambridge University Press | isbn=978-1-009-08574-8}}</ref>{{Rp|pages=74–77}} whereas others such as [[Greenlandic language|Greenlandic]], [[Quechua languages|Quechua]], and [[Nivkh languages|Nivkh]] have future and [[Nonfuture tense|nonfuture]].<ref name="Bittner">{{cite book |last1=Bittner |first1=Maria |title=Temporality: Universals and Variation |date=2014 |publisher=Wiley-Blackwell |isbn=9781405190404}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Nedialkov |first1=Vladimir P. |last2=Otaina |first2=G. A. |last3=Geniushene |first3=E. S. |last4=Gruzdeva |first4=Ekaterina |title=Syntax of the Nivkh language: The Amur dialect |date=2013 |publisher=John Benjamins |location=Amsterdam}}</ref> Some languages have four or more tenses, making finer distinctions either in the past (e.g. remote vs. recent past) or in the future (e.g. near vs. remote future). The six-tense language [[Kalaw Lagaw Ya]] of Australia has the remote past, the recent past, the today past, the present, the today/near future and the remote future.<ref>{{Cite book | last1=Ritz | first1=Marie-Eve | last2=Ponsonnet | first2=Maïa | year=2023 | chapter=Time, language and thought. What language can tell us about our concepts of time | type=preprint | editor-last1=McGrath | editor-first1=Ann | editor-link1=Ann McGrath | editor-last2=Rademaker | editor-first2=Laura  | editor-last3=Troy  | editor-first3=Jakelin | editor-link3=Jakelin Troy | title=Everywhen: Australia and the Language of Deep History | isbn=9781496234377 | pages=165–192 | location=Lincoln | publisher=University of Nebraska Press | chapter-url=https://hal.science/hal-04077962/document | chapter-format=PDF | via=HAL | access-date=22 October 2025}}</ref> Some languages, like the Amazonian [[Cubeo language]], have a historical past tense, used for events perceived as historical.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Morse |first1=Nancy L. |last2=Maxwell |first2=Michael B. |title=Studies in the languages of Colombia 5|chapter=Cubeo grammar |date=1999 |publisher=The Summer Institute of Linguistics and The University of Texas at Arlington |location=Arlington, TX|page=45}}</ref>


Tenses that refer specifically to "today" are called [[hodiernal tense]]s; these can be either past or future. Apart from Kalaw Lagaw Ya, another language which features such tenses is [[Mwera language|Mwera]], a [[Bantu language]] of Tanzania.{{citation needed|date=February 2022}} It is also suggested that in 17th-century French, the ''[[passé composé]]'' served as a hodiernal past.<ref name="Bybee">{{cite book |last1=Bybee |first1=Joan |last2=Perkins |first2=Revere |last3=Pagliuca |first3=William |title=The Evolution of Grammar: Tense, Aspect, and Modality in the Languages of the World |date=1994 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |location=Chicago |page=101}}</ref> Tenses that contrast with hodiernals, by referring to the past before today or the future after today, are called pre-hodiernal and post-hodiernal respectively. Some languages also have a [[crastinal tense]], a future tense referring specifically to tomorrow (found in some Bantu languages); or a [[hesternal tense]], a past tense referring specifically to yesterday<ref name="Nettle">{{cite book |last1=Nettle |first1=Daniel |title=The Fyem language of northern Nigeria (Languages of the world) |date=January 1, 1998 |publisher=LINCOM Europa }}</ref> (although this name is also sometimes used to mean pre-hodiernal).<ref name="Stevick">{{cite book |last1=Stevick |first1=Earl W. |title=Adapting and writing language lessons |date=1971 |publisher=U.S. Foreign Service Institute |location=Washington, DC |page=302 |url=https://www.livelingua.com/fsi/General/FSI%20-%20Adapting%20and%20Writing%20Language%20Lessons.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210717000927/https://www.livelingua.com/fsi/General/FSI%20-%20Adapting%20and%20Writing%20Language%20Lessons.pdf |archive-date=2021-07-17 |url-status=live |access-date=17 July 2021}}</ref> A tense for after tomorrow is thus called post-crastinal, and one for before yesterday is called pre-hesternal.{{citation needed|date=February 2022}}
Tenses that refer specifically to "today" are called [[hodiernal tense]]s; these can be either past or future. Apart from Kalaw Lagaw Ya, another language with such tenses is [[Mwera language|Mwera]], a [[Bantu language]] of Tanzania.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Harries |first1=Lyndon |title=A Grammar of Mwera |date=1950 |publisher=Witwatersrand University Press}}</ref>{{rp|85}} It is also suggested that in 17th-century French, the ''[[passé composé]]'' served as a hodiernal past.<ref name="Bybee">{{cite book |last1=Bybee |first1=Joan |last2=Perkins |first2=Revere |last3=Pagliuca |first3=William |title=The Evolution of Grammar: Tense, Aspect, and Modality in the Languages of the World |date=1994 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |location=Chicago |page=101}}</ref> Tenses that refer to the past before today or the future after today are called pre-hodiernal and post-hodiernal respectively. Some languages also have a [[crastinal tense]], a future tense referring specifically to tomorrow (found in some Bantu languages); or a [[hesternal tense]], a past tense referring specifically to yesterday<ref name="Nettle">{{cite book |last1=Nettle |first1=Daniel |title=The Fyem language of northern Nigeria | series=Languages of the world |date=January 1, 1998 |publisher=Lincom Europa }}</ref> (although this name is also sometimes used to mean pre-hodiernal).<ref name="Stevick">{{cite book |last1=Stevick |first1=Earl W. |title=Adapting and writing language lessons |date=1971 |publisher=U.S. Foreign Service Institute |location=Washington, DC |page=302 |url=https://www.livelingua.com/fsi/General/FSI%20-%20Adapting%20and%20Writing%20Language%20Lessons.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210717000927/https://www.livelingua.com/fsi/General/FSI%20-%20Adapting%20and%20Writing%20Language%20Lessons.pdf |archive-date=2021-07-17 |url-status=live |access-date=17 July 2021}}</ref> A tense for after tomorrow is thus called post-crastinal,<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Dombrowsky-Hahn |first1=Klaudia |title=A Grammar of Kusaal: A Mabia (Gur) Language of Northern Ghana |journal=Linguistic Typology |date=27 May 2020 |volume=24 |issue=1 |pages=187–199 |doi=10.1515/lingty-2020-2037}}</ref>{{rp|195}} and one for before yesterday is called pre-hesternal.<ref name="Botne">{{cite book | first1=Robert | last1=Botne | chapter=Remoteness distinction | pages=536–562 | editor-last1=Binnick |editor-first1=Robert I. |title=The Oxford handbook of tense and aspect |date=2012 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-538197-9}}</ref>{{rp|556}}


Another tense found in some languages, including [[Luganda]], is the persistive tense, used to indicate that a state or ongoing action is still the case (or, in the negative, is no longer the case). Luganda also has tenses meaning "so far" and "not yet".{{dubious|reason=These sound like aspects.|date=February 2022}}
Another tense found in some languages, including [[Swahili]], is the persistive tense, used to indicate that a state or ongoing action still continues (or, if in the negative, does not).<ref name="Hewson_tense">{{cite book | first1=John | last1=Hewson | chapter=Tense | pages=507–535 | editor-last1=Binnick |editor-first1=Robert I. |title=The Oxford handbook of tense and aspect |date=2012 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-538197-9}}</ref>{{rp|525}} The [[Washo language|Washo]] language has tenses to indicate if an event occurred before the speaker's lifetime.<ref>{{cite thesis |last=Jacobson, Jr. |first=William Horton |date=1964 |title=A Grammar of the Washo Language |url=https://escholarship.org/content/qt52c6q7hg/qt52c6q7hg.pdf |work= |degree=Ph.D. |location=Berkeley, California |publisher=University of California, Berkeley |access-date=}}</ref>{{rp|636}}


Some languages have special tense forms that are used to express [[relative tense]]. Tenses that refer to the past relative to the time under consideration are called ''anterior''; these include the [[pluperfect]] (for the past relative to a past time) and the [[future perfect]] (for the past relative to a future time). Similarly, ''posterior'' tenses refer to the future relative to the time under consideration, as with the English "[[future-in-the-past]]": ''(he said that) he '''would go'''.'' Relative tense forms are also sometimes analysed as combinations of tense with aspect: the [[perfect aspect]] in the anterior case, or the [[prospective aspect]] in the posterior case.
Some languages have special tense forms that are used to express [[relative tense]]. Tenses that refer to the past relative to some time other than that of the utterance are called ''anterior'';<ref name="surcompose">{{cite book | first1=Louis | last1=De Saussure | first2=Bertrand | last2=Sthioul | chapter=The surcomposé past tense | pages=586–610 | editor-last1=Binnick |editor-first1=Robert I. |title=The Oxford handbook of tense and aspect |date=2012 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-538197-9}}</ref>{{rp|587}} these include the [[pluperfect]] (for the past relative to a past time)<ref name="narratology">{{cite book | first1=Monika | last1=Fludernik | author-link=Monika Fludernik | chapter=Narratology and literary linguistics | pages=75–101 | editor-last1=Binnick |editor-first1=Robert I. |title=The Oxford handbook of tense and aspect |date=2012 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-538197-9}}</ref>{{rp|95}} and the [[future perfect]] (for the past relative to a future time).<ref name="Stowell_syntax">{{cite book | first1=Tim | last1=Stowell | author-link=Tim Stowell | chapter=Syntax | pages=184–211 | editor-last1=Binnick |editor-first1=Robert I. |title=The Oxford handbook of tense and aspect |date=2012 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-538197-9}}</ref>{{rp|193–194}} Similarly, ''posterior'' tenses refer to the future relative to the time under consideration,<ref name="Hatav_bound">{{cite book | first1=Galia | last1=Hatav | chapter=Bound tenses | pages=611–637 | editor-last1=Binnick |editor-first1=Robert |title=The Oxford handbook of tense and aspect |date=2012 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-538197-9}}</ref>{{rp|623–624}} as with the English "[[future-in-the-past]]": (''he said that'') ''he '''would go'''.''<ref name="compositionality">{{cite book | first1=Henk J. | last1=Verkuyl | chapter=Compositionality | pages=563–585 | editor-last1=Binnick |editor-first1=Robert I. |title=The Oxford handbook of tense and aspect |date=2012 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-538197-9}}</ref>{{rp|565}} Relative tenses are also sometimes analysed as aspects: the [[perfect aspect]] in the anterior case, or the [[prospective aspect]] in the posterior case.<ref name="Ritz_perfect_tense">{{cite book | first1=Marie-Eve | last1=Ritz | author-link= | chapter=Perfect tense and aspect | pages=881–907 | editor-last1=Binnick |editor-first1=Robert I. |title=The Oxford handbook of tense and aspect |date=2012 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-538197-9}}</ref>{{rp|885–886}}


Some languages, such as [[Nez Perce language|Nez perce]] or [[Cavineña language|Cavineña]] also have [[periodic tense]] markers that encode that the action occurs in a recurrent temporal period of the day ("in the morning", "during the day", "at night", "until dawn" etc) or of the year ("in winter").<ref>{{cite journal|author=[[Guillaume Jacques]]|year=2023|title=Periodic tense markers in the world's languages and their sources.|journal=Folia Linguistica |volume=57|issue=3|pages=539–562|doi=10.1515/flin-2023-2013|url=https://shs.hal.science/halshs-04239547}}</ref>
Some languages, such as [[Nez Perce language|Nez Perce]] or [[Cavineña language|Cavineña]] also have [[periodic tense]] markers that encode that the action occurs in a recurrent temporal period of the day ("in the morning", "during the day", "at night", "until dawn" etc) or of the year ("in winter").<ref>{{cite journal|first=Guillaume |last=Jacques |author-link=Guillaume Jacques|year=2023|title=Periodic tense markers in the world's languages and their sources|journal=Folia Linguistica |volume=57|issue=3|pages=539–562|doi=10.1515/flin-2023-2013|url=https://shs.hal.science/halshs-04239547}}</ref>


