The perfect tense or aspect (abbreviated or ) is a verb form that indicates that an action or circumstance occurred earlier than the time under consideration, often focusing attention on the resulting state rather than on the occurrence itself. An example of a perfect construction is I have made dinner. Although this gives information about a prior action (the speaker's making of the dinner), the focus is likely to be on the present consequences of that action (the fact that the dinner is now ready). The word perfect in this sense means "completed" (from Latin perfectum, which is the perfect passive participle of the verb perficere "to complete").
In traditional Latin and Ancient Greek grammar, the perfect tense is a particular, conjugated-verb form. Modern analyses view the perfect constructions of these languages as combining elements of grammatical tense (such as time reference) and grammatical aspect. The Greek perfect tense is contrasted with the aorist and the imperfect tenses and specifically refers to completed events with present consequences; its meaning is thus similar to that of the English construction, "have/has (done something)". The Latin perfect tense is contrasted only with the imperfect tense (used for past incomplete actions or states) and is thus used to mean both "have/has done something" and "did something" (the preterite use). Other related forms are the pluperfect, denoting an event prior to a past time of reference, and the future perfect, for an event prior to a future time of reference.
In the grammar of some modern languages, particularly of English, the perfect may be analyzed as an aspect that is independent of tense – the form that is traditionally just called the perfect ("I have done") is then called the present perfect, while the form traditionally called the pluperfect ("I had done") is called the past perfect. (There are also additional forms such as future perfect, conditional perfect, and so on.) The formation of the perfect in English, using forms of an auxiliary verb (have) together with the past participle of the main verb, is paralleled in a number of other modern European languages.
The perfect can be denoted by the glossing abbreviation or . It should not be confused with the perfective aspect (), which refers to the viewing of an action as a single (but not necessarily prior) event. To avoid confusion with the perfective, the perfect is occasionally called the retrospective ().
As an aspect In some analyses, the perfect is identified as one of the grammatical aspects. In the perfect aspect, the event being referred to is viewed as already completed at the time of reference.Dahl, Osten, Tense and Aspect Systems, Blackwell Publ., 1985, chapter 5. It should not be confused with the perfective aspect, which marks a situation as a single event without internal structure, and does not imply prior occurrence or present relevance as the perfect aspect does. The perfect also contrasts with the prospective aspect, which encodes the present relevance or anticipation of a future event. While the perfect is a relatively uniform category cross-linguistically, its relation to the experiential and resultative aspects is complex – the latter two are not simply restricted cases of the perfect.Dahl, 1985, p. 190.
The perfect is not necessarily incompatible with other grammatical aspects. In English, for example, it can be combined with the progressive (continuous) aspect, wherein an event is viewed as temporary and ongoing. A form such as the present perfect progressive I have been working combines the meanings expressed by the two aspects – viewing my working as an ongoing process, but one which is now completed (or, as in I have been working for two hours, restricting attention to the completed portion of that process).
If perfect is viewed as an aspect, then the verb forms traditionally called just "perfect" (as in Greek or – in appropriate contexts – in Latin) in fact combine the perfect aspect with present tense (the event occurred prior to the time of speech). The pluperfect and future perfect forms combine perfect aspect with past and future tense respectively. This analysis is reflected more explicitly in the terminology commonly used in modern English grammars, which refer to present perfect, past perfect and future perfect (as well as some other constructions such as conditional perfect).
However, not all uses of "perfect" verb forms necessarily express this "perfect aspect" – sometimes they are simply used as expressions of past tense, that is, as preterites. This applies to some uses of the Latin perfect, and also (for example) to the modern German Perfekt.
