Lesson 24: Participle Agreement — The Full System

Part 1: The big picture — three rules

The past participle (parlé, fini, pris, allé) behaves differently depending on which auxiliary you use and where the direct object sits in the sentence.

Case	Agrees with what?	Example
être (L22, "the être house")	with the subject	Elle est allée. / Ils sont partis.
avoir + direct object AFTER the verb	no agreement	J'ai vu la maison. (vu, not vue!)
avoir + direct object BEFORE the verb	with that object	La maison que j'ai vue.
Reflexive verbs (se …)	usually with the subject (with caveats)	Elle s'est lavée.

The magic acronym: DO = direct object. If it stands before the verb, the participle "sticks" to it and agrees in gender and number. French grammarians call this the COD préposé ("preceding direct object").

English has nothing like this. You'd never write "the apple I ate-feminine" — but in French, that's exactly the move. Once you accept that the participle is just an adjective with a long memory, the rules click.

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Part 2: Agreement with être — easy and visible

Verbs from the "être house" (DR & MRS VANDERTRAMP — L22) plus all reflexives use the auxiliary être. The participle behaves like an adjective and agrees with the subject.

Subject	Ending	Example
masc. sg.	–	Il est allé.
fem. sg.	-e	Elle est allée.
masc. pl.	-s	Ils sont allés.
fem. pl.	-es	Elles sont allées.

Mixed group (m. + f.) → masculine plural wins, even if there's one man and ninety-nine women: Marie et Paul sont allés. Quatre-vingt-dix-neuf femmes et un homme sont arrivés.

The vous trap. When vous refers to one person (polite vous), agreement is singular: Vous êtes venu (to a man) / Vous êtes venue (to a woman). When vous is genuinely plural, you get -s or -es: Vous êtes venus / Vous êtes venues. Same letters, very different meaning.

Sound check: allé / allée / allés / allées all sound identical — "ah-LAY". Agreement with être is mostly a writing thing. The reader sees it, the listener doesn't.

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Part 3: Agreement with avoir — the rule French people get wrong too

With avoir, the participle NEVER agrees with the subject.

• Marie a mangé une pomme. — mangé, not mangée. (Marie is feminine, but it doesn't matter.)
• Elles ont fini leur travail. — fini, not finies. (They are feminine plural — irrelevant.)

This is the single most common mistake English speakers (and French schoolchildren) make. With avoir, the subject is invisible to the participle.

But the participle does agree — with the direct object, when that object sits BEFORE the verb.

The three triggers for "object before verb"

Trigger	Example	Agreement
Direct object pronoun le, la, les, me, te, nous, vous (L15)	La pomme ? Je l'ai mangée.	la pomme → -e
Relative pronoun que (L30)	La lettre que j'ai écrite.	la lettre → -e
Question word quel(le)(s) or combien de	Quelles villes as-tu visitées ?	quelles villes → -es

Side-by-side comparison

No agreement (object after)	Agreement (object before)
J'ai vu les filles.	Les filles que j'ai vues.
J'ai pris les clés.	Les clés ? Je les ai prises.
Elle a écrit trois lettres.	Trois lettres qu'elle a écrites.
Nous avons mangé la tarte.	La tarte ? Nous l'avons mangée.
Tu as ouvert la porte ?	La porte, tu l'as ouverte ?

The algorithm — drill this into your reflex:

1. Auxiliary = avoir?
2. Is there a direct object anywhere?
3. Is it before the verb? → agree.
4. Is it after the verb, or no DO at all? → leave the participle alone.

Three traps with avoir

Trap 1: en does NOT trigger agreement.

• Des pommes ? J'en ai mangé. — NOT mangées. The pronoun en (L17) is partitive — "some of them" — and French treats it as too vague to count as a real direct object.
• Combien de livres as-tu lus ? — lus (agrees with combien de livres).
• Des livres ? J'en ai lu trois. — lu (en blocks agreement).

Trap 2: indirect object (à qqn) is NOT a direct object.

• Je lui ai parlé. — parlé, no agreement (lui = indirect, L16; parler à qqn).
• La femme à qui j'ai parlé. — parlé, no agreement.
• Les amis à qui j'ai téléphoné. — téléphoné, no agreement.

If the verb takes à before its object (parler à, téléphoner à, répondre à, dire à, écrire à, demander à, offrir à), that object is indirect — never triggers agreement.

Trap 3: intransitive verbs with avoir (couru, dormi, plu, vécu, marché) have no direct object at all.