Some languages have [[cyclic tense]] systems. This is a form of temporal marking where tense is given relative to a reference point or reference span. In [[Burarra language|Burarra]], for example, events that occurred earlier on the day of speaking are marked with the same verb forms as events that happened in the far past, while events that happened yesterday (compared to the moment of speech) are marked with the same forms as events in the present. This can be thought of as a system where events are marked as prior or contemporaneous to points of reference on a timeline.<ref name="Green">{{cite book |last1=Green |first1=Rebecca |title=A sketch grammar of Burarra (Honours thesis) |date=1987 |publisher=Australian National University |location=Canberra |doi=10.25911/5d778709e1631 |hdl=1885/109283 |url=http://hdl.handle.net/1885/109283 |access-date=17 July 2021}}</ref>
Some languages have [[cyclic tense]] systems. This is a form of temporal marking where tense is given relative to a reference point or reference span. In [[Burarra language|Burarra]], for example, events that occurred earlier on the day of speaking are marked with the same verb forms as events that happened in the far past, while events that happened yesterday (compared to the moment of speech) are marked with the same forms as events in the present. This can be thought of as a system where events are marked as prior or contemporaneous to points of reference on a timeline.<ref name="Green">{{cite book |last1=Green |first1=Rebecca |title=A sketch grammar of Burarra (Honours thesis) |date=1987 |publisher=Australian National University |location=Canberra |doi=10.25911/5d778709e1631 |hdl=1885/109283 |url=http://hdl.handle.net/1885/109283 |access-date=17 July 2021}}</ref>
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===Morphology of tense===
===Morphology of tense===
Tense is normally indicated by the use of a particular verb form – either an [[inflection|inflected]] form of the main verb, or a [[periphrasis|multi-word construction]], or both in combination. Inflection may involve the use of [[affix]]es, such as the ''-ed'' ending that marks the past tense of [[English verbs|English regular verbs]],<ref name="Lin_tenselessness" />{{rp|670}} but can also entail [[word stem|stem]] modifications, such as [[ablaut]], as found as in the [[Germanic strong verb|strong verb]]s in English and other Germanic languages,<ref name="CamGEL" />{{rp|405–406}} or [[reduplication]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Adamczyk |first1=Elzbieta |title=Reduplication and the Old English strong verbs class VII |journal=Studia Anglica Posnaniensia |date=2002 |issue=38 |url=http://ifa.amu.edu.pl/sap/files/38/02adamczyk.pdf |access-date=7 November 2025}}</ref>{{rp|28}} Multi-word tense constructions often involve [[auxiliary verb]]s or [[clitics]]. Examples which combine both types of tense marking include the French ''[[passé composé]]'', which has an auxiliary verb together with the inflected [[past participle]] form of the lexical verb;<ref name="oxfromance"/>{{rp|305}} and the [[Irish grammar#Verbs|Irish past tense]], where the proclitic ''do'' (in various surface forms) appears with the affixed or ablaut-modified past tense form of the lexical verb.
Indications of tense are often bound up with indications of other verbal categories, such as [[tense-aspect-mood|aspect and mood]].<ref name="">{{cite book | first1=Robert I. | last1=Binnick | chapter=Introduction | pages=3–58 | editor-last1=Binnick |editor-first1=Robert I. |title=The Oxford handbook of tense and aspect |date=2012 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-538197-9}}</ref>{{rp|47}} The [[grammatical conjugation|conjugation]] patterns of verbs often also reflect [[agreement (linguistics)|agreement]] with categories pertaining to the [[subject (grammar)|subject]], such as [[grammatical person|person]], [[grammatical number|number]] and [[grammatical gender|gender]] via [[portmanteau morph]]s. It is thus not always possible to identify elements that mark any specific category, such as tense, separately from the others.
====Nominal tense====
<section begin="list-of-glossing-abbreviations"/>
<div style="display:none;">
PROP:proprietive case
</div>
<section end="list-of-glossing-abbreviations"/>
A few languages have been shown to mark tense information (as well as aspect and mood) on [[noun]]s. This may be called nominal tense, or more broadly [[nominal TAM]] which includes nominal marking of [[Grammatical aspect|aspect]] and [[Grammatical mood|mood]] as well.<ref name="Nordlinger">{{cite book |last1=Nordlinger |first1=Rachel |last2=Sadler |first2=Louisa |editor-last1=Butt |editor-first1=Miriam |editor-last2=King |editor-first2=Tracy Holloway |title=Proceedings of the LFG 00 Conference University of California, Berkeley |chapter=Tense as a Nominal Category |date=2000 |publisher=CSLI Publications |location=Berkeley |pages=196–214 |url=https://web.stanford.edu/group/cslipublications/cslipublications/LFG/LFG5-2000/pdfs/lfg00.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170216203141/http://web.stanford.edu/group/cslipublications/cslipublications/LFG/LFG5-2000//pdfs/lfg00.pdf |archive-date=2017-02-16 |url-status=live |access-date=17 July 2021}}</ref>


Tense is normally indicated by the use of a particular verb form – either an [[inflection|inflected]] form of the main verb, or a [[periphrasis|multi-word construction]], or both in combination. Inflection may involve the use of [[affix]]es, such as the ''-ed'' ending that marks the past tense of [[English verbs|English regular verbs]], but can also entail [[word stem|stem]] modifications, such as [[ablaut]], as found as in the [[Germanic strong verb|strong verb]]s in English and other Germanic languages, or [[reduplication]]. Multi-word tense constructions often involve [[auxiliary verb]]s or [[clitics]]. Examples which combine both types of tense marking include the French ''[[passé composé]]'', which has an auxiliary verb together with the inflected [[past participle]] form of the main verb; and the [[Irish grammar#Verbs|Irish past tense]], where the proclitic ''do'' (in various surface forms) appears in conjunction with the affixed or ablaut-modified past tense form of the main verb.
For example, the [[Kayardild]] language uses case markers to mark tense:<ref name="Nordlinger"/>{{rp|199}}<ref name="Evans">{{cite book |last1=Evans |first1=Nicholas D. |title=A Grammar of Kayardild: With Historical-Comparative Notes on Tangkic |date=31 December 1995 |doi=10.1515/9783110873733}}</ref>{{rp|404}}
{{Interlinear|Ngada kurri-nangku mala'''-wu''' (balmbi'''-wu''')|number=(1)|
              1.SG.NOM see-NEG.POT sea-M.'''PROP''' morrow.M.'''PROP'''|
  'I '''won't''' be able to see the sea (tomorrow)'}}


As has already been mentioned, indications of tense are often bound up with indications of other verbal categories, such as [[tense-aspect-mood|aspect and mood]]. The [[grammatical conjugation|conjugation]] patterns of verbs often also reflect [[agreement (linguistics)|agreement]] with categories pertaining to the [[subject (grammar)|subject]], such as [[grammatical person|person]], [[grammatical number|number]] and [[grammatical gender|gender]]. It is consequently not always possible to identify elements that mark any specific category, such as tense, separately from the others.
{{Interlinear|Ngada kurri-nangku mala'''-y''' (barruntha'''-y''')|number=(2)|
              1.SG.NOM see-NEG.POT sea-M.'''LOC''' morrow.M.'''LOC'''|
  'I '''couldn't''' see the sea (yesterday)'}}
The verb stays the same, with the [[modal case]]s being used to show tense in the sentences.<ref name="Evans"/>{{rp|404}}


Languages that do not have grammatical tense, such as most [[Chinese language|Sinitic languages]], express time reference chiefly by [[Lexical (semiotics)|lexical]] means – through [[adverbial]]s, time phrases, and so on. (The same is done in tensed languages, to supplement or reinforce the time information conveyed by the choice of tense.) Time information is also sometimes conveyed as a secondary feature by markers of other categories, as with the [[Chinese grammar#Aspects|aspect markers]] {{lang|zh|了}} ''le'' and {{lang|zh|過}} ''guò'', which in most cases place an action in past time. However, much time information is conveyed implicitly by context – it is therefore not always necessary, when [[translation|translating]] from a tensed to a tenseless language, say, to express explicitly in the target language all of the information conveyed by the tenses in the source.
====Tenseless language====
A ''tenseless language'' is one that does not mark tense information at all. Examples are [[Burmese language|Burmese]], [[Dyirbal language|Dyirbal]],<ref name="Comrie_Tense" />{{rp|50–53}} most [[Varieties of Chinese|varieties]] of [[Chinese language|Chinese]], [[Malay language|Malay]] (including [[Indonesian language|Indonesian]]), [[Thai language|Thai]], [[Yucatec Maya language|Yucatec Maya]], [[Vietnamese language|Vietnamese]], and in some analyses [[Greenlandic language|Greenlandic]]<ref>{{cite journal|last=Bittner|first=Maria|year=2005|title=Future discourse in a tenseless language|journal=Journal of Semantics |volume=12|pages=339–388|doi=10.1093/jos/ffh029|issue=4}}</ref> (Kalaallisut) and [[Guaraní language|Guaraní]].<ref>{{cite journal|last=[[Judith Tonhauser|Tonhauser]]|first=Judith|year=2011|title=Temporal reference in Paraguayan Guaraní, a tenseless language|journal=Linguistics and Philosophy|volume=34|issue=3|pages=257–303|doi=10.1007/s10988-011-9097-2|s2cid=62125736}}</ref>


====Nominal Tense====
Tenseless languages can and do refer to [[time]], but they do so using lexical items that establish time reference, or by using combinations of [[grammatical aspect|aspect]], [[mood (linguistics)|mood]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Bittner |first=Maria |title=Temporality: Universals and Variation |publisher=John Wiley & Sons |year=2014 |isbn=978-1-4051-9040-4}}</ref> For example, most [[Chinese language|Sinitic languages]] express time reference chiefly by lexical means – through [[Adjunct (grammar)|adjuncts]], time phrases, and so on.<ref name="Mandarin">{{cite book |last1=Ross |first1=Claudia |last2=Ma |first2=Jing-heng Sheng |title=Modern Mandarin Chinese grammar: A practical guide |date=2014 |publisher=Routledge |location=London |isbn=9781315814759 |edition=2nd}}</ref>{{rp|201}} (The same is done in tensed languages, to supplement or reinforce the time information conveyed by the choice of tense.<ref name="Lin_tenselessness">{{cite book | first=Jo-Wang | last=Lin | chapter=Tenselessness | pages=669–695 | editor-last1=Binnick |editor-first1=Robert I. |title=The Oxford handbook of tense and aspect |date=2012 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-538197-9}}</ref>{{rp|670}}) Time information is also sometimes conveyed as a secondary feature by markers of other categories, as with the [[Chinese grammar#Aspects|aspect markers]] {{lang|zh|了}} ''le'' and {{lang|zh|過}} ''guò'', which in most cases place an action in past time.<ref name="Mandarin"/>{{rp|244–247}} However, much time information is conveyed implicitly by context – it is therefore not always necessary, when [[translation|translating]] from a tensed to a tenseless language, say, to make explicit in the target language all of the information conveyed by the tenses in the source.<ref name="Mandarin"/>{{rp|236}}
A few languages have been shown to mark tense information (as well as aspect and mood) on [[noun]]s. This may be called '''nominal tense''', or more broadly '''[[nominal TAM]]''' which includes nominal marking of [[Grammatical aspect|aspect]] and [[Grammatical mood|mood]] as well.<ref name="Nordlinger">{{cite book |last1=Nordlinger |first1=Rachel |last2=Sadler |first2=Louisa |editor-last1=Butt |editor-first1=Miriam |editor-last2=King |editor-first2=Tracy Holloway |title=Proceedings of the LFG 00 Conference University of California, Berkeley |chapter=Tense as a Nominal Category |date=2000 |publisher=CSLI Publications |location=Berkeley |pages=196–214 |url=https://web.stanford.edu/group/cslipublications/cslipublications/LFG/LFG5-2000/pdfs/lfg00.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170216203141/http://web.stanford.edu/group/cslipublications/cslipublications/LFG/LFG5-2000//pdfs/lfg00.pdf |archive-date=2017-02-16 |url-status=live |access-date=17 July 2021}}</ref>
 
