-oir
French
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /waʁ/
Etymology 1
Inherited from Old French -eoir, from Latin -(āt)ōrium, a suffix attached to the supine stem of verbs to form neuter nouns denoting instruments or places. See also -oire f, inherited from Latin -(āt)ōria (the feminine version of this suffix), and -(at)oire m, a semi-learned borrowing from -tōrium that is found in nouns built on Latin supine stems. Cognate to English -ory and -or.
Suffix
-oir m (noun-forming suffix, plural -oirs)
- A suffix used on verbs to form masculine words for objects or tools used to do something.
- A suffix used on verbs to form masculine words for places where something is done.
Derived terms
French terms suffixed with -oir
Etymology 2
Inherited from Latin -ēre, the ending of the present active infinitive form of second conjugation verbs. Compare Italian -ere, Romanian -ea, Romansh -air.
Suffix
-oir
- A suffix forming infinitives of some verbs.
Usage notes
- Verbs in -oir are fairly few and all of them are irregular to different degrees. The most important ones are asseoir, avoir, devoir, falloir, pleuvoir, pouvoir, recevoir, savoir, valoir, voir, vouloir.
Conjugation
Conjugation of -oir (see also Appendix:French verbs)
| infinitive | simple | -oir | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| compound | avoir + past participle | ||||||
| present participle or gerund1 | simple | -ant | |||||
| compound | ayant + past participle | ||||||
| past participle | -u | ||||||
| singular | plural | ||||||
| first | second | third | first | second | third | ||
| indicative | je (j’) | tu | il, elle, on | nous | vous | ils, elles | |
| (simple tenses) |
present | -s or -x | -s or -x | -t | -ons | -ez | -ent |
| imperfect | -ais | -ais | -ait | -ions | -iez | -aient | |
| past historic2 | -us | -us | -ut | -ûmes | -ûtes | -urent | |
| future | -rai | -ras | -ra | -ront | -rez | -ront | |
| conditional | -rais | -rais | -rait | -rions | -riez | -raient | |
| (compound tenses) |
present perfect | present indicative of avoir + past participle | |||||
| pluperfect | imperfect indicative of avoir + past participle | ||||||
| past anterior2 | past historic of avoir + past participle | ||||||
| future perfect | future of avoir + past participle | ||||||
| conditional perfect | conditional of avoir + past participle | ||||||
| subjunctive | que je (j’) | que tu | qu’il, qu’elle | que nous | que vous | qu’ils, qu’elles | |
| (simple tenses) |
present | -e | -es | -e | -ions | -iez | -ent |
| imperfect2 | -usse | -usses | -ût | -ussions | -ussiez | -ussent | |
| (compound tenses) |
past | present subjunctive of avoir + past participle | |||||
| pluperfect2 | imperfect subjunctive of avoir + past participle | ||||||
| imperative | – | – | – | ||||
| simple | — | -s or -x | — | -ons | -ez | — | |
| compound | — | simple imperative of avoir + past participle | — | simple imperative of avoir + past participle | simple imperative of avoir + past participle | — | |
| 1 The French gerund is usable only with the preposition en. | |||||||
2 In less formal writing or speech, these tenses may be found to have been replaced in the following way:
(Christopher Kendris [1995], Master the Basics: French, pp. 77, 78, 79, 81). | |||||||
- The basic inflectional endings are nearly identical to those of -re verbs, with the exception of the past historic/imperfect subjunctive endings, whose theme vowel is -u- instead of -i-.
- In addition, -oir verbs retain historical alternations such as distinct stressed, unstressed and future/conditional stems, making their conjugations highly irregular on the surface. See French irregular verbs.
See also
French terms suffixed with -oir