Past tense of shelve
regular verb
The past tense of shelve is shelved. The past participle is also shelved.
Forms of shelve
| Base form (V1) | shelve /ʃɛlv/ |
|---|---|
| Past tense (V2) | shelved |
| Past participle (V3) | shelved |
| Present participle | shelving |
| Third person singular | shelves /ˈʃɛlvz/ |
Shelved in a sentence
- They shelved the entire project when they heard how much it would cost.
- D357–D384, on the West Highland and Callander-Oban lines has been shelved.1961 October, “Motive Power Miscellany: Scottish Region”, in Trains Illustrated, London: Ian Allan Publishing, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 636
- That same month, another local icon, Guinness, shelved plans to build a new $1.04 billion (Canadian) "superbrewery" in the Dublin outskirts.2009 May 3, David Olive, “The boom, bust and echo of the Emerald economy”, in Toronto Star. From the entry superbrewery
- Not reaching even the plumber from Kenosha today, will it be completely shelved in the greater égalitarianism of tomorrow?1961, The Iowa Journal of History (State Historical Society of Iowa), volume 59, issues 1–2, page 123. From the entry égalitarianism
Meaning of shelve
- verb To furnish (a place) with shelves; especially, to furnish (a library, etc.) with bookshelves.
- verb To place (something) on a shelf; especially, to place or arrange (books) on a bookshelf.
- verb To take (drugs) by anal or vaginal insertion.
Questions about the past tense of shelve
- What is the past tense of shelve?
- The past tense of shelve is shelved.
- What is the past participle of shelve?
- The past participle of shelve is shelved.
- Is shelve a regular or irregular verb?
- Shelve is a regular verb: its past tense adds -d.
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: shelve (page history and authors) and the entries of its forms. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws left out forms marked obsolete, archaic, rare or dialectal and added the examples. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Cite this page: “Past tense of shelve.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/past-tense/shelve. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.