Past perfect

Plusquamperfekt

The past perfect tense Plusquamperfekt is used to describe events in the past that took place before something else in the past.

Building sentences in the Plusquamperfekt tense

hatte/war + Partizip II

A sentence in Plusaquamperfekt is formed in the following way: haben/sein in the Präteritum (hatte/war) form + Partizip II (for regular verbs: ge- + verb stem + -t).

Bevor wir ins Kino gingen, hatten wir die Hausaufgabe gemacht.

Translation
We had done the homework before we went to cinema.

Explanation
wir + haben + machen 👉 wir hatten + ge- + mach + -t 👉 wir hatten gemacht

Bevor die Polizei ankam, war der Dieb schon geflohen.

Translation
By the time the police arrived, the thief had already run away.

Person	hatte + lernen (Partizip II)	war + reisen (Partizip II)
ich	hatte gelernt	war gereist
du	hattest gelernt	warst gereist
er/sie/es	hatte gelernt	war gereist
wir	hatten gelernt	waren gereist
ihr	hattet gelernt	wart gereist
sie/Sie	hatten gelernt	waren gereist

Applications

Order of events in the past

The tense Plusquamperfekt is used when we want to describe an activity/event that took place in the past before another activity/event in the past.

Ich hatte Deutsch 10 Jahre lang gelernt, bevor ich nach Deutschland zog.

Translation
Before I moved to Germany, I had been learning German for 10 years.

Explanation
The part of the sentences describing the earlier activity/event is always in the tense Plusquamperfekt 👉 hatte gelernt and the subsequent activity/event in the tense Präteritum 👉 zog (ziehen - zog - gezogen).

The conjunction nachdem

The Plusquamperfekt tense is most commonly used to describe the order of events in the past in sentences with the conjunction nachdem (after ... then ...).

Nachdem ich mein Studium abgeschlossen hatte, ging ich auf eine Reise um die Welt.

Translation
After I finished my studies, I went on a trip around the world.

Explanation
The earlier activity (graduation) in the Plusquamperfekt tense 👉 hatte abgeschlossen, and the later activity (going on a trip around the world) in the Präteritum tense 👉 gingen (gehen - ging - gegangen).