Luc:	Tu n’es pas contre le fait que nous parlions de la Coupe du Monde, n’est-ce pas ?
Delphine:	Non bien sûr.
Luc:	Tant mieux ! Sais-tu qui l’a inventée ?
Delphine:	Qui l’a inventée ? Eh bien, je l’ai peut-être su mais je l’ai oublié.
Luc:	C’est un Français du nom de Jules Rimet qui a dirigé la Fédération internationale de football de 1920 à 1954.

In the previous lessons about the passé composé we mentioned that there was no agreement between the subject and the past participle of the verb in the passé composé when the auxiliary “avoir” is used.

For example:

Le garçon a chanté toute la nuit.
The boy sang all night long.

Les filles ont chanté toute la nuit.
The girls sang all night long.

In the second sentence, even though the subject is feminine plural, the past participle is the same as in the second sentence where the subject is masculine singular.

In this lesson we will see that in some cases the object -not the subject- agrees with the past participle of the verb with the auxiliary “avoir”, but there is a condition for that.

The object agrees with the past participle of the verb when the object comes before the verb. The verb has to be transitive. If the verb is intransitive then it doesn’t agree with the subject.

For example:

Mes parents ont acheté une nouvelle voiture.
My parents bought a new car.

La voiture que mes parents ont achetée est très puissante.
The car that my parents bought is very powerful.

In the first example, the verb is “ont acheté. We notice that the past participle doesn’t agree with the subject. In the second example “ voiture” is the direct object and it precedes the verb. When this happens, the direct object agrees with the past participle. We added “e” to “achetée” because “voiture” is feminine.

More examples:

Elle a mis ses bottes noires. Elle les a mises parce qu’elle aime la couleur noire.
She wore her black boots. She wore them because she likes black color.

In the first sentence, we can see that the past participle “mis” doesn’t agree with the subject “elle” because the auxiliary “avoir” is used. It doesn’t agree with the direct object either because the direct object comes after the verb. In the second sentence, the past participle agrees with the direct object which is in the form of a pronoun “les” replacing “ bottes” because “les” comes before the verb.

Here is another example:

Tu as aidé ton frère mais tu ne m’as pas aidé moi.
You helped your brother, but you didn’t help me.

m’ is the contraction of “me” which acts as a direct object.

He is the list of personal pronouns acting as direct objects.

me - te - le - la -les

Because the forms of the the auxiliary avoir in the passé composé always start with a vowel: ai, as, a, avons, avez, ont, the personal pronouns me, te, le - la - always contract i.e. the final vowel drops and is replaced by an apostrophe. This is called “ une élision” .

me becomes m’ -
te becomes t’
le and la become l’

Example: Instead of saying or writing:

Ils le ont trouvé dans le garage. (incorrect)
They found him in the garage.

You write:

Ils l’ont trouvé dans le garage.(correct)

l’ is used for a feminine and masculine object.

Negative statements:

Le professeur nous a donné beaucoup d’exercices mais nous ne les avons pas faits.
The teacher gave us a lot of exercises, but we didn’t do them.

Sa fille lui manque. Elle ne l’a pas vue depuis des mois.
She misses her daughter. She hasn’t seen her for months.