The Past Perfect
had Ved / V3
| Affirmative | Negative | Interrogative |
| I had done you had done he/she/it had done we had done you had done they had done | I had not done you had not done he/she/it had not done we had not done you had not done they had not done | had I done? had you done? had he/she/it done? had we done? had you done? had they done? |
The Past Perfect is used:
1) to express an action accomplished before a given past moment and viewed back from that past moment. It may be a single point action, an action of some duration or a recurrent action.
It was long afterwards that I found out what had happened.
2) to express an action which began before a given past moment and continues into it or up to it:
a) With stative verbs where its use is compulsory.
She began to do all the things that she had wanted to do for years.
He suddenly understood that she had loved him all her life.
b) With some dynamic verbs of durative meaning where the Past Perfect (Non-Continuous) may be used instead of the Past Perfect Continuous with little difference in meaning.
Roy mentioned that he had dined at home since his return.
Time expressions:
| already, by the time, by that time, ever, never, before, after, the day before, before that |
I. Read and translate the sentences. Explain the use of the Past Perfect.
1. They had finished the work by the end of the year.
2. We went to the station to catch the train, but the train had already left.
3. In 2005 Derek started to work in Berlin. He had always planned it.
4. Joe knew Munich well because he had visitedthat beautiful city many times.
5. By 1850 the United Kingdom had become the richest and most powerful nation in the world.
II. Put the verbs into the correct form.
1. Before the lesson ended they ________ (write) three tests.
2. He _______ (not / be) to Cape Town before 1997.
3. _________________ (you / ever / travel) by plane before your holiday in Spain?
4. The population of white-faced owl ______ (decline) considerably by the end of the 19th century.
5. By 1963, several formerly abundant species of native birds _______ (disappear) from the central part of the island where snakes were most populous.
6. By the end of the 19th century most biologists _______ (come) to accept it as fact that plant and animal species evolve from earlier species. Lamarck _______ (suggest) one process by which evolution might occur, but Darwin _______ (propose) an alternative that was more powerful and more convincing.
7. By 1982 Greenpeace _______ (grow) into a full-fledged international movement with offices and staff around the world.
III. Complete the sentences using the verbs from the box in the Past Perfect.
| become (2) occur classify exceed disappear discover describe decrease destroy |
1. By the end of the Cretaceous period, dinosaurs _______ from the planet.
2. By 1758 Carl Linnaeus _______ and _______ 4,400 animal species and more than 7,700 plant species.
3. Another investigation found that the company ________the allowable emissions for dioxins.
4. By the 1900s, scientists _______ that atoms are themselves made of even smaller particles.
5. Data collected in the late 1990s indicate that ozone levels over the United States _________ by five to ten percent since the 1970s.
6. By the year 2000, people __________ nearly two-thirds of the koala’s habitat to logging, agriculture, cities, and roads.
7. By the end of the 17th century, a scientific revolution _______ and science _______ an established mathematical, mechanical, and empirical body of knowledge. Galileo Galilei, René Descartes, Blaise Pascal, Isaac Newton, and others ______ noted scientists.
IV. Put questions to the underlined parts of the sentences.
1. By 1900 scientists had discovered all major parts of the cell.
2. The New Zealand Thrush had become the rarest bird in the country by the end of the 19th century.
3. By the end of the meeting they had signed an agreement to reduce greenhouse gases.
4. Fifteen students had made this difficult experiment by the end of the lesson.
5. By the year 1804, Alexander von Humboldt had published 26 volumes on plants and related environmental data.
V. Ask questions of 4 types (general, special, alternative, disjunctive) to each sentence.
1. Before midnight James had translated the article.
2. By the end of the week they had planted more than 200 trees.
3. By the time dinosaurs became extinct mammals had appeared on earth.
VI. Put the verbs in brackets into the Past Perfect or Past Simple.
1. When Sara ______ (reach) the bus stop, the bus ___________ (already/ leave).
2. The storm ______ (destroy) the sandcastle that we _________ (build).
3. After they _______ (eat) shellfish, they _______ (begin) to feel sick.
4. They _______ (not/ walk) two kilometres when the thunderstorm _______ (break) out.
5. Yesterday I _______ (go) to an interesting museum that I _______ (not/visit) before.
6. He ________ (give) me back the book, _____ (thank) me for lending it to him and ______ (say) that he _____ (enjoy) it very much; but I _____ (know) that he ______ (not read) it because most of the pages _______ (be) still uncut.
7. I _______ (think) my train _____ (leave) at 14.33, and ______ (be) very disappointed when I ______ (arrive) at 14.30 and ______ (learn) that it just ______ (leave). I ________ (find) later that I _______ (use) an out-of-date timetable.