| a. | 1. | (Gram.) Past; - applied to a tense which expresses an action or state as past. |
| 2. | Belonging wholly to the past; passed by. | |
| n. | 1. | (Gram.) The preterit; also, a word in the preterit tense. |
| Noun | 1. | preterit - a term formerly used to refer to the simple past tense Synonyms: preterite |