craindre

French

Etymology

From Middle French, from Old French criembre, criendre (later creindre), from Classical Latin tremere, present active infinitive of tremō, later altered into a regional Gallo-Romance Vulgar Latin form *cremere, with the initial c- under the influence of the Celtic root *krit- (Breton kridien, Scottish Gaelic crith), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *krey- (Latin tremō ultimately derives from Proto-Indo-European *trem- (“to tremble”)). Compare the similar Occitan crénher.

Pronunciation

• audio:

  (file)

• IPA^(key): /kʁɛ̃dʁ/

Verb

craindre

1. (transitive) to fear
2. (intransitive, slang) to suck (to be unwanted or bad)

   J’ai perdu mon portefeuille. — Merde, ça craint.

   I've lost my wallet. — Shit, that sucks.

Usage notes

• craindre que is followed by a subjunctive, and in addition takes a ne as a meaningless particle, e.g. in the following sentence:

  Je crains que le lac ne soit froid. ― I fear that the lake is cold.

Conjugation

This verb is conjugated like peindre. It uses the same endings as rendre or vendre, but its -nd- becomes -gn- before a vowel, and its past participle ends in 't' instead of a vowel.

Conjugation of craindre (see also Appendix:French verbs)

infinitive	simple	craindre
	compound	avoir + past participle
present participle or gerund1	simple	craignant /kʁɛ.ɲɑ̃/ or /kʁe.ɲɑ̃/
	compound	ayant + past participle
past participle		craint /kʁɛ̃/
		singular			plural
		first	second	third	first	second	third
indicative		je (j’)	tu	il, elle, on	nous	vous	ils, elles
(simple tenses)	present	crains /kʁɛ̃/	crains /kʁɛ̃/	craint /kʁɛ̃/	craignons /kʁɛ.ɲɔ̃/ or /kʁe.ɲɔ̃/	craignez /kʁɛ.ɲe/ or /kʁe.ɲe/	craignent /kʁɛɲ/
	imperfect	craignais /kʁɛ.ɲɛ/ or /kʁe.ɲɛ/	craignais /kʁɛ.ɲɛ/ or /kʁe.ɲɛ/	craignait /kʁɛ.ɲɛ/ or /kʁe.ɲɛ/	craignions /kʁɛ.ɲjɔ̃/ or /kʁe.ɲjɔ̃/	craigniez /kʁɛ.ɲje/ or /kʁe.ɲje/	craignaient /kʁɛ.ɲɛ/ or /kʁe.ɲɛ/
	past historic2	craignis /kʁɛ.ɲi/ or /kʁe.ɲi/	craignis /kʁɛ.ɲi/ or /kʁe.ɲi/	craignit /kʁɛ.ɲi/ or /kʁe.ɲi/	craignîmes /kʁɛ.ɲim/ or /kʁe.ɲim/	craignîtes /kʁɛ.ɲit/ or /kʁe.ɲit/	craignirent /kʁɛ.ɲiʁ/ or /kʁe.ɲiʁ/
	future	craindrai /kʁɛ̃.dʁe/	craindras /kʁɛ̃.dʁa/	craindra /kʁɛ̃.dʁa/	craindrons /kʁɛ̃.dʁɔ̃/	craindrez /kʁɛ̃.dʁe/	craindront /kʁɛ̃.dʁɔ̃/
	conditional	craindrais /kʁɛ̃.dʁɛ/	craindrais /kʁɛ̃.dʁɛ/	craindrait /kʁɛ̃.dʁɛ/	craindrions /kʁɛ̃.dʁi.jɔ̃/	craindriez /kʁɛ̃.dʁi.je/	craindraient /kʁɛ̃.dʁɛ/
(compound tenses)	present perfect	present indicative of avoir + past participle
	pluperfect	imperfect indicative of avoir + past participle
	past anterior2	past historic of avoir + past participle
	future perfect	future of avoir + past participle
	conditional perfect	conditional of avoir + past participle
subjunctive		que je (j’)	que tu	qu’il, qu’elle	que nous	que vous	qu’ils, qu’elles
(simple tenses)	present	craigne /kʁɛɲ/	craignes /kʁɛɲ/	craigne /kʁɛɲ/	craignions /kʁɛ.ɲjɔ̃/ or /kʁe.ɲjɔ̃/	craigniez /kʁɛ.ɲje/ or /kʁe.ɲje/	craignent /kʁɛɲ/
	imperfect2	craignisse /kʁɛ.ɲis/ or /kʁe.ɲis/	craignisses /kʁɛ.ɲis/ or /kʁe.ɲis/	craignît /kʁɛ.ɲi/ or /kʁe.ɲi/	craignissions /kʁɛ.ɲi.sjɔ̃/ or /kʁe.ɲi.sjɔ̃/	craignissiez /kʁɛ.ɲi.sje/ or /kʁe.ɲi.sje/	craignissent /kʁɛ.ɲis/ or /kʁe.ɲis/
(compound tenses)	past	present subjunctive of avoir + past participle
	pluperfect2	imperfect subjunctive of avoir + past participle
imperative		–	tu	–	nous	vous	–
simple		—	crains /kʁɛ̃/	—	craignons /kʁɛ.ɲɔ̃/ or /kʁe.ɲɔ̃/	craignez /kʁɛ.ɲe/ or /kʁe.ɲe/	—
compound		—	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	—	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	—
1 The French gerund is usable only with the preposition en.
2 In less formal writing or speech, these tenses may be found to have been replaced in the following way: past historic → present perfect past anterior → pluperfect imperfect subjunctive → present subjunctive pluperfect subjunctive → past subjunctive (Christopher Kendris [1995], Master the Basics: French, pp. 77, 78, 79, 81).

Synonyms

• avoir peur
• redouter

Derived terms

• chat échaudé craint l’eau froide

Related terms

• crainte
• trembler

Further reading

• “craindre”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.