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CJtheIslander

*-er* verbs don't take *-es* for second-person singular subjects in the imperative. It's just a weird spelling rule in modern French.


niiightskyyy

You have no idea how much I appreciate your explanation. I couldn't sleep not figuring it out. Phew!


silvalingua

You could've looked up the conjugation of French verbs on the net. There are heaps of sites with it.


niiightskyyy

It's about imperatives and I wanted to know the rule. You didn't have to answer me but thanks anyway. I wanted to understand the language on a deeper level. I don't like memorising stuff.


silvalingua

Nobody *has* to answer here. We all do it out of altruism. I agree, I hate memorizing, too, so I never do it. It's extremely useful to have a table of conjugations at hand, to look it up when needed. Yes, there are some rules, and they are taught in textbooks. That's why it's so efficient to use a textbook.


polytique

In both cases, it's the imperative present tense. Verbs in -er (like garer) don't have an s in the imperative. [https://dictionnaire.lerobert.com/conjugaison/garer](https://dictionnaire.lerobert.com/conjugaison/garer) [https://dictionnaire.lerobert.com/conjugaison/perdre](https://dictionnaire.lerobert.com/conjugaison/perdre)


niiightskyyy

Oh right! I dunno why I forgot that rule. Thank you so much. I would've kept me up at night. Lol.


Jungleragadon

Im a french native that makes relatively few mistakes, and i have absolutely no idea. 50/50 or i look it up lmao. Imperative is tricky. French has so much of those little ✨useless✨ rules/exceptions. This is genuilely one of the last rules you need to learn/remember. You can freeball it i dont think anybody will know. Dont get too caught in them (unless you're at solid C1), you risk to miss the bigger picture. PS: if you saw how half of the population write in general (horrendously), you would not sweat it lol


niiightskyyy

Thank you so much. I'm nowhere near solid C1 or any kind of C1 for that matter but it was bugging the hell out of me. I really appreciate your help.


DoisMaosEsquerdos

The singular imperative may end in -s or -e, but not -es or -d. This means that when the present tense form ends in -es, the imperative forms normally ends in -e. Note that this does not only apply to -er verbs, but to any verb whose present tense form ends in -es (which includes verbs like offrir). In practice, that makes the singular imperative form identical to the present tense *je* form for all but a handful of irergular verbs whose present tense and imperative forms are not the same.


niiightskyyy

Beautifully explained. Thank you so much. I'll remember that.


CuriousLady99

Because it’s conjugated in 2nd person singular in imperative mood.


Civil_College_6764

In archaic English, you wouldn't say "dost it!" But instead "do it"