Breakdown of La sœur du voleur s'est enfuie, mais elle s'est évanouie.
être
to be
elle
she
mais
but
la sœur
the sister
de
of / from / any (in negative sentences) / about (concerning)
le voleur
the thief
s'évanouir
to faint
s'enfuir
to flee (run away, escape)
Questions & Answers about La sœur du voleur s'est enfuie, mais elle s'est évanouie.
Why do both enfuie and évanouie have an extra e at the end?
Both s'enfuir (to flee) and s'évanouir (to faint) are 'essentially pronominal verbs', meaning they only exist with a reflexive pronoun like se or s'. For these verbs, the past participle in the passé composé always agrees with the subject. Since the subject is La sœur (feminine singular), we add an e to make enfuie and évanouie.
Are there non-reflexive versions of these verbs, like enfuir or évanouir?
In everyday modern French, no. This is exactly what makes them 'essentially pronominal'. They do not exist in a standard non-reflexive form (unlike a verb like laver, which can be se laver or just laver). Because the reflexive pronoun is built into their identity, they always follow the strict subject-agreement rule for their past participles.
What is the difference between s'est enfuie and a fui? Could I use fuir here?
You could say a fui (fled or ran away), but s'enfuir specifically emphasizes the act of escaping or running away from a place or captor, which fits perfectly for a thief's sister. Fuir is slightly broader and can also mean to shun or even to leak (like a water pipe). Notice that fuir uses avoir as its auxiliary, so it would be elle a fui without the extra e for agreement.
In the phrase la sœur du voleur, how do we know the agreement matches the sister and not the thief?
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