Learn French: Le train arrive à six heures et quart. - The train arrives at a quarter past six.

Le train arrive à six heures et quart.

The train arrives at a quarter past six.

Breakdown of Le train arrive à six heures et quart.

at / to / in (general locations) / about (what one thinks about / reacts to)

the hour / o'clock (f)

Questions & Answers about Le train arrive à six heures et quart.

How does et quart translate to "a quarter past"?

In French, you add fractions of an hour by using et (and) followed by the fraction. Quart means "quarter" (15 minutes). So literally, you are saying the train arrives at "six hours and quarter".

Why do we use à here instead of Il est?

The lesson uses Il est to state the current time, like "It is six o'clock" (Il est six heures). However, when you want to say that an event happens at a specific time, you use the preposition à, exactly like "at" in English.

How do you pronounce six heures? Does the 'x' change its sound?

Yes! Because the 'h' in heures is silent, the word starts with a vowel sound. This causes the 'x' in six to connect to it with a 'z' sound. Instead of sounding like "seess", six heures is pronounced "see-zeur". This connecting of sounds is called a liaison.

Why does heures have an 's' at the end?

In French, you must always include the word heure or heures when telling the time (unlike in English where we just say "at six"). Because six is more than one, heures is plural and needs an 's'. It only drops the 's' for one o'clock (une heure).