← Back to all Modern Standard Arabic verbs
Root Verb
اِسْتَطَاعَ
istata3a
to be able to
ط و ع
This is a Form X hollow verb; the long vowel disappears in the past tense when the suffix starts with a consonant (e.g., istata3tu).
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Past Affirmative
أنا
I — "I could"
How these tenses work
The present tense
Person prefixes, plus the dialect's marker for "now" or "usually".
The past tense
One stem, eight endings.
The future
One small prefix or word in front of the present.
Saying "not"
Negating verbs, nouns and adjectives.
Roots and verb forms (Form I–X)
How three root letters and a pattern make a verb.
Verb classes: sound, hollow, defective, doubled
Why some verbs change shape when they conjugate.