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In contrast to regular verbs,
irregular verbs are those verbs that fall outside the
standard patterns of conjugation in the languages in
which they occur. For there to be irregular verbs in a language, obviously there must be regular verbs. English has several regular groups of verbs which are typically predictable (i.e., if one is shown the verb and is told it is not irregular, one can know instantly with perfect accuracy how to conjugate it without the need to have it pre-sorted into a class of verbs). |
The English language has a large number of
irregular verbs. In the great majority of these, the past
participle and/or past tense is not formed according to the usual
patterns of English regular verbs. Other parts of the verb - such
as the present 3rd person singular -s or -es, and present
participle -ing - may still be formed regularly.
Among the exceptions are the verb to be and certain defective
verbs which cannot be conjugated into certain tenses.
Most English irregular verbs are native, originating in Old
English. They also tend to be the most commonly used verbs. The
ten most commonly used verbs in English are all
irregular.
What Counts As
"Regular"?
Classes of verbs in English
include:
| Ending in e: | care, cares, cared, caring |
| Ending in o: | coo, coos, cooed, cooing |
| Ending in i | ski, skis, skied, skiing |
| Ending in y as a vowel (i.e., preceded by a consonant): | try, tries, tried, trying |
| Ending in y as a consonant: | fray, frays, frayed, fraying |
| Ending in y as a consonant: | fray, frays, frayed, fraying |
| Ending in single consonant (besides y) preceded by single stressed vowel: | zap, zaps, zapped, zapping |
| Ending in consonant otherwise: | trick, tricks, tricked, tricking |
Other languages have different numbers
of regular verbs; for instance, French divides regular
verbs into just three categories ("er", "ir", and "re"
endings).
How many patterns of conjugation are considered to be standard in
a given language is often up for debate. If a large enough group
of irregular verbs in a language have parallel conjugations, it
is almost arbitrary whether to count that as an additional
"standard" conjugation or as a large collection of irregular
verbs.
Differentiating Between Regular and
Irregular
What counts as an irregular verb is strongly
dependent on the language itself. In English, the surviving
strong verbs are considered to be irregular. In Old English, by
contrast, the strong verbs are usually not considered to
be irregular, at least not only by virtue of being
strong verbs: there were several recognized classes of strong
verbs, which were regular within themselves.
In modern English, the strong verbs are largely a closed and
vestigial class. All of the surviving strong verbs differ
markedly from other verbs, and thus are classified as
"irregular"; here, they are conspicuous exceptions in the midst
of a much larger class of rule-bound regular verbs.
Irregular In Spelling
Only
In some languages, the count of
irregular verbs could be greatly expanded if one were to count
verbs that are irregular only in their spelling, but not in their
pronunciation.
The substitution of "c" for "z" does not affect the
pronunciation. It is strictly a matter of
orthography and can be perfectly predicted. Therefore,
this verb is not always considered to be irregular.
English has similar cases; the verb "pay" sounds regular: "I
pay", "I paid", and "I have paid" are all pronounced as
expected.
But the spelling is irregular and that cannot be perfectly
predicted - for example, "pay" and "lay" turn into "paid" and
"laid", but "sway" and "stay" turn into "swayed" and "stayed".
For this reason "pay" and verbs like it are almost always
considered to be irregular.
Common
Irregularities
common with most Indo-European languages, in
English, such common verbs as to be, to be able, to do, and
to have are extremely irregular.
This is a list of some irregular verbs in English. Of course,
there are many others, but these are the more common irregular
verbs.
| Base Form | Past Simple | Past Participle |
| awake | awoke | awoken |
| be | was, were | been |
| become | became | become |
| cost | cost | cost |
| draw | drew | drawn |
| eat | ate | eaten |
| fall | fell | fallen |
| grow | grew | grown |
| hide | hid | hidden |
| keep | kept | kept |
| lend | lent | lent |
| make | made | made |
| pay | paid | paid |
| ring | rang | rung |
| sell | sold | sold |
| teach | taught | taught |
| understand | understood | understood |
| write | wrote | written |
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References: English Club, Wikipedia
