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Essential Italian Grammar – Regular and Irregular Verbs

In English, it is generally easy to differentiate between regular and irregular verbs. Regular verbs follow the same pattern of becoming past tense (generally, they get an "ed" added to the end of the base word.). But irregular verbs are rebellious; they don't tend to follow any rules, and the present simple and past tenses make new words all together (as in "begin", "began", "begun").

Italian verbs are a bit different. They're divided in three conjugations, according to the ending of the infinitive form:

• verbs ending in the infinitive with – are: cantare, to sing – ballare,to dance – sognare, to dream>
• verbs ending in the infinitive with – ere: correre, to run – vedere, to see – temere,to fear
• verbs ending in the infinitive with – ire: scoprire, to discover – dormire, to sleep – sentire, to feel; these verbs can also be divided in two categories, with or without the suffix –isc: capire, to understand – preferire, to prefer

Regular verbs always have the same stem, but most of the Italian verbs are irregular and they use more stems, according to their Latin origin. For example the verb andare (to go) has the following stems: and-, v-, vad-

There are two kinds of tenses: simple tenses and compound tenses. The latter express an action happening before the corresponding simple tense form. They are built with the auxiliary verb at the simple tense + the past participle.

The verbs almost always need the auxiliary avere, except in the following situations, which require the auxiliary essere.

• with verbs meaning movement (andare, to go; venire, to come; etc.): io sono andato, I went. Similarly, camminare (to walk), nuotare (to swim) and sciare (to ski) all require avere
• reflexive verbs (alzarsi, stand up): io mi sono alzato, I stood up
• piacere (like): mi è piaciuto, I liked it

The past participle when used with essere follows the usual adjective agreement rules concerning gender and number.
Luigi è andat-o (masculine singular)
Luigi e Paolo sono andat-i (masculine, plural)
Lucia è andat-a (feminine, singular)
Lucia e Catia sono andat-e (feminine, plural)

Simple Tense

Indicativo Presente – e.g. I sing.

Indicativo Imperfetto – I used to sing.

Indicativo Passato Remoto – I sang.

*many verbs have irregular form in this tense

Indicativo Futuro – I will sing.

Condizionale Presente – I would sing.

Congiuntivo Presente – That I sing.

* The congiuntivo expresses an opinion and it is used always after statements as Io penso (I think), Io spero (I hope) or in conditional sentences.

Congiuntivo Imperfetto – That I sing.

Imperativo Presente – Sing!

Impersonal Forms – Present

• Gerundive and participle can both be translated into English with the –ing form, but the participle is just used as a substitute for the relative form.
• Sto andando a casa I am going home
• L'aggettivo che segue The following adjective

Scheme of connection between simple tenses and compound tenses

* Imperative has just a present tense.