The past continuous (past continuous) is a verbal tense used in English.
The past continuous is a verbal tense of the English language , called past continuous in the original language . At this time, the action mentioned began to develop in the past (with respect to the speaker's situation) and then extended in time.
It should be noted that what has already happened is part of the past . If we place ourselves on a chronological line, the past is what was left behind the current time (the present ), while the events that have not yet taken place will take place in the future . Continuous , on the other hand, is that which remains or develops without interruptions. It is something incessant, which lacks pauses or cuts.
Examples of sentences in the past continuous
«She was reading a book» is a phrase that can be translated as “She was reading a book.” The past continuous indicates that the woman in question, a day ago, was reading a work; This activity did not necessarily end at that moment, but could continue.
Something similar happens with the following expression : “Manuel was talking when his father arrived.” In this case, the verb tense indicates that, when his father arrived, Manuel had already begun to speak: the action, therefore, began before his father arrived.
The past continuous can also be used when we have two past actions, one of which has already finished and the other continues while the first one was completed. The action that ended at the moment is expressed in the simple past , while the other must appear in the past continuous: “ When he shouted, I was talking to Sarah.” ).
An action in the past continuous began to develop in the past (taking into account the speaker's situation) and then continued in time.
Differences with the past simple
Although at first glance the simple past and the past continuous seem very easy to distinguish if you carefully study their definitions, it is worth mentioning that many foreigners use the second instead of the first, probably because of certain language differences that prevent them from perceiving the application. correct for each one. For example, to express that "the Romans used shields and spears" the most precise sentence conjugates the verb use in the past simple (" Romans used shields and spears "), and not in the past continuous (" Romans were using shields and spears "). .
Just as with the present simple and continuous, the past simple can indicate an action that took place many times over an extended period of time , something that was true in a past era (" I went to school by bus ." / « I went to school by bus «); However, unlike the present simple, it also serves to relate an event that occurred only once, at a well-defined moment (" That day I finally understood my father's words " / " That day I finally understood my father's words" «).
The past continuous cannot fulfill any of these functions , but it can provide us with a context to locate the last example: « That day, while I was reading your book , I finally understood my father's words «, « That day, while I was reading your book, book , I finally understood my father's words . The action of reading the interlocutor's book may indicate, for example, that thanks to its content the sender was able to process and understand the message that his father had given him in a previous instance; Therefore, said construction is secondary, it could be omitted without altering the main meaning of the sentence.
It is important to remember that the English language does not use the term tense to group the possible conjugations of verbs, but rather uses the word tense ; Although in Spanish we translate it as time, the need to resort to another concept arises due to not having enough conjugations to express all the verb tenses. In English, therefore, many tenses denote more than one tense, depending on the context .