Talk:Latin grammar

Lots of original research on this page
Stuff like "Latin has six declensions" and too many examples to count of mnemonic devices one teacher came up with somewhere being included as universal rules smack of OR. I understand that it's quirky that "3rd i-stem" is not considered a separate declension, but it isn't. Such weird deviations from the way every Latin textbook on Earth states things to be don't belong here when uncited. DarthSquidward (talk) 22:22, 13 March 2008 (UTC)


 * I think the page is just confused between declensions and cases. (I fear to look at the Latin declension page...) Adam Bishop (talk) 09:36, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Noun cases
It appears to me that Latin has a bunch of "noun classes". What makes gender a salient attribute apart from the various declensions? Declension and gender seem to be very intertwined - how can I understand them better? &mdash; Hippietrail 14:53, 24 Jul 2004 (UTC)


 * with a short list of exceptions (agricola, nauta, come to mind) all 1st declension nouns are feminine.  so just tell yourself, all words that end -a, -ae are feminine.  that's a good rule (but keep in mind the exceptions).  then all words that end in -us, &#299; are masculine (i don't think there are any exceptions to this one), all words that end -um, -&#299; are neuter (also no exceptions).  with third declension nouns, there is no way of guessing the gender, you must simply learn it with the word.  4th declension words are usually masculine, but some are neuter, and they have to be learnt with the word as well, and 5th declension (-&#275;s, -e&#299;) is usually feminine.


 * As for first declension nouns that are masculine, many first declension masculines denote "male" occupations--pirata [pirate], poeta [poet], agricola [farmer], incola [inhabitant--this word can also be feminine if the person happens to be a female], nauta [sailor], auriga [chariot driver] and so on. In general, with no exceptions I can think of right now, all nouns that denote people have natural gender (i.e., males are masculine, females are feminine). Consequently, Roman names of men that are first declension are also masculine. There are many of these: Dolabella, Sulla, Catalina, and so on.


 * There are actually quite a few second declension nouns ending in -us that are feminine. These include some plants, gems, islands, and countries: fagus [beech], ulmus [elm], Aegyptus [Egypt], sapphirus [sapphire], and even some words like arctus [bear--borrowed from the Greek].


 * so yes, for 3 of the 5 declensions, the declension is intertwined with the gender. I hope that helps.  If it is still unclear, ask some more questions  -Lethe 01:25, Jul 25, 2004 (UTC)


 * So what qualities of a word give it its gender and what qualities give it its declension? Is it the way adjectives and demonstratives decline in agreement with the nouns? Is it what was written in the oldest Latin grammars? Thanks for your answers so far. &mdash; Hippietrail 08:16, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)


 * I think the gender and declension of a word are just intrinsic properties of a noun, just as much as the meaning of the word is an intrinsic property. I don't think that the way adjectives agree with the noun determine the gender, rather i think it is the other way around: the gender determines how the adjectives agree with the noun.  And the declension of the noun has no effect on modifying adjectives whatsoever.  I don't think written grammars determine the language either, but rather that all indo-europeans have (or at least, had at some point) grammatical gender.  Every word in Latin inherited its gender from some word in the parent language, proto-Indo-european.  any new words in the Latin language would then be assigned a gender and declension based on some pattern like the ones mentioned above.  You might want to read grammatical gender for some more explanations of genders.  I hope this helps.  Lethe


 * Do note that not all experts agree on the original gender system of Proto-Indo-European. Some experts who study Hittite which has some relation with Proto-Indo-European believe that the original gender distinction was between animate and inanimate gender.


 * My high school latin teacher would sometimes tell us how certain words had very feminine or maternal imagery associated with them, such as the meaning of "boat" (carrying a person) being comparable to that of a pregnant woman. My latin's so rusty though that I can't elaborate on the subject further, and also, my latin teacher was a bit kooky. &#9992; James C. 03:27, 2004 Sep 11 (UTC)


 * I know this is a late response, but I couldn't resist. We should not forget that words in English are also feminine, masculine or neuter. This is also the case in Dutch, my first language. Why we don't learn that anymore is because Latin is a gender-centered language; the adjectives agree with the gender of the noun. (Femina bona, res bona, agricola bonus, dominus bonus). This is why it is important we learn the genders of Latin words.

In English every noun gets the same adjective. A good woman, a good thing, a good farmer, a good lord.

So what words are feminine, what masculine and what neuter? Words that end with -a are feminine, with the exception or words that point to a man, like agricola. Words that end with -us are masculine, with the exception of I think one or two, and many words from the 4th declination, which is a long -us as opposed to the short -us of the first declination. An example is the feminine manus, which means hand. And neuter...well all the other words, lol! The termination -us in the 4th declension is short in the nominative singular and long in the genitive singular and nominative and accusative plural. Seadowns (talk) 22:57, 19 November 2016 (UTC)

There are also two gendered words like dies (day), from the 5th declination. If the author speaks about one particular day (Dies haec), dies is often feminine. If the other does not (Dies pulchri (plural)), dies is often masculine.

Third Declension Neuter Endings

 * - The nominative and accusative forms of a neuter word are always the same. In the third declension the nominative is unique, and in a third neuter word the accusative is always the same as the nominative (for a few execptions).

The nominative and accusative are the same in every neuter word, singular and plural.

Locative Endings
I dont know a whole lot about the locative but I know the endings. When it is used, it is instead of using Ablative Place Where only with: Names of Cities, Towns, Domus (noun for home) and Rūs (country, opposite of city). When it is used ALL prepositions are omitted.

