bâcler

French

Etymology

Perhaps from unattested Middle French and Old French *bâcler, *bacler (“to hold in place, prop a door or window open”). From Vulgar Latin *bacculare, from Latin baculum (“rod, staff used for support”), from Proto-Indo-European *bak-. Indirectly attested in Old French desbacler (“to clear a harbour by getting ships unloaded to make room for incoming ships with lading”).

The hypothesis of a derivation from Middle Dutch bakkelen (“to freeze artificially, lock in place”), from bakken (“to stick, stick hard, glue together”) has been discredited by the lack of attestation of bakkelen in Middle Dutch and by it having only the meaning "freeze superficially" in Dutch.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ba.kle/ ~ /bɑ.kle/

• Audio:

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• Audio (Canada):

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Verb

bâcler

1. (transitive) to bang out (a task), to botch

Conjugation

Conjugation of bâcler (see also Appendix:French verbs)

infinitive	simple	bâcler
	compound	avoir + past participle
present participle or gerund1	simple	bâclant /ba.klɑ̃/ or /bɑ.klɑ̃/
	compound	ayant + past participle
past participle		bâclé /ba.kle/ or /bɑ.kle/
		singular			plural
		first	second	third	first	second	third
indicative		je (j’)	tu	il, elle, on	nous	vous	ils, elles
(simple tenses)	present	bâcle /bakl/ or /bɑkl/	bâcles /bakl/ or /bɑkl/	bâcle /bakl/ or /bɑkl/	bâclons /ba.klɔ̃/ or /bɑ.klɔ̃/	bâclez /ba.kle/ or /bɑ.kle/	bâclent /bakl/ or /bɑkl/
	imperfect	bâclais /ba.klɛ/ or /bɑ.klɛ/	bâclais /ba.klɛ/ or /bɑ.klɛ/	bâclait /ba.klɛ/ or /bɑ.klɛ/	bâclions /ba.kli.jɔ̃/ or /bɑ.kli.jɔ̃/	bâcliez /ba.kli.je/ or /bɑ.kli.je/	bâclaient /ba.klɛ/ or /bɑ.klɛ/
	past historic2	bâclai /ba.kle/ or /bɑ.kle/	bâclas /ba.kla/ or /bɑ.kla/	bâcla /ba.kla/ or /bɑ.kla/	bâclâmes /ba.klam/ or /bɑ.klam/	bâclâtes /ba.klat/ or /bɑ.klat/	bâclèrent /ba.klɛʁ/ or /bɑ.klɛʁ/
	future	bâclerai /ba.klə.ʁe/ or /bɑ.klə.ʁe/	bâcleras /ba.klə.ʁa/ or /bɑ.klə.ʁa/	bâclera /ba.klə.ʁa/ or /bɑ.klə.ʁa/	bâclerons /ba.klə.ʁɔ̃/ or /bɑ.klə.ʁɔ̃/	bâclerez /ba.klə.ʁe/ or /bɑ.klə.ʁe/	bâcleront /ba.klə.ʁɔ̃/ or /bɑ.klə.ʁɔ̃/
	conditional	bâclerais /ba.klə.ʁɛ/ or /bɑ.klə.ʁɛ/	bâclerais /ba.klə.ʁɛ/ or /bɑ.klə.ʁɛ/	bâclerait /ba.klə.ʁɛ/ or /bɑ.klə.ʁɛ/	bâclerions /ba.klə.ʁjɔ̃/ or /bɑ.klə.ʁjɔ̃/	bâcleriez /ba.klə.ʁje/ or /bɑ.klə.ʁje/	bâcleraient /ba.klə.ʁɛ/ or /bɑ.klə.ʁɛ/
(compound tenses)	present perfect	present indicative of avoir + past participle
	pluperfect	imperfect indicative of avoir + past participle
	past anterior2	past historic of avoir + past participle
	future perfect	future of avoir + past participle
	conditional perfect	conditional of avoir + past participle
subjunctive		que je (j’)	que tu	qu’il, qu’elle	que nous	que vous	qu’ils, qu’elles
(simple tenses)	present	bâcle /bakl/ or /bɑkl/	bâcles /bakl/ or /bɑkl/	bâcle /bakl/ or /bɑkl/	bâclions /ba.kli.jɔ̃/ or /bɑ.kli.jɔ̃/	bâcliez /ba.kli.je/ or /bɑ.kli.je/	bâclent /bakl/ or /bɑkl/
	imperfect2	bâclasse /ba.klas/ or /bɑ.klas/	bâclasses /ba.klas/ or /bɑ.klas/	bâclât /ba.kla/ or /bɑ.kla/	bâclassions /ba.kla.sjɔ̃/ or /bɑ.kla.sjɔ̃/	bâclassiez /ba.kla.sje/ or /bɑ.kla.sje/	bâclassent /ba.klas/ or /bɑ.klas/
(compound tenses)	past	present subjunctive of avoir + past participle
	pluperfect2	imperfect subjunctive of avoir + past participle
imperative		–	tu	–	nous	vous	–
simple		—	bâcle /bakl/ or /bɑkl/	—	bâclons /ba.klɔ̃/ or /bɑ.klɔ̃/	bâclez /ba.kle/ or /bɑ.kle/	—
compound		—	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	—	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	—
1 The French gerund is usable only with the preposition en.
2 In less formal writing or speech, these tenses may be found to have been replaced in the following way: past historic → present perfect past anterior → pluperfect imperfect subjunctive → present subjunctive pluperfect subjunctive → past subjunctive (Christopher Kendris [1995], Master the Basics: French, pp. 77, 78, 79, 81).

Derived terms

• débâcler

Further reading

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