It can be called either the past historic or the simple past and is exclusive only to French. It is becoming more and more rare as writers use it less. Below are how it is formed, after removing the ending.
It may be useful to know these two verbs in this tense
Imperfect Subjunctive
This is used for the same reasons as the present subjunctive, but for an action that was not completed (see imperfect indicative). To conjugate this verb find the il/elle part of the verb in the past historic and remove the -a or -it ending. Then add the following.
It may be useful to know these two verbs in this tense
Others
There also several other French "literary" tenses. I have not put them down because they are tenses already familiar to you, but with the past participle on the end
