French Possessive Adjectives - Adjectifs possessifs

Possessive adjectives are the words used in place of articles to indicate to whom or to what something belongs. French possessive adjectives are used similarly to English possessive adjectives, but there are some differences in form.

1) French has many more possessives than English, because there are different forms not only for grammatical person and number, but sometimes also the gender and the first letter of the thing possessed. All of the different forms are summarized in the table at the bottom of the page and are explained in detail in the other pages of this lesson.

2) When describing two or more nouns in French, a possessive adjective must be used in front of each one:

    son frère et sa soeur
    his brother and sister

    notre fils et notre fille
    our son and daughter

3) The possessive adjective is almost never used with body parts in French. You can't say "my hand" or "my hair." Instead, the French use pronominal verbs to show possession with body parts:

    Je me suis cassé la jambe
    I broke my leg (literally, I broke the leg of myself).

    Il se lave les cheveux
    He's washing his hair (literally, He washes the hair of himself).


Test on French possessive adjectives

Related lessons: French Possession