fourbir

French

Etymology

From (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Middle French fourbir, from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Old French forbir, from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Frankish *furbijan, from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Proto-Germanic *furbijaną (“to clean, scour”), from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Proto-Indo-European *prep- (“to appear”). Cognate with Middle High German vurben, vürben (“to clean, cleanse, sweep”), Old English feormian (“to clean, scour, furbish”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /fuʁ.biʁ/

• Audio:

  (file)

Verb

fourbir

1. (transitive) to furbish, burnish

Conjugation

This is a regular verb of the second conjugation, like finir, choisir, and most other verbs with infinitives ending in -ir. One salient feature of this conjugation is the repeated appearance of the infix -iss-.

Conjugation of fourbir (see also Appendix:French verbs)

infinitive	simple	fourbir
	compound	avoir + past participle
present participle or gerund1	simple	fourbissant /fuʁ.bi.sɑ̃/
	compound	ayant + past participle
past participle		fourbi /fuʁ.bi/
		singular			plural
		first	second	third	first	second	third
indicative		je (j’)	tu	il, elle, on	nous	vous	ils, elles
(simple tenses)	present	fourbis /fuʁ.bi/	fourbis /fuʁ.bi/	fourbit /fuʁ.bi/	fourbissons /fuʁ.bi.sɔ̃/	fourbissez /fuʁ.bi.se/	fourbissent /fuʁ.bis/
	imperfect	fourbissais /fuʁ.bi.sɛ/	fourbissais /fuʁ.bi.sɛ/	fourbissait /fuʁ.bi.sɛ/	fourbissions /fuʁ.bi.sjɔ̃/	fourbissiez /fuʁ.bi.sje/	fourbissaient /fuʁ.bi.sɛ/
	past historic2	fourbis /fuʁ.bi/	fourbis /fuʁ.bi/	fourbit /fuʁ.bi/	fourbîmes /fuʁ.bim/	fourbîtes /fuʁ.bit/	fourbirent /fuʁ.biʁ/
	future	fourbirai /fuʁ.bi.ʁe/	fourbiras /fuʁ.bi.ʁa/	fourbira /fuʁ.bi.ʁa/	fourbirons /fuʁ.bi.ʁɔ̃/	fourbirez /fuʁ.bi.ʁe/	fourbiront /fuʁ.bi.ʁɔ̃/
	conditional	fourbirais /fuʁ.bi.ʁɛ/	fourbirais /fuʁ.bi.ʁɛ/	fourbirait /fuʁ.bi.ʁɛ/	fourbirions /fuʁ.bi.ʁjɔ̃/	fourbiriez /fuʁ.bi.ʁje/	fourbiraient /fuʁ.bi.ʁɛ/
(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	fourbisse /fuʁ.bis/	fourbisses /fuʁ.bis/	fourbisse /fuʁ.bis/	fourbissions /fuʁ.bi.sjɔ̃/	fourbissiez /fuʁ.bi.sje/	fourbissent /fuʁ.bis/
	imperfect2	fourbisse /fuʁ.bis/	fourbisses /fuʁ.bis/	fourbît /fuʁ.bi/	fourbissions /fuʁ.bi.sjɔ̃/	fourbissiez /fuʁ.bi.sje/	fourbissent /fuʁ.bis/
(compound tenses)	past	present subjunctive of avoir + past participle
	pluperfect2	imperfect subjunctive of avoir + past participle
imperative		–	tu	–	nous	vous	–
simple		—	fourbis /fuʁ.bi/	—	fourbissons /fuʁ.bi.sɔ̃/	fourbissez /fuʁ.bi.se/	—
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).

Further reading

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