gave

gave — verb

1. Gave is the form of the verb 'give' that you use for something that happened in

1.verbtransitive / intransitiveB1
Definition

Gave is the form of the verb 'give' that you use for something that happened in the past. It means to hand something to another person, to provide something for someone, or to allow someone to have or experience something at an earlier time.

Example

Shirin gave her little sister a warm hug before leaving for school.

ditransitive: gave + indirect object + direct object

Aarav gave his old smartphone to a friend who needed one for school.

gave + direct object + to + recipient

Common collocations
  • gave someone something
  • gave something to someone
  • gave away
  • gave generously
  • gave freely
  • gave out

Grammar Patterns

gave + someone + something

gave + something + to + someone

Usage Note

Gave is only the past simple form — it cannot follow have, has, or had. Use given (the past participle) after auxiliary verbs: She has given me advice before. Gave stays the same for all subjects (I gave, you gave, he gave, we gave, they gave). Unlike regular verbs, it never takes an -ed ending.

Common Mistakes

She gived me a book for my birthday.
She gave me a book for my birthday.
'give' is an irregular verb; the past tense is 'gave', not 'gived'.
I have gave him the money yesterday.
I gave him the money yesterday.
use 'gave' for the simple past; 'given' is the form that goes with 'have/has/had'.
He was gave a present by his boss.
He was given a present by his boss.
in passive sentences, use the past participle 'given', not the simple past 'gave'.

Word family

Common collocations

Nouns

Adverbs

Phrases

  • gave someone a hand
  • gave it a try
  • gave rise to
  • gave way to

Prepositions

Etymology

Old EnglishMiddle EnglishEnglish

Gave comes from Old English 'giefan' (to give). In Old English, the past tense was 'geaf', which changed to 'yaf' and later 'gave' in Middle English. This irregular pattern has survived into Modern English because the verb is so common that it resisted the regular -ed rule.