For example, in [[Mandarin Chinese|Mandarin]], though the language is tenseless, the auxiliary verb {{lang|zh|[[:wikt:會|会]]}} ''huì'' can be used to express an action that will occur in the future:<ref name="Mandarin"/>{{rp|242}}
{{fs interlinear|indent=3
|我 想 他 不 '''会''' 来 了。|c1= &#91;{{zh|labels=no|t=我想他不會來了。}}&#93;
|Wǒ xiǎng tā bù '''huì''' lái le.
|I think he not '''FUT''' come PFV
|'I don’t think he '''will''' come.'}}


===Syntax of tense===
===Syntax of tense===
The syntactic properties of tense have figured prominently in formal analyses of how tense-marking interacts with word order. Some languages (such as French) allow an adverb (Adv) to intervene between a tense-marked verb (V) and its direct object (O); in other words, they permit [Verb-'''Adverb'''-Object] ordering. In contrast, other languages (such as English) do not allow the adverb to intervene between the verb and its direct object, and require [Adverb-'''Verb'''-Object] ordering.
The syntactic properties of tense have been prominent in formal analyses of how tense-marking interacts with word order. Some languages (such as French<ref>{{Cite book | first=Michael Allan | last=Jones | title=Foundations of French Syntax | series=Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics | location=Cambridge | publisher=Cambridge University Press | year=1996 | pages=340–345 | isbn=0-521-38104-5}} (Also {{ISBN|0-521-38805-8}}.)</ref>) allow an adverb (Adv) between a tense-marked verb (V) and its direct object (O); in other words, they permit [Verb-<mark>Adverb</mark>-Object] order. In contrast, other languages (such as English) do not allow an adverb to come between a tense-marked [[lexical verb]] and its direct object, and instead require [Adverb-<mark style="background:lightblue;">Verb</mark>-Object] order. (For tense-marked [[English auxiliary verbs|auxiliary verbs in English]], either position of the adverb is possible.{{Efn|text="Central position [of an [[adverb phrase]] (which may simply consist of one adverb)] in clauses headed by a lexical verb is between the subject and the verb; for clauses headed by an auxiliary verb it can again be between subject and verb, but is more often just after the verb (and hence not always clearly distinct from end position)."<ref name="CamGEL" />{{Rp|575}}}})
 
{| class=wikitable style="text-align:left;"
|+ Adverb placement, French versus English{{Efn|This article follows the linguistics convention of [[Asterisk#Ungrammaticality|marking an ungrammatical construction with an asterisk]].}}
|-
! !! French !! English
|-
! rowspan=2 | <mark style="background:lightblue;">Tense-marked verb</mark>, then <mark>adverb</mark>
| <span lang="fr" style="font-style:italic" title="French-language text">Jules <mark style="background:lightblue;">apprend</mark> <mark>vite</mark> ses rôles.</span><br />('Jules learns his lines quickly.')
| *''Jules <mark style="background:lightblue;">learns</mark> <mark>quickly</mark> his lines.''
|-
| <span lang="fr" style="font-style:italic" title="French-language text">Jules <mark style="background:lightblue;">a</mark> <mark>vite</mark> appris son rôle.</span><br />('Jules learnt his lines quickly.')
| ''Jules <mark style="background:lightblue;">has</mark> <mark>quickly</mark> learnt his lines.''
|-
! rowspan=2 | <mark>Adverb</mark>, then <mark style="background:lightblue;">tense-marked verb</mark>
| *<span lang="fr" style="font-style:italic" title="French-language text">Jules <mark>vite</mark> <mark style="background:lightblue;">apprend</mark> ses rôles.</span>
| ''Jules <mark>quickly</mark> <mark style="background:lightblue;">learns</mark> his lines.''
|-
| *<span lang="fr" style="font-style:italic" title="French-language text">Jules <mark>vite</mark> <mark style="background:lightblue;">a</mark> appris son rôle.</span>
| *''Jules <mark>quickly</mark> <mark style="background:lightblue;">has</mark> learnt his lines.''{{Efn|For a [[verb phrase]]–oriented [[Adjunct (grammar)|adjunct]] such as ''quickly'', "Central position (after the tensed auxiliary if there is one) is an alternative [to end position]".<ref name="CamGEL" />{{Rp|576, 578}}}}
|}


Tense in syntax is represented by the category label T, which is the head of a TP (tense phrase).
Tense in syntax is represented by the category label T, which is the head of a TP (tense phrase).
==Tenseless language==
In linguistics, a '''tenseless language''' is a language that does not have a grammatical category of tense. Tenseless languages can and do refer to [[time]], but they do so using lexical items such as adverbs or verbs, or by using combinations of [[grammatical aspect|aspect]], [[mood (linguistics)|mood]], and words that establish time reference.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Bittner |first=Maria |title=Temporality: Universals and Variation |publisher=John Wiley & Sons |year=2014 |isbn=978-1-4051-9040-4}}</ref> Examples of tenseless languages are [[Burmese language|Burmese]], [[Dyirbal language|Dyirbal]],<ref>{{cite book|last=Comrie|first=Bernard|authorlink=Bernard Comrie|year=1985|title=Tense|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=0-521-28138-5}}</ref>{{rp|50–53}} most [[Varieties of Chinese|varieties]] of [[Chinese language|Chinese]], [[Malay language|Malay]] (including [[Indonesian language|Indonesian]]), [[Thai language|Thai]], Maya (linguistic nomenclature: "Yukatek Maya"), [[Vietnamese language|Vietnamese]] and in some analyses [[Greenlandic language|Greenlandic]]<ref>{{cite journal|last=Bittner|first=Maria|year=2005|title=Future discourse in a tenseless language|journal=Journal of Semantics |volume=12|pages=339–388|doi=10.1093/jos/ffh029|issue=4}}</ref> (Kalaallisut) and [[Guaraní language|Guaraní]].<ref>{{cite journal|last=[[Judith Tonhauser|Tonhauser]]|first=Judith|year=2011|title=Temporal reference in Paraguayan Guaraní, a tenseless language|journal=Linguistics and Philosophy|volume=34|issue=3|pages=257–303|doi=10.1007/s10988-011-9097-2|s2cid=62125736}}</ref>


==In particular languages==
==In particular languages==
The study of modern languages has been [[History of English grammars|greatly influenced]] by the grammar of the Classical languages, since early grammarians, often monks, had no other reference point to describe their language. Latin terminology is often used to describe modern languages, sometimes with a change of meaning, as with the application of "perfect" to forms in English that do not necessarily have perfective meaning, or the terms ''Imperfekt'' and ''Perfekt'' to [[German verbs|German past tense forms]] that mostly lack any relationship to the aspects suggested by those terms.


The study of modern languages has been [[History of English grammars|greatly influenced]] by the grammar of the Classical languages, since early grammarians, often monks, had no other reference point to describe their language. Latin terminology is often used to describe modern languages, sometimes with a change of meaning, as with the application of "perfect" to forms in English that do not necessarily have perfective meaning, or the words ''Imperfekt'' and ''Perfekt'' to [[German verbs|German past tense forms]] that mostly lack any relationship to the aspects implied by those terms.
===Indo-European languages===
[[Proto-Indo-European verbs]] had present, aorist and perfect forms – these can be considered as representing two tenses (present and past) with different [[grammatical aspect|aspects]].<ref name="shields">{{cite book |last1=Shields |first1=Kenneth |title=A history of Indo-European verb morphology |date=1992 |publisher=Benjamins |location=Amsterdam  |isbn=9789027235886}}</ref>{{rp|92}} Most [[Indo-European languages]] have developed systems either with two morphological tenses (present or "non-past", and past) or with three (present, past and future).{{cn|date=November 2025}} The tenses often form part of entangled [[tense–aspect–mood]] conjugation systems.<ref name="shields"/>{{rp|92}} Additional tenses, tense–aspect combinations, etc., such as the future tense, can be provided by compound constructions using auxiliary verbs.<ref name="shields"/>{{rp|162}}


=== Latin ===
==== Latin ====
{{main|Latin tenses}}
{{main|Latin tenses}}
[[Latin]] is traditionally described as having six verb paradigms for tense (the Latin for "tense" being ''tempus'', plural ''tempora''):
[[Latin]] is traditionally described as having six tenses (the Latin for "tense" being ''tempus'', plural ''tempora''):<ref>{{cite book |last1=Kennedy |first1=Benjamin Hall | author-link1=Benjamin Hall Kennedy | title=The Revised Latin Primer |date=1906 |publisher=Longmans, Green |location=London |oclc=4095281 |url=https://archive.org/details/kennedy-benjamin-the-revised-latin-primer |access-date=10 November 2025 | via=Internet Archive}}</ref>{{rp|56}}
* [[Present tense|Present]] ''(praesēns)''
* [[Present tense|Present]] (''praesēns'')
* [[Future tense|Future]] ''(futūrum)''
* [[Future tense|Future simple]] (''futūrum'')
* [[Imperfect]] ''(praeteritum imperfectum)''
* [[Imperfect|Past imperfect]] (''praeteritum imperfectum'')
* [[Perfect (grammar)|Perfect]] (''praesēns perfectum'')<!-- praeteritum perfectum is the pluperfect, see below--> or [[aorist]]
* [[Future perfect]] (''futūrum perfectum'')
* [[Pluperfect]] (''plūs quam perfectum, praeteritum perfectum'')
 
A newer grammar of Latin also lists these six{{Efn|text=Although it names them respectively: present or present imperfective, future or future imperfective, imperfect or past imperfective, perfect, future perfect or future perfective, pluperfect or past perfective.<ref name="Panhuis">{{Cite book | first=Dirk | last=Panhuis | title=Latin Grammar | location=Ann Arbor | publisher=University of Michigan Press | year=2006 | isbn=978-0-472-11542-6}}</ref>{{Rp|42–43}}}} but comments that "The distinction between imperfective and perfective 'tenses' is really a distinction of aspect, which is at the basis of the whole conjugation system"; and states that Latin thus has just three tenses: present, past, and future.<ref name="Panhuis" />{{Rp|107}}


* [[Perfect (grammar)|Perfect]] ''(praesēns perfectum)''<!-- praeteritum perfectum is the pluperfect, see below-->
Imperfect tense verbs represent a past process combined with [[imperfective aspect]], that is, they often stand for an ongoing past action or state at a past point in time (see [[Latin tenses (semantics)#Secondary present|secondary present]]) or represent habitual actions (see [[Latin tenses with modality]]) (e.g. 'he was eating', 'he used to eat'). The perfect tense combines the meanings of a simple past ('he ate') with that of an English perfect tense ('he has eaten'), which in ancient Greek are two different tenses ([[Aorist (Ancient Greek)|aorist]] and perfect).
* [[Future perfect]] ''(futūrum perfectum)''
* [[Pluperfect]] ''(plūs quam perfectum, praeteritum perfectum)''


Imperfect tense verbs represent a past process combined with so called [[imperfective aspect]], that is, they often stand for an ongoing past action or state at a past point in time (see [[Latin tenses (semantics)#Secondary present|secondary present]]) or represent habitual actions (see [[Latin tenses with modality]]) (e.g. 'he was eating', 'he used to eat'). The perfect tense combines the meanings of a simple past ('he ate') with that of an English perfect tense ('he has eaten'), which in ancient Greek are two different tenses (aorist and perfect).
The pluperfect, the perfect and the future perfect may also realise [[relative tense]]s, standing for events that are past at the time of another event (see [[Latin tenses (semantics)#Secondary past|secondary past]]): for instance, {{lang|la|mortuus erat}}, {{lang|la|mortuus est}}, {{lang|la|mortuus erit}} may mean respectively 'he had died', 'he has died' and 'he will have died'.