Do any of you think that a section about the locative should be put in like there are sections about the other cases? I have a book with all of this grammar stuff in it and I could type a few pages of it up during my midterms next week. I'm in high school and my midterms will be easy except for Latin because we have to memorize like 600 lines, its AP Latin Vergil. Sigh... BenWhitey 01:09, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Misprint
There is a misprint in the first declension. "puella" has the form "puella" in ablative singular.

Roosen


 * Thanks! You could have fixed it yourself, by the way - just click "edit" like you on this page. Adam Bishop 06:56, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)


 * Whoa! That mistake wasn't in there when I added the table! -Lethe | Talk 16:49, Dec 21, 2004 (UTC)


 * No, it was added a few days ago by an anon, along with bolding the endings...seems to have been an accident. Adam Bishop 17:08, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)


 * Oh I see. This is the same person who added the sentence about the vocative.  Well thanks for fixing it. -Lethe | Talk

Is anybody still active in here? Is there a group of interested parties?


 * Interested in what? Adam Bishop 02:19, 14 September 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for cleaning up
Thank you Adam Bishop and Lucius for cleaning up the mess.Philx 12:21, 13 October 2005 (UTC)PhilxPhilx 12:21, 13 October 2005 (UTC)

locative endings are used for cities, towns and SMALL islands (not Sicily for example). The reason is that small islands typically had only one town on them, so they could be treated as a town. Larger islands, like Sicily, had more than one town. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.7.144.221 (talk) 19:55, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

Merge this with Latin conjugation and Latin declension?
We should merge the Latin grammar page into the Latin declension and Latin conjugation page. Most of the elements which are in the grammar page are already on the other two; namely, the charts. Or, just remove the grammar page all together, and focus on the grammar of nouns and verbs on the subsequent other two pages. good, bad, mediocre idea? 01:37, Mar 16, 2005 (UTC)

I've suggested it. Does anyone disagree? My only concern is that this article is getting a bit long, but otherwise the conjugation and declension articles contain much of the same information (the conjugation article is more in-depth), just formatted differently.--Wasabe3543 07:14, 25 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Well, there are a lot of grammatical topics that are not appropriate for the declension and conjugation pages, so a complete merger of this page is ill-advised. As far as the charts being merged, yes, I agree with that.  Tables of paradigms will make this article too long and distract from interesting discussion.-lethe talk 12:20, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I propose that we do the following. We should get rid of the declension, conjugation, and grammar pages in the form that they exist now. Then, make a page for each different Latin part of speech: adjectives, adverbs, nouns, verbs, interjections, etc. We then would create a main page on Latin grammar, explaining the general concepts. From the main Latin grammar page, we would link to the subsequent parts of speech pages, which would describe in finer detail the complexities of the language and include the conjugation/ declension charts. How's that sound? Christopher 00:25, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

For example:

A Complete Latin Grammar ==Verbs== link to main article on latin verbs (charts and fine details go on this page) latin verbs behave like... (general explanation here) ==Nouns== link to main article on latin nouns  (charts and fine details go on this page) latin nouns behave like... (general explanation here) ==Adjectives== link to main article on latin adjectives (charts and fine details go on this page) latin adjectives behave like... (general explanation go here) etc.

I'm not a fan of splitting up articles like that. I know there is precedent for it (like for French verbs or whatever), but I think it would be far more useful to have the information on one page. Adam Bishop 00:54, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

I would prefer to have all of the information on a single page to avoid having to keep clicking links to see the two closely related pages. I do like the idea proposed by User Christopher Willis, though. Jds10912 00:30, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

We need more opinions on this Christopher 08:24, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I think that we should probably put all of the Latin grammar stuff on the Latin Grammar page. Then we can brake it up into subsections with verbs, nouns, adjectives, etc. I think that the most useful parts of all the pages should be merged into one UBER-LATIN GRAMMAR page. BenWhitey 01:13, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

It is ridiculous to maintain two sets of grammatical tables that serve the same purpose. We should keep the tables in separate articles (like they are now) and provide more general elaboration on the main Latin grammar page.&mdash;Kbolino 03:11, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

I definetly think that they should be merged into the Grammar section. Conjugation of verbs and declension of nouns... It's impossible to have a discussion about Latin grammar without them. They belong under the same topic. Not only that, but, taking it a step further, I think the grammar section should be merged with the article Latin, putting literally everything on one page. GofG 00:41, 9 February 2006 (UTC)


 * That's how the page on Sanskrit appears. - Christopher 00:12, 16 February 2006 (UTC)


 * Oppose. Latin conjugation and Latin declension are too huge to merge, moreover the Latin grammar article is too big itself. Brandmeister 18:58, 21 February 2006 (UTC)


 * It's so big because it's ridden with redundancy. -Christopher 19:11, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

I would prefer them separate. I am trying to learn latin and tend to re-read these pages. Since they are separate, they should have slightly different angles of describing the same thing. --Jondel 07:42, 23 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Separate! When I refer to it, I know what I need already! All the grammar articles should be broken out into major tabular sections. StrangerInParadise 09:08, 11 April 2006 (UTC)


 * Agreed. Keep these articles separate. Far too cumbersome to place these topics all on one page. Latin conjugations and declensions are certainly worthy of their own articles. I support placing summaries on this page and linking to the main page. Definately do not merge this page with the main Latin page! Mysterius 03:26, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

I think they should stay seperate but they should definantly be linked to each other. Jesusfreak 01:28, 2 May 2006 (UTC)
 * I hate to have to quote The Offspring here, but "Keep 'em separated."--Jpbrenna 23:29, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

