The symbol of Death in Brittany

"Le symbole de la Mort en Bretagne"
French C1 writing exercise

Soazig is recalling the time when her grandfather encountered a strange shadowy figure.

Pay attention to the hints!

Some vocabulary you may want to look up before or during this exercise: "foggy", "on the edge of a forest", "a figure (person)", "gloomy", "in the distance", "the latter", "a hooded cloak", "to hold [something] in one's hand", "a scythe", "a (horse-pulled) cart", "creaking (squeaking)", "to be pulled by a horse", "skeletal", "to collect (souls)", "a soul", "to be about to [do]", "frozen in place", "at the idea of [doing]", "to manage to [do]", "to turn around", "to draw attention to [oneself]", "to have a nightmare about something".

I’ll give you some sentences to translate into French

  • I’ll show you where you make mistakes
  • I’ll keep track of what you need to practise
  • Change my choices if you want
Start the exercise
How the test works

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One cold foggy night, when he was still a teenager, my grandfather was walking alone on the edge of the forest when he suddenly noticed a tall and gloomy figure in the distance. The latter was wearing a black hooded cloak and was holding a scythe in its hand. It was seated in a wooden creaking cart which was pulled by a skeletal horse. My grandfather had immediately thought of Ankou, the mythical creature who collects the souls of people about to die. He was unable to move, frozen in place, completely terrified at the idea of being its next victim. After a few seconds that had felt like an eternity (to him), he'd managed to turn around without drawing attention to himself. After coming back home, he'd had nightmares about it for weeks. But it was only recently, as I was visiting him, that he spoke about it for the very first time.

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