fatigué

Fatigué is a French adjective meaning tired or weary. It describes a state of physical or mental exhaustion and is commonly used to indicate temporary tiredness after activity, illness, or lack of sleep. It can also express fatigue caused by monotony or stress, as in fatigue de ce travail. The form varies with gender and number: masculine singular fatigué, feminine singular fatiguée, masculine plural fatigués, and feminine plural fatiguées. In everyday speech, one says je suis fatigué or elle est fatiguée.

Fatigué also functions as the past participle of the transitive verb fatiguer (to tire, to weary someone or something). In compound tenses, the participle generally agrees with a preceding direct object: La marche m'a fatigué (the walk tired me) or Les efforts qui l'ont fatigué. The reflexive verb se fatiguer means to become tired; phrases like je me fatigue are uncommon, with preferred constructions emphasizing the cause or duration of tiredness.

Etymology traces fatigué to the verb fatiguer from Latin fatigare, meaning to tire or weary. Related forms include fatigue (the noun for weariness) and fatigant/fatigante (tiring, wearying). In French, fatigue as a noun is common in medical and everyday contexts, as in fatigue chronique (chronic fatigue) or fatigue passagère (transient tiredness).

Beyond French, the term appears in English loan contexts. In English, fatigue is the standard noun, while fatigué may appear in bilingual texts or stylistic renderings. The plural form fatigues exists in English to denote military fatigues (uniforms) and other uses, though this is a separate development from the French adjective.