I personally believe that Latin conjugation and Latin declension (as well as Word order in Latin) should all be "merged" into Latin grammar. I like the idea of keeping everything on one page and just scrolling down to the topic I want to read (à la GMail, "don't throw anything away" and "search, don't sort" but still "keep it all in context".). Adding these articles to Latin grammar would create only a very small change in the size of the article, because most of what is stated in Latin conjugation and Latin declension is already stated in Latin grammar. It would not be "too cumbersome", as Mysterius says, in fact it would be less cumbersome than having three separate pages. Why have "summaries on this page [...] linking to the main page" (sorry Mysterius, no offense intended, just using your argument for the sake of rebutting :D ) when Latin declension could become a redirect to Latin grammar, which would be more in depth and more informative because it would include information from both articles? As for Brandmeister, these articles are huge because they are basically just tables. Anyway, what is huge? Many of the featured articles are "huge". As for StrangerInParadise, they are broken into tables on this page, why put the tables somewhere else? This article could tell you all you need to know, just use the Table of Contents to go to the section that you want, that's what it's there for :P. Note: I completely understand that this is personal preference, I am not pushing my beliefs upon anyone. To resolve this issue, I suggest two things: a vote and a "pros and cons" table. I always had this idea but never got to use it. Check it out: Now anyone can fill in what they want. Also, I'll be the first to vote:

Vote for merge of Latin declension and Latin conjugation with Latin grammar

 * Support. See reasons listed above. J. Finkelstein 19:55, 10 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Oppose Would be far too long an article. People are perfectly capable of navigating between a couple of different pages Nomist 01:01, 11 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Support. See reasons listed above. - Christopher 02:39, 18 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Oppose Too long! You'll tire out the reader.--Jondel 04:51, 18 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Oppose - The page Latin conjugation has become so large that merging that article has become impossible. It contains enough information to stand in its own right. Since merging has become impossible this vote is useless in any case. Shinobu 11:29, 24 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Oppose As per WP:SS. Also, I deleted an unsigned support because there's nothing even suggesting that it wasn't done by someone else who has already supported. UnDeadGoat 22:21, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Does this count as a consensus? Can we call this poll closed? UnDeadGoat 18:25, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Probably. Of course, I'm one the opposers, but I doubt the supporters will have a different opinion. Shinobu 05:28, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Right then. This vote counts as CLOSED and I'm deleting the little banner things. UnDeadGoat 23:22, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Translation of book title?
Hello, I'm finishing up an article on the Spanish traveller García de Silva Figueroa and need an English translation of the title of his book Totius legationis suae et Indicarum rerum Persidisque commentarii. Can anyone tell me what this would be in English? Thanks! --Peripatetic 12:01, 7 January 2006 (UTC)


 * How about "Commentaries of his whole mission and of Indian and Persian affairs"? Adam Bishop 17:58, 7 January 2006 (UTC)


 * That looks accurate to me! Cjcaesar

The Gerundive is NOT a Future Passive Participle!
The gerundive shows obligation, not futurity. It can be useful for people learning the language to identify the gerundive with the FPP, but it must be stressed that they are not the same thing. GenericGabriel 22:34, 27 March 2006 (UTC)


 * This is not entirely true, since the gerundive is used to make the Passive periphrastic conjugation one can asume that it is a future passive participle 189.145.97.14 05:53, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

Is, Ea, Id
Could somebody please put in some tables for the pronouns 'is, ea, id', 'ille, illa, illud', and 'hic, haec, hoc', as well as of the relative pronound 'qui, quae, quod'? It just looks sort of disconnected from the rest of the article - since the rest of it is so comprehensive, the lack of in-depth text in one area makes the article look a bit patched up.

--Stefano 21:53, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Latin as a Spoken Language
I'm in high school in New Zealand, and I'm studying Latin. My Latin teacher is great, and he's poured into me an almost terrible enthusiasm of Latin (seeing as I would like to become an engineer). He is a great teacher, of both Latin and English literature, and though a lot of people say that Latin is a dead language, I'm sure there are some people out there with comparable or more skill than he is at Latin, and actually speak it fluently and often. Could you tell me what you think of Latin please? Thanks a lot.


 * The Roman Catholic church used Latin exclusively in its masses for a very long time until the 1960's when it was decided for them to deliver masses in the peoples' native tongues. However, there are still masses spoken entirely in Latin for the curious of us. I really don't think Latin is much of a spoken language beyond a few (mainly) academic circles. It's a great language to know if you're seeking to improve your English vocabulary, as about 60% of English words are derived from Latin. You can have alot of fun in the language with a friend; send messages to them in Latin, work together to translate things, et cetera. All I'll say about its practicality is that I would not list it as a second language on a job application. Mustang 18:39, 24 May 2006 (UTC)


 * I most wholeheartedly would list it as an area of knowledge on a job application, though. One could make the case that Latin is the official language of the Vatican, but he or she wouldn't likely get anywhere with that. It's incredibly useful in terms of knowledge, although you aren't likely to find someone with whom to speak it. Having said that, I've found that if you know virtually no Italian, it's possible in Rome to get a basic message across by using Latin.


