Main Entry: past tense

Function: noun

Date: 1813

: a verb tense expressing action or state in or as if in the past: a : a verb tense expressive of elapsed time (as wrote in “on arriving I wrote a letter”) b : a verb tense expressing action or state in progress or continuance or habitually done or customarily occurring at a past time (as was writing in “I was writing while he dictated” or loved in “their sons loved fishing”)