Language/French/Grammar/Order-of-unstressed-object-pronouns-when-more-than-one-is-present

Order of unstressed object pronouns when more than one is present

Rule

When two (and more rarely three) unstressed object pronouns appear before a verb, their order usually follows the pattern indicated in Table 3.E (known by generations of British schoolchildren as the 'soccer team' of pronouns with a ball (en), a goalkeeper (y), two full-backs (lui, leur), three midfield players (le, la, les) and five strikers (me, te, se, nous, vous):

Table: The order of unstressed object pronouns

POSITION
First	Second	Third	Fourth	Fifth
me	le	lui		en
te	la	leur	y
se	les
nous
vous

Examples

• Il me l'a dit

He told me about it

• Elle le lui a dit

She told him about it

• Elle nous les a donnés

She gave them to us

• Nous le leur avons dit

We told them about it

• Susanne m'en a parlé

Susanne spoke to me about it

• Nous nous y sommes beaucoup attachés

We have become very fond of it

• Nous y en avons beaucoup trouvé

We found a lot of it there

• Elle les y a souvent vus

She has often seen them there

• Nous leur en avons promis beaucoup

We have promised a lot of those to them

• Ne me le donne pas

Don't give it to me

• Lui en auras-tu parlé avant demain?

Will you have spoken to him about it before tomorrow?

• En voudriez-vous s'il y en avait?

Would you want some if there were any?

• M'y accompagnerez-vous?

Will you come there with me?

• Il y en a beaucoup

There are a lot of them

• Nous y en avons trouvé plusieurs

We found several of them there

3 pronouns may occur in combination

More rarely three pronouns may occur in combination where the first is a benefactive (i.e. indicates that the action described by the verb is 'for the benefit' of the person in question), although this benefactive use is regarded as colloquial:

• Tu vas me le lui écrire, et plus vite que ça!

You will write it to her for me, and be quick about it!

In formal French the benefactive interpretation would be expressed through other means:

• Tu vas me le lui écrire = Tu vas me faire le plaisir de le lui écrire

Other Lessons

• Easy way of generating the imperative mood
• How to Guess the Gender of French Nouns
• Summary table of subject pronouns
• Time adverbs
• Adjectives
• Compound Tenses
• How to use Have
• Location of adverbs modifying adjectives, prepositions, noun phrases and other adverbs
• Reflexive use of me, te, se, nous, vous
• Use of the definite article with names of countries, regions, départements
• Pronouns
• Agreement of the past participle having the auxiliary "être" in compound tenses
• Subject verb agreement when subject quantifiers are present
• Impersonal verbs