The pluperfect, the perfect and the future perfect may also realise [[relative tense]]s, standing for events that are past at the time of another event (see [[Latin tenses (semantics)#Secondary past|secondary past]]): for instance, {{lang|la|mortuus erat}}, {{lang|la|mortuus est}}, {{lang|la|mortuus erit}} may stand for respectively '{{lang|en|he had died}}', '{{lang|en|he has died}}' and '{{lang|en|he will have died}}'.
Latin verbs are inflected for tense and aspect together with [[grammatical mood|mood]] – [[Realis mood|indicative]], [[Subjunctive mood|subjunctive]], and [[Imperative mood|imperative]] (all [[Finiteness#Linguistics_and_semantics|finite]]); and [[infinitive]] and [[participle]] (both non-finite{{Efn|text=There are also [[gerund#Latin_gerund|gerund]], [[gerundive]], and [[supine]], but these three are irrelevant to tense.}}) – and [[grammatical voice|voice]] ([[Active voice|active]] or [[Passive voice|passive]]).<ref name="Panhuis" />{{Rp|42–44}} Most forms inflected for tense consist of a verb stem and a suffix whose inflection expresses not only tense but (as a "[[portmanteau morph]]") also other categories (such as [[Grammatical person|person]] and [[Grammatical number|number]]). Some tenses are expressed by [[Latin periphrases|sequences of inflected verbs]].


Latin verbs are inflected for tense and aspect together with [[grammatical mood|mood]] (indicative, subjunctive, infinitive, and imperative) and [[grammatical voice|voice]] (active or passive). Most verbs can be built by selecting a verb stem and adapting them to endings. Endings may vary according to the speech role, the number and the gender of the subject or an object. Sometimes, verb groups function as a unit and supplement inflection for tense (see [[Latin periphrases]]). For details on verb structure, see [[Latin tenses]] and [[Latin conjugation]].
=====Romance languages=====
The [[Romance languages]] (descendants of Latin) have past, present and future morphological tenses, with additional aspectual distinction in the past. [[French language|French]] is an example of a language where, as in German, the simple morphological perfective past (''[[passé simple]]'') has mostly given way to a compound form (''[[passé composé]]''), the former mostly reserved for use in formal contexts.<ref name="oxfromance">{{cite book |editor-first1=Adam |editor-last1=Ledgeway |editor-link1=Adam Ledgeway |editor-first2=Martin |editor-last2=Maiden | editor-link2=Martin Maiden |title=The Oxford guide to the Romance languages |date=2016 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |isbn=9780199677108}}</ref>{{rp|305}}


=== Ancient Greek ===
==== Ancient Greek ====
{{main|Ancient Greek verbs}}
{{main|Ancient Greek verbs}}
The paradigms for [[Ancient Greek verbs#Tenses|tenses in Ancient Greek]] are similar to the ones in Latin, but with a three-way aspect contrast in the past: the [[Aorist tense|aorist]], the perfect and the imperfect. Both aorist and imperfect verbs can represent a past event: through contrast, the imperfect verb often implies a longer duration (e.g. 'they urged him' vs. 'they persuaded him'). The aorist participle represents the first event of a two-event sequence and the present participle represents an ongoing event at the time of another event.<ref>Daniel Couto-Vale, 'Report and Taxis in Herodotus's Histories: a systemic- functional approach to the description of Ancient Ionic Greek', ''Nuntius Antiquus'', v. 11, n. 1, p. 33–62, 2015</ref> Perfect verbs stood for past actions if the result is still present (e.g. 'I have found it') or for present states resulting from a past event (e.g. 'I remember').
The paradigms for [[Ancient Greek verbs#Tenses|tenses in Ancient Greek]] are similar to those in Latin, but with a three-way aspectual contrast in the past: the [[Aorist (Ancient Greek)|aorist]], perfect and imperfect. Both aorist and imperfect verbs can represent a past event: through contrast, the imperfect verb often implies a longer duration (e.g. 'they urged him' vs. 'they persuaded him'). The aorist participle represents the first event of a two-event sequence, and the present participle an ongoing event at the time of another event.<ref>{{cite journal | first=Daniel | last=Couto-Vale | title=Report and Taxis in Herodotus's Histories: A systemic-functional approach to the description of Ancient Ionic Greek | journal=Nuntius Antiquus | volume=11 | number=1 | pages=33–62 | year=2015 | doi=10.17851/1983-3636.11.1.33-62}}</ref> Perfect verbs stand for past actions if the result is still present (e.g. 'I have found it') or for present states resulting from a past event (e.g. 'I remember').
 
===English===
English has only two [[morphology (linguistics)|morphological]] tenses: the [[present tense|present]] (or [[non-past tense|non-past]]), as in ''he '''goes''''', and the [[past tense|past]] (or [[preterite]]), as in ''he '''went'''''.<ref name="Huddleston">{{cite book |last1=Huddleston |first1=Rodney |last2=Pullum |first2=Geoffrey K. |title=The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language |date=15 April 2002 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge |isbn=978-0-521-43146-0 |url=http://www.cambridge.org/us/academic/subjects/languages-linguistics/grammar-and-syntax/cambridge-grammar-english-language |access-date=10 February 2015 |page=51}}
*{{lay source |template=cite web |author=Peter W. Culicover |title=The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language |type=Review |url=http://www.ling.ohio-state.edu/~culicove/Publications/CGEL_Review.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060101215049/http://www.ling.ohio-state.edu/~culicove/Publications/CGEL_Review.pdf |archive-date=2006-01-01 |url-status=live |website=Ohio State University}}</ref> The non-past usually references the present, but sometimes references the future (as in ''the bus '''leaves''' tomorrow''). In special uses such as the [[historical present]] it can talk about the past as well. These morphological tenses are marked either with a [[suffix]] (''walk(s)'' ~ ''walked'') or with [[ablaut]] (''sing(s)'' ~ ''sang'').
 
In some contexts, particularly in [[English language teaching]], various tense–aspect combinations are referred to loosely as tenses.<ref name="Penston">{{cite book |last1=Penston |first1=Tony |title=A Concise Grammar for English Language Teachers |date=2005 |publisher=TP Publications |page=17}}</ref> Similarly, the term "future tense" is sometimes loosely applied to cases where modals such as ''will'' are used to talk about future points in time.


===Other Indo-European languages===
====Germanic languages====
[[Proto-Indo-European verbs]] had present, perfect ([[stative verb|stative]]), imperfect and aorist forms – these can be considered as representing two tenses (present and past) with different [[grammatical aspect|aspects]]. Most languages in the [[Indo-European languages|Indo-European]] family have developed systems either with two morphological tenses (present or "non-past", and past) or with three (present, past and future). The tenses often form part of entangled [[tense–aspect–mood]] conjugation systems. Additional tenses, tense–aspect combinations, etc. can be provided by compound constructions containing auxiliary verbs.
The [[Germanic languages]] (which include English) have present (non-past) and past tenses formed morphologically,<ref name="shields"/>{{rp|410}} with future and other additional forms made using auxiliaries. In standard [[German language|German]], the compound past (''[[German verbs|Perfekt]]'') is preferred over the morphological past in spoken language.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Durrell |first1=Martin |last2=Hammer |first2=A. E. |title=Hammer's German grammar and usage |date=2011 |publisher=Hodder Education |location=London |isbn=9781444120165 |edition=5th}}</ref>{{rp|288}}


The [[Germanic languages]] (which include English) have present (non-past) and past tenses formed morphologically, with future and other additional forms made using auxiliaries. In standard [[German language|German]], the compound past ''([[German verbs|Perfekt]])'' has replaced the simple morphological past in most contexts.
=====English=====
{{main|English tenses}}
English has only two [[morphology (linguistics)|morphological]] tenses: the [[present tense|present]] (or [[non-past tense|non-past]]), as in ''he '''goes''''', and the [[past tense|past]] (or [[preterite]]), as in ''he '''went'''''. The non-past usually references the present, but sometimes the future (as in ''the bus '''leaves''' tomorrow'').<ref name="CamGEL" />{{rp|405}} In special uses such as the [[historical present]] it can refer to the past as well.<ref name="CamGEL" />{{rp|625}} These morphological tenses are marked either with a [[suffix]] (''walk(s)'' ~ ''walked'') or with [[ablaut]] (''sing(s)'' ~ ''sang'').<ref name="CamGEL" />{{rp|405–406}}


The [[Romance languages]] (descendants of Latin) have past, present and future morphological tenses, with additional aspectual distinction in the past. [[French language|French]] is an example of a language where, as in German, the simple morphological perfective past ''([[passé simple]])'' has mostly given way to a compound form ''([[passé composé]])''.
In some contexts, particularly in [[English language teaching]], various tense–aspect combinations are referred to loosely as tenses.<ref name="Penston">{{cite book |last1=Penston |first1=Tony |title=A Concise Grammar for English Language Teachers |date=2005 |publisher=TP Publications |page=17}}</ref> Similarly, the term "future tense" is sometimes loosely applied to cases where modals such as ''will'' are used to talk about future points in time.<ref name="CamGEL" />{{rp|629}}<ref>{{Cite web | first=Geoffrey K. | last=Pullum | author-link=Geoffrey K. Pullum | title=The lord which was and is | website=[[Language Log]] | date=18 March 2008 | url=http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005471.html | access-date=9 November 2025}}</ref>


[[Irish language|Irish]], a [[Celtic language]], has past, present and future tenses (see [[Irish conjugation]]). The past contrasts perfective and imperfective aspect, and some verbs retain such a contrast in the present. [[Classical Irish]] had a three-way aspectual contrast of simple–perfective–imperfective in the past and present tenses. Modern [[Scottish Gaelic]] on the other hand only has past, non-past and 'indefinite', and, in the case of the verb 'be' (including its use as an auxiliary), also present tense.
====Slavic languages====
In the [[Slavic languages]], verbs are [[Grammatical aspect#Slavic languages|intrinsically]] perfective or imperfective.<ref name="timberlake">{{cite book |last1=Timberlake |first1=Alan |editor1-last=Gutschmidt |editor1-first=Karl |editor2-last=Kempgen |editor2-first=Sebastian |editor3-last=Berger |editor3-first=Tilman |editor4-last=Kosta |editor4-first=Peter |title=Die slavischen Sprachen |date=2014 |publisher=De Gruyter Mouton |location=Berlin |isbn=9783110215472 |volume=II |chapter=The Simple Sentence |trans-title=The Slavic Languages}}</ref>{{Rp|1676}} In [[Russian language|Russian]] and other [[East Slavic languages]], perfective verbs have past and "future" tenses, while imperfective verbs have past, present and "future", the imperfective "future" being a compound tense in most cases. The "future tense" of perfective verbs is formed in the same way as the present tense of imperfective verbs. However, in [[South Slavic languages]], there may be a greater variety of forms – [[Bulgarian language|Bulgarian]], for example, has present, past (both "imperfect" and "aorist") and "future tenses", for both perfective and imperfective verbs, as well as [[perfect aspect|perfect]] forms made with an auxiliary (see [[Bulgarian verbs]]). However it doesn't have a real future tense, because the future tense is formed by the shortened version of the present of the verb ''hteti'' (ще) and it just adds present tense forms of person suffixes: ''-m'' (I), ''-š'' (you), ''-ø'' (he, she, it), ''-me'' (we), ''-te'' (you, plural), ''-t'' (they).


