Latin Help

Latin uses inflection, which means you change the ending of the word, depending on its usage. Nouns use declensions, verbs use conjugation, and adverbs are not inflected. There are five declensions with a few irregular ones, as well as four conjugations and its irregular ones.

Declensions consist of number, case and gender. Number is whether the word is singular or plural, case is its purpose (eg, subject, object, etc.), and gender is either feminine, masculine or neuter. Gender is only important for adjectives, as I'll talk about that later.

Cases:

Nominative - use this as a subject in a sentence, or if the word is standing on its own.

Genitive - this is used for possession. In English, this is the equivalent of using "of" or the apostrophe. The genitive word is the object or person who possesses the object. eg, "boy's dog" or "dog of the boy".

Dative - this is used as the indirect object--the person or thing who receives something. eg, "Give me the package."

Accusative - the direct object, or in some cases, the object of certain prepositions, such as "ex".

Ablative - the object of the preposition. Prepositions such as "ex" have a different meaning, depending on whether you put the object in the accusative or ablative case.

Vocative - used when addressing someone (ie, the apostrophe in poetry) or calling attention.

If you don't understand any parts, please ask about a specific part and I'll try to explain.

Next: First declension

Gender is important for nouns too, since the nominative/accusative forms change in second and third declensions for neuter nouns.

*hates nueter nouns*

Oh yes, forgot to mention that.

Alrighty then! How is it years ago, I could ace English but seem so lost on the first day of school here?

Lucifer, I will take your advice and read up on more Latin before I bore you to death with infinite questions.. I may be a student of life, but it seems I need to brush up on my study skills.

i am trying to teach myself latin, any advice on where to start or some good websites to look at would be really great.

You have come to the right place, danni-lee! Lucifer has been so kind as to also help me. My own desire for learning was sparked when some things in latin were said that I did not understand. And sorely wanted to!! I am certain he will be a great source of inspiration for us both.

cool, latin looks so pretty, even something stupid or pointless sounds nice in latin ,

Te audire no possum. Musa sapientum fixa est in aure.

it looks so pretty, youd never think it said :I can't hear you. I have a banana in my ear. lol (sorry if thats not a completly correct sentence, i got it off the net)

Lol! danni-lee, you are far ahead of me! But it sounds (by sight, is that possible?) incredibly beautiful! I must start my homework and just stop dreaming on this subject..

im pretty sure that no matter how it sounded back in the day, it would have been beautiful. i know latin probably shouldnt be the first language i learn aside from english, but its really interesting

I don't know if there's a Latin word for "banana", so I don't know what's going on with the last sentence. The first one should have "non" instead of "no", according to my Latin dictionary.

Thank ou, Lucifer, for joining us here.

Banana would be a neo-Latin word: banana, -ae,f. (source: NLL [Lexicon recentis latinitatis*])

(When you read history tects in Latin, like I had to do, you'll notice that every time period "invented" words in Latin.)


* this dictionary should tp be found at least in any university library (Lexicon recentis latinitatis / editum cura Operis fundati cui nomen "Latinitas". - Urbe Vaticana : Libreria Editoria Vaticana, 1992. - ISBN 88-209-1731-9 )

Why would they do that, Walter? Because of things not yet discovered to have latin meanings at the time? I guess that would be no different than what we do today in a way. As new inventions or procedures or whatever are developed, someone has to assign it a name with a definition, yes?

Those authors (mostly monks) were translating e.g. legal things from [Old-] French, German, English into Latin or vice versa.
And some "normal" things of "normal" life weren't know in first couple of centuries, indeed.

Latin was developed in Roman civilization. So whatever wasn't in Rome at that time didn't appear in Latin either.

Ah! I actually suspected correctly! There may be hope for me after all. Maybe. I worry sometimes that I may not be able to learn again as I once did, when it all came so easy for me.

Originally, Latin was the language spoken by small groups people living along the lower Tiber River.

After the fall of the Roman Empire, Latin continued in two ways:
- first, the language developed on the basis of local spoken forms and evolved into the modern Romance languages and dialects;
- second, the language continued in a more or less standardized form throughout the Middle Ages as the language of religion and scholarship; in this form it had great influence on the development of the West European languages.

Then it would be:

Te audire non possum. Banana in aure est.

Simple enough. Since we're trying to understand it, and I'm an insomniac, I'll break it up into linguistic elements.

te--------audi---re---non-pos(t)----sum.----------banana--------in--aur--e-----est.
you/acc--hear---inf--not--be able--I/nom/pres---banana/nom---in--ear--abl---be/pres/sing/3P

Hope that made sense.
acc = accusative
nom = nominative
abl = ablative
pres = present (tense)
inf = infinitive

Syntax is generally SOV (Subject Object Verb). Certain prepositions have to take certain cases, so "in" meaning "in" must take an ablative, and "ad" ("to") must take an accusative, and "in" meaning "into" takes an accusative too, etc. So "ad casam" (to house(cas)/acc(am)) is "to the house", "in casa" (in house(cas)/abl(a)) is "in the house" or "within the house" whereas "in casam" (into house(cas)/acc(am)) is "into the house" as in "she called them into the house." (eos in casam vocavit)

I probably only served to confuse people further, but, um, yeah.

Yeah, for how old it is, I think it's pretty amazing how much Latin was actually preserved. I wonder what they translated Quidditch as in Harry Potter? ;-)

Geez, lots of you are insomniacs, either that or you live in Australia or something.