secourir

French

Etymology

Inherited from Middle French secourir, from an alteration of Old French sucurre, secorre (based on courir), from Latin succurrere.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /sə.ku.ʁiʁ/

• Audio:

  (file)

Verb

secourir

1. to succor; to help out

Conjugation

This verb is conjugated like other regular -ir verbs, except that in the conditional and future tenses an extra 'r' is added to the end of the stem and the past participle ends in -u. All verb ending in -courir are conjugated this way.

Conjugation of secourir (see also Appendix:French verbs)

infinitive	simple	secourir
	compound	avoir + past participle
present participle or gerund1	simple	secourant /sə.ku.ʁɑ̃/
	compound	ayant + past participle
past participle		secouru /sə.ku.ʁy/
		singular			plural
		first	second	third	first	second	third
indicative		je (j’)	tu	il, elle, on	nous	vous	ils, elles
(simple tenses)	present	secours /sə.kuʁ/	secours /sə.kuʁ/	secourt /sə.kuʁ/	secourons /sə.ku.ʁɔ̃/	secourez /sə.ku.ʁe/	secourent /sə.kuʁ/
	imperfect	secourais /sə.ku.ʁɛ/	secourais /sə.ku.ʁɛ/	secourait /sə.ku.ʁɛ/	secourions /sə.ku.ʁjɔ̃/	secouriez /sə.ku.ʁje/	secouraient /sə.ku.ʁɛ/
	past historic2	secourus /sə.ku.ʁy/	secourus /sə.ku.ʁy/	secourut /sə.ku.ʁy/	secourûmes /sə.ku.ʁym/	secourûtes /sə.ku.ʁyt/	secoururent /sə.ku.ʁyʁ/
	future	secourrai /sə.kuʁ.ʁe/	secourras /sə.kuʁ.ʁa/	secourra /sə.kuʁ.ʁa/	secourrons /sə.kuʁ.ʁɔ̃/	secourrez /sə.kuʁ.ʁe/	secourront /sə.kuʁ.ʁɔ̃/
	conditional	secourrais /sə.kuʁ.ʁɛ/	secourrais /sə.kuʁ.ʁɛ/	secourrait /sə.kuʁ.ʁɛ/	secourrions /sə.kuʁ.ʁjɔ̃/	secourriez /sə.kuʁ.ʁje/	secourraient /sə.kuʁ.ʁɛ/
(compound tenses)	present perfect	present indicative of avoir + past participle
	pluperfect	imperfect indicative of avoir + past participle
	past anterior2	past historic of avoir + past participle
	future perfect	future of avoir + past participle
	conditional perfect	conditional of avoir + past participle
subjunctive		que je (j’)	que tu	qu’il, qu’elle	que nous	que vous	qu’ils, qu’elles
(simple tenses)	present	secoure /sə.kuʁ/	secoures /sə.kuʁ/	secoure /sə.kuʁ/	secourions /sə.ku.ʁjɔ̃/	secouriez /sə.ku.ʁje/	secourent /sə.kuʁ/
	imperfect2	secourusse /sə.ku.ʁys/	secourusses /sə.ku.ʁys/	secourût /sə.ku.ʁy/	secourussions /sə.ku.ʁy.sjɔ̃/	secourussiez /sə.ku.ʁy.sje/	secourussent /sə.ku.ʁys/
(compound tenses)	past	present subjunctive of avoir + past participle
	pluperfect2	imperfect subjunctive of avoir + past participle
imperative		–	tu	–	nous	vous	–
simple		—	secours /sə.kuʁ/	—	secourons /sə.ku.ʁɔ̃/	secourez /sə.ku.ʁe/	—
compound		—	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	—	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	—
1 The French gerund is usable only with the preposition en.
2 In less formal writing or speech, these tenses may be found to have been replaced in the following way: past historic → present perfect past anterior → pluperfect imperfect subjunctive → present subjunctive pluperfect subjunctive → past subjunctive (Christopher Kendris [1995], Master the Basics: French, pp. 77, 78, 79, 81).

Derived terms

• au secours
• secours

Related terms

• courir

Further reading

• “secourir”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

Anagrams

• croiseur

Middle French

Etymology

From an alteration of Old French sucurre, secorre (based on courir), from Latin succurrere, present active infinitive of succurrō.

Verb

secourir

1. to succor; to help out

Descendants

• French: secourir