Why no consensus on the number of verb moods?
I only recently tried using the verb conjugator here on this site. I was wondering about the format of the listings. I thought they might be arranged according to moods. Since they weren't (strictly) I became curious as to how many moods were listed in the Reference grammar section. I see that they list the 3 that I was taught in school. Since school I've seen 4 moods listed. After just doing a search online I found 4, 5, then 7 moods listed. Why is there no consensus on something as basic as the number of moods for verbs?
Here are the 7 moods groupings:
personal moods
indicative
subjunctive
condicional
imperative
impersonal moods (not conjugated)
infinitive
gerund
participle
2 Answers
Thank you.
Very helpful.
Impersonal moods'? Never heard such a thing.
The conditional used to be regarded as a mood... long time ago, but nowadays the consensus is: indicative, subjunctive and imperative. On the other hand, Infinitive, present participle and past participle (infinitivo, gerundio y participio) are called non-personal forms of the verb in Spanish grammars.
[url=http://buscon.rae.es/draeI/SrvltGUIVerbos'origen=RAE&IDVERBO=6903]This[/url] is how the RAE (Real Academia Española) classifies tenses and moods.
