Le Présent: Venir et Tenir

Venir ("to come") and tenir ("to hold") are the twin pillars of one of the most productive verb families in French. They share an identical conjugation pattern with three different stems — -ien- in the singular, -en- in nous/vous, -ienn- in ils/elles — and between them they generate roughly thirty derived verbs (revenir, devenir, parvenir, intervenir, retenir, obtenir, soutenir, maintenir, contenir, appartenir…) that follow exactly the same pattern. Learn this conjugation once and you have free access to a substantial fraction of the French verb system.

The two verbs also stand at the heart of two grammatical structures every learner needs: venir de + infinitif (the passé récent, "I just did X") and tenir à + noun/infinitif (to care about / be set on / insist). And — this is critical — they take different auxiliaries in compound tenses: venir takes être (it's a maison-d'être verb), while tenir takes avoir. The same compound logic propagates to their respective families.

This page covers the full present paradigm, the three-stem alternation and its pronunciation traps, the passé récent construction, the tenir à family of expressions, and the auxiliary split that affects the whole derivative network.

The full paradigm — venir

Past participle: venu /vəny/. Auxiliary: être (maison d'être). Je suis venu(e) — "I came."

The full paradigm — tenir

Past participle: tenu /təny/. Auxiliary: avoir. J'ai tenu — "I held."

The two paradigms are exactly parallel — only the initial consonant differs (v- vs t-). Learn one and you know the other.

The three-stem alternation: -ien- / -en- / -ienn-

This is the most important pattern to internalize. Both venir and tenir alternate between three different stems, distributed across the paradigm in a fixed way:

The pattern is driven by phonotactics. When the e of -ent is silent and the spelling has -ien- with no following vowel, the -n nasalizes the preceding vowel: vient /vjɛ̃/. When a pronounced vowel follows the n (the -ons, -ez endings, or the -ent with the implicit "e" supporting plural participle agreement), the -n becomes oral and the vowel is no longer nasal: venons /vənɔ̃/, viennent /vjɛn/.

The 3pl spelling doubles the n — viennent — which is what makes the -n phonetically active even though the -ent is silent. The double n serves the same function as the e in the 1pl/2pl: it prevents nasalization.

Use 1: Venir — coming, arriving, originating

The core meaning of venir is motion toward the speaker (or toward a contextually understood destination):

A second core use is to indicate origin with the preposition de:

Note the directional contrast with aller (to go) — French is rigid about this distinction in a way English sometimes blurs:

When the speaker and the destination are co-located, venir; when speaker and destination are separate, aller. English speakers often default to "come" in both cases, which is incorrect in French.

Use 2: Venir de + infinitif — the passé récent

This is one of the highest-frequency constructions in spoken French and a place where English has no clean equivalent. The construction venir de + infinitif expresses an action that just happened — the immediate recent past:

The literal logic is "I am coming from V-ing" — using venir in its sense of "originating from," with the action V as the source. The construction is always in the present tense of venir when describing the immediate past from the present moment. (When describing the immediate past from a past moment — "I had just done X" — venir shifts to the imparfait: je venais de manger quand il est arrivé — "I had just eaten when he arrived.")

The English speaker's instinct is to translate "I just ate" with the passé composé (j'ai mangé). That's grammatical but misses the immediacy. Je viens de manger says specifically "the action ended seconds or minutes ago." It's the construction you want when "just" in English means "immediately before now."

For the full treatment, see Passé récent: venir de + infinitif.

Use 3: Tenir — holding physically and figuratively

The core meaning of tenir is to hold something — physically grasp it, keep it in place, retain control:

It also extends figuratively to keeping a promise, holding a position, running a business:

Use 4: Tenir à — caring deeply / being set on

This is one of the most useful French expressions and a place where English has no idiomatic equivalent. Tenir à + noun means "to be deeply attached to" or "to care a lot about"; tenir à + infinitif means "to insist on doing" or "to be set on doing":

The expression carries an emotional weight that "I want to" doesn't capture. Tenir à is not just preference — it's commitment, attachment, even a touch of insistence. A French speaker saying je tiens à venir is signaling something stronger than je veux venir.

Idiomatic expressions

A handful of additional expressions you will hear constantly:

The compound families — and the auxiliary split

Both venir and tenir anchor productive families of derived verbs. Every member of these families inherits the parent's conjugation and auxiliary choice.

The venir family — all take ÊTRE

The tenir family — all take AVOIR (with one exception)

The pattern: every reflexive verb takes être (regardless of family), so se souvenir and s'abstenir both take être. Outside reflexives, venir-family takes être (motion / change of state) and tenir-family takes avoir (transitive holding/possession).

A note on convenir

Convenir is mildly anomalous: when it means "to suit / be appropriate" it traditionally takes avoir (cette date m'a convenu); when it means "to agree on" or "to be agreed" it takes être (nous sommes convenus de nous voir samedi). The avoir usage dominates everyday speech. Most learners can default to avoir with convenir and be safe; the être form is more literary.

Common Mistakes

Mistake 1: Forgetting the nasal/oral shift in pronunciation.

The contrast between vient /vjɛ̃/ and viennent /vjɛn/ is the most important pronunciation feature of this family.

Mistake 2: Wrong auxiliary in compound tenses.

Mistake 3: Confusing venir and aller (direction).

Mistake 4: Translating "I just ate" as j'ai juste mangé.

Mistake 5: Using vouloir where tenir à is more natural.

Mistake 6: Wrong stem — using -en- in singular.

Key takeaways

Venir and tenir are best learned together as a paired family. Three points to internalize:

1. Three stems — -ien- / -en- / -ienn- — distributed across the paradigm. The pronunciation contrast between nasal -ien- (singular) and oral -ienn- (3pl) is one of the rare audible markers of singular/plural in French. Drill it.
2. Two auxiliaries. The venir family takes être (motion / change of state); the tenir family takes avoir (transitive holding). Reflexive members of either family take être by virtue of being reflexive. Internalize this so the auxiliary choice is automatic — this is the largest single gateway to the passé composé of dozens of verbs.
3. Two key constructions. Venir de + infinitif for the immediate recent past ("I just did X"). Tenir à + noun/infinitif for emotional attachment or insistent commitment. These are not optional vocabulary — they are core grammatical structures every learner has to master.

Once venir and tenir are solid, the entire family — revenir, devenir, parvenir, intervenir, retenir, obtenir, soutenir, maintenir, contenir, appartenir — is essentially free.