[[Persian language|Persian]], an [[Indo-Iranian language]], has past and non-past forms, with additional aspectual distinctions. Future can be expressed using an auxiliary, but almost never in non-formal context. Colloquially the perfect suffix ''-e'' can be added to past tenses to indicate that an action is speculative or reported (e.g. "it seems that he was doing", "they say that he was doing"). A similar feature is found in Turkish. (For details, see [[Persian verbs]].)
====Irish====
{{Main|Irish conjugation}}
[[Irish language|Irish]], a [[Celtic language]], has past, present and future tenses. The past contrasts perfective and imperfective aspect, and some verbs retain such a contrast in the present. [[Classical Irish]] had a three-way aspectual contrast of simple–perfective–imperfective in the past and present tenses. Modern [[Scottish Gaelic]] on the other hand only has past, non-past and 'indefinite', and, in the case of the verb 'be' (including its use as an auxiliary), also present tense.


[[Hindustani grammar|Hindustani]] ([[Hindi]] and [[Urdu]]), an [[Indo-Aryan languages|Indo-Aryan language]], has indicative perfect past and indicative future forms, while the indicative present and indicative imperfect past conjugations exist only for the verb ''honā'' (to be). The indicative future is constructed using the [[Subjunctive mood|future subjunctive]] conjugations (which used to be the indicative present conjugations in older forms of Hind-Urdu) by adding a future future suffix -''gā'' that declines for [[Grammatical gender|gender]] and the [[Grammatical number|number]] of the noun that the pronoun refers to. The forms of ''gā'' are derived from the perfective participle forms of the verb "to go," ''jāna''. The conjugations of the indicative perfect past and the indicative imperfect past are derived from participles (just like the past tense formation in [[Slavic languages]]) and hence they agree with the [[grammatical number]] and the [[Grammatical gender|gender]] of noun which the pronoun refers to and not the pronoun itself. The perfect past doubles as the perfective aspect participle and the imperfect past conjugations act as the copula to mark imperfect past when used with the aspectual participles. Hindi-Urdu has an overtly marked [[Tense–aspect–mood|tense-aspect-mood]] system. [[Periphrasis|Periphrastic]] Hindi-Urdu verb forms (aspectual verb forms) consist of two elements, the first of these two elements is the aspect marker and the second element (the copula) is the common tense-mood marker. Hindi-Urdu has 3 grammatical aspectsː [[Habitual aspect|''Habitual'']], [[Perfective aspect|''Perfective'']], and [[Continuous and progressive aspects|''Progressive'']]; and 5 grammatical moodsː ''[[Realis mood|Indicative]]'', ''[[Grammatical mood|Presumptive]]'', ''[[Subjunctive mood|Subjunctive]]'', ''[[Counterfactual conditional|Contrafactual]]'', and ''[[Imperative mood|Imperative]]''.<ref name=":13">{{Cite journal|last=VAN OLPHEN|first=HERMAN|title=Aspect, Tense, and Mood in the Hindi Verb|date=1975|url=http://www.jstor.org/stable/24651488|journal=Indo-Iranian Journal|volume=16|issue=4|pages=284–301|doi=10.1163/000000075791615397|jstor=24651488|s2cid=161530848 |issn=0019-7246|url-access=subscription}}</ref> (Seeː ''[[Hindi verbs]]'')
====Persian====
{{Main|Persian verbs}}
[[Persian language|Persian]], an [[Indo-Iranian language]], has past and non-past forms, with additional aspectual distinctions.<ref name="farahani">{{cite thesis |last1=Khomeijani Farahani |first1=Ali Akbar |title=A syntactic and semantic study of the tense and aspect system of modern Persian |date=1990 |location=[[University of Leeds]] |degree=PhD |url=https://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/id/eprint/917/1/uk_bl_ethos_252658.pdf |access-date=9 November 2025}}</ref>{{rp|18}} Future can be expressed using the auxiliary {{lang|fa|[[:wikt:خواستن|خواستن]]}} ''xâstan'', but almost never in non-formal contexts, for which the present tense is used instead.<ref name="farahani"/>{{rp|115}} For example:
{{Interlinear|indent=2|fardâ bârân mi-âyad
                      |tomorrow rain IPFV-come-3SG-PRES|
                      'It will rain tomorrow'}}
The adverb "tomorrow" is used to signal future time, with the verb being in the present (non-past) tense.<ref name="farahani"/>{{rp|115}}


In the [[Slavic languages]], verbs are [[Grammatical aspect#Slavic languages|intrinsically]] perfective or imperfective. In [[Russian language|Russian]] and some other languages in the group, perfective verbs have past and "future tenses", while imperfective verbs have past, present and "future", the imperfective "future" being a compound tense in most cases. The "future tense" of perfective verbs is formed in the same way as the present tense of imperfective verbs. However, in [[South Slavic languages]], there may be a greater variety of forms – [[Bulgarian language|Bulgarian]], for example, has present, past (both "imperfect" and "aorist") and "future tenses", for both perfective and imperfective verbs, as well as [[perfect aspect|perfect]] forms made with an auxiliary (see [[Bulgarian verbs]]). However it doesn't have real future tense, because the future tense is formed by the shortened version of the present of the verb hteti (ще) and it just adds present tense forms of person suffixes: -m (I), -š (you), -ø (he,she,it), -me (we), -te (you, plural), -t (they).
====Hindustani====
 
{{Main|Hindustani verbs}}
===Other languages===
[[Hindustani grammar|Hindustani]] ([[Hindi]] and [[Urdu]]), an [[Indo-Aryan languages|Indo-Aryan language]], has indicative perfect past and indicative future forms, while the indicative present and indicative imperfect past conjugations exist only for the verb ''honā'' (to be). The indicative future is constructed using the [[Subjunctive mood|future subjunctive]] conjugations (which used to be the indicative present conjugations in older forms of Hindi–Urdu) by adding a future suffix ''-gā'' that declines for [[Grammatical gender|gender]] and the [[Grammatical number|number]] of the noun that the pronoun refers to. The forms of ''gā'' are derived from the perfective participle forms of the verb ''jāna'' ('to go'). The conjugations of the indicative perfect past and the indicative imperfect past are derived from participles (just like the past tense formation in [[Slavic languages]]) and hence they agree with the [[grammatical number|number]] and the [[Grammatical gender|gender]] of the noun which the pronoun refers to and not the pronoun itself. The perfect past doubles as the perfective aspect participle and the imperfect past conjugations act as the copula to mark imperfect past when used with the aspectual participles. Hindi–Urdu has an overtly marked [[tense–aspect–mood]] system. [[Periphrasis|Periphrastic]] Hindi–Urdu verb forms (aspectual verb forms) consist of two elements, the first of these two elements is the aspect marker and the second element (the copula) is the common tense-mood marker. Hindi–Urdu has three aspectsː [[Habitual aspect|''Habitual'']], [[Perfective aspect|''Perfective'']], and [[Continuous and progressive aspects|''Progressive'']]; and five moodsː ''[[Realis mood|Indicative]]'', ''[[Grammatical mood|Presumptive]]'', ''[[Subjunctive mood|Subjunctive]]'', ''[[Counterfactual conditional|Contrafactual]]'', and ''[[Imperative mood|Imperative]]''.<ref name=":13">{{Cite journal|last=Van Olphen|first=Herman|title=Aspect, Tense, and Mood in the Hindi Verb|date=1975|url=http://www.jstor.org/stable/24651488|journal=Indo-Iranian Journal|volume=16|issue=4|pages=284–301|doi=10.1163/000000075791615397|jstor=24651488|s2cid=161530848 |issn=0019-7246|url-access=subscription}}</ref>  
[[Finnish language|Finnish]] and [[Hungarian language|Hungarian]], both members of the [[Uralic languages|Uralic]] language family, have morphological present (non-past) and past tenses. The [[Hungarian verbs|Hungarian verb]] ''van'' ("to be") also has a future form.
 
[[Turkish grammar|Turkish verbs]] conjugate for past, present and future, with a variety of aspects and moods.
 
[[Arabic verbs]] have past and non-past; future can be indicated by a prefix.
 
[[Korean verbs]] have a variety of affixed forms which can be described as representing present, past and future tenses, although they can alternatively be considered to be aspectual. Similarly, [[Japanese verbs]] are described as having present and past tenses, although they may be analysed as aspects. Some [[Wu Chinese]] languages, such as [[Shanghainese]], use [[grammatical particle]]s to mark some tenses.<ref>{{cite book|author=Qian, Nairong ({{lang|zh|錢乃榮}})|year=2010|title={{lang|zh|《從〈滬語便商〉所見的老上海話時態》}} (''Tenses and Aspects? Old Shanghainese as Found in the Book Huyu Bian Shang'')|location=Shanghai|publisher=The Chinese University of Hong Kong Press}}</ref> Other [[Chinese languages]] and many other East Asian languages generally lack inflection and are considered to be [[tenseless language]]s, although they often have aspect markers which convey certain information about time reference.
 
For examples of languages with a greater variety of tenses, see the section on [[#Possible tenses|possible tenses]], above. Fuller information on tense formation and usage in particular languages can be found in the articles on those languages and their grammars.


=== Austronesian languages ===
=== Austronesian languages ===
 
<section begin="list-of-glossing-abbreviations"/>
<div style="display:none;">
DIR:directional
</div>
<section end="list-of-glossing-abbreviations"/>
==== Rapa ====
==== Rapa ====
[[Rapa language|Rapa]] is the French Polynesian language of the island of [[Rapa Iti]].<ref name="Walworth">{{cite book |last1=Walworth |first1=Mary E. |title=The Language of Rapa Iti: Description of a Language In Change. Diss. |date=2015 |publisher=U of Hawaii at Manoa |location=Honolulu |url=http://ling.hawaii.edu/wp-content/uploads/MaryWalworthFinal.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150825115109/http://ling.hawaii.edu/wp-content/uploads/MaryWalworthFinal.pdf |archive-date=2015-08-25 |url-status=live |access-date=17 July 2021}}</ref> Verbs in the indigenous Old Rapa occur with a marker known as TAM which stands for tense, aspect, or mood which can be followed by directional particles or [[Deixis|deictic]] particles. Of the markers there are three tense markers called: Imperfective, Progressive, and Perfective. Which simply mean, Before, Currently, and After.<ref name="Walworth"/> However, specific TAM markers and the type of deictic or directional particle that follows determine and denote different types of meanings in terms of tenses.
[[Rapa language|Rapa]] is a French Polynesian language of the island of [[Rapa Iti]].<ref name="Walworth">{{cite thesis |last1=Walworth |first1=Mary E. |title=The Language of Rapa Iti: Description of a Language in Change | degree=PhD | date=May 2015 |publisher=University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa |location=Honolulu |url=http://ling.hawaii.edu/wp-content/uploads/MaryWalworthFinal.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150825115109/http://ling.hawaii.edu/wp-content/uploads/MaryWalworthFinal.pdf |archive-date=2015-08-25 |url-status=live |access-date=20 October 2025}}</ref>{{Rp|vi}} Verbs in the indigenous Old Rapa{{Efn|text="Very little of Old Rapa is still spoken, the modern language ('Reo Rapa') has become heavily Tahitianized, and a 'new' Rapa ('New Rapa') is emerging from revitalization efforts.&nbsp;.&nbsp;.&nbsp;."<ref name="Walworth" />{{Rp|vi}}}} occur with a TAM (tense, aspect, or mood) marker which can be followed by directional or [[Deixis|deictic]] particles. "The primary tense–aspect markers used in Old Rapa are the imperfective, progressive, perfective, past, imperative, and subjunctive."<ref name="Walworth"/>{{Rp|99}} However, specific tense–aspect–modality (TAM) markers and the type of deictic or directional particle that follows express different types of meaning.<ref name="Walworth"/>{{Rp|105–106}}
 
