KAPITEL 5 | TEIL 4 - PAST PERFECT TENSE |
		A. The past perfect tense (das Plusquamperfekt) The formation of the past perfect tense is very similar to the present perfect tense: it also uses a helping verb (either haben or sein) plus a past participle, but the helping verb is in the simple past tense (hatte or war). Present Perfect Past Perfect hat gekauft hatte gekauft ist gegangen war gegangen The past perfect tense is used to recount an event that happens before another event in the past tense. In the example below, the first sentence describes an event that happened in the afternoon. The second event refers to an earlier event from that morning. Ich wollte mir heute Nachmittag ein neues Buch kaufen. I wanted to buy a new book in the afternoon. Intermatik Audio: kap5/k5-4a-s1 Leider hatte ich meine Kreditkarte am Morgen zu Hause gelassen. Unfortunately, I had left my credit card at home that morning. Note: With the conjuction "nachdem" (after), German uses the past perfect tense: Nachdem sie zur Kasse gegangen war, bemerkte sie, dass sie keine Kreditkarte bei sich hatte.