Portuguese 5.4. Perfect Subjunctive Tense

In this lesson, we study the perfect subjunctive tense in Portuguese.

We have previously studied the subjunctive mood and the present subjunctive tense. The subjunctive mood is used to express opinion, possibility, and feelings, such as fear, doubt, hope, desire, etc.

Now, we will study the case when we want to express opinions, possibilities, and feelings, such as fear, doubt, hope, desire, etc., about something that happened in the past. In other words, we want to describe the past tense but in the subjunctive mood, i.e., the perfect subjunctive.

Conjugation

The perfect subjunctive tense in Portuguese, similar to the present perfect in the indicative, uses the past participle. However, the only difference is that the auxiliary verb “ter” is conjugated in the subjunctive.

		-ar ending e.g., falar	-er ending e.g., comer	-ir ending e.g., partir
eu	tenha	falado	comido	partido
ele/ela/você	tenha
nós	tenhamos
eles/elas/vocês	tenham

Remember that even though both “ter” and “haver” are both grammatically correct. The auxiliary “haver” is seldom used in spoken language and is less commonly used in written language nowadays than “haver.” Thus, we will focus here only on the use of the auxiliary “ter.”

Examples

Let us look at some examples in context:

É bom que eu tenha descansado depois do jogo.	It is good that I have relaxed after the match.
Espero que você tenha gostado da sua viagem.	I hope that you have enjoyed your trip.
Fico triste que ele não tenha me ligado.	It makes me sad that he hasn’t called me.
Duvido que tenhamos visto sua casa antes de hoje.	I doubt that we have seen your house before today.
Estou feliz que você tenha chegado.	I am happy that you have arrived.
Acho que eles não tenham vivido aqui.	I don’t believe they have lived here.

Another less common use is to describe things that will have been completed in the future. It is, in effect, expressing the future perfect in the subjunctive mood, for example:

Espero que você tenha terminado de escrever o livro no ano que vem.

I hope that you will have finished writing the book by next year.

Note that “no ano que vem” (by next year) is what clarified the meaning to be in the future. Otherwise, without reference to some future time, it is more likely to assume the following meaning:

Espero que você tenha terminado de escrever o livro.

I hope that you have finished writing the book.

Next: Imperfect Subjunctive

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