'''Imperfective:''' denotes actions that have not occurred yet but will occur and expressed by TAM e.<ref name="Walworth"/>
 
{{interlinear|number=ex:
|e naku mai te 'āikete anana'i
|IPFV come DIR INDEF teacher tomorrow
|'The teacher is coming tomorrow.'}}
 
{{interlinear|number=ex:
|e mānea tō pē'ā ra
|IPFV pretty DEF woman DEIC
|'That woman is beautiful.'}}
<ref name="Walworth"/>
 
'''Progressive:''' Also expressed by TAM e and denotes actions that are currently happening when used with deictic '''na''', and denotes actions that was just witnessed but still currently happening when used with deictic '''ra'''.<ref name="Walworth"/>
 
{{interlinear|number=ex:
|e 'āikete na 'ōna i te tamariki
|IPFV learn DEIC 3S ACC INDEF child/children
|'He is teaching some children.'}}
 
{{interlinear|number=ex:
|e kai na ou i kota'i kororio eika
|IPFV eat DEIC 1S ACC one small fish
|'I am eating a small fish.'}}
 
{{interlinear|number=ex:
|e tunu na ou i te mīkaka tonga te pōpongi
|IPFV cook DEIC 1S ACC INDEF taro all INDEF morning
|'I cook taro every morning.'}}
 
{{interlinear|number=ex:
|e kaikai ra te kurī i te moa
|IPFV eat.continuously DEIC INDEF dog ACC INDEF chicken
|'The dog is eating a chicken.'}}
 
{{interlinear|number=ex:
|e mate atu ra 'ōna
|IPFV die DIR DEIC 3S
|'She has just died.'}}
<ref name="Walworth"/>
 
'''Perfective:''' denotes actions that have already occurred or have finished and is marked by TAM ka.<ref name="Walworth"/>
 
{{interlinear|number=ex:
|ka ngurunguru te kurī
|PFV growl INDEF dog
|'A dog growled.'}}
 
{{interlinear|number=ex:
|ka tākave tō tangata i te mango
|PFV kill DEF man ACC INDEF shark
|'The man killed the shark.'}}
 
{{interlinear|number=ex:
|ka tunu na ou i te mīkaka tonga te pōpongi
|PFV cook DEIC 1S ACC INDEF taro all INDEF morning
|'I used to cook taro every morning'}}
<ref name="Walworth"/>
 
In Old Rapa there are also other types of tense markers known as Past, Imperative, and Subjunctive.
 
'''Past'''


TAM i marks past action. It is rarely used as a matrix TAM and is more frequently observed in past embedded clauses<ref name="Walworth"/>
"TAM particle ''i'' marks past action. It is rarely used as a matrix TAM and is more frequently observed in past embedded clauses."<ref name="Walworth"/>{{Rp|103}}


{{interlinear|number=ex:
{{interlinear|indent=2
|i komo mātou
|i komo mātou
|PST sleep 1PL.EXCL
|PST sleep 1PL.EXCL
|'We slept.'}}
|'We slept.'}}


{{interlinear|number=ex:
{{interlinear|indent=2
|e a'a koe i 'aka-ineine
|e a'a koe i 'aka-ineine
|IPFV what 2S PST CAUS-ready
|IPFV what 2S PST CAUS-ready
|'What did you prepare?'}}
|'What did you prepare?'}}


'''Imperative'''
==== Wuvulu-Aua ====
[[Wuvulu-Aua language|Wuvulu-Aua]] does not have explicit tense, but rather time reference is conveyed by mood, aspect markers, and time phrases. Wuvulu speakers use a [[realis mood]] to describe the past as they can be certain about events that have occurred.<ref name="Hafford">{{cite thesis|last1=Hafford|first1=James A.|title=Wuvulu Grammar and Vocabulary|date=2014|location=Honolulu | publisher=University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa | degree=PhD | url=http://www.ling.hawaii.edu/graduate/Dissertations/JamesHaffordDraft.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170211081022/http://www.ling.hawaii.edu/graduate/Dissertations/JamesHaffordDraft.pdf |archive-date=2017-02-11 |url-status=dead |access-date=6 March 2017}}</ref>{{rp|89}} In some cases, realis mood is used for the present — often for [[Stative verb|stative]] clauses. An irrealis mood is used for the future.<ref name="Hafford"/>{{rp|90}}


The imperative is marked in Old Rapa by TAM a. A second person subject is implied by the direct command of the imperative.<ref name="Walworth"/>
Tense in Wuvulu-Aua may also be implied by using time adverbials and aspectual markings. Wuvulu contains three verbal markers to indicate sequence of events. The preverbal adverbial ''loʔo'' ('first') indicates the verb occurs before any other. The postverbal morpheme ''liai'' and ''linia'' are the respective intransitive and transitive suffixes indicating a repeated action. The postverbal morpheme ''li'' and ''liria'' are respectively intransitive and transitive suffixes indicating a completed action.<ref name="Hafford"/>{{rp|91}}


{{interlinear|number=ex:
==== Mortlockese ====
|a naku mai
[[Mortlockese]] uses tense markers such as ''mii'' to denote the present state of a subject, ''aa'' to denote a present state that an object has changed to, ''kɞ'' to describe something that has already been completed, ''pɞ'' and ''lɛ'' to describe the future, ''pʷapʷ'' to denote a possible action or state in the future, and ''sæn/mwo'' for something that has not yet happened. Each of these markers, except for ''aa'' and ''mii'', is used in conjunction with the subject [[proclitic]]s. Additionally, ''mii'' can be used with any type of intransitive verb.<ref name="Odango">{{cite thesis|last1=Lopez Odango|first1=Emerson |title=Afféú Fangani 'Join Together': A Morphophonemic Analysis of Possessive Suffix Paradigms and A Discourse-Based Ethnography of the Elicitation Session in Pakin Lukunosh Mortlockese|date=May 2015|publisher=University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa |degree=PhD |url=http://ling.hawaii.edu/wp-content/uploads/Dissertation_ODANGO-FINAL.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150825114843/http://ling.hawaii.edu/wp-content/uploads/Dissertation_ODANGO-FINAL.pdf |archive-date=2015-08-25 |url-status=dead}}</ref>
|IMP come DIR
|'Come here.'}}


{{interlinear|number=ex:
===Other languages===
|a kai tā-koe eika
[[Finnish language|Finnish]] and [[Hungarian language|Hungarian]], both members of the [[Uralic languages|Uralic]] language family, have morphological present (non-past) and past tenses. The [[Hungarian verbs|Hungarian verb]] ''van'' ("to be") also has a future form.
|IMP eat INDEF.{{gcl|PossA|possessive a-noun}}-2S fish
|'Eat your fish.'}}


For a more polite form rather than a straightforward command imperative TAM a is used with adverbial kānei. Kānei is only shown to be used in imperative structures and was translated by the French as "please".
[[Turkish grammar|Turkish verbs]] conjugate for past, present and future, with a variety of aspects and moods.


{{interlinear|number=ex:
[[Arabic verbs]] have past and non-past; future can be indicated by a prefix.<ref name="Ryding_Arabic" />
|a rave mai kānei tō mea
|IMP take DIR PREC DEF thing
|'Please take the thing.'}}


{{interlinear|number=ex:
[[Korean verbs]] have a variety of affixed forms which can be described as representing present, past and future tenses, although they can alternatively be considered to be aspectual. Similarly, [[Japanese verbs]] are described as having present and past tenses, although the distinction may be analysed as one of aspect. Some [[Wu Chinese]] languages, such as [[Shanghainese]], use [[grammatical particle|particles]] to mark some tenses.<ref>{{cite book|author=Qian, Nairong ({{lang|zh|錢乃榮}})|year=2010|title={{lang|zh|《從〈滬語便商〉所見的老上海話時態》}} (''Tenses and Aspects? Old Shanghainese as Found in the Book Huyu Bian Shang'')|location=Shanghai|publisher=The Chinese University of Hong Kong Press}}</ref> Other [[Chinese languages]] and many other East Asian languages generally lack inflection and are considered to be [[tenseless language|tenseless]], although they often have aspect markers which convey information about time reference.
|a omono kānei koe tō ka'u ra
|IMP dress PREC 2S DEF clothing DEIC
|'Please dress yourself in those clothes.'}}
 
It is also used in a more impersonal form. For example, how you would speak toward a pesky neighbor.
 
{{interlinear|number=ex:
|a naku kānei
|IMP go PREC
|'Please leave now!'}}
'''Subjunctive'''
 
The subjunctive in Old Rapa is marked by kia and can also be used in expressions of desire<ref name="Walworth"/>
 
{{interlinear|number=ex:
|kia naku ou i te 'are e kaikai ou
|SBJV come 1S PREP INDEF house IPFV eat.continuously 1S
|'When I get to the house, I will eat.'}}
 
{{interlinear|number=ex:
|kia rekareka kōrua
|SBJV happy 2DU
|'May you two be happy.'}}
 
==== Tokelau ====
The [[Tokelauan language]] is a tenseless language. The language uses the same words for all three tenses; the phrase E liliu mai au i te Aho Tōnai literally translates to Come back / me / on Saturday, but the translation becomes 'I am coming back on Saturday'.<ref>{{cite web |title=Tau Gana Tokelau|edition= 1st |date=2017 |url=http://www.learntokelau.co.nz/documents/TauGagana.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170303051810/http://www.learntokelau.co.nz/documents/TauGagana.pdf |archive-date=2017-03-03 |url-status=live |website=www.learntokelau.co.nz |publisher=Ministry of Pacific Island Affairs|location=New Zealand}}</ref>
 
==== Wuvulu-Aua ====
[[Wuvulu-Aua language|Wuvulu-Aua]] does not have an explicit tense, but rather tense is conveyed by mood, aspect markers, and time phrases. Wuvulu speakers use a realis mood to convey past tense as speakers can be certain about events that have occurred.<ref name="Hafford">{{cite book|last1=Hafford|first1=James A|title=Wuvulu Grammar and Vocabulary|date=2014|url=http://www.ling.hawaii.edu/graduate/Dissertations/JamesHaffordDraft.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170211081022/http://www.ling.hawaii.edu/graduate/Dissertations/JamesHaffordDraft.pdf |archive-date=2017-02-11 |url-status=live|access-date=6 March 2017}}</ref> {{rp|89}} In some cases, realis mood is used to convey present tense — often to indicate a state of being. Wuvulu speakers use an irrealis mood to convey future tense.<ref name="Hafford"/>{{rp|90}}
Tense in Wuvulu-Aua may also be implied by using time adverbials and aspectual markings. Wuvulu contains three verbal markers to indicate sequence of events. The preverbal adverbial ''loʔo'' 'first' indicates the verb occurs before any other. The postverbal morpheme ''liai'' and ''linia'' are the respective intransitive and transitive suffixes indicating a repeated action. The postverbal morpheme ''li'' and ''liria'' are the respective intransitive and transitive suffixes indicating a completed action.<ref name="Hafford"/>{{rp|91}}
 
=== Mortlockese ===
[[Mortlockese]] uses tense markers such as ''mii'' and to denote the present tense state of a subject, ''aa'' to denote a present tense state that an object has changed to from a different, past state, ''kɞ'' to describe something that has already been completed, ''pɞ'' and ''lɛ'' to denote future tense, ''pʷapʷ'' to denote a possible action or state in future tense, and ''sæn/mwo'' for something that has not happened yet. Each of these markers is used in conjunction with the subject proclitics except for the markers ''aa'' and ''mii''. Additionally, the marker ''mii'' can be used with any type of intransitive verb.<ref name="Odango">{{cite book|last1=Odango|first1=Emerson Lopez|title=Afféú Fangani 'Join Together': A Morphophonemic Analysis of Possessive Suffix Paradigms and A Discourse-Based Ethnography of the Elicitation Session in Pakin Lukunosh Mortlockese|date=May 2015|publisher=University of Hawaii at Manoa Dissertation|url=http://ling.hawaii.edu/wp-content/uploads/Dissertation_ODANGO-FINAL.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150825114843/http://ling.hawaii.edu/wp-content/uploads/Dissertation_ODANGO-FINAL.pdf |archive-date=2015-08-25 |url-status=live}}</ref>


