Second Conjugation Italian Verbs - Conjugating Italian Ere Verbs

The infinitives of all regular verbs in Italian end in –are, –ere, or –ire and are referred to as first, second, or third conjugation verbs, respectively. In English the infinitive (linfinito) consists of to verb. amare to love  Ã‚  Ã‚  temere to fear  Ã‚  Ã‚  sentire to hear Verbs with infinitives ending in –ere are called second conjugation, or –ere, verbs. The present tense of a regular –ere verb is formed by dropping the infinitive ending –ere and adding the appropriate endings to the resulting stem. There is a different ending for each person. Characteristics of the Second Conjugation The  «passato remoto » (historical past) of the second conjugation verbs has two diverse forms of the first and third person singular and third person plural:io temetti/temeiegli temette/temà ©essi temettero/temeronoio vendetti/vendeiegli vendette/vendà ©essi vendettero/venderonoNote! In standard usage the forms –etti, –ette, and –ettero are preferred. The majority of verbs whose root ends in t though, such as battere, potere, and riflettere, take the endings –ei, –à © and –erono.battereio batteiegli battà ©essi batteronopotereio poteiegli potà ©essi poteronoriflettereio rifletteiegli riflettà ©essi rifletteronoThe verbs fare and dire are considered second conjugation verbs (because they are derived from two third conjugation Latin verbs—facere and dicere) as well as all verbs ending in –arre (trarre), –orre (porre), and –urre (tradurre).Verbs ending in –cere (vincere), –gere (scorgere), or –scere (conoscere) have a particular phonetic rule. C, g, and sc of the root maintains the soft sound of the infinitive before the declinations that start with e or i. They take the hard sound before the declinations that begin with a or o:vinceretu vinciche egli vincaspargeretu spargiche egli spargaconosceretu conosciche egli conoscaconosciutocresceretu cresciche egli crescacresciutoMany irregular verbs ending in –cere (piacere, dispiace, giacere, nuocere, tacere) maintain the soft sound by inserting an i before declinations that begin with a or o; if the verb has a regular past participle ending in –uto, an i is also added:nuocereio nuocciotu nuociessi nuocciononuociutopiacereio piacciotu piaciessi piaccionopiaciutogiacereio giacciotu giaciessi giaccionogiaciutoVerbs ending in –gnere are regular and maintain the i of the declinations iamo (indicative and present subjunctive) and iate (present subjunctive):spegnerenoi spegniamoche voi spegniateVerbs endi ng in –iere drop the i of the root before declinations that start with i:compieretu compinoi compiamo