Le passé simple - The Simple Past

The passé simple (Simple Past):

• The Simple Past is a verb tense in French used to talk about events that occurred in the past and are completely finished. 
• The Simple Past is considered a literary tense and is not commonly used in everyday conversation. It’s primarily used in historical writing, literature, and very formal speeches.
• You may never need to use the passé simple, but it's important to be familiar with it, especially if you read French frequently.
• The passé simple is used to express an event that occurred in the past precisely and relatively briefly, without repetition. It contrasts with the passé composé, which is used to express a recurring event or habit.
• The passé simple (simple past) is the literary and historical equivalent of the passé composé, which is used in informal speaking and writing, such as a letter to a friend. Therefore, passé simple and passé composé are not used together.

Endings of Passé Simple:

The endings of passé simple vary with different verb groups in French, and it has four sets of endings:

1 -er Verbs:

2 -ir Verbs:

3 -ir Verbs:

For the third group, there are three models of endings.

Model 1: Uses the same endings as -ir verbs.

Model 2: Uses unique endings.

(to die - mourir)، (to believe - Croire)

Upgrade to remove ads

Model 3: Includes “venir” (to come), “tenir” (to hold), and their derivatives, such as "revenir" (to come back) and "retenir" (to retain, to hold back).

Conjugation of Avoir in Passé Simple:

Conjugation of Être in Passé Simple:

Exceptions:

1- For verbs ending in -cer, change 'c' to 'ç' (to preserve the soft 'c' sound), except when conjugating the verb with the pronoun ils/elles:

Notes:

• There is no rule to know whether verbs belonging to the third group have endings starting with 'i' or 'u', so they must be memorized.
• There are four types of endings for conjugating the passé simple:

1. Endings for verbs of the first group and the verb "aller":
             ai, as, a, âmes, âtes, èrent
   
   
2.  Endings for verbs of the second group and some verbs of the third group that start with 'i':
            is, is, it, îmes, îtes, irent
   
   
3. Endings for some verbs of the third group that start with 'u':
            us, us, ut, ûmes, ûtes, urent
   
   
4. Endings for verbs of the third group (Venir and Tenir) that start with 'in':
           ins, ins, int, înmes, întes, inrent

Upgrade to remove ads

When do we use the passé simple?

1- To express an action that occurred once and ended in the past:

Last month, I went on vacation to Spain.

Le mois dernier, je partis en vacances en Espagne.

2- To express several actions that happened sequentially in the past:

Last year, I went to Spain on vacation, and I visited the Sagrada Familia.

L'année dernière, je partis en Espagne en vacances et je visitai la Sagrada Familia.

3- To express a new action interrupting an action already happening in the past:

While I was visiting Spain, I took a lot of photos.

Pendant que je visitais l'Espagne, je pris beaucoup de photos.

Thus, we have concluded our discussion on the simple past, understanding its formulation, when it is applied, and how to conjugate it. If you have any questions or inquiries, please feel free to write them in the comments, and I will gladly respond."