The passé composé is the most used past tense in the modern French language. It is used to express an action that has been finished completely or incompletely at the time of speech, or at some time in the past. The passé composé originally corresponded in function to the English present perfect, but is now used mainly as the equivalent of the simple past. The passé composé is formed using an auxiliary verb and the past participle of a verb.
Conjugation
The passé composé is formed by the auxiliary verb, usually the avoir auxiliary, followed by the past participle. The construction is parallel to that of the present perfect. The passé composé is usually translated into English as a simple past tense, "I saw", or as a present perfect, "I have seen". It could also be translated as emphatic past tense, "I did see".
J'ai vu quelque chose
Tu as parlé de quelque chose
Le garçon est sorti
The auxiliary may actually be used similarly in any tense, leading to the French compound tenses.
The auxiliary verb is typically avoir ‘to have’, but is sometimes être ‘to be’. This is the conjugation of avoir, with a past participle: j’ai vunous avons vu tu as vuvous avez vu il/elle/on a vuils/elles ont vu /they
Auxiliary ''être''
The verbs that use être as an auxiliary verb are intransitive verbs that usually indicate motion or change of state. Since some of these verbs can be used as a transitive verb as well, they will instead take avoir as an auxiliary in those instances; e.g.
Sortir, monter, descendre, entrer, retourner, and passer all have transitive and intransitive uses. This is the conjugation of être, with a past participle: jesuismortnoussommesmorts tuesmortvousêtesmorts il/elle/onestmort he/it died, ils/ellessontmorts The following is a list of verbs that use être as their auxiliary verbs in passé composé:
The above are commonly remembered using the acronym DR and MRS VANDERTRAMP. In addition to these, at least one other verb is conjugated with être:
Décéder – to die – décédé
Passer – to spend/pass– passé
Reflexive forms
In addition to the above verbs, all reflexive/pronominal verbs use être as their auxiliary verb. A reflexive/pronominal verb is one that relates back to the speaker, either as an object e.g. Je me suis trompé ‘I'm mistaken, I made a mistake’, or as a dative form e.g. Je me suis donné du temps.
To form the past participle for first-group verbs and aller too, drop the -er and add -é. parler - er + é = parlé arriver - er + é = arrivé manger - er + é = mangé To form the past participle for second-group verbs, drop the -ir and add -i. finir - ir + i = fini choisir - ir + i = choisi grandir - ir + i = grandi To form the past participle for third-group verbs, drop the -re and add -u. pendre - re + u = pendu vendre - re + u = vendu entendre - re + u = entendu attendre - re + u = attendu
The irregular past participles must be memorized separately, of which the following are a few:
acquérir: acquis apprendre: appris atteindre: atteint avoir: eu boire: bu comprendre: compris conduire: conduit connaître: connu construire: construit courir: couru couvrir: couvert craindre: craint croire: cru décevoir: déçu découvrir: découvert devoir: dû dire: dit écrire: écrit être: été faire: fait instruire: instruit joindre: joint lire: lu mettre: mis offrir: offert ouvrir: ouvert paraître: paru peindre: peint pouvoir: pu prendre: pris produire: produit recevoir: reçu savoir: su souffrir: souffert surprendre: surpris suivre: suivi tenir: tenu venir: venu vivre: vécu voir: vu vouloir: voulu
Agreement between participle and object
The use of the past participle in compound tenses in French is complicated by occasional "agreement" with the object of the action. In French, agreement is accomplished by adding an -e to the end of the past participle if the grammatical gender of the subject or direct object in question is feminine and an -s if it is plural.
The past participle almost always agrees with the subject when the auxiliary verb is être, or when the past participle is used as an adjective.
When the auxiliary verb is avoir, the past participle must agree with the direct object if the direct object precedes the past participle in the sentence.
Examples :
Les hommes sont arrivés.
: NB: agreement, s is needed in that case, because of the être auxiliary - the meaning is that of a predicative expression in that case.
Les filles sont venues.
: NB: agreement of venues, see above.
Nous nous sommes levés.
: NB : an extra e would be required if nous refers to a group of females - see above.
J'ai vu la voiture.
Je l'ai vue.
: NB - agreement needed in that case, referring to the car.
Les voitures que j'ai vues étaient rouges.
: que relative to Les voitures, implies that the participle is feminine plural in that case.
Où sont mes lunettes ? Où est-ce que je les ai mises ?
