Word
Ils leur ont fait une promesse.
Meaning
They made a promise to them.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Breakdown of Ils leur ont fait une promesse.
une
a / an (feminine)
ils
they (masculine/mixed)
avoir
to have
faire
to do, to make
Questions & Answers about Ils leur ont fait une promesse.
Why do we use leur here instead of les?
Because you make a promise to someone. The French expression is faire une promesse à quelqu'un. When a verb connects to a person using the preposition à (to), we use the indirect object pronoun leur for "to them" rather than the direct object pronoun les.
Why does leur go before ont instead of before fait?
In the past tense (passé composé), object pronouns always go right in front of the helping verb, which is ont here. You will never put the pronoun between the helping verb and the past participle. So it must be Ils leur ont fait, not Ils ont leur fait.
Since "them" is plural, why doesn't leur have an "s" at the end?
As an indirect object pronoun (meaning "to them"), leur never takes an "s". The word leurs with an "s" is a possessive word meaning "their", used only when placed directly in front of a plural noun, like in the phrase leurs promesses (their promises).
Does the past participle fait need to change spelling to match une promesse or Ils?