had
James, while John had had "had", had had "had had"; "had had" had had a better effect on the teacher.
The sentence describes two students whose responses to a grammar question revealed that 'had had' was preferred over plain 'had' for clarity in past perfect tense.
Meanings (pronounced /hæd/)
the past tense of 'have' — possessed, held, or experienced
- She had a wonderful time.
- We had three dogs growing up.
used with a past participle to form the past perfect tense, denoting completed past action prior to another past time
- By the time I arrived, she had already left.
- He had eaten before the meeting started.
Word origin
From Old English hæfde, the past tense of habban ('to have'), from Proto-Germanic *habjaną. 'Have' (and its past tense 'had') is among the most frequent verbs in English, doing duty as both a main verb (to possess) and an auxiliary verb (forming the perfect tenses).
Fun fact
The 'James while John had had had had...' sentence is grammatically valid English — it's a constructed example often used to teach the difference between simple past and past perfect tenses. The 11 'had's parse as a contrast between two students' answers; punctuated correctly with quotation marks, the sentence is unambiguous.