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# were — English to French

How English *were* is translated into French in open, checked parallel texts: 4 translations with example sentences.

The [Elamur Dictionary](https://dictionary.elamur.ai/free/en/english/) has no article on this word yet.

Sentence pairs counted, by form: were (1 235 075), weres (3). By style: everyday 6 867 · literary 668 · biblical 2 180 · parliamentary 48 196 · legal and administrative 70 566 · UN documents 1 106 601.

## ont

Used about 381 734 times in the texts (everyday ≈ 858 · parliamentary ≈ 16 065 · legal and administrative ≈ 17 642 · UN documents ≈ 347 169).

- A lot of soldiers **were** killed here.
  Beaucoup de soldats **ont** été tués ici.
  ([Tatoeba](https://tatoeba.org/) · Tatoeba, CC BY 2.0 FR · sentences by CK and sacredceltic · checked, community translation · [\#61876](https://tatoeba.org/en/sentences/show/61876) [\#11196](https://tatoeba.org/en/sentences/show/11196))

- One hundred people **were** taken hostage and 40 died as a result.
  Cent personnes **ont** été prises en otage et 40 sont mortes.
  ([Europarl v8](https://www.statmt.org/europarl/) · Source: European Parliament proceedings, Europarl v8 (Koehn 2005) via OPUS (Tiedemann 2012) · checked, professional translation · segment 1449304)

- Accordingly, these claims **were** not accepted.
  En conséquence, ces demandes n'**ont** pas été acceptées.
  ([DGT-TM v2021](https://joint-research-centre.ec.europa.eu/language-technology-resources/dgt-translation-memory_en) · Source: European Commission, DGT-TM (Steinberger et al. 2012), re-used under Commission Decision 2011/833/EU; the Commission keeps ownership of the data · checked, professional translation · segment 2890010)

- At this meeting the following decisions **were** taken:
  A cette occasion, les décisions ci-après **ont** été adoptées :
  ([United Nations Parallel Corpus v1.0](https://conferences.unite.un.org/UNCorpus) · Source: United Nations, United Nations Parallel Corpus v1.0 (Ziemski, Junczys-Dowmunt and Pouliquen 2016) · checked, professional translation · segment 10352288)

- About thirty insurgents **were** killed.
  Une trentaine d'insurgés **ont** été tués.
  ([Tatoeba](https://tatoeba.org/) · Tatoeba, CC BY 2.0 FR · sentences by CK and lbdx · checked, community translation · [\#5137604](https://tatoeba.org/en/sentences/show/5137604) [\#10484503](https://tatoeba.org/en/sentences/show/10484503))

## étaient

Used about 285 815 times in the texts (everyday ≈ 1 288 · literary ≈ 167 · biblical ≈ 318 · parliamentary ≈ 6 025 · legal and administrative ≈ 17 642 · UN documents ≈ 260 377).

- They **were** not ill.
  Ils n'**étaient** pas malades.
  ([Tatoeba](https://tatoeba.org/) · Tatoeba, CC BY 2.0 FR · sentences by sundown and Amastan · checked, community translation · [\#9926485](https://tatoeba.org/en/sentences/show/9926485) [\#2078503](https://tatoeba.org/en/sentences/show/2078503))

- They **were** your neighbors.
  Ils **étaient** vos voisins.
  ([Project Gutenberg books (Verne, Hugo, Maupassant and their translators)](https://www.gutenberg.org/) · Project Gutenberg, public domain · checked, professional translation · hugo les miserables, row 23670)

- If they **were** all one member, where would the body be?
  Si tous **étaient** un seul membre, où serait le corps?
  ([World English Bible and Louis Segond 1910](https://ebible.org/) · World English Bible; Louis Segond 1910; public domain, eBible.org · checked, professional translation · 1CO 12:19)

- From the United Kingdom position, we **were** left with the situation where a number of issues had to be ironed out.
  En ce qui concerne la position britannique, un certain nombre de problèmes **étaient** restés en suspens.
  ([Europarl v8](https://www.statmt.org/europarl/) · Source: European Parliament proceedings, Europarl v8 (Koehn 2005) via OPUS (Tiedemann 2012) · checked, professional translation · segment 396589)

- Some of those companies **were** in the start-up phase.
  Certaines de ces sociétés **étaient** en phase de démarrage.
  ([DGT-TM v2021](https://joint-research-centre.ec.europa.eu/language-technology-resources/dgt-translation-memory_en) · Source: European Commission, DGT-TM (Steinberger et al. 2012), re-used under Commission Decision 2011/833/EU; the Commission keeps ownership of the data · checked, professional translation · segment 3929306)

## ces

Used about 5 113 times in the texts (literary ≈ 28 · biblical ≈ 136 · parliamentary ≈ 2 008 · legal and administrative ≈ 2 940).

