tenais

Tenais is a form of the French verb tenir. It is the imperfect indicative conjugation for the second-person singular, and it also serves as the first-person singular form in the same tense, since both je tenais and tu tenais share the same ending. In context, tenais means “you were holding” or “you used to hold,” depending on the surrounding clause.

The verb tenir has several core meanings related to holding, keeping, or possessing something, as well as figurative senses such as maintaining a position or keeping an appointment. The imperfect tense, including tenais, describes ongoing past actions, repeated past actions, or background information in narrative. For example: “Quand tu tenais le livre, tu parlais.” or “Je tenais ce secret autrefois.” The form tenais is primarily used in written and spoken French when discussing past events from a perspective that emphasizes continuity or habit.

Etymology traces tenir to the Latin tenēre, meaning to hold. The French verb belongs to a class of irregular verbs that share a historical development from Latin through Old French to modern usage. Tenais, as a simple verb form, does not stand alone as a lexical item beyond its role as a conjugated form of tenir.

See also: tenir, French conjugation, imperfect tense. Note that tenais can be ambiguous with je tenais or tu tenais, depending on context, since the ending is the same for both subjects in the imperfect.