ils

See also: ILS and ILs

Franco-Provençal

Etymology

Plural formed from il.

Pronoun

ils m pl (postpositive -ils) (ORB, broad)

1. they (third-person plural masculine nominative)

See also

Franco-Provençal personal pronouns

			nominative	accusative	dative	tonic1	possessive2
singular	1st person		jo	mè			min
	2nd person		te	tè			tin
	3rd person	masculine	il	lo / le	lui		sin
		feminine	el	la	lyé
		neuter	o		y	—
		reflexive	—	sè
plural	1st person		nos				noutro
	2nd person		vos				voutro
	3rd person	masculine	ils	los / les	lor		lor
		feminine	els	les	lor / lyés
		reflexive	—	sè

¹ Disjunctive or object of a preposition.   ² Generally preceded by a definite article.

References

• ils in DicoFranPro: Dictionnaire Français/Francoprovençal – on dicofranpro.llm.umontreal.ca
• ils in Lo trèsor Arpitan – on arpitan.eu

French

Etymology

Inherited from Vulgar Latin illī, which sounded il in Old French, to which a plural -s was added. While il was the nominative form from late Latin, els, eus was the oblique form ("them") that had evolved from late Latin illōs, and is the ancestor of modern French eux.

In Old French, "they", being a nominative, was il from late Latin *illi, thus it didn't have the final -s, thus it was il used both for "he" and "they". The -s was added at the end of the 13th century in some regions, at the time the declension system of Old French started to collapse. As a consequence, some oïl languages in France have retained the original Old French il-form, and in some other regions, the ils-form supplanted the older one. Some dialects have even retained both forms depending on the locals.

See cognates in regional languages in France: Angevin, Champenois, Lorrain, and Orléanais is; Bourbonnais-Berrichon ils; Bourguignon âs; Franc-Comtois and Poitevin-Saintongeais és; Gallo i and iz; Norman i and is; Picard is and i; Franco-Provençal ils; Occitan els (Gascon eus); Catalan ells; Corsican elli.

Pronunciation

• (standard and higher registers) IPA^(key): /il/, (in liaison) /il.z‿/
• (familiar and informal registers, France)
  • (France) IPA^(key): /i/, (in liaison) /i.z‿/
  • (Quebec) IPA^(key): /i/, (prevocalic) /j/

• Audio (France):

  (file)

• Homophones: île, il

Pronoun

ils m pl (third-person plural, singular il, accusative les, dative leur, emphatic eux, possessive determiner leur)

1. they (male or mixed group)
2. (Quebec, informal) they (female)

Related terms

French personal pronouns

number	person	gender	nominative (subject)	accusative (direct complement)	dative (indirect complement)	locative (at)	genitive (of)	disjunctive (tonic)
singular	first	—	je, j’	me, m’		—	—	moi
	second	—	tu	te, t’		—	—	toi
	third	masculine	il	le, l’	lui	y	en	lui
		feminine	elle	la, l’				elle
		indeterminate	on1	—	—	—	—	—
		reflexive4	—	se, s’		—	—	soi
plural	first	—	nous	nous		—	—	nous
	second2	—	vous	vous		—	—	vous
	third	masculine	ils3	les	leur	y	en	eux3
		feminine	elles					elles

¹ On can also function as a first person plural (although agreeing with third person singular verb forms).
² Vous is also used as the polite singular form.
³ Ils and eux are also used when a group has a mixture of masculine and feminine members.
⁴ These forms are also used as third person plural reflexive.

Further reading

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

Anagrams

• lis
• s’il

Swedish

Noun

ils

1. indefinite genitive singular of il

Anagrams

• sil

Tashelhit

Etymology

From Proto-Berber *iləs, from Proto-Afroasiatic *lis-.

Pronunciation

IPA^(key): /ils/

Noun

ils m (plural ilsiwn)

1. tongue (organ)
2. language

Derived terms

• tasnilst (“linguistics”)