Breakdown of Ik heb gisteravond al een pizza gegeten.
ik
I
een
a/an
hebben
to have
eten
to eat
al
already
gisteravond
yesterday evening
de pizza
the pizza
Questions & Answers about Ik heb gisteravond al een pizza gegeten.
What is the dictionary form of gegeten?
The infinitive is eten (to eat). Its past participle is irregular. While regular past participles usually end in -t or -d, irregular ones like gegeten often end in -en and simply add the ge- prefix to the front.
The sentence uses heb ... gegeten (have eaten), but the English translation says 'ate'. Why?
In everyday Dutch, the present perfect tense (heb gegeten) is the most common way to talk about the past. While English prefers the simple past ('ate') when mentioning a specific time like yesterday, Dutch naturally uses the 'have eaten' structure.
Why is gegeten all the way at the end of the sentence?
This is a strict rule in Dutch word order. When you use a helping verb like heb, the second verb (the past participle gegeten) is pushed to the very end of the sentence. The time (gisteravond), adverbs (al), and objects (een pizza) are sandwiched in between.
Is gisteravond made of two different words?
Yes, it combines gisteren (yesterday) and avond (evening). You will see this pattern often with times of day. Notice that the 'en' from gisteren is dropped to make the new combined word easier to say.
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