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Adjectifs possessifs pour possessions plurielles
When dealing with plural possessions, there’s only one French possessive adjective for each grammatical person:
| my | mes | |
| your (tu form) | tes | |
| his, her, its | ses | |
| our | nos | |
| your (vous form) | vos | |
| their | leurs |
Par exemple…
| Où sont mes frères ? | Where are my brothers? | |
| Nous écoutons tes chansons. | We’re listening to your songs. | |
| Il a perdu ses clés. | He lost his keys. | |
| Ce sont nos livres. | These are our books. | |
| Je vois vos voitures. | I see your cars. | |
| Il veut leurs idées. | He wants their ideas. |
The tricky part
You have to be careful when deciding whether a plural owner’s possession is singular or plural.
For example, my husband and I live in the same house. Though there are two of us, we have one house that we share, so we say notre maison. Likewise, since we share a car, we say notre voiture.
| Nous avons acheté notre maison en 2015. | We bought our (shared) house in 2015. | |
| David et Anna, votre voiture elle belle ! | David and Anna, your car is beautiful! |
There are two types of scenarios in which the possession is considered plural:
- We each have our own house and our own car (we’re divorced).
- Collectively, we have multiple houses and multiple cars (we’re rich).
| Nous avons vendu nos maisons en 2017. | We sold our houses in 2017. | |
| Où sont vos voitures ? | Where are your cars? |
With the third person plural, using the plural adjective automatically means that each person has more than one of the item.
| Ils aiment bien leurs profs. | They really like their teachers. (they have several) | |
| Elles ont fait leurs lits. | They made their beds. (they each have two) |
When the item is not shared, it’s more idiomatic to use the singular possessive, even though this is ambiguous.
| Ils aiment bien leur prof. | They really like their teacher. (they share a teacher) or They really like their teachers. (they have different teachers) |
|
| Elles ont fait leur lit. | They made their bed. (the two girls share a bed) or They made their beds. (each girl made her own bed) |
More French possessive adjectives
- Introduction
- Singular possessors | Plural possessors
- Singular possessions | Plural possessions
Quizzes on possessive adjectives vs possessive pronouns
Note: You must be logged into your Progress with Lawless French account to take these tests. If you don’t have one, sign up – it’s free!
- Introduction to nouns and gender
- Introduction to adjectives
- Tes vs vos
- More French possession
- PwLF super list of possession lessons
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