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Je tiens à te remercier moi-même.

Je tiens à te remercier moi-même.
I insist on thanking you myself.
From Lesson 443:Verbs that change meaning with prepositions·French

Breakdown of Je tiens à te remercier moi-même.

même
same; even
remercier
to thank
tenir à
to be keen on, to insist on

Questions & Answers about Je tiens à te remercier moi-même.

Why does tiens à mean "insist on" here instead of "hold"?
The verb tenir on its own means "to hold". However, when used with the preposition à, its meaning shifts. tenir à followed by a noun means "to care about" (for example, Je tiens à toi). When followed by an infinitive like remercier, it means "to be anxious to", "to really want to", or "to insist on" doing it.
What would happen if I used the preposition de instead of à with the verb tenir?
Changing the preposition completely changes the verb's meaning, which fits right into your current lesson. While tenir à means "to insist on" or "to care about", tenir de means "to take after" someone. For example, Je tiens de mon père would mean "I take after my father".
Why is the pronoun te placed before remercier instead of before tiens?
Object pronouns go immediately before the verb they actually belong to. Here, you are thanking someone, so te is the direct object of remercier (to thank), not of tiens. Therefore, it is placed right in front of the infinitive.
Is moi-même the object being thanked in this sentence?
No, te (you) is the object being thanked. The word moi-même (myself) is used here to emphasize the subject Je. It simply highlights that I am the one doing the thanking personally, rather than sending someone else to do it for me.

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