Conjugation of the Spanish Verb Mentir

The Day the Wolf Came to Town

There is a story that tells us about a silly boy in a faraway town in Europe, a boy who was tending sheep, but he was kind of bored and planning many pranks to play to his friends. Suddenly, this boy thought of the biggest prank ever. That afternoon as he left the sheep into their shed, the boy got back to town, running and crying out loud “the wolf is coming, the wolf is coming”. I think you know the rest of the story, but let me tell you that it did not end well for the boy whose lies put the town on the verge of a nervous breakdown, my recommendation? No mientas, do not lie.

Mentir, yet another member of the Irregular family

Well, this group of verbs, the irregulars, has the characteristic of being chameleons, they change their form sometimes in a drastic way in order to conjugate. Mentir is part of this group, and we are going to review these changes so prepare for the ride of your life, y no estoy mintiendo (I am not lying).

She has Lying Eyes Verbals

Verbals are words that decided to stop being verbs, and need other words in order to be used. No matter the person, tense, number, these words will remain the same (hooray!). The verb Mentir has three verbals: the infinitive, the gerund and the participle. Let’s move on to the examples:

	Verbal	Common use	Example	English
Infinitive	Mentir (to lie / lying)	Non conjugated	Mentir es el camino a la perdición	Lying is the way to your doom
Gerund	Mintiendo (lying)	Adverb	Ella me estuvo mintiendo todo el tiempo	She was lying to me all the time
Participle	Mentido (lied)	Adjective	Lied and robbed, a very bad experience	Mentido y robado, una muy mala experiencia

Conjugate Mentir

One of the infallible and classic methods that exist to learn how to conjugate the verb Mentir is to memorize the ways in which it is conjugated, as there are several cases. However, native Spanish speakers don’t memorize these conjugations, they use them! Many Spanish teachers strongly recommend having practical exercises with real conversations to obtain “naturalness” in the way of speaking.

Mentir Conjugation: Indicative Mood

Simple Tenses of the Indicative Mood

Subject	Present	Preterite	Imperfect	Conditional	Future
	(lie)	(lied)	(lied)	(would lie)	(will lie)
yo	miento	mentí	mentía	mentiría	mentiré
tú	mientes	mentiste	mentías	mentirías	mentirás
él/ella/ usted	miente	mintió	mentía	mentiría	mentirá
nosotros	mentimos	mentimos	mentíamos	mentiríamos	mentiremos
ellos/ella/ustedes	mienten	mintieron	mentían	mentirían	mentirán

Some examples:

• Cada que la maestra preguntaba sobre nuestra tarea, mentíamos – Every time the teacher asked about the homework, we lied.
• Sarah miente cuando le preguntan su edad – Sarah lies when she is asked about her age.

Compound Tenses of the Indicative Mood

Subject	Present	Preterite	Imperfect	Conditional	Future
	(have/has lied)	(had lied)	(had lied)	(would have lied)	(will have lied)
yo	he mentido	hube mentido	había mentido	habría mentido	habré mentido
tú	has mentido	hubiste mentido	habías mentido	habrías mentido	habrás mentido
él/ella/usted	ha mentido	hubo mentido	había mentido	habría mentido	habrá mentido
nosotros	hemos mentido	hubimos mentido	habíamos mentido	habríamos mentido	habremos mentido
ellos/ellas/ustedes	han mentido	hubieran mentido	habían mentido	habrían mentido	habrán mentido

Mentir Conjugation: Subjunctive Mood

With this mood, we hypothesize or express our wishes. The number of verb tenses is reduced, being divided equally into simple and compound.