 * P.S. Keep up the Latin. ;) GenericGabriel 04:52, 4 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Learning Latin will help you learn the Romance languages in no time. Plus, you will be able to read science articles in almost any Europe language if you learn Latin.  Greek would also be good.Cameron Nedland 15:10, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Latin Grammar, Declension, and Conjugation still have a lot of redundant information
Each page to a certain degree overlaps with the other. How can we organize each page so that they each will cover their own separate topics? Should Latin grammar focus on indo European influences on the Latin language? Nouns, adjectives, and adverbs are declined, so the declension page should focus on those. Likewise, verbs are conjugated, so the Conjugation page should focus on verbs. That leaves the Grammar page. What should that focus on, if nouns and verbs are already covered? All of it as of now is terrible unorganized and redundant. Is there any reason why we shouldn't combine all three pages? It seems like that would simplify a great deal of information. Suggestions? - Christopher 21:18, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

On my update
First of all, I removed all the charts, which over the next few days, I'll add properly to the declension and conjugation pages. I think charts say a lot more than paragraphs when trying to describe cases and conjugations. They're easier for the eyes, and easier to interpret. The fact that vocative endings are similar to nominative is easier to discern from a chart than from something written out; e.g. from the previous version:

This generally looks exactly like Nominative, except in second declension masculine nouns ending in "us" where the "us" is turned to an "e", and second declension masculine nouns ending in "ius", where the "ius" is turned into "ī". E.g., "servus" becomes "serve", and "filius" becomes "filī"

The specifics should be discussed on the declension page.

I've tried to reduce the amount of redundant information and clarify many of the topics discussed. I expanded the opening into a paragraph, as well as many of the sections. I added a section on adverbs. I incorporated the both the page on word order and the ablative absolute because I felt they were too small to merit a page of their own. I modified them both slightly for clarity.

I removed the section on Latin sentence construction and rules of subordination because it focused on was word order, which I felt that through the examples above, it's pretty obvious that there's a variable word order in Latin.

I still think the page remains in an unfinished state and I'm sure that it's still missing some more detailed information, but on the whole, it's looking pretty good. Suggestions, comments? - Christopher 07:44, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

It's pretty good! 1. Could we have a heading or link for definition of prepositions? 2. Another heading for articles (to say they don't exist in Latin) 3. The heading for degrees of comparison under adjective should be a subheading 4. It is very helpful to have English examples of word types so school students can easily understand. Hifromnz (talk) 01:35, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Question for experts
I recently encountered a sentence (don't have the exact sentence with me now) with the following structure:

Name (of person) explicavit, et Name2, et Name3 et Name4 et Name5 plural-verb....

A translator grouped it like this: Name1 and Name2 explained, and Name3, Name4, etc. ....

Would it be more appropriate to translate the first verb in the singular and handle the first et as "as did Name2"? Or is it a common enough construction to turn the singular verb into plural with the et? The author is 5th century. Thanks! Zeusnoos 14:26, 18 August 2006 (UTC)


 * It's hard to tell if we don't have the whole sentence. Do you know who the author was? Was the plural verb also a form of explicare? Presumably the first guy explained something, and the other people agreed with him later. Adam Bishop 15:44, 18 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Omnia emin, quae Name1 explicavit et Name2 et quae Name3, Name4 et Name5 ediderunt, [et] ceterique omnes huius artis scii. Zeusnoos 21:32, 18 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Hmm...well are you sure that is the whole sentence? I found this on Google: "Omnia enim quae Aesculapio Mercurius et Anubis (?) tradiderunt, quae Petosiris explicavit et Nechepso, et quae Abram, Orpheus et Critodemus ediderunt ceterique omnes hujus artis scii ... perscripsimus", from a book about Greek astrology. I would say that means "We reported everything which Mercury and Anubis told to Aesculapius, and which Petosiris explained to Nechepso, and which Abram, Orpheus and Critodemus, and all others skilled in this art, taught." The "quae Petosiris explicavit et Nechepso" bit is a little strange but everything seems to match. Adam Bishop 22:41, 18 August 2006 (UTC)


 * I find your suggested translation of making the second person dative interesting - I wanted to do that, but the et was in the way (I wonder if it was added by a transcriber or editor). I deliberately left the names out to focus only on this segment of the sentence and to not introduce bias by how the names are historically grouped in other writers.  If you are correct that P explains to N, then my hypothesis about these writers has more support.  Thank you.  Zeusnoos 04:43, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

Adjectives...pulcherior
Cornelia pulcherior puella est quam Flavia

Shouldn't that be pulchrior? Peter1968 17:09, 16 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Yes, and it is also somewhat irregular, so I put it with the irregular list, and switched it with fortis, which is what the example was using previously. Adam Bishop 18:27, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

"When used in sentences, the comparative adjective (better, faster, brighter) may be put in the ablative or with the addition of 'quam' (Latin: than)."

This is strictly wrong - the comparative adjective is not used in the ablative, the noun is. This forms the ablative of comparison. However, both the ablative of comparison and the quam construction are irrelevant in this particular section (there is also erroneous use of bold text). If this out of place information is to be kept in the article, then it would be advisable to add the equally out of place information about the quam + superlative construction. Where is any mention of substantives? Indeclinable adjectives? The declension tables are poorly titled. Declension paradigms, too, are totally out of place in this article (Latin grammar). Rewrite? I apologize, but undue and disproportionate focus on the ablative absolute is only the result of there being so little information in the article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.10.240.223 (talk) 22:39, 20 January 2009 (UTC)


