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Arnaud25 Diglot Senior Member France Joined 3765 days ago 129 posts - 235 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Speaks: French*, English Studies: Russian
| Message 9 of 19 08 September 2014 at 7:29pm | IP Logged |
s_allard wrote:
emk wrote:
[...
French verbs fall into three general categories:
* -er verbs: These are all completely regular, except for aller and a couple of rare slang forms.
UPDATE: Oh, yeah. And some minor variations in certain stems. More on this later.
* -ir verbs: Many of these are mostly regular, but lots of them have slightly unpredictable details to their
conjugation.
* -re verbs: These tend to be pretty irregular.
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Now that I have a bit of time, I want to revisit something that I glossed over quickly earlier. It is true that if one
looks at just the last two letters of the infinitive of French verbs, they fall into three groups, as stated above. But
this is not how verb conjugation is taught in French. First of all, it is important to understand what a regular
conjugation means. When the various verb forms can be easily derived from the infinitive, the verb is called
regular. You look at the infinitive and you know how to conjugate the verb. There may be little spelling
adjustments for phonetic reasons.
Traditionally, French verbs are classified into three groups.
1. All the regular verbs ending in -er. This is the largest group of French verbs, and nearly all new verbs take this
ending.
2. All the regular verbs ending in -ir.
3. All the irregular verbs ending in -er, -ir, -oir and the verbs ending in -re. This is a mixed bag, This is where
the problems of conjugation lie. I should point out that the only irregular -er verb is aller.
There are somewhere around 350 to 500 verbs in this last group depending on how obscure the verbs may be.
But this is also where some of the most common verbs in French can be found, especially the top ten verbs.
The interesting thing is that if you look at these so-called irregular verbs of the group 3, you will notice that
there are actually a number of subgroups or sets of words that have similar conjugation. attendre, entendre,
vendre, défendre are conjugated exactly alike. prendre, comprendre, reprendre conjugate identically
because they have the same radical. venir, tenir and derived forms go together, except for the auxiliary in
the passé composé.
So, when you look at those so-called irregular verbs from this perspective, there are actually very few truly
irregular verbs, i.e. where about the conjugation is unpredictable just by looking at the infinitive. This article
says that there are only nine irregular verbs in French.
Conjugaison en français
The author notes that for the verb faire, the non-standard form vous faisez is becoming accepted as an
alternative to vous faites. No word about vous disez that is still considered a big mistake.
The importance of all this is that French so-called irregular verbs are not a huge mass of illogical forms to be
learned by heart. There are around 9 patterns that you have to learn to derive all the conjugations.
A much bigger and important problem, that's not the subject of this thread, is how to use them properly.
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Absolutly exact.
The french children spend a lot of time at school learning the regular sub-groups of the verbs of the 3rd group, and little mental tricks to remplace one by another to check if the conjugation is correct or not.
The regular 2nd group contains all the -ir verbs having the first plural person in -issons: finir-> nous finissons: 2nd group. Ouvrir: nous ouvrons->3rd group.
I think nonetheless that "vous faisez" is still considered as a "barbarisme" and should be avoided.
BTW: "finir" and "réfléchir" are regular verbs of the 2nd group
Edited by Arnaud25 on 08 September 2014 at 8:08pm
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emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5455 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map
| Message 10 of 19 09 September 2014 at 5:32pm | IP Logged |
s_allard wrote:
So, when you look at those so-called irregular verbs from this perspective, there are actually very few truly
irregular verbs, i.e. where about the conjugation is unpredictable just by looking at the infinitive. This article
says that there are only nine irregular verbs in French.
Conjugaison en français |
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Thank you for this link. The author's model of French verbs is really quite brilliant, though it overlooks a handful of minor irregularities. I used this model to update my analysis, with occasional reference to this article that tries to group verbs by how their principal parts vary.
French irregular verbs: Reaching 98% text coverage
For my working notes, see my speadsheet of verb prototype frequencies with notes. Up through 98% coverage, these notes are based on a rigorous, systematic validation of the actual verb forms using software.
Stuff you need to learn for real:
Regular verb groups: -er, -ir, -re.
7 true irregulars: être, avoir, aller, pouvoir, vouloir, savoir, devoir.