Types In English, several uses of the perfect aspect have been recognized:Michaelis, Laura (1994)"The Ambiguity of the English Present Perfect". Journal of Linguistics 30: 1Mittwoch, Anna (2008) "The English Resultative Perfect and Its Relationship to the Experiential Perfect and the Simple Past Tense". Linguistics and Philosophy, Vol. 31, No. 3, pp. 323–351Comrie, Bernard (1976) Aspect: An introduction to verbal aspect and related problems. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University, pp. 52ff Resultative perfect (referring to a state in the present which is the result or endpoint of an event in the past): "I have lost my pen-knife" (message: I still don't have it) Continuative perfect (past situations continuing into present): "I have always guided him" Anterior perfect (completed past situations, but with relevance to the present): "It has rained" (implication: the streets are wet now) Experiential perfect (stating that a given situation has occurred at least once in a period of time leading up to the present time): "Bill has been to America" "I have seen that film three times now" Universal perfect (stating that a given situation has been going on continuously during a period leading up to the present time): "The meaning of the Perfect has been debated for 200 years"
In other languages other uses of the perfect are found: Perfect of present state (stating that a present situation holds as a result of something that has happened recently):Comrie (1976) Aspect, p. 57. (Swahili) 'he is tired' () (Swahili) 'he is standing' ().Ashton, E. O. (1947). Swahili Grammar (Including Intonation). Longmans Green, p. 37. This can be considered to be the same as resultative perfect. Perfect of very recent past: (Alicante Spanish) '(An hour ago) I was walking in the forest. Suddenly I stepped on a snake. It bit me in the leg.' ().Lindstedt, Jouko "The perfect – aspectual, temporal and evidential". In Dahl, Östen (ed.) (2000). Tense and Aspect in the Languages of Europe. Mouton de Gruyter, Berlin and New York, p. 267. Evidential or inferential perfect (a statement that something must have happened because of the evidence available): (Swedish) 'The thief evidently got in through this window' (literally, 'has got in')Lindstedt, Jouko, "The perfect – aspectual, temporal and evidential", p. 376. Reportative perfect (referring to an event which the speaker has heard about but not personally witnessed). This is common in languages such as Turkish, Persian, Georgian, and Bulgarian:Comrie, Aspect, p. 108ff. (Turkish) 'They say I was/am ill' (literally, 'I have been ill')Sezer, Engin "Finite Inflection in Turkish", p. 17. In Taylan, Eser Erguvanlı (ed.) (2002), The Verb in Turkish, John Benjamins, Amsterdam.
Discontinuous past In some languages a type of tense has been noted with exactly the opposite implication to a perfect. This type of tense is known as discontinuous past.Plungian, Vladimir A. & Johan van der Auwera (2006). "Towards a typology of discontinuous past marking." Sprachtypol. Univ. Forsch. (STUF), Berlin 59, 4, 317–349. Thus if a sentence such as "I have put the book on the table" implies that it is still on the table, so a discontinuous past sentence "I put the book on the table" in these languages would imply that the book is no longer on the table.
Construction with auxiliaries A number of modern European languages exhibit a parallel type of perfect (or perfect-like) construction, formed with an auxiliary verb in combination with the past participle of the main verb. The auxiliary may be a verb meaning have (as in the English I have won) or a verb meaning be (as in the French , "I (have) arrived", literally "I am arrived").
The have-perfect developed from a construction where the verb meaning have denoted possession, and the past participle was an adjective modifying the object, as in I have the work done.“Have, V., Sense VI.i.30.” Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford UP, September 2024, https://doi.org/10.1093/OED/3760462532. This came to be reanalyzed, with the object becoming the object of the main verb, and the participle becoming a dependent of the have verb, as in I have done the work. The construction could then be generalized to be used also with intransitive verbs. A vestige of the original interpretation is preserved in some languages in the form of inflection on the participle to agree with the gender and number of the object.
The be-perfect developed similarly, from a construction where the verb meaning be was an ordinary copula and the participle expressed a resultative state of the subject.Joan Bybee, Revere Perkins, William Pagliuca, The Evolution of Grammar: Tense, Aspect, and Modality in the Languages of the World, University of Chicago Press, 1994. It is consequently used mostly with verbs that denote a change in the state or location of the subject, and in some languages the participle inflects to agree with the gender and number of the subject.
Languages that use these constructions can generally inflect the auxiliary to produce different verb forms for the perfect aspect: the pluperfect or past perfect is produced with the auxiliary in the past tense, the future perfect with the auxiliary in the future tense, and so on. These include non-finite forms such as perfect infinitives. (More possible forms and examples are given under below.)
The basic (present) perfect form, with the auxiliary in the present tense, may specifically carry the meaning of perfect aspect, as in English; however in some languages it is used more generally as a past tense (or preterite), as in French and German.
The use of auxiliaries and meaning of the constructions in various languages are described below. English uses have as the auxiliary; the use of be with some intransitive verbs (as in I am come; he is gone) is archaic. For more details see the section on below. German uses ("have") as the auxiliary with most verbs, and ("be") with some intransitives, including the copula itself. The German "present perfect" construction is called the (perfect), and for most verbs is the usual past tense for colloquial speech and dialects. For details, see German verbs. Other Germanic languages have similar constructions, such as the of Swedish and the (compound past) of Dutch. French uses ("have") as the auxiliary with most verbs, but uses ("be") with reflexive verbs and with a certain number of intransitive verbs. The past participle is inflected to agree in gender and number with the subject when is used, and with a direct object when is used, but then only when the object precedes the verb (which is normally the case with personal pronouns and in some relative and interrogative clauses). The composed tense using a present auxiliary and past participle form is called the (compound past) and now corresponds to the English simple past. (It replaced the French passé simple in speech and journalistic writing in the 20th century, thereby losing its distinctive aspectual characteristics). For more details see .