B1 · The past tense · about 7 minutes
Gdzieś był? The movable personal ending
the movable ending (ruchoma końcówka)
The ending -em, -eś, -śmy, -ście can move from the verb to a word further forward.
Do you know this already?
“New to me”: the explanation first, then practice. “Test myself”: 3 short questions – get at least two right and you go straight to the harder exercises.
Understand
RememberThe ending may move, but it appears only once — and you write it on the verb.
- When
- Before the past
- The past
- Past linked to the present
- The present
- The future
- Completed in the future
The past — Something that happened, finished, and stays where it happened.
- Signal words
- gdzieś
- coś
- kiedyś
- myśmy
- wyście
- gdybyś
- żebyś
The form
The patterns at a glance
Each row first says when or what the pattern is used for, then gives an example in Polish.
negation question marker
| standard | Gdzie byłeś? |
| colloquial | Gdzieś był? |
| standard | Co kupiliście? |
| colloquial | Coście kupili? |
| standard | My o tym nie wiedzieliśmy. |
| colloquial | Myśmy o tym nie wiedzieli. |
| fixed phrase | Dawnośmy się nie widzieli! |
| always moved: conditional, żeby | gdybyś, gdybyśmy, żebyś, żebyście |
| the same pattern | być, robić, kupić, wiedzieć, widzieć |
The rules one by one
The form this topic is about
In the standard language the ending stays on the verb.
Gdzie byłeś wczoraj?Where were you yesterday? (to a man)
Colloquially it moves to the first stressed word.
Gdzieś był wczoraj?Where were you yesterday? (to a man, casual)
The ending appears only once in the sentence — on the verb or before it, never on both.
Coście robili w weekend?What did you get up to at the weekend? (to several people)
It likes to move onto a stressed pronoun.
Myśmy już jedli.We have already eaten.
After gdyby and żeby it always moves.
Gdybyś chciał, mógłbyś przyjść.If you wanted to, you could come. (to a man)
Example sentences
Dawnośmy się nie widzieli!We haven’t seen each other for ages!
Coś ty zrobił?What on earth have you done? (to a man)
Wyście to zrobili?Did you do that? (to several people)
6 more example sentences
Kiedyś przyjechał?When did you arrive? (to a man)
Żebyś wiedział, jak tu pięknie!If only you knew how lovely it is here! (to a man)
Gdzie byliście na wakacjach?Where did you go on holiday? (to several people)
Gdzieście byli na wakacjach?Where did you go on holiday? (to several people, casual)
Tyś to powiedział?Did you say that? (to a man)
Szkoda, żeś nie przyszedł.Pity you didn’t come. (to a man)
The trap English speakers fall into
Watch out
Once you have heard the moved ending, it is tempting to put it in twice: on the question word and again on the verb. The ending appears only once. Either Gdzie byłeś? or Gdzieś był?.
Quick check
A warm-up: 2 questions, answered straight away. They do not count towards your progress.
Practise
9 exercises on this topic. Your answers are checked in the browser; none of them leaves your device.
Now write it yourself8 sentences on this topic, typed and checked instantly.
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The full explanation
Read it all · about 1 min
The past-tense endings for “I”, “you”, “we” and “you” (plural) — -em, -eś, -śmy, -ście — are really little words stuck to the verb. In casual speech they can come loose and move to the first stressed word of the sentence, often a question word: Gdzie byłeś? becomes Gdzieś był? It is a little like English “where’ve you been?”, where the auxiliary leans on the question word.
You hear it mostly in questions and with pronouns: Coście kupili? instead of Co kupiliście?, Myśmy o tym nie wiedzieli instead of My o tym nie wiedzieliśmy. The meaning stays the same; only the tone is more relaxed.
For you this means: speak and write the standard form, with the ending on the verb. But you must recognise the moved ending, because otherwise gdzieś means “somewhere” and coś “something”. Coś zrobił? can mean “What have you done?” or “Has he done something?” — the context decides.
The same endings move quite regularly in the conditional and after żeby: gdybyś, żebyśmy. There they are standard, and you will learn them in the topics on gdyby and żeby.
Worth knowing1
Worth knowing
A feature of conversation
Like English contractions, the moved ending lives mainly in speech. In a letter to an office you write Gdzie Pan był? or the standard form.
Gdzieś się tak spieszył?Where were you rushing off to? (to a man)
The verbs on this page, in every form: być · zrobić · móc · chcieć · przyjść · robić · jeść · przyjechać