le plus-que-parfait du subjonctif

The pluperfect or past perfect subjunctive (le plus-que-parfait du subjonctif) is a mood used in French literature. It is equivalent to the the past subjunctive in spoken French. It differs from the imperfect subjunctive in that the past action is completed.

Here are some example sentences. The equivalent sentences in the past subjunctive are in parentheses.

Il était possible qu’il fût sorti. It was possible he went out.
(Il était possible qu’il soit sorti.)

Je ne savais pas qu’il eût dit cela. I didn’t know he said that.
(Je ne savais pas qu’il ait dit cela.)

Je doutais que tu eusses compris la leçon. I doubted you understood the lesson.
Je doutais que tu aies compris la leçon.

French pluperfect subjunctive conjugation

The pluperfect subjunctive is formed by combining the auxiliary verb avoir (to have) or être (to be) conjugated in the imperfect subjunctive with the past participle of the main verb. For example:

que tu eusses mangé -> that you ate
que tu fusses parti(e) -> that you left

Here are the equivalents in the past subjunctive:

que tu aies mangé -> that you ate
que tu sois parti(e) -> that you left

The following chart shows how to conjugated an avoir, être and reflexive verb in the pluperfect subjunctive.

	avoir verb	être verb	reflexive verb
	parler – to speak	aller – to go	se souvenir – to remember
je/j’	eusse parlé	fusse allé(e)	me fusse souvenu(e)
tu	eusses parlé	fusses allé(e)	te fusses souvenu(e)
il	eût parlé	fût allé	se fût souvenu
elle	eût parlé	fût allée	se fût souvenue
nous	eussions parlé	fussions allé(e)s	nous fussions souvenu(e)s
vous	eussiez parlé	fussiez allé(e)(s)	vous fussiez souvenu(e)(s)
ils	eussent parlé	fussent allés	se fussent souvenus
elles	eussent parlé	fussent allées	se fussent souvenues

More verb tenses and moods

Verb lessons

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David Issokson is the founder of FrenchLearner.com, where he’s been helping students master French through vocabulary, grammar, and cultural lessons since 2012.

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