Italian Verbs
When working with Italian verbs, many English-speaking people are amazed to discover that many of these are familiar to them. Italian and English are both Latin-based languages, and many of the verbs in these languages are similar. To illustrate the common roots of these words, the following is a list of common Italian verbs and their English meanings:
Italian Verb / English Meanings
arrivare to arrive
abitaire to live, to inhabit
desiderare to want, to desire
parlare to speak, to parley
riservare to reserve
costare to cost
contare to count
calcolare to calculate
continuare to continue
guardare to watch, to guard
immaginare to imagine
indicare to point to, to indicate
pagare to pay
telefonare to telephone
terminare to finish, to terminate
dividere to divide
esprimere to express
ricevere to receive
As you can see, you could probably understand the gist of an Italian conversation by listening carefully to the words.
Conjugating Italian verbs is also easily accomplished once you understand the patterns that they follow. All these verbs end in “-are,” “-ere,” or “ire” which are all conjugated in different ways. We will begin with “-are.” We will use “arrivare” and “desiderare” for this example:
Verb / Present Tense / Translation
arrivare
io arrivavo I arrive tu arrivavi you (informal) arrive egli arrivava he arrives noi arrivamo we arrive voi arrivavate you (informal plural) arrive essi arrivavano they arrive
desiderare
io desidero I want
tu desideri you(informal) want
egli desidera he wants
noi desideriamo we want
voi desiderate you (informal plural) want
essi desiderano they want
As you can see, these verbs utilize the same endings for each conjugation in the present tense. We will now examine the conjugation of Italian verbs into the present tense that end in “-ere.” We will use the verbs “dividere” and “ricevere” for our examples:
Verb / Present Tense / Translation
dividere
io divido I divide tu dividi you (informal) divide egli divide he divides noi dividiamo we divide voi dividete you (informal plural) divide essi dividono they divide
ricevere
io ricevo I receive
tu ricevi you (informal) receive
egli riceve he receives
noi riceviamo we receive
voi ricevete you (informal plural) receive
essi ricevono they receive
While the present tense is similar between the verbs ending in “-are” and those ending in “-ere,” the spellings do vary. So you will need to remember to look closely at the way in which an Italian verb ends to conjugate it correctly.
As we had not included any Italian verbs that end in “-ire” on our original list, we will use the verb “dire” (to say) for our example when conjugating verbs into the present tense:
Verb / Present Tense / Translation
dire
io dico I say
tu dici you (informal) say
egli dice he says
noi diciamo we say
voi dite you (informal plural) say
essi dicomo they say
As you can see, the conjugation of Italian verbs ending in “-ire” differ greatly from the other two word endings.
To fully understand the conjugation of Italian verbs, you will probably need to study the language closely. A language software program is a good way to learn the basics of the language from the comfort of your own home. If you wish to speak Italian fluently, these programs are probably your best bet.