 * I have no problem with a rewrite. Are you volunteering? I don't have enough energy to contribute much to it, beyond the occasional error correction should the need arise (a.k.a. sniping from the sidelines :) Rwflammang (talk) 23:52, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

where is this page headed
People are complaining about redundancy - well, I think a more comprehensive topic would include how Latin grammar evolved, especially in regard to its PIE roots. I'm rather curious since it only mentions PIE a few times. John Riemann Soong 21:02, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Hello John, it is a propos to me that you should have brought this up. Since you did a lot of work has been done on the classification of Latin and the boxes to the right have been devised. What everyone has been putting off however is an article on Proto-Latin. At this very moment I am building one in a word file but I hope someone will beat me to it. All the major references listed in these articles do in fact discuss the evolution of Latin. We have articles now on Italic languages, Osco-Umbrian and Faliscan even though some are stubs. To me Proto-Latin is worth the candle - it might be tied in to prehistory in Latium - another topic people seem to be avoiding or putting off. All we get are some centuries-old statements about the Italic tribes roaming through the area and replacing the native squirrels with Indo-European pioneers. It reminds me of some British historians I have read who like to talk about the total replacement of the Celts in Britain with Anglo-Saxons and how there is no trace now of any Celts. This kind of jingoism ought to go into the trash can and we ought to stand up to it. We need an article on Proto-Latin.Dave (talk) 12:43, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

Accents
I have been trying to learn latin from a number of different sources, and need to know, does latin feature any accents? Some pages show use of accents, some show none at all, and almost all show different accents. Which one is the true one? Elbbom 10:28, 28 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Do you mean accents on letters or accents of speech? Latin does have pronounced accents, but they are normally weak compared to English ones. As for accents on letters, a horizontal line designates that a verb is long, but this is usually left out and instead is implied. Sometimes Latin texts show which syllable takes the accent (for instance, amâre). RedRabbit1983 01:23, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

That?
How does one say, the king said that the youths had been very brave. Da G007 (talk) 22:11, 6 December 2007 (UTC)


 * In classical Latin this sentence does not have the word "that", they use a construction called "accusative infinitive". I would translate it as "Rex pueros fuisse fortiores dixit". Adam Bishop (talk) 02:02, 7 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Mostly right, but the superlative fortissimos should be used (fortiores means 'somewhat brave'), and iuvenes is better than 'pueros'. In vulgar and non-classical Latin in general (Christian, post-classical) it is possible to use conjunctions such as quod or even quia and quoniam. Iblardi (talk) 17:13, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

Arte Et Debris
Is this an actual 'Latin' phrase?

If so, what does it translate into in modern English, wroughly! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.138.204.27 (talk) 15:20, 21 August 2008 (UTC)


 * That's neither Latin, nor any other language, according to Google. Adam Bishop (talk) 04:53, 24 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I don't believe 'debris' is a Latin word, but comes from French. Petronivs (talk) 17:55, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Vivo Caesare
Vivus Caesar means "Caesar alive". Its ablative form is vivo Caesare, which means "when Caesar was alive". In this case, vivo is an ablative adjective; it is not a finite verb. Victus (the adjective, not the noun) means "defeated", not "alive". The correct phrase definitely is not victo Caesare. Rwflammang (talk) 13:27, 20 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Yeah, Eldaran and I were talking about this on our user talk pages. I figured it would be better to change the phrase entirely. Adam Bishop (talk) 13:32, 20 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Good change. I just got confused by the edit comments. Rwflammang (talk) 17:46, 20 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Almost men, not quite. The construction is a form of the ablative absolute, it is not an ordinary noun with modifier. You would never use it in the nominative, as it would mean "the living Caesar" as opposed to "the dead Caesar". As only the living Caesar would ever do anything there would be no need to contrast the living and dead. If he were doing it anyone could see he was alive. The ablative absolute construction, on the other hand, means "when Caesar was alive." It is used as a shorthand for lengthier subordinate clauses starting with cum. Somewhere in there is an understood form of the linking verb "be": Caesar having been alive", but there is no appropriate form so they just understood one. Sometimes you might even see a one-word absolute so the ability to spot the construction is essential to its translation. Most Latin II texts go into it in some detail. If you just do an Internet search all the best grammars will be available to you at a touch: Gildersleeve, Harkness, what have you. Wheelock must be around there somewhere. Seek and ye shall find.Dave (talk) 17:44, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

Going to do some work
I'm going to go over this article. I realize a lot have people have worked on this and put some affectionate care into it. If anyone disagrees with any changes I might make speak right up. For the time being I want to look at references and conclusions and try to match the content of the article to the discussion. I'm not perfect, you know, even though some of you might have thought I think I am. I don't. So I am going to make a real effort to avoid tags. A second objective is to clarify the technical linguistics a little - a little I say - by an example or an extra phrase or sentence here or there. I see the article has few or no tags. With so many editors I presume that is because no one wants to see them on there and I will try to respect that.Dave (talk) 12:52, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

Latin is right-branching?
This is a term from structural linguistics. It is a little heavy for the general run of readers. However, this term does not appear to be being used correctly. My source says that Latin is a left-branching language. It defines the head as that word or word segment that "assigns the syntactical function to its complement." In left-branching the complement goes to the left of the head and in right to the right. In syntactical branching these two elements are words; in morphological, segments. In syntactical the verb is nearly always the head. Romans tended to put it last; therefore, Latin is syntactically left-branching. In morphological, the inflectional affix is generally the head; again left-branching. The stated conclusion is that Latin is a left-branching language. I followed down the links on Wikipedia and our article is incomprehensible. You can understand from it neither the head nor the complement much less left- and right-branching. This is consonant with my perception of the specialized linguistics articles on Wikipedia, which are attracting a growing number of complaints. They were written in most cases by students with a double major of computers and linguistics. Without intending any insult, they appear to be writing above their heads linguistically; specifically, they cannot use the technical jargon properly. Since we do not understand it without someone explaining it in a user-friendly manner (I'm a tech writer, you know), no one can even know that it is wrong much less dare to correct or flag it. These articles are now collecting a growing number of tags requesting references. This article in fact has in effect no line-item references. Almost every good Wikipedia article has 70 or 80 line-item references or more. As I have been being bombed by quasi-linguistics students recently I do not wish to bomb this article. So, I am giving you notification of an impending change. My reference is "Grammaticalization: studies in Latin and Romance morphosyntax" By Jürgen Klausenburger and the pages are 28-35. Jurgen is quite sure Latin is left-branching. I plan to very briefly explain what he means by that and replace what we have on it. If you have another view, let's have your reference and a bit of explanation, please. Fold or draw, men, in this game of Wikipedia poker.Dave (talk) 14:49, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

"Est Natus"
I last took Latin many, many years ago, and I recall pretty clearly my teacher telling me that "est natus" was not passive voice, but a special something else, though I can't recall what. Anyone know what I'm having trouble remembering?

