Italian Essentials: Congiuntivo Imperfetto (Imperfective Subjunctive)
- Mille Larsen •2 mins read
It’s subjunctive week. We've already looked at exactly what the subjunctive mood is, and how it is used, and yesterday we took our first look at using the subjunctive in Italian with il congiuntivo presente. Today, we're going to look at il congiuntivo imperfetto.
Il congiuntivo imperfetto
The congiuntivo imperfetto, or imperfect subjunctive, describes an uncertain verb action that was ongoing in the past. It is formed with the following endings:
| -are | -ere | -ire | |
|---|---|---|---|
| che io | -assi | -essi | -issi |
| che tu | -assi | -essi | -issi |
| che lui/lei | -asse | -esse | -isse |
| che noi | -assimo | -essimo | -issimo |
| che voi | -aste | -este | -iste |
| che loro | -assero | -essero | -issero |
This is one of the easiest conjugations yet. You really only have four endings: -assi, -assimo, -aste, and -assero. The only other detail is to make sure to swap the a for an e or an i according to the verb's ending.
Examples
avere:
Credevo che avessero ragione.
capire:
Non c'era nessuno che ci capisse.
potere:
Era un peccato che tu non potessi venire.
smettere:
Vorrei che tu smettessi di furmare.
The -ss in the endings is significantly different from any other verb forms we've encountered, so it should be easy to remember that this is a special form of the verb. If you have trouble remembering which special form, just think of the s as standing for "subjunctive", and there are two of them because it is ongoing!
Tomorrow, we’ll look at the perfective counterpart, the congiuntivo passato.