Past participle following imparfait

Rebekah O.C1Kwiziq community member

Past participle following imparfait

Why do we use the past participle "occupés" after "semblaient" in the third sentence. Why isn't it in the infinitive "occuper"?

Asked 3 years ago
CécileNative French expert teacher in KwiziqCorrect answer

Hi Rebekah,

Just to add to Maarten’s answer, here, ‘occupés’ (busy) is an attribute adjective which refers to the verb of statesembler’ (rather than two verbs following each other).

It could have been -

 

Ils semblaient impatients =They seemed impatient

Ils semblaient heureux They seemed happy

Here is a link to the Kwiziq list ( not exhaustive) of verbs of state -

https://kwiziq.learnfrenchwithalexa.com/learn/theme/1512981

 

Hope this helps!

Maarten K.C1 Kwiziq Q&A super contributor

This is past participle as adjective - “the ants seemed (to be) busy carrying etc”Try another adjective that isn’t a past participle in place of “busy” to check - eg “the ants seemed (to be) slow carrying . . .”

Past participle following imparfait

Why do we use the past participle "occupés" after "semblaient" in the third sentence. Why isn't it in the infinitive "occuper"?

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