Using The Irregular Spanish Verb Tener - To Have
It is inevitable that you will use the verb tener which means 'to have'
, from quite an early stage of your Spanish studies as it is one of the most commonly used verbs in the Spanish language.
It is a particularly useful verb as it is used not only to indicate possession but it is also used in a number of idiomatic expressions that indicate emotions or states of being.
In English the verb 'to have' is used to describe possession but it can also be used as an auxiliary verb, for example; 'I have a car' (possessive) and 'I have seen a car' (auxiliary use).
In Spanish however, although 'tener' also means 'to have' it is only used as the possessive variation of the verb and the verb 'haber', also meaning 'to have', is used as the auxiliary verb.
Tener follows the following format in the present tense:
Singular:
(Yo) tengo I have
(T) tienes you have (familiar)
(l, Ella) tiene he/she has
(Usted) tiene you have (polite)
Plual:
(Nosotros) tenemos we have
(Vosotros) tenis you have (plural familiar)
(Ellos, Ellas) tienen they have
(Ustedes) tienen you have (plural polite)
You may have noticed that the forms above are preceded by a subject pronoun in brackets this is because in Spanish the subject pronoun is very rarely used apart from when ambiguity needs to be avoided, however in most, if not all, South, and Latin American countries the subject pronoun is used a lot of the time.
As you can see from the formation of the verb table above, 'tener' uses the same verb endings as a regular '-er' verb, these are -o, -es, -e, -emos, -is and -en but it has irregularities in the stem of all singular forms and the plural form they and you (polite).
'Tener' is used pretty much in the same way as the English possessive verb 'to have', however expressions using 'tener' are quite common and can be quite confusing, as the following list highlights with the literal translation followed by the english meaning..
tener hambre to have hunger or, to be hungry
tener sed to have thirst or, to be thirsty
tener calor to have heat or, to be hot
tener fro to have cold or, to be cold
tener miedo to have fear or, to be afraid
tener razn to have right or, to be right
tener lugar to have place or, to take place
tener suerte to have luck or, to be lucky
tener sueo to have sleep or, to be sleepy
So, if you were to say for example, 'I am hungry' you would actually say 'tengo hambre' (I have hunger)
by: Daniel Major
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