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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

preterite.

Showing an action at a determined moment in the past.

9 characters3 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

adj/ˈpɹɛtəɹɪt//ˈpɹɛtəɹət/
  1. Showing an action at a determined moment in the past.

    not-comparable
  2. Belonging wholly to the past; passed by.

    not-comparable
Where this word comes from

From Middle English preterit, from Old French preterit (13th century), from Latin praeteritum (as in tempus praeteritum (“time past”)), the past participle of praetereō (“to go by, go past”), itself from praeter (“beyond, before, above, more than”) (comparative of prae (“before”)) + itum (the past participle of eō (“to go”)).

noun/ˈpɹɛtəɹɪt//ˈpɹɛtəɹət/
  1. A grammatical tense or verb form serving to denote events that took place or were completed in the past.

Where this word comes from

From Middle English preterit, from Old French preterit (13th century), from Latin praeteritum (as in tempus praeteritum (“time past”)), the past participle of praetereō (“to go by, go past”), itself from praeter (“beyond, before, above, more than”) (comparative of prae (“before”)) + itum (the past participle of eō (“to go”)).

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.