Simple Tenses of the Subjunctive Mood

Subject	Present	Imperfect	Imperfect 2	Future
yo	mienta	mintiera	mintiese	mintiere
tú	mientas	mintieras	mintieses	mintieres
él/ella/usted	mienta	mintiera	mintiese	mintiere
nosotros	mintamos	mintiéramos	mintiésemos	mintiéremos
ellos/ellas/ustedes	mientan	mintieran	mintiesen	mintieren

More examples:

• No me gusta que los comerciales de TV mientan tanto – I do not like the TV commercials to lie that much.
• Si mintieses menos, sería mejor para nuestra relación – If you lied a little less, it would be better for our relationship

Compound Tenses of the Subjunctive Mood

Subject	Present	Imperfect	Imperfect 2	Future
	(have lied)	(had lied)	(had lied)	(would have lied)
yo	haya mentido	hubiera mentido	hubiese mentido	hubiere mentido
tú	hayas mentido	hubieras mentido	hubieses mentido	hubieres mentido
él/ella/usted	haya mentido	hubiera mentido	hubiese mentido	hubiere mentido
nosotros	hayamos mentido	hubiéramos mentido	hubiésemos mentido	hubiéremos mentido
ellos/ellas/ustedes	hayan mentido	hubieran mentido	hubiesen mentido	hubieren mentido

Mentir Conjugation: Imperative Mood

We enter the last mood you are going to memorize, with fewer people to learn (fortunately): the bossy (or Imperative) mood. With this conjugation, you can express orders. And since you can’t order yourself or a third party, you will only learn 3 persons and 1 verb tense. Possible uses of the Imperative mood? Children, pets, or those workers who constantly arrive late to work.

Imperative Mood’s Conjugations

Subject	Affirmative	Negative
	(lie / let's lie)	(don't lie / let's not lie)
tú	mientas	no mientas
nosotros	mintamos	no mintamos
ustedes	mientan	no mientan

Examples:

• No mientas más, confiesa y el juez quizá te otorgue clemencia – Do not lie anymore, confess and the judge might grant you clemency.
• Ustedes mientan al ofrecer este producto, así venderemos más. – You lie when offering this product, so we can sell more.

Mentir – Quiz/Worksheet

Your best resource in mastering Spanish will be practicing, and since our goal is to help you, we will leave you some sentences to review what we have learned in this lesson. Fill in the correct conjugation in the spaces using the possible answers from the box below. Just pay attention, for there are two too many:

1.       La próxima vez mejor ___________ y grites que el lobo está viniendo. (Next time, better not lie and do not shout that the wolf is coming)

2.       No te _______________, no va a llegar el producto esta semana. (I will not lie to you, the product will not arrive this week)

3.       Sr. González, usted nos ____________ en su declaración de impuestos y le pondremos una multa. (Mr. Gonzalez, you lied to us in your tax declaration, and thus you will receive a fine)

4.       Si los dos alumnos no _____________ sobre lo sucedido, el director no las habría expulsado de la escuela. (If the two students had not lied about what happened, the principal would not have expelled them)

5.       El hecho de que tú le _________________ a tu esposa para poder venir a ver el partido seguramente te causará problemas. (The fact that you lied to your wife to be able to come to see the match will surely cause you trouble)

6.       Cuando el juez se dio cuenta que los testigos _____________, los sacó de la corte. (When the judge realized that the witnesses had lied, he ordered them out of court)

7.       Cuando fuimos niños éramos muy traviesos, ______________mucho. (When we were children, we were very mischievous, we lied a lot)

8.       Si tus amigos te __________ tanto es una señal de lo poco que valoran tu amistad. (If your Friends lie to you so much, that is a sign that they do not value your friendship) 

9.       El día que lo atraparon ya _____________ a cinco mujeres a quienes prometió casarse con ellas. (The day he was caught, he had already lied to five women to whom he promised to get married)       

10.   “No ___________ Obi Wan, ¡vine a matarte!” dijo Dart Vader. (“Let’s not lie Obi Wan, I am here to kill you” said Dart Vader)

Answers

Here you can confirm if you got the answers right, remember that it’s okay to make mistakes, don’t lose sleep over a few mistakes, keep practicing every day!

1.    No mientas

2.       Mentiré

3.       Mintió

4.       Hubiesen mentido

5.       Hayas mentido

6.       Habían mentido

7.       Mentíamos

8.       Mienten

9.       Había mentido

10.   Mintamos