3 irregular forms: Vous dites, il plaît, il connaît.
1 defective verb: falloir only exists in a handful of forms.
When to use the 7 principal parts: Infinitive, past participle, singular, atonic, tonic, future, passé simple.
Some sound laws: Handle ge, ç, d/t + t when applying suffixes.
After that, you only need to learn the principal parts:
Insanely messy: asseoir (seriously, no wonder I can never get this right).
Fairly complicated: voir, tenir/venir, boire, mourir, plaire.
Doubling consonants: appeler/jeter.
Groups with random e weirdness: espérer, amener.
The -ire variations: lire, conduire, écrire.
Groups with minor tweaks: suivre, croire, mettre, dormir/partir/mentir/sentir/servir, ouvrir/offrir, vivre, envoyer, foutre.
The verb foutre is actually part of a larger group with vendre/rompre/vaincre/foutre that I haven't finished analyzing yet. There are another 35 prototypes or so that look useful but which I haven't analyzed yet. (They look like they're almost entire principal part variations). If those are included, we would reach 99.9% verb coverage in the film corpus.
If we finished this analysis, I think it could be used to build a really amazing Anki verb deck, with coverage up through "well-educated native with a copy of Bescherelle" levels.
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emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5455 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map
| Message 11 of 19 09 September 2014 at 9:16pm | IP Logged |
By the way, if you're interested in seeing the underlying conjugation models, I've put some source code on GitHub. I added a few verbs over lunch, reaching 99.9% text coverage with only 11 irregular verbs and 4 "defective" ones.
The code is very declarative:
Code:
@conjugates([u'.*ir'])
class IrConjugator(Conjugator):
REMOVE = 'r'
PAST_PARTICIPLE = ''
SINGULAR_RADICAL = ''
ATONIC_RADICAL = 'ss'
TONIC_RADICAL = 'ss'
FUTURE_RADICAL = 'r'
SIMPLE_PAST_RADICAL = ''
class IrWithoutIssConjugator(IrConjugator):
REMOVE = 'ir'
ATONIC_RADICAL = ''
TONIC_RADICAL = ''
@conjugates([u'.*voir|.*oir'])
class VoirConjugator(IrWithoutIssConjugator):
REMOVE = 'oir'
PAST_PARTICIPLE = 'u'
ATONIC_RADICAL = 'oy'
TONIC_RADICAL = 'oi'
FUTURE_RADICAL = 'err'
SIMPLE_PAST_RADICAL = 'i'
@conjugates([u'prévoir'])
class PrevoirConjugator(VoirConjugator):
REMOVE = 'oir'
FUTURE_RADICAL = 'oir' # Go home, French. You're drunk. |
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If anybody is working on a guide to French verbs, this code can be used to very rigorously analyze what sub-groups exist, and how they relate to each other. And by refactoring the code, you can attempt to simplify the underlying model. Everything gets verified against an existing public domain database of French verb prototypes, as mentioned on the first page of this thread, and any incorrect changes to the model will result in an error.
One interesting takeaway from this work: Thanks to massive exposure to actual French, I already know a surprising fraction of these irregular verbs without ever having consciously learned them. As usual, this suggests that exposure and study are two great tools that work much better together.
