leur

French

Etymology

Inherited from Middle French leur, from Old French lor, from Latin illōrum, genitive masculine plural of ille.

As a possessive it was originally uninflected (as still is Italian loro), but adopted the plural ending in Middle French. Feminine -e was hindered by the analogy of other possessives, all of which have but one plural form and in the case of notre, votre no gender agreement at all.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /lœʁ/
  • Audio:(file)
  • Homophones: leurre, leurrent, leurres, leurs
  • Rhymes: -œʁ

Pronoun

leur m pl or f pl

  1. (personal, indirect) (to) them
    Je leur ai donné un coup de main.
    I gave them a hand.
French personal pronouns
number person gender nominative
(subject) 		accusative
(direct complement) 		dative
(indirect complement) 		locative
(at) 		genitive
(of) 		disjunctive
(tonic)1 		emphatic
reflexive 		relative proximal distal
singular first — je, j’ me, m’ — — moi moi-même —
second — tu te, t’ — — toi toi-même —
third masculine il2 le, l’ lui y en lui lui-même celui celui-ci celui-là
feminine elle la, l’ elle elle-même celle celle-ci celle-là
indeterminate on3, l’on (formal), ce4, c’, ça — — — — — — ce ceci cela, ça
reflexive — se, s’5 — — soi soi-même —
plural first — nous nous — — nous nous-mêmes —
second6 — vous vous — — vous vous-mêmes,
vous-même6 		—
third masculine ils7 les leur y en eux7 eux-mêmes7 ceux ceux-ci ceux-là
feminine elles elles elles-mêmes celles celles-ci celles-là

1 The disjunctive (tonic) forms are also used after an explicit preposition (de/d‘, à, pour, chez, dans, vers, sur, sous, ...), instead the accusative, dative, genitive, locative, or reflexive forms, where a preposition is implied.
2 Il is also used as an impersonal nominative-only pronoun.
3 On can also function as a first person plural (although agreeing with third person singular verb forms).
4 The nominal indeterminate form ce (demonstrative) can also be used with the auxiliary verb être as a plural, instead of the proximal or distal gendered forms.
5 The reflexive third person singular forms (se or s’) for accusative or dative are also used as third person plural reflexive.
6 Vous is also used as the polite singular form, in which case the plural disjunctive tonic vous-mêmes becomes singular vous-même.
7 Ils, eux and eux-mêmes are also used when a group has a mixture of masculine and feminine members.

Determiner

leur (plural leurs)

  1. their
    J'aperçois leur maison d'ici.
    I can see their house from here.

Derived terms

French possessive determiners
possessee
singular plural
m f
possessor singular 1st mon1 ma mes
2nd ton1 ta tes
3rd son1 sa ses
plural 1st notre nos
2nd votre2 vos2
3rd leur leurs
1 Also used before feminine adjectives and nouns beginning with a vowel or mute h.
2 Also used as the polite singular form.
For the singular persons there are gender-neutral neologisms man, tan, san. These are extremely rare.

Further reading

Anagrams

Middle French

Etymology

From Old French lor.

Pronoun

leur

  1. (object pronoun) them

Descendants

  • French: leur
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