802: Strong Verb Participles (-en day 3) Feb 17, 2017

While it is true that there are many ways in which '-en' is used, often the examples are few, and ever dwindling. Meanwhile, perhaps the most common occasion to see the suffix '-en' in English is when it forms the past participle of strong verbs, which you can learn more about here: Strong Verbs. Most of the English's surviving strong verbs, which is to say: verbs that change tense by altering the middle instead of adding common suffixes like, '-ed'—which attaches to weak verbs—come from Old English. Some strong verbs, such as 'take', with the participial form 'taken', or adjectives like 'spoken', derive from this ending. This is not the case for all strong verbs though, as many have a separate participial form, such as 'sing' and 'sung'. Interestingly, the '-ed' attached to weak verbs also comes from Old English, but is now by far the most popular.
Check out the yesterday's post on this versatile suffix: 'Vixen', 'Burden' and Inflectional Suffixes.