• Les heures que j'ai couru. — NOT courues. (That's duration, not the thing being run.)
• Les années qu'il a vécu à Paris. — vécu, no agreement.

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Part 4: Reflexive verbs — the special case

Reflexive verbs (se laver, se lever, s'appeler…) are conjugated with être (L22), but agreement follows the logic of avoir: you check whether the reflexive pronoun (se / me / te / nous / vous) is a direct or indirect object.

The rule in two lines

| Reflexive se = direct object | Agree with the subject | | Reflexive se = indirect object | NO agreement |

How to tell direct from indirect

The test: strip the reflexive prefix and ask: does the underlying verb take à before a person?

Verb	Strip-and-test	se type	Agreement
se laver	laver qqn (wash someone)	direct	Elle s'est lavée.
se laver les mains	laver les mains à qqn	indirect (s' = "to herself")	Elle s'est lavé les mains.
se parler	parler à qqn	indirect	Elles se sont parlé. (no -e!)
se voir	voir qqn	direct	Elles se sont vues.
se téléphoner	téléphoner à qqn	indirect	Ils se sont téléphoné.
se dire	dire qqch à qqn	indirect	Elles se sont dit la vérité.
se rencontrer	rencontrer qqn	direct	Elles se sont rencontrées.
s'écrire	écrire à qqn	indirect	Ils se sont écrit.

The shortcut: if the underlying verb takes à before a person (parler à, téléphoner à, écrire à, dire à, demander à, répondre à), the reflexive se is indirect → no agreement. Memorize this list — it covers 90% of the cases.

The double-object case: reflexive verb + real direct object after

If the reflexive verb has its own direct object after it, that object is the one that may trigger agreement — by the avoir rule.

• Elle s'est lavé les mains. — les mains is the direct object, sitting after the verb. No agreement on lavé. (s' = "to herself" = indirect.)
• Les mains qu'elle s'est lavées. — same verb, but now les mains sits before the verb (pulled forward by que). Agreement kicks in: lavées.

This is the trickiest pattern in all of French grammar. Don't try to memorize the cases — internalize the algorithm and run it every time.

Special verbs

A few reflexives are always reflexive (no non-reflexive form exists, or the meanings differ entirely). Treat them as automatically agreeing with the subject:

• se souvenir de (remember) → Elle s'est souvenue de moi.
• s'en aller (go away) → Elles s'en sont allées.
• s'évanouir (faint) → Elle s'est évanouie.
• se moquer de (mock) → Elles se sont moquées de lui.

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Part 5: Master table — every case on one page

Auxiliary	What's to the left of the verb?	Agreement
être (être house)	the subject	with subject
avoir	nothing / only an indirect object / en	none
avoir	a direct object (le/la/les, que, quel)	with that DO
reflexive (se)	se = direct object	with subject
reflexive (se)	se = indirect object	none
reflexive (se) + DO after the verb	—	none
reflexive (se) + DO before the verb	the DO	with that DO

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Part 6: Pronunciation — audible vs silent agreement

This is where English speakers can relax a little. Most agreement is silent.

The added -e or -s doesn't change pronunciation for participles ending in a vowel:

• parlé / parlée / parlés / parlées — all sound identical: "par-LAY"
• allé / allée / allés / allées — all "ah-LAY"
• fini / finie / finis / finies — all "fee-NEE"
• vu / vue / vus / vues — all "vew"
• bu / bue / bus / bues — all "bew"

Where agreement IS audible

When the masculine participle ends in a silent consonant (-t, -s, -is, -rt), the feminine form wakes that consonant up — and you hear the difference.

Participle	masc.	fem.	Audible?
mis (put)	"mee"	mise → "meez"	YES
pris (taken)	"pree"	prise → "preez"	YES
écrit (written)	"ay-KREE"	écrite → "ay-KREET"	YES
ouvert (opened)	"oo-VAIR"	ouverte → "oo-VAIRT"	YES
fait (done)	"feh"	faite → "fet"	YES
dit (said)	"dee"	dite → "deet"	YES
mort (dead)	"mor"	morte → "mort"	YES
offert (offered)	"oh-FAIR"	offerte → "oh-FAIRT"	YES
compris (understood)	"kohn-PREE"	comprise → "kohn-PREEZ"	YES

Takeaway: In writing, agreement is mandatory across the board. In speech, you hear it only with consonant-final participles (mis, pris, fait, dit, écrit, ouvert, mort, offert, compris, appris…). Native speakers cheat in casual speech all the time on the silent cases — but in writing, they don't, and neither should you.

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