[Grammar] Les noms en francais - Nouns in French

Les noms or les substantifs (nouns) are naming words: they refer to people (le sac), places (l'Angleterre), animals (le chien), objects (la chaise) and concepts (le courage). A noun can be a subject or an object in a sentence. They are often accompanied by an article and can be described by adjectives. To avoid repetition, nouns can be replaced by pronouns. Examples:

Mon chat aime les friandises. (animal)

Le courage rend plus fort. (feeling, concept)

J’ai appelé mon frère hier. (person)

Quel musée avez-vous visité? (place)

La revue paraîtra en décembre. (object)


There are several categories of nouns in French: they can be proper or common, countable or uncountable as well as abstract or concrete.


Like in English, nouns can be singular or plural in French, however, unlike English French nouns have gender: they can be masculine or feminine.


Read more on nouns in our next post on gender.