Learning a new language can be tough. What makes all this worse is not remembering or being familiar with the grammar terminology itself. I have your back! In this lesson, we’re looking at what a verb is and how verbs in Portuguese are used.
Portuguese sentences follow (for the most part) the SVO sequence (subject/verb/object). The V represents the verbs.
What’s a verb?
A verb is a word that represents an action, such as “sleep”, “eat”, ”speak”, ”stand”, etc
What’s a conjugation?
Conjugation is the verb variation that inflects (changes) to reflect the doer of the actions and how many doers there are. In grammar terms, these “doers” are grammatical people, and we express them using subject personal pronouns.
In English, these verb variations are difficult to see because our verbs have very few conjugations.
| I have |
| You have |
| He has |
| We have |
| They have |
As you can see, there are only two variants: ‘have’ and ‘has’. That’s it.
But, in Portuguese, this is not the case at all. Each verb has at least 5 forms in each tense that are used. This means that one verb can have over 50 different forms in Portuguese!!
The reason for this is that Portuguese is a null-subject language. That means that we can create a full sentence with only the verb – without including a personal pronoun. This is not possible in English. We always need to include who the “doer” is. More on that here.
How are verbs divided in Portuguese?
Generally, Portuguese verbs divide into two main groups: verbos regulares (regular verbs) and verbos irregulares (irregular verbs).
Regular verbs follow a predictable pattern or formula that you can apply to all verbs in that category. Irregular verbs, on the other hand, do not fit easily into these predictable patterns, and some of them do not at all.
Each of these groups can be further divided into 3 sub-groups:
“AR” verbs / “ER” verbs and “IR” verbs
These refer to the two ending letters of the verbs in their full unconjugated form – the infinitive form. For example:
Note: (“OR” verbs also exist, but they are in their own category)
Click here on “formula” for an example of how it works in the present tense.
Click the link for a list of the top 25 verbs used in conversational Portuguese.
What’s a tense?
An action (verb) can happen in the past, the present or the future. The tense is just that, it’s the category that tells us when the action happens. If you see “presente do indicativo” you’ll know that the action is happening/happens in the present.
Compound tense?
Compound tenses are formed by an auxiliary verb (helping verb) and the main verb in the past participle in Portuguese form (mostly ado/ido endings). The auxiliary verb inflects in tense and person, while the main verb always remains as the participle. The verb ter (to have) is the most used auxiliary verb in Portuguese. Other verbs that can be auxiliary include: haver (to exist/there is), ser (to be – fixed) and estar (to be – moving). More info on ser/estar in Portuguese. For more info on compound tenses in Portuguese click here.
What’s a mood?
A verb mood is a classification that indicates the speaker’s position in relation to the verbal action. In Portuguese, four moods reflect the “when”, the “who” and how many “whos”. We classify the following moods as finite forms, and they are: Indicativo, Imperativo, Conjuntivo and Condicional. And then there are three further moods that we class as non-finite forms. These, except the personal infinitive tense, do not reflect “when”, the “who” and how “many whos”. And they are: Infinitivo, Particípio Passado and Gerúndio. Let’s look at these individually so we can understand how to use them.
Indicativo
We use the indicative mood to register a fact, a certainty or a truth. It comprises five tenses: Presente do Indicativo, Pretérito Perfeito do Indicativo, Pretérito Imperfeito do Indicativo, Pretérito Mais-que-Perfeito do Indicativo and Futuro do Indicativo. And three compound tenses: Pretérito Perfeito Composto, Pretérito-Mais-que-Perfeito Composto and Futuro Composto.
Imperativo
The imperative mood is used to give orders, commands or advice, and/or to make requests or suggestions. It has one tense that’s also called Imperativo. This tense is often referred to as the “command tense”.
Conjuntivo
We use the conjuntivo mood (subjunctive) to refer to uncertain or doubtful facts, possibilities, hypothetical scenarios, outcomes or desires. This mood comprises three tenses: Presente do Conjuntivo, Pretérito Imperfeito do Conjuntivo, and Futuro do Conjuntivo. Plus three compound tenses: Pretérito Perfeito Composto do Conjuntivo, Pretérito mais-que-perfeito Composto do Conjuntivo and Futuro Composto do Conjuntivo.
Condicional
The conditional mood is used when we want to refer to facts that are dependent on a condition. We also use it to express doubt or to refer to an event that took place after another past event. This is the “would /should/could” mood, and it comprises two tenses: Condicional Simples and Condicional Composto.
Infinitivo
We use the infinitivo to express the meaning of the verb without any temporal location or grammatical person. In other words, it expresses the action without any attachment to the past, present, future or the doer. This mood comprises two tenses: Infinitivo Pessoal (which does express the doer) and Infinitivo Impessoal.
A quick word on these two tenses here.
Particípio Passado
The particípio passado in Portuguese (participle) is used in compound and passive tenses. The word alone is never attached to any temporal location or grammatical person.
Gerúndio
The gerúndio (gerund) usually translates an action in progress, which can be simultaneous with another action. However, it’s important to note that in European Portuguese, in the majority of situations, the use of the verb “estar”, conjugated in the appropriate tense, followed by the preposition “a” and then by the main verb of the action in the infinitive form, expresses the same sense as the gerund.
Don’t Stress
I know all this is a lot to take in, and I would never dream of telling anyone they need to just memorise it and remember it at the drop of a hat. At the end of the day, knowing all these definitions is not what’s going to make you proficient in Portuguese. But grammar has its place. It’s a great tool for organising your thoughts, finding the appropriate information and for when you want to study or practice similar structures.
My promise to you is that I will always try my best to explain things in the clearest way possible. I will always tell you what’s important to know and what’s just nice to know.
Start here with the Present Tense in Portuguese!
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