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In Spanish as in other languages, the past tense cannot be disentangled from the category of aspect. The term ‘aspect’ eludes a definition that is valid for all languages, but in Spanish it refers to a category of the verb that primarily expresses the completedness or non-completedness of the action or state described. Aspect is the crucial factor in the distinction between the Spanish preterite and the imperfect, forms of the verb that can both be used to translate the English simple past tense (she went, they wanted etc.). Broadly speaking, the preterite signals that an event had a beginning and an end, while the imperfect imposes no temporal boundaries.

1. Imperfect–Preterite & Aspectual Class

In default circumstances the imperfect is used normally with stative predicates and the preterite with event predicates:

With activity predicates, the preterite indicates that the activity had a beginning and an end, while the imperfect leaves this open:

Certain verbs are ambiguous between a stative sense and a (punctual) event sense. Thus consider the ambiguous sentence below:

This could mean either that I came to understand what John meant (with the event sense of 'understand') or that I was in the position of knowing what John's point was (with the stative sense). In Spanish, unlike in English, the distinction is reflected formally, through the preterite ~ imperfect contrast:

Items such as dos veces, varias veces etc. can be used to indicate an event occurred a definite or indefinite number of times. In other words, they can be regarded as temporal quantifiers. For example, sentence (8) below can be thought of as asserting that there were three times at which the house changed hands:

If the symbol '$₃x' is used to mean 'true for 3 values of x', and if F means 'occasion on which the house changed hands', then the logical structure of (8) is just '$₃x(Fx)'. A symbol such as '$₃x', which differs from the existential quantifier solely in that a numeral appears between the '$' and the variable, is called a numerically definite quantifier. The meaning of the indefinite quantifier varias veces can be explained using stacked existential quantifiers and the negated identity sign '¹'. Consider sentence (9) below:

Here the logical structure is '$x(Fx & $ y[Fy & y ¹ x])'.

Temporal quantification may be implicit, as in the sentence below:

This asserts that, while he was in Madrid, there were no occasions on which the Pedro dined out. Thus the structure is '~$x(Fx & Gx)', where F means 'time when Pedro was in Madrid' and G means 'time when Pedro dined out'.

Temporal quantification always calls for the preterite, as is shown by the ungrammaticality of (11) below:

The verb form cenó in (10) can be replaced by cenaba without damaging grammaticality, but the nature of the sentence is changed. Consider (12) below:

This does not assert there were no occasions on which the Pedro dined out when he was in Madrid. Instead, it says that, at the time of his visit to Madrid, Pedro was not a frequenter of restaurants, i.e. the sequence no cenaba fuera is dispositional.

The incompatibility between the imperfect and temporal quantification affects all classes of predicate. Thus fue presidente but not era presidente fits naturally with the definite numeric quantifier dos veces:

Items such as siempre, a menudo, todas las semanas, a veces etc. indicate the frequency of an event or action. These are best regarded as forming a single dispositional term with rest of the verb phrase. Thus fuma a veces in (15) below can be treated as a single term that says something about Pedro's character or habits:

Other examples are as follows:

Dispositional predicates are like stative predicates in that they have the subinterval property. They pattern with states also in that in default circumstances they select the imperfect rather than the preterite:

Items like nunca sometimes function as frequency adverbials and sometimes as temporal quantifiers. Sentence (21) illustrates the first case and (22) the second:

Sentence (21) asserts merely that Pedro is not a shrimp-eater, whereas (22) cries out for an analysis in terms of '~ $x', as in '~ $x(Fx & Gx)', where Fs are times during Pedro's stay in Madrid and Gs are times when Pedro ate shrimp. Given that temporal quantification calls for the preterite while dispositional sentences usually call for the imperfect, it is easy to see how aspect selection distinguishes between the frequency and quantificational meanings of words like nunca.

Durational adverbials such as durante diez minutos specify the amount of time occupied by a situation. They are said to be downward-entailing, which means that if a situation holds for an interval I that is determined by a durational adverbial, the situation holds also for any subintervals of I. For example, if John sang for 10 minutes, he necessarily sang for 9, 8, etc. minutes. Therefore the applicability of a durational adverbial depends on whether the predicate in question has the subinterval property or not: state and activity predicates will be compatible but events will not be. In contrast, time-span phrases such as en diez minutos are not downward-entailing: if John cooked a meal in 10 minutes, it does not follow that he cooked it in 9, 8, etc. minutes. Thus predicates that have the subinterval property (i.e. state and activity predicates) will be incompatible.

