German Past Tense – The Pluperfect Tense

We’ve already introduced you to some German Past Tense forms like the Perfect Tense or the Imperfect Tense. And in this article we will be looking at the Pluperfect Tense.

The Pluperfect Tense sounds complicated but is actually a pretty straight forward German past tense. It is used to describe something that had happened or had been true at some point in the past. In English, you will see the pluperfect used in sentences with a form like “I had gone” or “you’d given”.

For example:

Er war spät nach Hause gekommen. – He had come home late.

Wir hatten seinen Geburtstag vergessen. – We had forgotten his birthday.

Forming a German Past Tense Sentence in the Pluperfect Tense

The pluperfect tense is formed in a similar way to the Perfect tense in that it has two parts:

• the imperfect tense of the verb haben (to have) or sein (to be)
• the past participle

Some verbs are built with „sein“ and others with „haben“. Which verb to use with which is exactly the same rule as we already discussed in the blog about the Perfect Tense. The majority of German past tense sentences are constructed using the verb haben, however when talking about something movement related, you would use the verb sein.

Verbs with haben are built like this in the Pluperfect Tense:

Here are some example sentences:

Ich hatte meinen Geldbeutel vergessen. – I had forgotten my wallet.

Er hatte mir 100€ geliehen. – He had lent me 100€.

Wir hatten ihm ein Auto gekauft. – We had bought him a car.

Verbs with sein are built like this in the Pluperfect Tense:

Here are some example sentences:

Du warst spät angekommen. – You had arrived late.

Ihr wart in London gewesen. – You had been to London.

Sie waren schon weggefahren. – They had already left.