past perfect simple in relative clauses – English Grammar Profiler

Let’s analyse a real expert example of the past perfect simple in a relative clause to give background information:

This is a 23-year-old woman who had come in by ambulance.

Listen to our example sentence.

We can write two sentences meaning the same thing:

This is a 23-year-old woman. (main clause and topic)
She had come in by ambulance. (extra background information about the woman. Notice: ‘She’ is replaced with the relative pronoun ‘who’)
*Usually the past perfect makes it clear that something happened before something else happened in the past. However, our first clause uses the present tense: ‘This is’ probably because it would sound strange to say ‘this was a woman’ which might suggest she is dead or not a woman now.

In the English Grammar Profile at B2, Point 77 in the category of PAST is defined as:

past perfect simple in relative clauses to give background information.

A search in iWeb for who|that|which had _vvn gives us:

The most common past participles found in past perfect relative clauses:

1 WHO HAD COME 7745 2 WHO HAD TAKEN 5753 3 WHO HAD WORKED 5373 4 WHO HAD DIED 5142 5 WHO HAD MADE 4712 6 WHO HAD LOST 4373 7 WHO HAD GONE 3907 8 THAT HAD HAPPENED 3888 9 WHO HAD SERVED 3609 10 WHO HAD RECEIVED 3596 11 THAT HAD COME 3547 12 WHO HAD BECOME 3400 13 WHO HAD SEEN 3340 14 WHO HAD LIVED 3120 15 THAT HAD GONE 2900 16 THAT HAD TAKEN 2845 17 THAT HAD BECOME 2761 18 WHO HAD SPENT 2713 19 WHO HAD GIVEN 2642 20 WHO HAD LEFT 2626

21 WHO HAD SUFFERED 2318

WHICH HAD BECOME

BBC News I was doing a piece on the second series of Dinnerladies, which had become a big hit. *This overlaps another B2 point = evaluative relative clauses.

23 THAT HAD FALLEN 2151 24 THAT HAD MADE 2088 25 WHO HAD FALLEN 2029 26 WHO HAD WON 1954 27 WHO HAD MOVED 1922 28 WHO HAD PLAYED 1846

29 WHO HAD HELPED 1827

WHO HAD EXPERIENCED

RACGP Dr Tam recently diagnosed cancer in a patient who had experienced delays in testing.

31 WHO HAD FLED 1744 32 THAT HAD OCCURRED 1705 33 WHO HAD USED 1703

34 WHO HAD FOUGHT 1592

35 WHO HAD JOINED 1459 36 WHO HAD ARRIVED 1427 37 WHO HAD PASSED 1402 38 WHO HAD STARTED 1378 39 WHO HAD WRITTEN 1371 40 WHO HAD HEARD 1370 41 WHO HAD BROUGHT 1368 42 WHO HAD TRIED 1356 43 WHO HAD GROWN 1314 44 WHO HAD GATHERED 1302 45 WHO HAD KNOWN 1268

46 WHO HAD COMMITTED 1264

WHICH HAD TAKEN

The Guardian Hitler shot himself on 30 April 1945, avoiding capture by Russian forces which had taken Berlin, and therefore punishment for his crimes.

48 THAT HAD BEGUN 1234 49 WHICH HAD COME 1209

50 WHO HAD ATTENDED 1166

51 WHO HAD LED 1165 52 WHO HAD UNDERGONE 1161 53 THAT HAD GROWN 1125

54 WHO HAD BOUGHT 1123

THAT HAD LED

Fox Sports Fevola said it was that publicity that had led to her being nominated.

56 WHO HAD RETURNED 1091 57 WHO HAD FOUND 1069 58 WHO HAD COMPLETED 1059 59 THAT HAD PASSED 1054 60 WHO HAD MARRIED 1054 61 WHO HAD STUDIED 1050

62 WHO HAD ESCAPED 1016

63 WHO HAD TURNED 990 64 WHO HAD FAILED 950 65 WHO HAD KILLED 949 66 WHO HAD RUN 949 67 WHO HAD TRAVELLED 934 68 THAT HAD SEEN 926 69 WHICH HAD FALLEN 921 70 WHO HAD PURCHASED 921 71 THAT HAD CAUSED 918 72 THAT HAD BROUGHT 903 73 THAT HAD STARTED 902 74 WHO HAD SURVIVED 900 75 WHO HAD ENTERED 897 76 WHO HAD VISITED 889 77 WHICH HAD MADE 884 78 WHO HAD PUT 876 79 WHICH HAD BEGUN 873

80 THAT HAD DEVELOPED 862

81 WHO HAD SIGNED 857 82 THAT HAD LOST 847 83 WHO HAD BUILT 835 84 WHO HAD CALLED 835 85 WHO HAD GOTTEN 834 86 WHO HAD READ 826 87 WHO HAD ASKED 813 88 WHO HAD SET 813 89 WHO HAD PAID 806

90 WHO HAD SUPPORTED 803

91 WHO HAD TRAVELED 802 92 WHO HAD HELD 800 93 WHO HAD PARTICIPATED 794

94 WHO HAD REMAINED 777

95 WHO HAD FOLLOWED 773 96 WHO HAD DEVELOPED 760

97 WHICH HAD LED 746

98 WHO HAD BEGUN 735

99 THAT HAD EXISTED 728

100 WHO HAD SETTLED 725

B1 vocabulary:

attended, developed, escaped, existed, experienced, fought, led, remained, signed, supported