Breakdown of Der Zeuge ist heute verhört worden.
sein
to be
heute
today
der Zeuge
the witness
werden
to be (passive auxiliary + past participle)
verhören
to interrogate
Questions & Answers about Der Zeuge ist heute verhört worden.
Why do we use ist and worden here instead of hat and geworden?
To form the passive voice in the Perfekt tense, German uses the auxiliary verb sein (conjugated here as ist) instead of haben. We also use worden instead of geworden as the past participle of werden whenever it acts as a helping verb for the passive voice.
Why is worden at the very end of the sentence?
In the Perfekt passive, the two participles (verhört and worden) get pushed to the end of the sentence. The past participle of the main action (verhört) always sits right before the passive helping verb (worden).
What is the infinitive of verhört, and why doesn't its past participle start with ge-?
The infinitive is verhören (to interrogate or question). Because it starts with the inseparable prefix ver-, it does not take the ge- prefix that usually marks past participles.
Zeuge ends in an "-e". Doesn't that usually mean it's a feminine noun?
Usually yes, but der Zeuge (the witness) is a masculine noun. It belongs to a specific group of masculine nouns called "weak nouns" (or N-declension nouns). While it is just Zeuge here in the subject position, it adds an -n in almost all other grammatical cases (for example, as a direct object it becomes den Zeugen).
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