Two seats were vacant. English can be difficult, especially when it comes to words that can be easily confused. My English99 teacher wrote a mark "weak" on my sentence starts with 'there' Dec 07 2009 23:12:39. anonymous "There" is a false subject and no, the word should not begin a sentence. Learn here. I wish he were here now. At the end of this sentence. What does were mean? There are several reasons why you might be struggling to decide whether you should be using \'was\' or \'were\' in a sentence. (verb) They were a fine group. So, you will use “was” with I, he, she and it while you will use “were” with you, we and they. We were younger then. Where to Use Was/Were? Generally, “was is used for singular objects and “were” is used for plural objects. Even though you are singular, you must use “were”. I wish I were a prince. The difference between Were, Where, and We're. There were two cakes. Had been is used in the past perfect continuous tense. I wish I were young. See more. A couple of examples would be who vs whom and further vs farther. They were very excited. Jonathan Oldstyle and Diedrich Knickerbocker were two of Irving's pen name. Where is the period? Alternatively, you can use the passive sentence form in the sentence as follows: “The players were slammed against the boards during the hockey game.” In such cases, the terms are used correctly by describing the state and tense of the subject in the passive form. Jonathan Oldstyle and Diedrich Knickerbocker are the subjects of the sentence. They were seen to go out. Were you out last night? Instead of saying, "There is a book on the table," as the cited example above does, write "A book is on the table." Any sentence with two subjects takes a plural verb. Both ‘are’ and ‘were… Third-person plural simple past tense indicative of be. In both the sentences, the word were is used in the past tense of the two sentences ‘they are tired’ and ‘the students are happy when they see the new books in the library’ respectively. We were very tired. Its counterpart, ‘were’, is used when the subject of the sentence is plural, and the action or condition that is expressed has already been completed or the event happened in the past. Where is a word used to ask the location of something (most of the time). I wish I were rich. Another combo that can get confusing is was vs were. Forty people were present. "Were" We were all tired. Since ‘are’ is in the present tense, it must be used to denote an action that is being done in the present. “You was” is an incorrect usage. There is a tip you might want to consider. The cat and the dog were sitting on the fence. What does Had Been mean? Observe the two sentences … Where were you going? Those are two completely different words. They were taken prisoner. 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