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The Past Continuous

 

 
Past Continuous is the tense of narrations and descriptions. It is used in order to describe an action that was being repeated in the past or that had a duration.

Examples:
Έπιναγάλα κάθε μέρα.(Epeena gala kathe mera). I used to drink milk every day.
Βλέπαμετηλεόραση όλο το απόγευμα.(Vlepame tileorasi olo to apogevma). We were watching television all afternoon.
The Past Continuous of the verbs έχω ( to have) and είμαι ( to be)
είχα ήμουν
είχεςήσουν
είχεήταν
είχαμεήμασταν
είχατεήσασταν
είχανήταν
Active Voice, 1st conjugation (verbs ending in –ω).
The Past Continuous is formed by the stem of the Present and the endings of the Past Simple, so if you are already familiar with the Present tense it’s very easy to form the Past Continuous:
Πηγαίνω= πήγαινα
Πηγαίνω = to go

πήγαινα = I was going
πήγαινες
πήγαινε
πηγαίναμε
πηγαίνατε
πήγαιναν
 
Notes:
1) The accent is over the ante-penultimate syllable (the third syllable counting from right to left). But, in the first and second plural person I move the stress one syllable to the right.
 
2) The prefix ε– or –η is added to two-syllable verbs in order to form the singular and the third plural person.

Κάνω = to do

έκανα = I was doing / I used to do
έκανες
έκανε
κάναμε
κάνατε
έκαναν
θέλω= Ι want
ήθελα
ήθελες
ήθελε
θέλαμε
θέλατε
ήθελαν
 
 

 

You can also read: Cases and syntactic functions

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