Edited by emk on 09 September 2014 at 9:18pm
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emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5455 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map
| Message 12 of 19 11 September 2014 at 1:16pm | IP Logged |
Getting to 99.9% irregular verb coverage
I keep hacking at this in my spare time, and I'm continually amazed at how simple the French verb system really is. Let me walk you through this. First, we're going to set aside some irregular and defective verbs:
Quote:
être: (irregular)
avoir: (irregular)
aller: (irregular)
faire: (irregular)
pouvoir: (irregular)
vouloir: (irregular)
savoir: (irregular)
devoir: (irregular)
falloir: (irregular)
valoir: (irregular)
faillir: (irregular)
pleuvoir: (defective)
parfaire: (defective)
distraire: (defective)
douer: (defective) |
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If we assume that these must be learned by heart, then we can 99.9% coverage of verbs in French films with only 49 additional rules of the form:
Quote:
-er: (p.p.) parlé, je parle, tu parles, il parle, nous parlons, vous parlez, ils parlent, il parlera, (p.s.) il parla, ils parlèrent
appeler: Like -er, except: tu appelles, ils appellent, il appellera
acheter: Like -er, except: tu achètes, ils achètent, il achètera
espérer: Like -er, except: tu espères, ils espèrent
ennuyer: Like -er, except: tu ennuies, ils ennuient, il ennuiera
essayer: Like ennuyer, except: tu essaies/tu essayes, ils essaient/ils essayent, il essaiera/il essayera
envoyer: Like ennuyer, except: il enverra
ficher: Like -er, except: (p.p.) fiché/fichu
-ir (-iss-): (p.p.) fini, tu finis, nous finissons, ils finissent, il finira, (p.s.) il finit
bénir: Like -ir (-iss-), except: (p.p.) béni/bénit
haïr: Like -ir (-iss-), except: tu hais, (p.s.) il haït, ils haïrent
partir: Like -ir, except: tu pars |
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…and so on. This list was generated by a program and verified against a database of French verbs.
Of course, this list assumes that you know about the various principal parts of French verbs, and when to use them. And also that you know how to insert ge and ç to preserve sounds, and to drop -t after d and t. And you need to know which verbs fall into which category.
Interestingly, the -ir verbs break into two categories: a large group of verbs which take -iss in their atonic and tonic radicals, and smaller group which doesn't. The former group is almost entirely regular, with two minor exceptions. The latter group, interestingly, has no regular pattern: every single verb which I've seen so far has at least one small irregularity.
When I have some time, I'll turn this into a spreadsheet or a website or something. But in the meantime, take heart: French verbs are a lot simpler than they look!
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| Jeffers Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4832 days ago 2151 posts - 3960 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Speaks: English* Studies: Hindi, Ancient Greek, French, Sanskrit, German
| Message 13 of 19 11 September 2014 at 2:31pm | IP Logged |
I haven't really struggled with French verbs, but one of the things I hated about Assimil NFWE was that it didn't say much when it introduced a new verb. It would give a rundown of the forms, and pretty much leave you to it. I would have liked more comments such as: "this verb is regular except for x, y or z forms", and so on. A bit more of the big picture would have given me more basis for assimilation.
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emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5455 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map
| Message 14 of 19 11 September 2014 at 5:05pm | IP Logged |
Yeah, for people who like having a big picture, I recommend supplementing Assimil NFWE with Dover's Essential French Grammar. It's usually only $2 or so, and covers all the essentials.
Anyway, my spreadsheet is now ready:
French verb conjugations in 63 rows
This shows how you can reach 99.9% coverage of verbs in French films with only 63 verb forms, and it includes detailed notes for everything except the truly irregular verbs. Here's what the coverage looks like:
If you combine the spreadsheet with the excellent explanation of principal parts that s_allard posted earlier, you should be in very good shape.
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| Jeffers Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4832 days ago 2151 posts - 3960 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Speaks: English* Studies: Hindi, Ancient Greek, French, Sanskrit, German
| Message 15 of 19 11 September 2014 at 6:19pm | IP Logged |
That is a very impressive spreadsheet, emk, thank you for putting it all together! So it looks like knowing the regular -er verbs, plus être, avoir and aller cover about 2/3 of verb usage. It would be nice to see a pie chart like you made on your first post, but which also had separate slices for être and avoir (just for curiosity).
I'm not fully sure how I will use the spreadsheet, but I am certain that it will be useful. I'd love to hear what you, and other readers, think you can do with the list. (And if anyone knows how to find the Anki deck Sizen mentioned, that would be great too!)
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| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5353 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish
| Message 16 of 19 12 September 2014 at 10:01pm | IP Logged |
The reason être, avoir and aller are so frequent, as to make up around 30-40% of all verbs in spoken French, is that
they are the key auxiliary verbs for the passé composé and the futur proche tenses in addition to other common
uses. For example, the common question forms Est-ce que, Qu'est-ce que, Quand est-ce que, etc. have an
embedded être form that often goes unnoticed.
What this all means actually is that conversations in French tend to use a small number of verbs over and over
again. I hardly need to say that around 100 active French verbs are probably all you are likely to use in everyday
speech.
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