Picture scene
Pays or paysage? Describe a country and the view
Explore a valley in French and separate un pays from un paysage. Practise landscape words, country and countryside phrases, and the two plural forms.
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In short
Un pays is usually a country. Un paysage is a landscape or the scenery you see: hills, buildings, fields and rivers can all be part of it. One country contains many different landscapes.
Yellow the idea to rememberBlue French to learn
| French | English | Focus |
|---|---|---|
| Nous visitons deux pays. | We are visiting two countries. | Which countries? |
| Nous admirons le paysage. | We admire the scenery. | What can we see? |
| Le paysage change après le village. | The landscape changes after the village. | The visible setting. |
Look out over the valley: name six details
Find:
Describe the view in three sentences
Au premier plan, on voit un champ de blé.
In the foreground, you can see a wheat field.
Au fond, il y a une colline et un bois.
In the distance, there is a hill and some woodland.
C’est un paysage de campagne.
It’s a rural landscape.
A city view is a landscape too: un paysage urbain. You can describe un paysage de montagne, un paysage côtier or un paysage industriel. In English, des paysages variés becomes “varied landscapes” or “varied scenery”.
What is the difference between pays and paysage?
un paysa country
Focus: the country as a place
Dans quel pays habites-tu ?
Which country do you live in?
la campagnethe countryside
Focus: a rural setting
Mes grands-parents habitent à la campagne.
My grandparents live in the country.
le pays de mon enfancethe place or region of my childhood
Focus: a familiar home region in this expression
Je retourne dans le pays de mon enfance, près du village où j’ai grandi.
I’m returning to the region of my childhood, near the village where I grew up.
| Singular | Plural |
|---|---|
| un pays | des pays |
| un paysage | des paysages |
Pays already ends in s, so its spelling stays the same in the plural. Paysage takes a regular plural s. Say ce pays and ce paysage.