Prétends

Prétends is the present indicative form of the French verb prétendre, which means to claim or to pretend, depending on context. The form prétends can correspond to the first person singular je prétends or the second person singular tu prétends, so standing alone it may be ambiguous without a subject.

Etymology and senses. Prétendre comes from Latin praetendere, “to stretch forth, to put forward,” and evolved in French to mean both making an assertion about something as fact and feigning or pretending. The verb retains both core meanings in modern French, and their distinction is usually inferred from the surrounding words or the broader sentence.

Conjugation and usage notes. Prétendre is irregular in the present tense and shares a pattern with attendre: je prétends, tu prétends, il prétend, nous prétendons, vous prétendez, ils prétendent. Beyond the present, the verb forms phrases such as prétendre que + clause (to claim that) or prétendre faire quelque chose (to pretend to do something). It can also take the construction prétendre à + noun to mean “to aspire to” or “to apply for” a position, for example prétendre à un poste. The form prétends appears in contexts where the speaker is either asserting something (to claim) or feigning something (to pretend), with the intended sense clarified by the rest of the sentence.

Examples. Je prétends être innocent. Tu prétends connaître la vérité. Il prétend que le travail est terminé. Elle prétend être malade pour éviter de sortir. Cela peut aussi signifier “feindre,” as in Il prétend être malade.

Related forms. The related noun prétendant means a suitor or fiancé in older or literary French, and prêtendre yields adjectives like prétendu (alleged) or prétendue (alleged, feminine). These derivatives reflect the broader semantic field tied to “to claim” or “to pretend.”