French guide 16

Adjectival agreement in French

In French, you have to make adjectives agree to the noun they’re describing. But what does that mean?

What’s an adjective?

Adjectives describe nouns, and in French, nouns can be either singular or plural, and masculine or feminine.

le chien – the dog (masculine singular)
la maison – the house (feminine singular)
les chiens – the dogs (masculine plural)
les maisons – the houses (feminine plural)

As I said, adjectives describe nouns. In English, it doesn’t matter what noun you describe; the adjective always stays the same. For example, look how the word “good” stays the same in all the example sentences below:

The wine is good
The food is good
The children are good
The cars are good

It doesn’t matter what the noun is; in English, the word “good” stays the same.

In French, however, if we were to say those sentences, the word for “good”, which is “bon” would change in each sentence:

Le vin est bon – the wine is good
La nourriture est bonne – the food is good
Les enfants sont bons – the children are good
Les voitures sont bonnes – the cars are good

You’ll see how the ending of the adjective “bon” changes slightly depending on the type of noun it’s describing. This is called “agreeing the adjective”.

Agreeing the adjective

There are rules for how to agree the adjective in French. If you were to look in a dictionary for any adjective, the version you find is the one you can use to describe masculine singular nouns, and then we change it if we want to describe feminine nouns or plural nouns. Let’s have a look at what those changes are:

MASCULINE SINGULAR NOUN
adjective doesn’t change

MASCULINE PLURAL NOUN
add an S to the end of the adjective

FEMININE SINGULAR NOUN
add an E to the end of the adjective

FEMININE PLURAL NOUN
add an ES to the end of the adjective

Let’s have a look at an example of this in use with the adjective “parfait”, which means “perfect”.

MASCULINE SINGULAR NOUN
le poulet est parfait – the chicken is perfect

MASCULINE PLURAL NOUN
les poulets sont parfaits – the chickens are perfect

FEMININE SINGULAR NOUN
la dinde est parfaite – the turkey is perfect

FEMININE PLURAL NOUN
les dindes sont parfaites– the turkeys are perfect

Adjectivesending in an “e”

Now, those four rules are general rules that you can apply to most adjectives. There are adjectives that don’t follow these rules, which do their own thing. When you come across irregular adjectives, it’s a good idea to learn how they change. In the 3 Minute French courses, when we learn irregular adjectives, we always learn their unique feminine and plural versions, too.

There is a group of adjectives that has a more simplified set of rules, and that’s adjectives that end in an “e”. If an adjective already ends in an “e”, in French, you don’t need to add an extra “e” to make it feminine. For example, “fantastique” means “fantastic”. Let’s have a look at the different versions of that adjective:

MASCULINE SINGULAR NOUN
le poulet est fantastique – the chicken is fantastic

MASCULINE PLURAL NOUN
les poulets sont fantastiques – the chickens are fantastic

FEMININE SINGULAR NOUN
la dinde est fantastique – the turkey is fantastic

FEMININE PLURAL NOUN
les dindes sont fantastiques – the turkeys are fantastic

You can see how you still have to add an “s” to make it plural, but the masculine and feminine versions are the same.

Another adjective that ends in an “e” is “terrible”:

MASCULINE SINGULAR NOUN
le poulet est terrible – the chicken is terrible

MASCULINE PLURAL NOUN
les poulets sont terribles – the chickens are terrible

FEMININE SINGULAR NOUN
la dinde est terrible – the turkey is terrible

FEMININE PLURAL NOUN
les dindes sont terribles– the turkeys are terrible

Let's practise

See if you can say these sentences in French. Firstly, here’s a little vocabulary you might need.

Masculine nouns
restaurant – restaurant
boy – garçon
chicken – poulet
child – enfant
wine – vin
dog – chien

Feminine nouns
house – maison
girl – fille
turkey – dinde
carrot – carotte
car – voiture
door – porte

Adjectives
big – grand
small – petit
fantastic – fantastique
perfect – parfait
red – rouge
terrible – terrible
black – noir
noisy – bruyant

The boy is small
The restaurant is big
The car is noisy
The car is red
The children are perfect
The girl is small
The turkey is fantastic
The carrots are fantastic
The dogs are black
The door is black
The houses are big
The dog is black
The girls are small
The boys are small
The restaurants are big
The children are noisy
The house is big
The wine is terrible
The doors are black
The chicken is fantastic

ANSWERS

Le garçon est petit
Le restaurant est grand
La voiture est bruyante
La voiture est rouge
Les enfants sont parfaits
La fille est petite
La dinde est fantastique
Les carottes sont fantastiques
Les chiens sont noirs
La porte est noire
Les maisons sont grandes
Le chien est noir
Les filles sont petites
Les garçons sont petits
Les restaurants sont grands
Les enfants sont bruyants
La maison est grande
Le vin est terrible
Les portes sont noires
Le poulet est fantastique

In context

It’s always good to look at rules in context, because it helps to solidify them in your mind. Let’s read through a few paragraphs from chapter 20 of Le Petit Prince (The Little Prince) by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, and focus on any adjectives that appear in the extract.

CHAPITRE XX

Mais il arriva que le petit prince, ayant longtemps marché à travers les sables, les rocs et les neiges, découvrit enfin une route. Et les routes vont toutes chez les hommes.

- Bonjour, dit-il.

C’était un jardin fleuri de roses.

- Bonjour, dirent les roses.

Le petit prince les regarda. Elles ressemblaient toutes à sa fleur.

- Qui êtes-vous? leur demanda-t-il stupéfait.
- Nous sommes des roses, dirent les roses.
- Ah! fit le petit prince...

Et il se sentit très malheureux. Sa fleur lui avait raconté qu’elle était seule de son espèce dans l’univers. Et voici qu’il en était cinq mille, toutes semblables, dans un seul jardin!

« Elle serait bien vexée, se dit-il, si elle voyait ça… elle tousserait énormément et ferait semblant de mourir pour échapper au ridicule. Et je serais bien obligé de faire semblant de la soigner, car, sinon, pour m’humilier moi aussi, elle se laisserait vraiment mourir… »

Puis il se dit encore: « Je me croyais riche d’une fleur unique, et je ne possède qu’une rose ordinaire. Ça et mes trois volcans qui m’arrivent au genou, et dont l’un, peut-être, est éteint pour toujours, ça ne fait pas de moi un bien grand prince… » Et, couché dans l’herbe, il pleura.

petit — small
fleuri — covered in flowers
stupéfait — astounded
malheureux — unhappy
seul — alone
vexé — offended
obligé — obliged
riche — rich
unique — only
ordinaire — ordinary
éteint — turned off
grand — big
couché — lying

Let’s quickly take each of those adjectives, and look at them in their four forms. We’ll do masculine singular, feminine singular, masculine plural and then feminine plural.

PETIT = petit, petite, petits, petites

FLEURI = fleuri, fleurie, fleuris, fleuries

STUPÉFAIT = stupéfait, stupéfaite, stupéfaits, stupéfaites

MALHEUREUX = malheureux, malheureuse, malheureux, malheureuses

SEUL = seul, seule, seuls, seules

VEXÉ = vexé, vexée, vexés, vexées

OBLIGÉ = obligé, obligée, obligés, obligées

RICHE = riche, riche, riches, riches

UNIQUE = unique, unique, uniques, uniques

ORDINAIRE = ordinaire, ordinaire, ordinaires, ordinaires

ÉTEINT = éteint, éteinte, éteints, éteintes

GRAND = grand, grande, grands, grandes