Passé composé

Passé composé (French pronunciation: [pase kɔ̃pɔze], compound past) is the most commonly used past tense in the modern French language. It is used to express an action that has been completed at the time of speech, or at some (possibly unknown) time in the past. Passé composé originally corresponded in function to the English present perfect, and is still occasionally used as such (ex: J'ai fini = I have finished), while its main use is as a past tense. It is commonly used as a "narration tense" for oral and written narration. Narration tense is a feature of the Romance languages, which divide events in a story between timeline events, which appear successively in the narration in the same order they happened in real life (or "fictional real life"), and background events, which do not follow such a strict order of appearance and are to be situated relatively to timeline events (anterior, simultaneous, posterior). Narration tense is used for timeline events only, so a string of successive events is frequently expressed with passé composé. Note that in formal writing, even for children, narration is usually done with the passé simple instead of the passé composé.

Passé Composé is formed using an auxiliary verb and the past participle of a verb. The auxiliary verb is typically avoir ("to have") but sometimes être ("to be")

This is the conjugation of avoir:

j'ai  (I have)             nous avons (we have)
tu as (you have)           vous avez  (you have)
il/elle/on a  (he/she/it has)    ils/elles ont    (they have)

This is the conjugation of être:

je suis  (I am)              nous sommes (we are)
tu es    (you are)           vous êtes   (you are)
il/elle/on est   (he/she/it is)    ils/elles sont    (they are)

The following is a list of verbs which use être as their auxiliary verbs in passé composé:

Devenir – to become – devenu
Revenir – to come back – revenu

Monter – to climb – monté
Rester – to stay – resté
Sortir – to exit – sorti

Venir – to come – venu
Aller – to go – allé
Naître – to be born – né

Descendre – to descend – descendu
Entrer – to enter – entré
Retourner – to return – retourné

Tomber – to fall – tombé
Rentrer- to re-enter- rentré
Arriver – to arrive – arrivé
Mourir – to die – mort
Partir – to leave – parti

The above are commonly remembered using the acronym DR & MRS VAN DER TRAMP. In addition to these, at least two other verbs are conjugated with être:

Passer – to pass by (this case only) – passé
Décéder – to decease – décédé

The verbs that use être as an auxiliary verb are intransitive verbs that usually indicate motion or change of state, and can be summarized as in an acrostic "Dr. and Mrs. Van der Tramp" or "Mrs. D.R. Van der Tramp". 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 Eg. Il a sorti un outil pour le réparer.

In addition to the above verbs, all reflexive/pronominal verbs use être as their auxiliary verb.

To form the past participle for first group verbs (-ER verbs) and aller too, drop the -er and add -é.

parler (to speak)    - er + é = parlé (spoken)
arriver (to arrive)  - er + é = arrivé (arrived)
manger (to eat)      - er + é = mangé (eaten)

To form the past participle for second group verbs (-IR verbs with -ISSANT gerund), drop the -ir and add -i.

finir (to finish)    - ir + i = fini (finished)
choisir (to choose)  - ir + i = choisi (chosen)
grandir (to grow up) - ir + i = grandi (grown up)

The irregular past participles found with the third group verbs must be memorized separately, of which the following are a few:

acquérir:    acquis      (acquired)
aller:       allé        (gone)
apprendre:   appris      (learnt/learned)
atteindre:   atteint     (attained)
attendre:    attendu     (waited)
avoir:       eu          (had)
battre:      battu       (beaten)
boire:       bu          (drunk/drunken)
comprendre:  compris     (understood)
conduire:    conduit     (driven)
connaître:   connu       (known)
construire:  construit   (constructed)
courir:      couru       (run)
couvrir:     couvert     (covered)
craindre:    craint      (feared)
croire:      cru         (believed)
décevoir:    déçu        (disappointed)
découvrir:   découvert   (discovered)
devoir:      dû          (had to)
dire:        dit         (said)
écrire:      écrit       (written)
être:        été         (been)
faire:       fait        (done, made)
fondre:      fondu       (melted)
instruire:   instruit    (prepared)
joindre:     joint       (joined)
lire:        lu          (read)
mettre:      mis         (put, placed)
offrir:      offert      (offered)
ouvrir:      ouvert      (opened)
paraître:    paru        (come out)
peindre:     peint       (painted)
pouvoir:     pu          (been able to)
prendre:     pris        (taken)
produire:    produit     (produced)
recevoir:    reçu        (received)
savoir:      su          (known)
souffrir:    souffert    (hurt)
surprendre:  surpris     (surprised)
suivre:      suivi       (followed)
tenir:       tenu        (held, holden)
vendre:      vendu       (sold)
vivre:       vécu        (lived)
voir:        vu          (seen)
vouloir:     voulu       (wanted)

The passé composé is formed by the auxiliary verb followed by the past participle:

J'ai vu (I saw)

Tu as parlé (You spoke)

Le garçon est sorti (The boy went out)

The passé composé is usually translated into English as a simple past tense, "I saw." More rarely it might be translated as a present perfect, "I have seen," or an emphatic past tense, "I did see."

The Past Participle almost always agrees with the subject when the auxiliary verb is être. 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. Recall that in French, agreement is accomplished by adding an -e to the end of the past participle if the subject/direct object in question is feminine and an -s if it is plural. (Note that for verbs of the first and second group, the past participle ends with a vowel, thus the masculine and feminine, singular and plural, forms are all pronounced the same. Within the third group verbs, one can find past participles ending with a mute consonant, such as mis and fait, and these do change pronunciation.)

Les hommes sont arrivés. (The men arrived.)

Les filles sont venues. (The girls came.)

Nous nous sommes levé(e)s. (We got up, extra e required if nous refers to a group of females.)

J'ai vu la voiture. (I saw the car) Je l'ai vue. (I saw it, referring to the car)

Les voitures que j'ai vues étaient rouges. (The cars that I saw were red, que relative to Les voitures, feminine plural)

Où sont mes lunettes ? Où est-ce que je les ai mises ? (Where are my glasses? Where did I put them?)

Voilà l'erreur que j'ai faite. (There's the mistake I made, que relative to l'erreur, feminine singular)

For more information, see French verbs.

Passé composé

See also