ABOUT COURSES

Grammar

PREPOSITIONS BEFORE CITIES AND COUNT

by Frenchlearners
26 janvier 2019
0 comment

✈️French Prepositions Before Cities And Country Names

To tell people in which country or city you live, you need to know the names in French and
which preposition you put before them.

In English, the only thing you have to know is ‘in’: I live in France. I live in Montpellier.

But in French, it’s not that simple. This is what we’ll see in today’s lesson!

In English, you say, ‘I live in France. I live in Denmark. I live in Rome. I live in the
Netherlands.’

But in French, the translation is J’habite en France. J’habite au Danemark. J’habite à Rome.
J’habite auxuses
This website Pays-Bas.
cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.
Cookie settings ACCEPT
So the question is, how do you choose between en, au, aux and à?
ABOUT COURSES

Let’s start with the easiest preposition:  à

J’habite à Paris (à Lyon, à Los Angeles, à Tokyo …).

Every time you mention a city, the preposition à precedes the city name. This rule has no
exception!

The preposition en

J’habite en France. J’habite en Suède. J’habite en Mauritanie.

What do those three countries have in common? They are all feminine! Countries that end in
‘e’ are considered feminine: Espagne, Angleterre, Allemagne, Autriche, Hongrie, Slovénie,
Tunisie, Turquie, Chine …

Here, there’s an exception, but it’s a nice exception!

Every time a country starts with a vowel, you don’t have to guess whether the country name
is feminine or masculine. You just need the preposition en. For example: en Équateur, en
Iran, en Irak. These countries do not end in ‘e’ but we still use en.

The preposition aux

J’habite aux États-Unis. Je vais aux Pays-Bas. Je vis aux Philippines.

What do those countries have in common? They all end in ‘s’. Those countries are plural.
This preposition has to be pronounced [oz] in front of countries starting with vowels, e.g., aux
États-Unis, aux Émirats.

The preposition au

All other countries that do not end in ‘e’ or ‘s’ are masculine, so you must say au.

I know it sounds completely different than it is spelled, but the letter A partnered with the
letter U always produces the sound [o].
This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.
Cookie settings ACCEPT
So for the following countries, you say au Brésil, au Danemark, au Japon. All those countries
ABOUT COURSES
are masculine. They don’t end in ‘e’ and they don’t end in ‘s’.

Now you know the rules and should be able to explain where you live without a problem!

Let’s practice now. Which preposition do you put in front of these places?

… Maroc, … Tunisie, … Liban, … Grèce, … Atlanta, … Dubaï, … Athènes. (Au Maroc, en

Tunisie, au Liban, en Grèce, à Atlanta, à Dubaï, à Athènes).

But there are two exceptions you need to consider.

First exception

Mexico is Mexique in French. It ends in ‘e’ but is masculine, so you need to say au Mexique.
I don’t know why this kind of exception exists. Maybe the French language rule-maker
pointed randomly to a spot on the globe and said, ‘Let’s make an exception!’

It’s the same story with Cambodge, Mozambique and Zimbabwe. They are all masculine.

But if you aren’t from these countries, you likely won’t have to use their names very often.

Second (and last) exception

Islands don’t obey the same rule. We won’t make it more complicated than that for today!

Let’s practice—leave a comment below telling me in French where you live.

That’s all for today’s course. If you want to practice with self-correcting activities, click the
link below in the description, and if you liked this course, don’t hesitate to like, share and
subscribe!

Self-correcting activities:

This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.
Cookie settings ACCEPT
 ABOUT COURSES

Choisissez la bonne réponse / Choose the

right answer.
Click on the below arrow to
continue.

EASY FRENCH FRANCE FRENCH GRAMMAR FRENCH LANGUAGE FRENCH PREPOSITIONS

FRENCH PRONUNCIATION LEARN FRENCH LEARN FRENCH EASILY LEARN FRENCH IN ENGLISH

LEARN FRENCH ONLINE

 0 comment 3   

FRENCHLEARNERS

next post
FIVE COMMON MISTAKES WITH ÊTRE AND
AVOIR.

This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.
Cookie settings ACCEPT
YOU MAY ALSO LIKE
 ABOUT COURSES

THE FRENCH ARTICLES DE LA, 10 FRENCH ESSENTIAL VERBES THE FRENCH NUMBERS AND
DU, DES, DE... 5 avril 2021 THEIR INSANE RULES FROM...
19 mai 2021 21 mars 2021

 FACEBOOK
 INSTAGRAM
 YOUTUBE

@2021 - Frenchlearners. All Right Reserved.

Legal Notice and Privacy Policy -
Conditions Of Sale -
Contact

BACK TO TOP

This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.
Cookie settings ACCEPT