If it's not passive voice, then perhaps another voice. If so, then the page's claim that there are two voices needs to be updated.JKeck (talk) 22:55, 11 May 2010 (UTC)


 * It's deponent, which means it only has passive forms. It is still considered passive, it's just that there is no active equivalent. Adam Bishop (talk) 00:03, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

portatum est or portatum fuit?
The article gives an example of passive with the wine 'was carried' as 'portatum est'. Shouldn't it be either 'is carried' or 'portatum fuit'? Kashikom (talk) 17:39, 5 October 2010 (UTC)


 * No. "Portatum est" is the perfect passive, meaning "it was carried". "Portatum erat" is the pluperfect passive, "it had been carried, I don't think you would ever see "Portatum fuit", or at least it wouldn't be a normal verb tense; to me that looks like it should mean "it was something that was carried". "It is carried" is not a composite tense, it is just "portatur". Adam Bishop (talk) 18:26, 5 October 2010 (UTC)


 * (Actually I shouldn't say you never see "fuit" in the perfect passive, because you see it all the time in medieval and later Latin, but I don't think it's strictly correct, according to classical rules... Adam Bishop (talk) 18:38, 5 October 2010 (UTC))


 * Perhaps there should be some sort of parenthetical remark about the discrepancy in the tenses of the English and Latin then, since presumably most people coming to the site will not be knowledgeable. BTW, I did google 'portatum fuit' before posting here, and indeed the hits were from Renaissance examples rather than ancient native speakers.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kashikom (talk • contribs) 20:00, 5 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I added an example in the present passive to show the difference between that and the perfect passive. Is that helpful? Adam Bishop (talk) 20:26, 5 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I think that is helpful, thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kashikom (talk • contribs) 01:43, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

Linguistic typology editorial essay
The following editorial essay belongs in an article on current theories on head marking - it doesn't even summarize any part of the text.μηδείς (talk) 06:28, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

In linguistic typology Latin is classified as a flexible left-branching language. Branching is the clustering of grammatical units together and the nesting of dependent clusters within clusters to form a dependency diagram. In a given unit, such as a word, phrase, clause or sentence, the element that determines the grammatical categories of the unit, on which the other elements depend, is the head; the dependent elements, which modify the head, are the complement. If the elements are words, the branching is syntactic; if word segments, morphological. In a Latin word such as portabant, "they were carrying," the head segment, -nt, determines that the word is the third person plural of a verb. The complement, portaba-, is to the left of the head and branches into the stem, porta- and the imperfect marker, -ba-. This is a left-branching morphological structure. In the sentence femina togam texuit the head is texuit and the structure is syntactical and left-branching into subject and object. Texuit togam femina is right-branching. As Latin inflections are mainly suffices and the preferred word order places the verb last, Latin is a predominantly left-branching language. Since parts of speech may change from head to complement and vice versa, or the word order change, Latin is considered flexible. Identifying the head, however, is often problematical.

Macrons?
I would like to add macrons (lines) over the long vowels (in Latin words) in this article. Macrons help students distinguish between inflections. They also are essential for determining which syllables are stressed. Is there any reasons why macrons should not be added? Peter Chastain (talk) 21:48, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

I agree. Macrons are very useful when one is learning Latin, and helps differentiate between cases, as you said, as well as stress and intonation. However, Latin as a language did [not]* actively use macrons in its writing; indeed, for this reason many renditions of classics do not use macrons. In short, I could see this going both ways; though, as this article is meant to simply explain Latin grammar, I would prefer macrons. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.198.79.51 (talk) 23:31, 25 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Both the easily observable facts and the logic of the sentence and paragraph demonstrate that the user meant to write
 * Latin as a language did actively use macrons in its writing
 * and that the word's omission was a typo. I have corrected it. --Thnidu (talk) 21:32, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

Assessing the article
The article has not yet received an importance rating. The Project Languages assessment page suggests ratings based on the importance of a language (where Latin would get a Top importance rating) but that is unhelpful in assessing sub-articles. I would assess this article's importance as High. I consider that the quality of the article is greater than the "Start" that is currently assigned. I would assess it as "C". The only thing it needs to become "B" quality, IMO, would be a short discussion of participles.

I am not sure how ratings are assigned. Do we simply arrive at consensus here and slap on the assessment? Peter Chastain (talk) 23:54, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

Muddled thinking
The article said: "An English example appears in a line spoken by Helena in A Midsummer Night's Dream (Act 1, Scene 1): Were the world mine, Demetrius being bated, The rest I'd give to be to you translated."

In fact this ("Demetrius being bated") is a nominative absolute.

It then went on to say:

"Nevertheless, the construction is rarer and less natural in English than it is in Latin. It was introduced by early modern authors heavily influenced by Latin, for example, John Milton, whose Paradise Lost makes frequent use of the construction."