However both types of adverbial call for the preterite, as the use of either type presupposes that the state, activity or event in question came to an end:

Sentence (26) below appears to suggest the imperfect is compatible with durational adverbials:

However, the durante of (26) is not the same as the durante of the earlier examples. The earlier durante assigns a duration, whereas the durante of (26) indicates temporal inclusion. This second sense of durante is more clearly seen in cases of explicit quantification, such as (27) below:

This asserts that three times within the overall time of Pedro's visit to Madrid are times at which Pedro dined out (i.e. the structure is '$₃x(Fx & Gx)', where Fs are times when Pedro was in Madrid and Gs are times when he ate out. In the same way, (26) asserts not that the subject's stay in Pucallpa lasted for a month (the month of November) but that some time during the month of November was a time at which Pedro was in Pucallpa.

The incompatibility between durante-phrases, when they have a genuine duration-assigning role, and the imperfect is confirmed by the strict prohibition against the imperfect's occurring in interrogative sentences in which it is asked how long a situation lasted for and in which, therefore, a temporal inclusion interpretation is ruled out. Thus, for example,

Phrases such as las 3, dos minutos más tarde and cuando llegó la policía can be regarded as descriptions or proper names that designate instantaneous moments. Depending on the aspectual class of the relevant predicate, such phrases are compatible with clauses in either the preterite or the imperfect, although different temporal relations arise in the two cases. Consider (29) below:

With preterite embarcamos the time of our boarding the plane is interpreted as being identical to the time designated by the phrase las 2 (i.e. t₁ = t₂, where t₁ is the time we boarded and t₂ is 2 o'clock). On the other hand, with imperfect embarcábamos the relation is one of inclusion (i.e. t₂ Í t₁, where 'Í ' means 'is included in'). These differing temporal relations follow obviously enough from the fact that the preterite presents a situation as having a beginning and an end, whereas the imperfect does not.

With stative predicates and also with some activity predicates an absurdity may arise if both the preterite and an instantaneous time designator are used in the same clause. Consider the underlined clause in (30) below:

Given the usual rule, the relation between the time of our being in Bogotá and the time designated by the phrase las 7 y media is one of inclusion (i.e. t₁ Í t₂, where t₁ is 7.30 and t₂ is the time when we were in Bogotá). But if preterite estuvimos is substituted for estábamos, the relation becomes one of identity (i.e. t₁ = t₂), which represents a physical impossibility.

As has been mentioned several times, the preterite signals that a situation has a beginning and an end, while the imperfect imposes no temporal boundaries. This explains why (31) below, with the verb in the preterite, is inconsistent with (32), whereas (33), with the verb in the imperfect, is not:

The above examples each have an event predicate. But identical inconsistency relations hold also for the other aspectual classes. Sentences (34) to (36) below illustrate the point for stative estar enfermo con la gripe. Thus (34) is inconsistent with (35) but (36) is not:

Sentences (37) to (39) illustrate the same point for dispositional perder siempre en la semifinal:

A related phenomenon occurs in indirect speech, as well as in belief and knowledge reports. In this case, however, the effect of the preterite in the clause that describes what was said, believed etc. is to exclude the possibility that the relevant situation overlapped temporally with the time associated with the main clause. Consider (40) below:

The effect of preterite estuvo is to rule out the possibility that the time of María's being ill overlapped with the time associated with the clause Pedro sabía …. In other words (40) has an identical meaning to (41) below:

If estuvo in (40) is changed to estaba, however, the temporal relation vis-à-vis the main clause is transformed. Thus (42) below could be used (though it need not be) to indicate that María was still ill at the time associated with Pedro sabía … :

A phrase that refers to an event can be the subject of a verb. When this is the case, a predicate in the preterite applies to the event as a whole while a predicate in the imperfect applies only to a phase. Compare (43) and (44) below:

The first sentence says that the party as whole was lively, while the second says the party was lively during a certain phase (which would be specified by the context). Thus an item such as cuando la dejé can be added to (44) but not to (43).

In identity sentences, the aspect of ser simply duplicates the aspect of the verb(s) (if any) in the phrases that designate the items whose identity is being asserted: preterite with preterite in (45) below, imperfect with imperfect in (46) below:

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