Twelve Standard >> Participles

Participles

A participle is a non-finite verb that looks like a verb but does the job of an adjective. A participle is actually a verbal adjective. 

A participle can be three types.

  i) Present participle
 ii) Past participle
iii) Perfect participle

Present participle: 
  Present participles end in –ing.

Ex:1) Rolling stones gather no moss.
    In the above sentence apparently has two verbs. One is rolling and another gathers. Rolling stones is the subject of the sentence. Rolling describes the noun stones. So rolling does the job of an adjective. So gather is the only verb in the sentence. Hence rolling is a participle. It ends in -ing. So it is a present participle.
    
     2) Standing on his head, the clown made funny faces.

Past participle:
     Past participles end in –ed, -d, -en, -t, or –n.
    

     Ex: Spoken words cannot be taken back.
          Over here the subject is spoken words. Words is a noun and spoken descrives the noun words. So it is an adjective and it ends in -en. So it is a past participle.
    

Perfect participle:

   Perfect participle denotes an action that has been completed at some point of time.

     Ex: Having rested, we continued our journey.

Over here we is the subject and continued is the verb. Having rested is actually describes the subject we and they also denote an action that has been completed at some certain point of time. So Having rested is an example of the perfect participle.