Welcome back again to our weekly blog for French learners. Today we’re looking at a word that is in fact a combination of two words – jusqu’à.
Just before we get into the translation and examples, you can listen to its pronunciation in the clip below:
To understand jusqu’à, it’s first worth knowing that it is a preposition. But before translating this term, we also need to break it down into the two words we mentioned at the start:
Together, this becomes jusqu’à simply because the vowels are contracted, meaning an apostrophe appears in its place (between jusque and à). You can translate it as until, till, up to, or as far as. In terms of use, you’ll sometimes need to elide the final à with certain indefinite articles, so it could also be jusqu’au or jusqu’aux.
At this stage, it’s really not worth worrying about how this term might look a bit strange and consists of two separate words – just think of it asthe single word jusqu’à, with the meanings we mentioned above. You’ll pretty much always encounter it in this combined form, rather than ‘jusque’ alone.
Ready to see it in action?
jusqu’à present / maintenant up until now; so far
Mes enfants peuvent compter jusqu’à 100. My kids can count up to 100.
Je préfère attendre jusqu’à mon fils soit revenu. I’d prefer to wait until my son has come back.
Jusqu’à quelle heure ? Until when? ; Till what time?
aller jusqu’au bout to go all the way; to put your heart into it; to see something through
Nous ne resterons pas jusqu’à la fin. We will not stay until the end.
Il faut continuer jusqu’aux feux. You need to keep going as far as the traffic lights.
« Est-ce que vous vous êtes promenés loin d’ici ? » « Oui, on s’est promenés jusqu’aux montagnes. » “Did you go for a walk far from here?” “Yes, we walked as far as the mountains.”
jusqu’à ce que [+ verbe au subjonctif] until [verb] happens
Tout le monde peut rester au jardin jusqu’à ce qu’il pleuve. Everyone can stay in the garden until it starts raining.
We hope you enjoyed our blog – congratulations on learning another key French word and improving your vocabulary. Come back every week or re-read our old blogs until you take your language-learning journey to another level!
Written by Holly Tarbet, freelance copywriter and editor.
All opinions expressed on this blog are those of the individual writers, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions or policies of Collins, or its parent company, HarperCollins.
