étonner
French, verb/e.tɔ.ne/
étonner is spelled É-T-O-N-N-E-R (7 letters) and appears 7.1 times per million words in written French, the 8,672nd most frequent French word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). Étonner is a French verb meaning “to surprise” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire) defines it as “Ébranler à la manière du tonnerre”.
What does étonner mean in English?
verb
- 1
to surprise
Ce qui m'étonne, c'est qu'il n'en dise rien.
Source: English Wiktionary, French section, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0).
How French dictionaries define it
verb: 1. Ébranler à la manière du tonnerre. 2. Surprendre par quelque chose d’extraordinaire, d’inattendu ; frapper de stupeur.
The definition in the French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire), in French.
Source: French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire), dump of September 1, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org.
Forms of étonner
- avoir + past participle infinitive multiword-construction
- étonnant gerund participle present
- ayant + past participle gerund multiword-construction participle
- étonné participle past
- étonne first-person indicative present
- étonnes indicative present second-person
- étonnons first-person indicative plural
- étonnez indicative plural present
- étonnent indicative plural present
- étonnais first-person imperfect indicative
- étonnait imperfect indicative singular
- étonnions first-person imperfect indicative
- étonniez imperfect indicative plural
- étonnaient imperfect indicative plural
- étonnai first-person historic indicative
- étonnas historic indicative past
- étonna historic indicative past
- étonnâmes first-person historic indicative
Source: English Wiktionary and French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire) (dumps of September 2, 2026 and September 1, 2026).
How do you pronounce étonner?
- /e.tɔ.ne/
- \e.tɔ.ne\
- [etɔne]
Sources: English Wiktionary, French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire) (dumps of September 2, 2026 and September 1, 2026); recordings from Wikimedia Commons.
English words that translate to étonner
Source: the translation tables of the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026.
How common is étonner in French?
étonner appears 7.1 times per million words in written French.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).