==See also==
==See also==
*[[Sequence of tenses]]
*[[Sequence of tenses]]
*[[Spatial tense]]
*[[Spatial tense]]
==Notes==
{{Notelist}}


==References==
==References==
Line 269: Line 217:
* [http://www.bcbsr.com/greek/gtense.html Combinations of Tense, Aspect, and Mood in Greek]
* [http://www.bcbsr.com/greek/gtense.html Combinations of Tense, Aspect, and Mood in Greek]
* [http://www.smg.surrey.ac.uk/features/morphosemantic/tense/ Grammatical Features Inventory]
* [http://www.smg.surrey.ac.uk/features/morphosemantic/tense/ Grammatical Features Inventory]
<section begin="list-of-glossing-abbreviations"/><div style="display:none;">
DIR:directional particle
DEIC:deictic particle</div><section end="list-of-glossing-abbreviations"/>


{{Grammatical tenses}}{{Narrative}}
{{Grammatical tenses}}{{Narrative}}
{{Formal semantics}}
{{Formal semantics}}
{{Authority control}}
{{Authority control}}


<section begin="list-of-glossing-abbreviations"/><div style="display:none;">
{{DEFAULTSORT:Grammatical tense}}
DEIC:deictic
DIR:directional
</div><section end="list-of-glossing-abbreviations"/>
 
{{DEFAULTSORT:Grammatical Tense}}
[[Category:Grammatical tenses| ]]
[[Category:Grammatical tenses| ]]
[[Category:English grammar]]
[[Category:Time in linguistics]]
[[Category:Time in linguistics]]

Latest revision as of 19:26, 16 November 2025

Template:Short description Template:More citations needed Template:Grammatical categories In grammar, tense is a category that expresses time reference. Tenses are usually manifested by the use of specific forms of verbs, particularly in their conjugation patterns.

The main tenses found in many languages include the past, present, and future. Some languages have only two distinct tenses, such as past and nonpast, or future and nonfuture, while some languages make finer tense distinctions, such as remote vs recent past, or near vs remote future. There are also tenseless languages, like most of the Chinese languages, however, these languages do refer to time in different ways.

Tenses generally express time relative to the moment of speaking. In some contexts, however, their meaning may be relativized to a point in the past or future which is established in the discourse (the moment being spoken about). This is called relative (as opposed to absolute) tense. Some languages have different verb forms or constructions which manifest relative tense, such as pluperfect ("past-in-the-past") and "future-in-the-past".

Expressions of tense are often closely connected with expressions of the category of aspect; sometimes what are traditionally called tenses (in languages such as Latin) may in modern analysis be regarded as combinations of tense with aspect. Verbs are also often conjugated for mood, and since in many cases the three categories are not manifested separately, some languages may be described in terms of a combined tense–aspect–mood (TAM) system.

Etymology

The English noun tense comes from Old French Script error: No such module "Lang". "time" (spelled Script error: No such module "Lang". in modern French through deliberate archaization), from Latin Script error: No such module "Lang"., "time".[1] It is not related to the adjective tense, which comes from Latin Script error: No such module "Lang"., the perfect passive participle of Script error: No such module "Lang"., "stretch".[2]

Uses of the term

In modern linguistic theory, tense is understood as a category that expresses (grammaticalizes) time reference; namely one which, using grammatical means, places a state or action at a time relative to that of the utterance.[3][4] Nonetheless, in many descriptions of languages, particularly in traditional European grammar, the term "tense" is applied to verb forms or constructions that express not merely position in time, but also additional properties of the state or action – particularly aspectual or modal properties.

The category of aspect expresses how a state or action relates to time – whether it is seen as a complete event, an ongoing or repeated situation, etc. Many languages make a distinction between perfective aspect (denoting complete events) and imperfective aspect (denoting ongoing or repeated situations); the former may employ a perfect tense, but such a relationship between aspect and tense may not be simple. Some of the traditional "tenses" express time reference together with aspectual information. In Latin and French, for example, the imperfect denotes past time in combination with imperfective aspect, while other verb forms (the Latin perfect, and the French Script error: No such module "Lang". or Script error: No such module "Lang".) are used for past time reference with perfective aspect.

The category of mood is used to express modality, which includes such properties as uncertainty, evidentiality,[5]Template:Rp and obligation. Commonly encountered moods include the indicative, subjunctive, and conditional. Mood can be bound up with tense, aspect, or both, in particular verb forms. Hence, certain languages are sometimes analysed as having a single tense–aspect–mood (TAM) system, without separate manifestation of the three categories.

The term tense, then, particularly in less formal contexts, is sometimes used to denote any combination of tense proper, aspect, and mood. As regards English, there are many verb forms and constructions which combine time reference with continuous and/or perfect aspect, and with indicative, subjunctive or conditional mood.[6]Template:Rp

Particular tense forms need not always carry their basic time-referential meaning in every case. For instance, the historical present is a use of the present tense to refer to past events. The phenomenon of fake tense is common crosslinguistically as a means of marking counterfactuality in conditionals and wishes.[7][8]

Possible tenses

Not all languages have tense: tenseless languages include Chinese and Dyirbal.[9]Template:Rp Some languages have all three basic tenses (the past, present, and future), while others have only two: some have past and nonpast tenses, the latter covering both present and future times, as in Arabic,[10] Japanese,[11] and English;[12][6]Template:Rp[13]Template:Rp whereas others such as Greenlandic, Quechua, and Nivkh have future and nonfuture.[14][15] Some languages have four or more tenses, making finer distinctions either in the past (e.g. remote vs. recent past) or in the future (e.g. near vs. remote future). The six-tense language Kalaw Lagaw Ya of Australia has the remote past, the recent past, the today past, the present, the today/near future and the remote future.[16] Some languages, like the Amazonian Cubeo language, have a historical past tense, used for events perceived as historical.[17]

Tenses that refer specifically to "today" are called hodiernal tenses; these can be either past or future. Apart from Kalaw Lagaw Ya, another language with such tenses is Mwera, a Bantu language of Tanzania.[18]Template:Rp It is also suggested that in 17th-century French, the passé composé served as a hodiernal past.[19] Tenses that refer to the past before today or the future after today are called pre-hodiernal and post-hodiernal respectively. Some languages also have a crastinal tense, a future tense referring specifically to tomorrow (found in some Bantu languages); or a hesternal tense, a past tense referring specifically to yesterday[20] (although this name is also sometimes used to mean pre-hodiernal).[21] A tense for after tomorrow is thus called post-crastinal,[22]Template:Rp and one for before yesterday is called pre-hesternal.[23]Template:Rp

Another tense found in some languages, including Swahili, is the persistive tense, used to indicate that a state or ongoing action still continues (or, if in the negative, does not).[24]Template:Rp The Washo language has tenses to indicate if an event occurred before the speaker's lifetime.[25]Template:Rp

Some languages have special tense forms that are used to express relative tense. Tenses that refer to the past relative to some time other than that of the utterance are called anterior;[26]Template:Rp these include the pluperfect (for the past relative to a past time)[27]Template:Rp and the future perfect (for the past relative to a future time).[28]Template:Rp Similarly, posterior tenses refer to the future relative to the time under consideration,[29]Template:Rp as with the English "future-in-the-past": (he said that) he would go.[30]Template:Rp Relative tenses are also sometimes analysed as aspects: the perfect aspect in the anterior case, or the prospective aspect in the posterior case.[31]Template:Rp

Some languages, such as Nez Perce or Cavineña also have periodic tense markers that encode that the action occurs in a recurrent temporal period of the day ("in the morning", "during the day", "at night", "until dawn" etc) or of the year ("in winter").[32]

Some languages have cyclic tense systems. This is a form of temporal marking where tense is given relative to a reference point or reference span. In Burarra, for example, events that occurred earlier on the day of speaking are marked with the same verb forms as events that happened in the far past, while events that happened yesterday (compared to the moment of speech) are marked with the same forms as events in the present. This can be thought of as a system where events are marked as prior or contemporaneous to points of reference on a timeline.[33]

Tense marking

Morphology of tense

Tense is normally indicated by the use of a particular verb form – either an inflected form of the main verb, or a multi-word construction, or both in combination. Inflection may involve the use of affixes, such as the -ed ending that marks the past tense of English regular verbs,[34]Template:Rp but can also entail stem modifications, such as ablaut, as found as in the strong verbs in English and other Germanic languages,[6]Template:Rp or reduplication.[35]Template:Rp Multi-word tense constructions often involve auxiliary verbs or clitics. Examples which combine both types of tense marking include the French passé composé, which has an auxiliary verb together with the inflected past participle form of the lexical verb;[36]Template:Rp and the Irish past tense, where the proclitic do (in various surface forms) appears with the affixed or ablaut-modified past tense form of the lexical verb.

Indications of tense are often bound up with indications of other verbal categories, such as aspect and mood.[37]Template:Rp The conjugation patterns of verbs often also reflect agreement with categories pertaining to the subject, such as person, number and gender via portmanteau morphs. It is thus not always possible to identify elements that mark any specific category, such as tense, separately from the others.

Nominal tense

PROP:proprietive case

A few languages have been shown to mark tense information (as well as aspect and mood) on nouns. This may be called nominal tense, or more broadly nominal TAM which includes nominal marking of aspect and mood as well.[38]

For example, the Kayardild language uses case markers to mark tense:[38]Template:Rp[39]Template:Rp Template:Interlinear

Template:Interlinear The verb stays the same, with the modal cases being used to show tense in the sentences.[39]Template:Rp

Tenseless language

A tenseless language is one that does not mark tense information at all. Examples are Burmese, Dyirbal,[9]Template:Rp most varieties of Chinese, Malay (including Indonesian), Thai, Yucatec Maya, Vietnamese, and in some analyses Greenlandic[40] (Kalaallisut) and Guaraní.[41]

Tenseless languages can and do refer to time, but they do so using lexical items that establish time reference, or by using combinations of aspect, mood.[42] For example, most Sinitic languages express time reference chiefly by lexical means – through adjuncts, time phrases, and so on.[43]Template:Rp (The same is done in tensed languages, to supplement or reinforce the time information conveyed by the choice of tense.[34]Template:Rp) Time information is also sometimes conveyed as a secondary feature by markers of other categories, as with the aspect markers Script error: No such module "Lang". le and Script error: No such module "Lang". guò, which in most cases place an action in past time.[43]Template:Rp However, much time information is conveyed implicitly by context – it is therefore not always necessary, when translating from a tensed to a tenseless language, say, to make explicit in the target language all of the information conveyed by the tenses in the source.[43]Template:Rp

For example, in Mandarin, though the language is tenseless, the auxiliary verb Script error: No such module "Lang". huì can be used to express an action that will occur in the future:[43]Template:Rp Template:Fs interlinear

Syntax of tense

The syntactic properties of tense have been prominent in formal analyses of how tense-marking interacts with word order. Some languages (such as French[44]) allow an adverb (Adv) between a tense-marked verb (V) and its direct object (O); in other words, they permit [Verb-Adverb-Object] order. In contrast, other languages (such as English) do not allow an adverb to come between a tense-marked lexical verb and its direct object, and instead require [Adverb-Verb-Object] order. (For tense-marked auxiliary verbs in English, either position of the adverb is possible.Template:Efn)

Adverb placement, French versus EnglishTemplate:Efn
French English
Tense-marked verb, then adverb Jules apprend vite ses rôles.
('Jules learns his lines quickly.') 		*Jules learns quickly his lines.
Jules a vite appris son rôle.
('Jules learnt his lines quickly.') 		Jules has quickly learnt his lines.
Adverb, then tense-marked verb *Jules vite apprend ses rôles. Jules quickly learns his lines.
*Jules vite a appris son rôle. *Jules quickly has learnt his lines.Template:Efn

Tense in syntax is represented by the category label T, which is the head of a TP (tense phrase).

