Spelling Changes in the Preterite

Spelling changes in the Preterite occur because the Preterite vowel endings affect the way some consonants sound.
Remember, in Spanish:

G in front of i and e has a soft English "H" sound: general is pronounced "he-ne-rál".
G in front of a, o, and u has a hard "G" sound (as in "gone", "Gap" or "Gumby"): goma "go-mah" .
C in front of i and e has a soft "S" sound.
C in front of a, o, and u has a "K" sound .

So verbs ending in -car, -gar, and-zar change to maintain their original consonant sound.

Let's look at Jugar (to Play). It is a U-->UE stem-changing verb. In the present tense, Jugar conjugates as

Yo	tú	él, ella, usted	nosotros	ellos, ellas, ustedes
juego	juegas	juega	jugamos	juegan

The g in Jugar is hard, as in the English word `game'.
When we conjugate Jugar in the Preterite following the regular pattern, it should be:

Yo	tú	él, ella, usted	nosotros	ellos, ellas, ustedes
[*jugé]	jugaste	jugó	jugamos	jugaron

But look at the yo form! Remember the Spanish "g" in front of "e" is pronounced like an English "h". So *jugé would mean the g had lost the hard g (as in "game") sound, and the last syllable would be pronounced like the English word "hey". To preserve the hard "g" sound, we must add a "u" in front of the "é" to form the correct Yo form:

jugué

The "u" makes the "g" hard without changing the "é" vowel sound. The spelling changes result from an effort to maintain the same consonant sounds.

Another example is Buscar. In the present tense, Buscar conjugates as

Yo	tú	él, ella, usted	nosotros	ellos, ellas, ustedes
busco	buscas	busca	buscamos	buscan

The "c" is hard like the letter "k".
When we conjugate Buscar in the Preterite following the regular pattern, it should be:

Yo	tú	él, ella, usted	nosotros	ellos, ellas, ustedes
[*buscé]	buscaste	buscó	buscamos	buscaron

But again, look at the yo form! Remember the Spanish "c" in front of "e" is pronounced like an English "s". So *buscé would mean the "c" had lost the hard "k" sound, and the last syllable would be pronounced like the English word "say". To preserve the hard "k" sound, we must change the "c" to "qu" in front of the "é" to form the correct Yo form:

busqué

Remember that "qu" in Spanish always makes a "k" sound and never an English "kw" (as in "queen") sound.

Notice that irregular verbs comprised of 2 or three letters do not carry accent marks:

Yo	tú	él, ella, usted	nosotros	ellos, ellas, ustedes
Ver Vi	viste	vio	vimos	vieron
Ir/Ser Fui	fuiste	fue	fuimos	fueron
Dar Di	diste	dio	dimos	dieron

Dar, Ser and Ir are considered Irregular in the Preterite.

Another group of verbs with spelling changes are Er and IR verbs that have double vowels in their endings like:

Leer, Oír, Caer:

Yo	tú	él, ella, usted	nosotros	ellos, ellas, ustedes
Leer Leí	leíste	leyó	leímos	leyeron
Oír Oí	oíste	oyó	oímos	oyeron
Caer Caí	caíste	cayó	caímos	cayeron

Because the "i" is weak in the face of a stronger vowel, it requires an accent mark to give it emphasis.
Note in the third person singular and plural, the conjugation would be (for Leer) *leió and *leieron:

The "i" is too weak, and as an unaccented "i" between two strong vowels, the "i" becomes the semi-consonant "y" to maintain the pronunciation.

Back to the Preterite Page

Back to the Verb Page