This needs to be justified.

Then

"This imitation is more common with the word "being" inserted, which can be thought "left out" in Latin (where a corresponding word does not exist): "The city having been captured, Aeneas fled" etc."

It is pointless to say that 'being' is left out in Latin; the participle does all the work. And the nominative absolute can have 'being' in English if it is passive, but doesn't if it is active. "The soldiers having eaten the cake, the queen left the bedroom."

In short, it is best to leave the burden of explanation of the nominative absolute to the article dedicated to it rather than have 'approximate' and questionable explanations here. Pliny (talk) 13:07, 17 January 2013 (UTC)


 * I wonder what the point is for discussing the English nominative absolute in an article on Latin grammar. This article has a link to the article on Absolute construction, and there are other articles on related instances such as Genitive absolute. TomS TDotO (talk) 15:04, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Modal verbs
Should modal verbs, like posse, debere, solere, velle, be mentioned somewhere? -84.161.15.243 (talk) 13:39, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

Fortior puellarum
The trouble with this article (without denying that much of it is valuable and useful) is that not only are there very few references to standard textbooks and authorities, but also many of the Latin examples appear to have been invented, without reference to what is actually found in Latin authors. For example, fortior puellarum - there is no example in the Perseus corpus of fortior followed by or preceded by a genitive in 121 examples; festina, serve! - there is no example in the whole of Latin literature (apart from in the New Testament) of servus used in the vocative case (Romans always said 'puer'); homo quidam - this occurs only in the New Testament (where it is presumably imitated from Greek), apart from once in Plautus; portatum est - neither this phrase, nor portatus est, nor portata est, occurs anywhere in the entire Perseus corpus of Latin literature; ira calefacta - no example of this phrase occurs in Latin literature either, nor does Lewis & Short's dictionary appear to give any example of the verb calefacio used in connection with ira.

In short the article appears not to be describing Latin as such but an artificial tongue which is found only in textbooks, not in the pages of Cicero. Surely it would be better to give examples which are actually found in Latin. Kanjuzi (talk) 14:19, 28 September 2016 (UTC)


 * I see that the example with homo quidam comes from the 8th-century English writer Alcuin. But it is rather a bizarre example to use. The other example with the subjunctive pervenerit comes from Cicero, but I think a better and simpler example could perhaps be found. Kanjuzi (talk) 15:40, 28 September 2016 (UTC)

Verbs – reasons for rewriting the section.
Recently a Moroccan friend asked for some advice on how to learn Latin. I would have referred him to this article, but I realised that it would not be very helpful as it stood. I have therefore ventured to rewrite the section on verbs to make it more comprehensive and easier for beginners to follow.

Part of the problem is that this section as it was before I changed it started as follows:
 * "Latin verbs have numerous conjugated forms. Verbs have four moods (indicative, subjunctive, imperative and infinitive), two voices (active and passive), two numbers (singular and plural) and three persons (first, second and third). They are conjugated in six main tenses (present, imperfect, future, perfect, pluperfect and future perfect). They have the subjunctive mood for the present, imperfect, perfect and pluperfect. Infinitives and participles occur in the present, perfect and future tenses. As well, they have the imperative mood for present and future."

All this assumes that the reader already knows the meaning of phrases such as "conjugated forms", "indicative mood", "active voice", "1st person singular" and so on, which if they have never studied Latin is probably not the case. My idea is that it should be written in such a way that the technical terms are introduced one by one and each one explained as we come to it. I have tried to write it with that Moroccan friend in mind in such a way that he will be able to absorb the main ideas quickly and begin straightaway on Virgil. Readers may judge whether I have been successful. Kanjuzi (talk) 13:37, 15 July 2017 (UTC)

Word order
The statement in the introduction that colloquial Latin probably had Subject-Verb-Object word order contradicts one in the section on Word Order that it was probably Subject-Object-Verb. At any rate, it's rather speculative since there isn't enough direct evidence, and so it doesn't belong in the introduction. It is better if the two statements are put side by side so that readers can see that the matter isn't so simple. I have now done that. I also deleted the bit about the Latin Vulgate having mainly SVO word order; since that book is a translation, it may not reflect normal spoken Latin of the time. It would be useful to have a reference for the word order of conservative dialects like Sardinian; I don't think that is in Devine and Stephens. Kanjuzi (talk) 07:59, 16 July 2017 (UTC)

Conjugation
Recently, a huge amount has been added to the "conjugation" section. This is redundant with the material we already have in Latin conjugation. The editor claims "They are not being repeated here, but outlined. Moreover, there is plenty of information here not given there.)". The pre-existing Verbs section was already very large (about 50% of the total article) and covered a lot of material, with examples. The new material adds many more examples, and adds details on fine points (e.g., "The forms with a long -ī- (-īs, -īmus, -ītis) were preferred by writers such as Cicero and Catullus.").

The existing Latin conjugation article presents the material in a more organized way, using tables instead of lists. It also gives a gloss once for each tense/mood, rather than redundantly glossing all the persons and numbers; once we know what the future is usually translated "Person will Verb", we really aren't gaining anything by glossing separately "I will love", "you (singular) will love", etc.

