verbes

Verbs, or verbes in French, are a grammatical category that denotes actions, events, or states and function as the predicate of a sentence. They are normally inflected for features such as person and number and, in many languages, for tense, mood, and voice. In French, verb forms also reflect subject agreement and often require auxiliary verbs to form compound tenses.

Classification in French is commonly described by three conjugation groups according to the infinitive ending: -er (the largest group, including parler), -ir (second group, including finir), and -re (third group, including prendre). The first group is largely regular; the other groups contain irregular patterns and stem changes.

Morphology: besides the infinitive, verbs have forms such as present, past (passé composé, imparfait, etc.), future, and imperfect; moods include indicative, subjunctive, and imperative; participles (participe présent, participe passé) and the gerund (en + participe présent) are also used. In many tenses, French uses auxiliary verbs (être or avoir) to form compound tenses.

Syntax and semantics: verbs can be transitive, intransitive, or ditransitive, affecting their complements. They inflect for person and number to agree with the subject in languages with rich agreement; in French, agreement can also extend to adjectives or pronouns in compound structures.

Etymology: the term derives from Latin verbum, meaning word or verb.