A1
The passé composé with avoir
How the French passé composé is formed with avoir, how participles are built, and where the negative and adverbs go.
The ordinary past tense in spoken French is built from two pieces: avoir in the present, then the past participle.
J’ai mangé.
I-have eaten
I ate.
Nous avons vu le film.
we have seen the film
We saw the film.
Building the participle
| -er verbs | parler → parlé |
| -ir verbs | finir → fini |
| -re verbs | vendre → vendu |
The -er participle is the important one, since most verbs are -er. Parlé is pronounced exactly like the infinitive parler, and the spelling is the only difference.
The irregular ones are frequent
| avoir → eu | had |
| être → été | been |
| faire → fait | done, made |
| voir → vu | seen |
| prendre → pris | taken |
| mettre → mis | put |
J’ai fait une erreur.
I-have made a mistake
I made a mistake.
One French past, three English ones
J’ai mangé covers I ate, I have eaten and I did eat. French does not distinguish them here — the imperfect, which does something different, comes later.
The negative wraps the avoir
Je n’ai pas mangé.
I not-have not eaten
I haven’t eaten.
Je n’ai mangé pas.
Je n’ai pas mangé.
Ne and pas go around the conjugated verb — ai — and the participle follows both. See negation.
Short adverbs go inside
Bien, déjà, souvent, trop and beaucoup sit between the two parts.
J’ai déjà mangé.
I-have already eaten
I’ve already eaten.