I ask other editors to look over the recent edits and see what they think. --Macrakis (talk) 16:59, 10 February 2018 (UTC)


 * Per WP:Fork we really want summaries to be short overviews. If info is missing from our coverage of Latin conjugations, it should be added to that article, not this one. This convention isn't just based on esthetic considerations, but on practical ones: even for a subject like Latin that isn't going to change much and need to be updated in the foreseeable future, the differing writing styles of editors make it difficult for us to maintain the same info in two places.
 * I could see basic conjugation charts here, so that the outlines of Latin morphology are present in one place. But all the details and examples, and most of the variants and exceptions, should be restricted to the dedicated article. — kwami (talk) 18:44, 10 February 2018 (UTC)


 * As a Latin teacher, I know that my students would find the page Latin conjugation very confusing. It assumes a lot of knowledge already, such as the meanings of "1st person", "hortatorily", "deponent", and so on. The tables have no translations and seem to be not well laid out. It may be possible for well-informed students to find their way round that page but it would not be easy for beginners. In the current page on Latin grammar, however, whoever has laid out the tables of duco under the heading "Persons" has made a fine job of it, and has produced something very easy to understand. There seems to me to be no harm at all therefore in extending those tables with one or two more examples. I am thinking of readers who have never studied Latin at school and wish to know more about it, without going into the intricacies of the different conjugations. If it is desirable to remove something from the present article, I suggest the section on conjugations lower down might be shortened, since much of it is already very compressed and is covered in the other article. Even so, I would leave that section alone, since although you will find a table of the not-very-useful verb aio on the Latin conjugation page, you will look in vain for information about the common verbs sum or possum or fero, other than that they are said to be irregular. As for the table of sequor which has been added here, it seems very useful, in view of the fact that deponent verbs are so commonly met with, and there is no table of them on the Latin conjugation page, or even on the Deponent verb page. Kanjuzi (talk) 18:58, 10 February 2018 (UTC)


 * WP isn't intended to be tutorial in nature. Rather than explaining concepts like "1st person" in every language article separately, we link to Grammatical person.
 * Glossing every form independently (1st person singular: dūxī "I led" or "I have led") makes the size of the article larger without adding value. Yes, the Latin perfect can be translated in more than one way, but that doesn't depend on the person and number. It's not as though dūxistis has a different temporal connotation than dūxī.
 * I am not sure what you mean when you say that the tables in Latin conjugation are "not well laid out".
 * I agree that even before your additions, the section on conjugation in this article was too long.
 * In any case, the solution to all the issues above is not to WP:FORK the coverage of Latin conjugations, but to improve it in the canonical place. --Macrakis (talk) 19:56, 10 February 2018 (UTC)
 * I disagree that adding the translations doesn't add value. It makes everything much clearer. As for the lay-out of the tables in the Latin conjugation article, first, it isn't the customary one; secondly, there is no room for alternative forms; thirdly, the information they give in some places is misleading. For example, it is said that "portavissem" is the Pluperfect subjunctive of porto, and that this means "I should have carried" or "I would have carried". In fact, as a Perseus search shows, the usual form of this tense (more than 5 times as common in fact) is "portassem", and the most common meaning is "I had carried". Kanjuzi (talk) 20:23, 10 February 2018 (UTC)
 * I didn't say that translations doesn't add value. I said that putting them with each person/number form doesn't add value.
 * What about the layout do you object to?
 * Why do you say there is "no room for alternate forms"? Those can be supplied either within the existing cells (probably separated by &lt;br;&gt;) or as footnotes.
 * If the information is misleading or incorrect, correct it in the Latin conjugation article. It would be really perverse to have correct information in one article, and incorrect information in another.
 * Again, we have a standard policy about having two versions ("forks") of the same material: WP:FORK. In what way do you think this case is different? --Macrakis (talk) 00:48, 11 February 2018 (UTC)
 * I agree, there's too much stuff under conjugation here. But there's also too much stuff in the article Latin conjugation, in view of the fact that there are also appendixes in which the four main conjugations are laid out. That article really needs rewriting, as it is a mess. Why does it have a table for aio (an almost completely useless verb) and not one for sum? There is also too much emphasis on such things as the future imperative. As well as that, the tables don't look pretty. Readers would do much better to look at one of the standard grammars available on the Internet where they are laid out neatly. So really all the articles need rewriting to cut out redundancy. But this would be a major task and take up a lot of someone's time. Kanjuzi (talk) 07:41, 2 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I have now deleted a lot of stuff, and the article is now 20% shorter, but not less informative. The details on irregular verbs should go to the conjugation article too in due course. The section on nouns is not really satisfactory, however. – The table I have drawn up looks fine on a laptop. Does it come out ok on a phone? Kanjuzi (talk) 13:44, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

Strange forms
Whoever has added comparatives seems to be making up Latin as he goes along. Neither exterus nor novior exist in Latin authors, so they are strange examples to choose. It would be better to choose examples from a standard grammar such as Gildersleeve and Lodge. Kanjuzi (talk) 13:54, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

Use of cases
I thought it best to replace the examples of case use with genuine Latin examples. The examples there up to now, such as festina, serve! are rather artificial and several of them don't correspond to anything which a reader might find in a real Latin book. So although they explain well enough the grammar of the simple Latin found in beginners' books, they don't prepare the reader for what is actually found in real authors. However, readers can judge for themselves. Kanjuzi (talk) 15:34, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

Negation?
There's really nothing on negation in this entire article? How do you do standard negation? DavidJPeterson (talk) 23:41, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

Wrong translation of example in the introduction?
The example ductūrus est is translated to “he is going to lead”. Doesn’t it translate to “he is going to be led”? To my knowledge ducere is not a semi-deponent verb. Or am I getting anything wrong here? --Pogomeister (talk) 14:27, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
 * The future participle (ducturus) is active; only the perfect participle (ductus) is (usually) passive. So it's actually quite correct. Easy to confuse though. Kanjuzi (talk) 19:18, 14 July 2023 (UTC)