In particular languages

The study of modern languages has been greatly influenced by the grammar of the Classical languages, since early grammarians, often monks, had no other reference point to describe their language. Latin terminology is often used to describe modern languages, sometimes with a change of meaning, as with the application of "perfect" to forms in English that do not necessarily have perfective meaning, or the terms Imperfekt and Perfekt to German past tense forms that mostly lack any relationship to the aspects suggested by those terms.

Indo-European languages

Proto-Indo-European verbs had present, aorist and perfect forms – these can be considered as representing two tenses (present and past) with different aspects.[45]Template:Rp Most Indo-European languages have developed systems either with two morphological tenses (present or "non-past", and past) or with three (present, past and future).Script error: No such module "Unsubst". The tenses often form part of entangled tense–aspect–mood conjugation systems.[45]Template:Rp Additional tenses, tense–aspect combinations, etc., such as the future tense, can be provided by compound constructions using auxiliary verbs.[45]Template:Rp

Latin

Script error: No such module "Labelled list hatnote". Latin is traditionally described as having six tenses (the Latin for "tense" being tempus, plural tempora):[46]Template:Rp

A newer grammar of Latin also lists these sixTemplate:Efn but comments that "The distinction between imperfective and perfective 'tenses' is really a distinction of aspect, which is at the basis of the whole conjugation system"; and states that Latin thus has just three tenses: present, past, and future.[47]Template:Rp

Imperfect tense verbs represent a past process combined with imperfective aspect, that is, they often stand for an ongoing past action or state at a past point in time (see secondary present) or represent habitual actions (see Latin tenses with modality) (e.g. 'he was eating', 'he used to eat'). The perfect tense combines the meanings of a simple past ('he ate') with that of an English perfect tense ('he has eaten'), which in ancient Greek are two different tenses (aorist and perfect).

The pluperfect, the perfect and the future perfect may also realise relative tenses, standing for events that are past at the time of another event (see secondary past): for instance, Script error: No such module "Lang"., Script error: No such module "Lang"., Script error: No such module "Lang". may mean respectively 'he had died', 'he has died' and 'he will have died'.

Latin verbs are inflected for tense and aspect together with mood – indicative, subjunctive, and imperative (all finite); and infinitive and participle (both non-finiteTemplate:Efn) – and voice (active or passive).[47]Template:Rp Most forms inflected for tense consist of a verb stem and a suffix whose inflection expresses not only tense but (as a "portmanteau morph") also other categories (such as person and number). Some tenses are expressed by sequences of inflected verbs.

Romance languages

The Romance languages (descendants of Latin) have past, present and future morphological tenses, with additional aspectual distinction in the past. French is an example of a language where, as in German, the simple morphological perfective past (passé simple) has mostly given way to a compound form (passé composé), the former mostly reserved for use in formal contexts.[36]Template:Rp

Ancient Greek

Script error: No such module "Labelled list hatnote". The paradigms for tenses in Ancient Greek are similar to those in Latin, but with a three-way aspectual contrast in the past: the aorist, perfect and imperfect. Both aorist and imperfect verbs can represent a past event: through contrast, the imperfect verb often implies a longer duration (e.g. 'they urged him' vs. 'they persuaded him'). The aorist participle represents the first event of a two-event sequence, and the present participle an ongoing event at the time of another event.[48] Perfect verbs stand for past actions if the result is still present (e.g. 'I have found it') or for present states resulting from a past event (e.g. 'I remember').

Germanic languages

The Germanic languages (which include English) have present (non-past) and past tenses formed morphologically,[45]Template:Rp with future and other additional forms made using auxiliaries. In standard German, the compound past (Perfekt) is preferred over the morphological past in spoken language.[49]Template:Rp

English

Script error: No such module "Labelled list hatnote". English has only two morphological tenses: the present (or non-past), as in he goes, and the past (or preterite), as in he went. The non-past usually references the present, but sometimes the future (as in the bus leaves tomorrow).[6]Template:Rp In special uses such as the historical present it can refer to the past as well.[6]Template:Rp These morphological tenses are marked either with a suffix (walk(s) ~ walked) or with ablaut (sing(s) ~ sang).[6]Template:Rp

In some contexts, particularly in English language teaching, various tense–aspect combinations are referred to loosely as tenses.[50] Similarly, the term "future tense" is sometimes loosely applied to cases where modals such as will are used to talk about future points in time.[6]Template:Rp[51]

Slavic languages

In the Slavic languages, verbs are intrinsically perfective or imperfective.[52]Template:Rp In Russian and other East Slavic languages, perfective verbs have past and "future" tenses, while imperfective verbs have past, present and "future", the imperfective "future" being a compound tense in most cases. The "future tense" of perfective verbs is formed in the same way as the present tense of imperfective verbs. However, in South Slavic languages, there may be a greater variety of forms – Bulgarian, for example, has present, past (both "imperfect" and "aorist") and "future tenses", for both perfective and imperfective verbs, as well as perfect forms made with an auxiliary (see Bulgarian verbs). However it doesn't have a real future tense, because the future tense is formed by the shortened version of the present of the verb hteti (ще) and it just adds present tense forms of person suffixes: -m (I), -š (you), -ø (he, she, it), -me (we), -te (you, plural), -t (they).

Irish

Script error: No such module "Labelled list hatnote". Irish, a Celtic language, has past, present and future tenses. The past contrasts perfective and imperfective aspect, and some verbs retain such a contrast in the present. Classical Irish had a three-way aspectual contrast of simple–perfective–imperfective in the past and present tenses. Modern Scottish Gaelic on the other hand only has past, non-past and 'indefinite', and, in the case of the verb 'be' (including its use as an auxiliary), also present tense.

Persian

Script error: No such module "Labelled list hatnote". Persian, an Indo-Iranian language, has past and non-past forms, with additional aspectual distinctions.[53]Template:Rp Future can be expressed using the auxiliary Script error: No such module "Lang". xâstan, but almost never in non-formal contexts, for which the present tense is used instead.[53]Template:Rp For example: Template:Interlinear The adverb "tomorrow" is used to signal future time, with the verb being in the present (non-past) tense.[53]Template:Rp

Hindustani

Script error: No such module "Labelled list hatnote". Hindustani (Hindi and Urdu), an Indo-Aryan language, has indicative perfect past and indicative future forms, while the indicative present and indicative imperfect past conjugations exist only for the verb honā (to be). The indicative future is constructed using the future subjunctive conjugations (which used to be the indicative present conjugations in older forms of Hindi–Urdu) by adding a future suffix -gā that declines for gender and the number of the noun that the pronoun refers to. The forms of gā are derived from the perfective participle forms of the verb jāna ('to go'). The conjugations of the indicative perfect past and the indicative imperfect past are derived from participles (just like the past tense formation in Slavic languages) and hence they agree with the number and the gender of the noun which the pronoun refers to and not the pronoun itself. The perfect past doubles as the perfective aspect participle and the imperfect past conjugations act as the copula to mark imperfect past when used with the aspectual participles. Hindi–Urdu has an overtly marked tense–aspect–mood system. Periphrastic Hindi–Urdu verb forms (aspectual verb forms) consist of two elements, the first of these two elements is the aspect marker and the second element (the copula) is the common tense-mood marker. Hindi–Urdu has three aspectsː Habitual, Perfective, and Progressive; and five moodsː Indicative, Presumptive, Subjunctive, Contrafactual, and Imperative.[54]

Austronesian languages

DIR:directional

Rapa

Rapa is a French Polynesian language of the island of Rapa Iti.[55]Template:Rp Verbs in the indigenous Old RapaTemplate:Efn occur with a TAM (tense, aspect, or mood) marker which can be followed by directional or deictic particles. "The primary tense–aspect markers used in Old Rapa are the imperfective, progressive, perfective, past, imperative, and subjunctive."[55]Template:Rp However, specific tense–aspect–modality (TAM) markers and the type of deictic or directional particle that follows express different types of meaning.[55]Template:Rp

"TAM particle i marks past action. It is rarely used as a matrix TAM and is more frequently observed in past embedded clauses."[55]Template:Rp

Template:Interlinear

Template:Interlinear

Wuvulu-Aua

Wuvulu-Aua does not have explicit tense, but rather time reference is conveyed by mood, aspect markers, and time phrases. Wuvulu speakers use a realis mood to describe the past as they can be certain about events that have occurred.[56]Template:Rp In some cases, realis mood is used for the present — often for stative clauses. An irrealis mood is used for the future.[56]Template:Rp

Tense in Wuvulu-Aua may also be implied by using time adverbials and aspectual markings. Wuvulu contains three verbal markers to indicate sequence of events. The preverbal adverbial loʔo ('first') indicates the verb occurs before any other. The postverbal morpheme liai and linia are the respective intransitive and transitive suffixes indicating a repeated action. The postverbal morpheme li and liria are respectively intransitive and transitive suffixes indicating a completed action.[56]Template:Rp

Mortlockese

Mortlockese uses tense markers such as mii to denote the present state of a subject, aa to denote a present state that an object has changed to, kɞ to describe something that has already been completed, pɞ and lɛ to describe the future, pʷapʷ to denote a possible action or state in the future, and sæn/mwo for something that has not yet happened. Each of these markers, except for aa and mii, is used in conjunction with the subject proclitics. Additionally, mii can be used with any type of intransitive verb.[57]

Other languages

Finnish and Hungarian, both members of the Uralic language family, have morphological present (non-past) and past tenses. The Hungarian verb van ("to be") also has a future form.

Turkish verbs conjugate for past, present and future, with a variety of aspects and moods.

Arabic verbs have past and non-past; future can be indicated by a prefix.[10]

Korean verbs have a variety of affixed forms which can be described as representing present, past and future tenses, although they can alternatively be considered to be aspectual. Similarly, Japanese verbs are described as having present and past tenses, although the distinction may be analysed as one of aspect. Some Wu Chinese languages, such as Shanghainese, use particles to mark some tenses.[58] Other Chinese languages and many other East Asian languages generally lack inflection and are considered to be tenseless, although they often have aspect markers which convey information about time reference.

See also

Notes

Template:Notelist

References

Template:Reflist

Further reading

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External links

DIR:directional particle

DEIC:deictic particle

Template:Grammatical tensesTemplate:Narrative Template:Formal semantics Template:Authority control

  1. ↑ Template:L&S
  2. ↑ Template:OEtymD
  3. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  4. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  5. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  6. ↑ a b c d e f g Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  7. ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
  8. ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
  9. ↑ a b Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  10. ↑ a b Script error: No such module "citation/CS1". Also Template:ISBN.
  11. ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
  12. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  13. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  14. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  15. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  16. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  17. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  18. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  19. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  20. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  21. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  22. ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
  23. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  24. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  25. ↑ Template:Cite thesis
  26. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  27. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  28. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  29. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  30. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
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  32. ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
  33. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  34. ↑ a b Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  35. ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
  36. ↑ a b Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  37. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  38. ↑ a b Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  39. ↑ a b Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  40. ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
  41. ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
  42. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  43. ↑ a b c d Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  44. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1". (Also Template:ISBN.)
  45. ↑ a b c d Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  46. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  47. ↑ a b Cite error: Invalid <ref> tag; no text was provided for refs named Panhuis
  48. ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
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  53. ↑ a b c Template:Cite thesis
  54. ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
  55. ↑ a b c d Template:Cite thesis
  56. ↑ a b c Template:Cite thesis
  57. ↑ Template:Cite thesis
  58. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
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