Grammar Info

N5 Lesson 6: 4/13

だった・でした

Was, Were (Past tense)

い-Adjectives cannot be used with だった・でした

Structure

Noun + だった
[な]Adjective + だった

Details

  • Part of Speech

    Auxiliary Verb

  • Register

    Standard

  • 品詞

    助動詞

  • 使用域

    一般

About だった・でした

In order to say that something 'was' a certain way in Japanese, you will need to use だった (casual) or でした (polite) attached to the end of a noun or な-Adjective. This is simply a combination of two auxiliary verbs, (or です when polite) with た. For だった, we will need to add った to the base form of . For です, す will change to し before adding た.

Caution

The past form of い-Adjectives cannot be linked with だった or でした, as they have their own set of conjugation rules.

Examples

  • 綺麗(きれい) だった

    It was beautiful.

    • トムだった

      It was Tom.

      • (わたし)(くるま)(いろ)ピンクでした

        My car was pink.

        • それ昨日(きのう)でした

          That was yesterday.

          • (ねこ)(だい)()だった

            I really liked cats. (Cats were loved by me)

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