Break (irregular verb)
From Hull AWE
'To break' is an irregular verb. Its forms are given here:
| Base form | past tense | -ed participle | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| break | broke in Middle and Early Modern English brake |
broken | (In the informal sense of 'bankrupt', or 'without money', participial adjective: "I'm broke.") |
- This is one of the "the 250 or so irregular verbs" listed in Quirk 1985. The list "contains most of the irregular verbs in present-day English ... but is not meant to be exhaustive, particularly with regard to derivative verbs." AWE has copied most of the entries in that list. The verb 'to break' belongs to Quirk's Class 4 A
- You may also want to see an article on confusions between brake and break.