THE   PAST   TENSE

There is only one past tense in Czech language. We use it for everything what happened in past,
even if it is only one second ago.

Forms of the past tense are created from the infinitive:

STUDOVAT – T  changes to L

STUDOVAL  - this is the basic form of the past tense.

The first and the second person  (JÁ, TY) are created by adding present forms of the verb TO BE.

STUDOVAL   JSEM – I studied or I was studying.

STUDOVAL  JSI- You studied or You were studying.

The third person doesn´t use TO BE:

STUDOVAL – He studied or He was studying.

If you want to make the female forms,  you have to add A to the end, for the neutral gender  O:

STUDOVALA  JSEM                                STUDOVAL O JSEM

STUDOVALA   JSI                                   STUDOVALO   JSI

STUDOVALA                                           STUDOVALO

In the plural we use the same system:

STUDOVALI  JSME       We studied / We were studying

STUDOVALI  JSTE          You studied / You were studying

STUDOVALI                    They studied /They were studying

Forms STUDOVALY/A are for the masculins inanimate, feminins and neutrals, if there is no masculine
animate. If you have a group of one hundert of women and only one man, this man is more important
than one hundert of women and the grammar ending must be according to him.



In the second person of singular we very often use the shortened forms

STUDOVALS (= STUDOVAL  JSI )

STUDOVALAS ( = STUDOVALA  JSI)

These shortened forms are used ONLY for the second person of singular,  they are not possible to be
used for any other person.

NEGATION:

For negative forms we haveto put NE before the main verb:

NESTUDOVAL   JSEM                           NESTUDOVALA  JSEM

NEVER form negations  STUDOVAL  NEJSEM!!!!!!!!!!!!!



IRREGULAR   PAST   FORMS:

The most common verbs having irregular forms of the past tense are:

BÝT (be)                    - BYL (present já jsem)The lenght drops out.

BÝT is conjugated in the past tense:

BYL/A  JSEM                 BYLI JSME

BYL/A   JSI                      BYLI JSTE
BYL/A                              BYLI

MOCI/ MOCT (can) – MOHL (present já můžu)

MÍT ( have)               - MĚL (present já mám)

CHTÍT (want)            - CHTĚL (present já chci)

ČÍST (read)                - ČETL (present já čtu)

SPÁT (sleep)             - SPAL  (present spím)

PÍT (drink)                 -PIL  (present já piju)

PSÁT (write)             - PSAL   (present  já píšu) Be carefull and don´t confuse these two verbs.

JÍST (eat)                   - JEDL (present jím)

JÍT (go on foot)        - ŠEL  male form ŠLA female form ŠLO neutral form ŠLIplural form (present
jdu)

The verb JÍT is irregular, the verb JET is regullar with the past tense JEL   JSEM.

Also some perfective verbs have irregular  forms of the past tense, the most important of them are:

UMŘÍT (die)              - UMŘEL ( umřu)  this form means I will die because umřít is the
perfective verb)

VZÍT (take)                - VZAL (  vezmu)

ŘÍCT (say)                   ´- ŘEKL ( řeknu)

POMOCT (help)           - POMOHL  (pomůžu)

ZAPOMENOUT (forget)   - ZAPOMNĚL  (zapomenu)


THE WORD ORDER:

The auxiliaries JSEM, JSI, JSME, JSTE must be at the second position in the sentense. Reflexive
pronouns SE, SI move to the third position.

DÍVAL  JSEM  SE NA TELEVIZI. Díval – the first position

                                                      Jsem – the second position

                                                       SE – the third position

                                                          Than the rest of the sentence

If you start in the different way:

VČERA  JSEM  SE  DÍVAL  NA  TELEVIZI. – Včera – the first position, jsem the second position, se
the third position and than the rest of the sentence.

The irst position doesn´t mean the first word only. It can be longer.

VČERA VEČER A DNES RÁNO JSEM SE DÍVAL NA TELEVIZI. Včera večer a dnes ráno is only one information
about the time when I watched TV. So the whole this expression is the first position.

If we start a sentence with a pronoun the system is the same.

JÁ JSEM SE DÍVAL NA TELEVIZI VČERA VEČER A DNES RÁNO.

  1    2      3   and the of the sentence.

Vařila(1)  jsem(2)  oběd. – Já(1) jsem(2) vařila oběd.


Kde(1) jste(2) byli? – Byli(1) jsme(2) na fakultě. / My(1) jsme(2) byli na fakultě.

In the third person pronouns SE , SI are normally at the second position:

Petr si nemyl ruce. Dnes si Petr nemyl ruce.