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This is from the anime Noir, Episode 1 starting at 23:13 at the school:

[The two characters A and B are leaving the country.]
A: 出国{しゅっこく}の手配{てはい}は済{す}ませた。
　'I've made the arrangements to leave the country.'
B: ありがとう。

My question is about the conjugation of 済ませた. I would have expected to hear: 済まして(い)た. I can't figure out what kind of conjugation that is. It looks like the potential form with iru, but I've never seen a past potential form. Plus, 'can finished' or 'can have finished' is much different than 'have finished'. So again, what kind of conjugation is 済ませた? How is it formed?

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It is simply the 〜た form of 済ませる, which basically means the same as 済ます.

Quoted from 大辞泉:

すま・せる【済ませる】
「済ます」に同じ。

And 大辞林:

すま・せる 【済ませる】
「すます（済）」に同じ。

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  • I don't think my Japanese is good enough to actually understand what any of that is saying.
    – dotnetN00b
    Oct 24, 2011 at 3:50
  • Those quotes are simply the references that say that 済ませる and 済ます are exactly the same. I think "「済ます」に同じ" should be simple enough for beginner to understand.
    – Lukman
    Oct 24, 2011 at 6:01
  • Fair enough. X ni onaji is a simple :) But all that other stuff is distracting to a beginner. Or someone not familiar enough with Kanji.
    – dotnetN00b
    Oct 24, 2011 at 15:32
  • Fine. I've edited the quotes to your liking.
    – Lukman
    Oct 24, 2011 at 15:36
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    @dotnetN00b. You are right but 済ませる is also a root verb on its own. It's not uncommon to have a verb that looks the same as conjugated forms of other verbs. Examples: 任せる (root vs potential), 生まれる (root vs passive), 切れる (root v potential) etc.
    – Lukman
    Oct 25, 2011 at 23:26

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