Aorist in the context of Perfect (grammar)

The preterite or preterit (/ˈprɛtərɪt/ PRET-ər-it; abbreviated PRET or PRT) is a grammatical tense or verb form serving to denote events that took place or were completed in the past; in some languages, such as Spanish, French, and English, it is equivalent to the past simple tense. In general, it combines the perfective aspect (event viewed as a single whole; it is not to be confused with the similarly named perfect) with the past tense and may thus also be termed the perfective past. In grammars of particular languages the preterite is sometimes called the past historic, or (particularly in the Greek grammatical tradition) the aorist.When the term "preterite" is used in relation to specific languages, it may not correspond precisely to this definition. In English it can be used to refer to the past simple verb form, which sometimes (but not always) expresses perfective aspect. The case of German is similar: the Präteritum is the simple (non-compound) past tense, which does not always imply perfective aspect, and is anyway often replaced by the Perfekt (compound past) even in perfective past meanings.

Preterite may be denoted by the glossing abbreviation PRET or PRT. The word derives from the Latin praeteritum (the perfective participle of praetereo), meaning "passed by" or "past."

The perfective aspect (abbreviated PFV), sometimes called the aoristic aspect, is a grammatical aspect that describes an action viewed as a simple whole, i.e., a unit without interior composition. The perfective aspect is distinguished from the imperfective aspect, which presents an event as having internal structure (such as ongoing, continuous, or habitual actions). The term perfective should be distinguished from perfect (see below).

The distinction between perfective and imperfective is more important in some languages than others. In Slavic languages, it is central to the verb system. In other languages such as German, the same form such as ich ging ("I went", "I was going") can be used perfectively or imperfectively without grammatical distinction. In other languages such as Latin, the distinction between perfective and imperfective is made only in the past tense (e.g., Latin veni "I came" vs. veniebam "I was coming", "I used to come"). However, perfective should not be confused with tense—perfective aspect can apply to events in the past, present, or future.

The Polabian language, also known as Drevanian–Polabian language, Drevanian language, and Lüneburg Wendish language, is a West Slavic language that was spoken by the Polabian Slavs (German: Wenden) in present-day northeastern Germany around the Elbe, from which comes the term Polabian. It was spoken approximately until the rise to power of Prussia in the mid-18th century – when it was superseded by Low German – in the areas of Mecklenburg-West Pomerania, central Mittelmark part of Brandenburg and eastern Saxony-Anhalt (Wittenberg originally part of Bela Serbia), as well as in eastern parts of Wendland (Lower Saxony) and Schleswig-Holstein, Ostholstein and Lauenburg). Polabian was also relatively long (until the 16th century) spoken in and around the cities of Lübeck and Oldenburg. The very poorly attested Slavic dialects of Rügen seemed to have had more in common with Polabian than with Pomeranian varieties. In the south, it bordered on the Sorbian language area in Lusatia.

Polabian is characterized by the preservation of a number of archaic features, such as the presence of nasal vowels, a lack of metathesis of Proto-Slavic *TorT; the presence of an aorist and imperfect verb tenses, traces of the dual number, and some prosodic features, as well as by some innovations, including diphthongization of closed vowels, a shift of the vowels o to ö, ü and a to o; a softening of the consonants g, k in some positions to d', t', an occasional reduction of final vowels, and the formation of complex tenses, many which are associated with the influence of the German language. Polabian also has a large number of Middle Low German borrowings.

The perfect tense or aspect (abbreviated PERF or PRF) is a verb form that indicates that an action or circumstance occurred earlier than the time under consideration, often focusing attention on the resulting state rather than on the occurrence itself. An example of a perfect construction is I have made dinner. Although this gives information about a prior action (the speaker's making of the dinner), the focus is likely to be on the present consequences of that action (the fact that the dinner is now ready). The word perfect in this sense means "completed" (from Latin perfectum, which is the perfect passive participle of the verb perficere "to complete").

In traditional Latin and Ancient Greek grammar, the perfect tense is a particular, conjugated-verb form. Modern analyses view the perfect constructions of these languages as combining elements of grammatical tense (such as time reference) and grammatical aspect. The Greek perfect tense is contrasted with the aorist and the imperfect tenses and specifically refers to completed events with present consequences; its meaning is thus similar to that of the English construction, "have/has (done something)". The Latin perfect tense is contrasted only with the imperfect tense (used for past incomplete actions or states) and is thus used to mean both "have/has done something" and "did something" (the preterite use). Other related forms are the pluperfect, denoting an event prior to a past time of reference, and the future perfect, for an event prior to a future time of reference.