- “What men these regicides **were**!” said Enjolras.
  --Quels hommes que **ces** régicides! dit Enjolras.
  ([Project Gutenberg books (Verne, Hugo, Maupassant and their translators)](https://www.gutenberg.org/) · Project Gutenberg, public domain · checked, professional translation · hugo les miserables, row 24563)

- As soon as the morning was light, the men **were** sent away, they and their donkeys.
  Le matin, dès qu’il fit jour, on renvoya **ces** gens avec leurs ânes.
  ([World English Bible and Louis Segond 1910](https://ebible.org/) · World English Bible; Louis Segond 1910; public domain, eBible.org · checked, professional translation · GEN 44:3)

- These **were** significant changes.
  **Ces** changements furent cruciaux.
  ([Europarl v8](https://www.statmt.org/europarl/) · Source: European Parliament proceedings, Europarl v8 (Koehn 2005) via OPUS (Tiedemann 2012) · checked, professional translation · segment 1193001)

- Given the above, these claims **were** rejected.
  **Ces** arguments sont par conséquent rejetés.
  ([DGT-TM v2021](https://joint-research-centre.ec.europa.eu/language-technology-resources/dgt-translation-memory_en) · Source: European Commission, DGT-TM (Steinberger et al. 2012), re-used under Commission Decision 2011/833/EU; the Commission keeps ownership of the data · checked, professional translation · segment 5262548)

- To-day, when all these facts which **were** obscure are nothing more than history, we may publish them.
  Aujourd'hui que tous **ces** faits restés dans l'ombre ne sont plus que de l'histoire, on peut les publier.
  ([Project Gutenberg books (Verne, Hugo, Maupassant and their translators)](https://www.gutenberg.org/) · Project Gutenberg, public domain · checked, professional translation · hugo les miserables, row 18456)

## été

Used about 2 736 times in the texts (everyday ≈ 143 · literary ≈ 28 · biblical ≈ 91 · parliamentary ≈ 1 004 · legal and administrative ≈ 1 470).

- You **were** removed from the list.
  Vous avez **été** retirées de la liste.
  ([Tatoeba](https://tatoeba.org/) · Tatoeba, CC BY 2.0 FR · sentences by AlanF\_US and Aiji · checked, community translation · [\#7458904](https://tatoeba.org/en/sentences/show/7458904) [\#7793976](https://tatoeba.org/en/sentences/show/7793976))

- This is why you **were** not crossed off.”
  Cela fait que vous n'avez pas **été** rayé.
  ([Project Gutenberg books (Verne, Hugo, Maupassant and their translators)](https://www.gutenberg.org/) · Project Gutenberg, public domain · checked, professional translation · hugo les miserables, row 14275)

- But we **were** gentle among you, like a nursing mother cherishes her own children.
  mais nous avons **été** pleins de douceur au milieu de vous. De même qu’une nourrice prend un tendre soin de ses enfants,
  ([World English Bible and Louis Segond 1910](https://ebible.org/) · World English Bible; Louis Segond 1910; public domain, eBible.org · checked, professional translation · 1TH 2:7)

- At our insistence, Palestinian companies and research establishments **were** also involved in joint projects.
  Notre insistance quant à la participation d'entreprises et institutions de recherche palestiniennes aux projets communs a **été** satisfaite.
  ([Europarl v8](https://www.statmt.org/europarl/) · Source: European Parliament proceedings, Europarl v8 (Koehn 2005) via OPUS (Tiedemann 2012) · checked, professional translation · segment 1956977)

- Malong reportedly did not discourage the killing of civilians by the SPLA troops, and persons suspected of hiding rebels **were** considered legitimate targets.
  Il n'aurait pas découragé le meurtre de civils par les troupes de l'APLS, les personnes soupçonnées de cacher des rebelles ayant **été** considérées comme des cibles légitimes.
  ([DGT-TM v2021](https://joint-research-centre.ec.europa.eu/language-technology-resources/dgt-translation-memory_en) · Source: European Commission, DGT-TM (Steinberger et al. 2012), re-used under Commission Decision 2011/833/EU; the Commission keeps ownership of the data · checked, professional translation · segment 4665805)

## More sentences

Sentence pairs with the word where no single translation was found: it may be translated by a phrase, or left out.

- I thought that they **were** wrong.
  Je pensais qu'elles avaient tort.
  ([Tatoeba](https://tatoeba.org/) · Tatoeba, CC BY 2.0 FR · sentences by CK and Aiji · checked, community translation · [\#7172393](https://tatoeba.org/en/sentences/show/7172393) [\#6456009](https://tatoeba.org/en/sentences/show/6456009))

- We **were** just kidding around.
  On déconnait, c'est tout.
  ([Tatoeba](https://tatoeba.org/) · Tatoeba, CC BY 2.0 FR · sentences by Hybrid and lbdx · checked, community translation · [\#7004745](https://tatoeba.org/en/sentences/show/7004745) [\#12964861](https://tatoeba.org/en/sentences/show/12964861))

- I thought that you **were** a friend.
  Je pensais que vous étiez une amie.
  ([Tatoeba](https://tatoeba.org/) · Tatoeba, CC BY 2.0 FR · sentences by CK and sacredceltic · checked, community translation · [\#7171926](https://tatoeba.org/en/sentences/show/7171926) [\#2159723](https://tatoeba.org/en/sentences/show/2159723))

## Grammar

Notes on grammar and translation on Mova: [English grammar](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/en/) · [French grammar](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/fr/) · [translating between English and French](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/pairs/en-fr/) · [translating from English](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/from-en/) · [translating into French](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/translation/into-fr/).

## About these examples

Translations are found by how often the two words stand in the same sentence pairs, and the highlighted words are matched automatically: both are approximate. Counts are estimated from a sample of each source. Every example names its source and licence. [Submit a better translation or example](https://md.translate.elamur.ai/free/en/submit/?pair=en-fr&word=were).


Every example is quoted under its source's licence and credited with it; the rest of the site is open under the Elamur Cosmic License.