It's time to learn some of the basic Latin adjectives. After you you learn them, you can practice by using them in Latin sentences. Take a piece of paper, think, and write sentences that you created in your mind on it. This will help your brain to store those new words for a long term.
0 Comments
Adjectives express quality of nouns. For example: Red carpet, long way...etc. In Latin, adjectives agree with nouns which they belong to. Therefore, they also agree with their nouns' number and case. Let's examine them closely:
bonus: adj. good Marcus bonōs librōs amat. (Mark loves good books).'Bonōs' and 'librōs' in the accusative case (masculine and plural). They agree in the case, number and gender each other.
Here is another example: puella pulchra bonōs librōs amat. Declensions of Adjectives As I said at the beginning, adjectives agree with the nouns which they belong to. That means adjectives are declined just like nouns in Latin. There are some patterns which they fall. They are: Adjectives of First and Second Declensions In this group, terminations of adjectives differ for all masculine, feminine and neuter forms. In the nominative case masculine ending is mostly -us, feminine ending is -a, and neuter ending is -um. See how adjectives are declined in 'Table 10'. A few masculine adjectives end in -er in first and second declensions. Some of them omit -e. For example; miser, misera, miserum and pulcher, pulchra, pulchrum. See how these adjectives are declined in 'Table 11' and 'Table 12'. There are also nine irregular adjectives. To see them, check 'Table 13' and 'Table 14'. Adjectives of Third Declension Adjectives of third declension are grouped according to their endings. These groups are:
Agricola et Iūlia
Quintus est agricola. agricolae fīlia est Iūlia. Quintus Iūliae librum dat. Quintus in sellā sedet. Quintus servum vocat. servus dominō aquam portat. agricola aquam bibit. Iūlia in sellā sedet et librum studet. Iūlia librum non comprehendet. Iūlia vocabula nescit. Pater! Iūlia clāmat. Quintus Iūliam videt. agricola liberum studet. Quintus Iuliae vocabula narrat. Iūlia in libero vocbula scrībit. nunc, Iūlia liberum comprehendet. Iūlia ridet. senex est Lucius. Lucius Quintī amīcus. amīcus est in villā. Lucius Iūliam non audit. Lucius dormit. Note: In Latin 'in' means, 'in' or 'on' in English. It is used with a noun which is in the ablative form. 'Non' means 'not'. It's placed before verbs. It makes the sentence negative. 'Et' means 'and' in Latin. 'Nunc' means 'now' in English. 'Est' means 'is'. I will explain the details about it in future posts. I created sets of flashcards about nouns and verbs. This step is important to build simple sentences and improve vocabulary. I will use these vocabularies in the reading texts and in exercises. Firstly, we will learn some basic nouns. There are 17 nouns. I give nouns with their genitive endings, genders, and their English equivalent as answers. There are 16 basic Latin verbs in this set of flashcards. The number next to the verb is its conjugation (1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th). I am following this order, because it will help you to build simple Latin sentences. There is a key point in learning a new language: using vocabularies and grammar rules to communicate in a given language. Even though Latin is a dead language, you practice it by yourself, or with other people. Internet gives us many opportunities. I tell you; never study a language if you don't use it in some ways to describe your thoughts. Anyways, verbs have such an important mission in all language. They tell us what the subject does. I believe learning some basic verbs in this early stage will give a better understanding of Latin. Verbs are more complex in Latin than in English. I will try to simplify this complexity as much as I can. I am giving all conjugations of active indicative for the simple present and the present continuous tense in this post. There are more to mention about verbs. However, it's difficult to learn it one lesson. I will post about them later.
How verbs are formed and what are the conjugations? Verbs change their endings according to the subject(e.g. I, you, he, she....), in other words, according to the person. It does not often occur in English. But, there are some cases: for instance, I do, she does or they go, it goes, and so forth... In Latin, verbs get their endings according to first person singular (I), second person singular (you), third person singular (he/she/it), first person plural (we), second person plural (you) and third person plural (they). An important point to mention; unlike English, in a simple sentence in Latin, subjective pronouns (I, you...etc) is not mentioned separately. However, subject is mentioned, if it is a name of a person. For example, do from dare (to give) means I give (no subject!), and Marcus labōrat from labōrāre (to work) means Mark works (Subject is given, because it is a person's name). The ending of the verb lets us know the subject. There are four main patterns which form endings of the verbs. They are called conjugations. All verbs are not conjugated in the same way. Now, we will learn conjugations of verbs in the simple present, and in the present continuous tense. The simple present and the present continuous tense have the same structure in Latin. Lets say, they are the same in Latin. First Conjugation - stems in -a Verbs of this group end in -āre in their present infinitive form. If you want to use a verb of first conjugation in a sentence, remove the ending - āre, and place the following endings according to the subject: I -ō We -ā.mus You -ā.s You -ā.tis He/ She/ It -a.t They -a.nt Some examples: labōrāmus. - We work. Lucia lancēs lavārat. - Lucia washes the dishes. Second Conjugation - stems in -e Verbs of this group end in -ēre in their present infinitive form. Replace -ēre with following endings according to the subject: I -e.ō We -ē.mus You -ē.s You -ē.tis He/ She/ It -e.t They -e.nt Some examples: removēo - I am removing. Tiberius rīdet. - Tiberius is laughing. Third Conjugation - stems in consonants Verbs of this group end in -ere in their present infinitive form. Replace -ere with following endings according to the subject: I -ō We -imus You -is You -itis He/ She/ It -it They -unt Some examples: regis. - You rule. Titus pilleum forō emit. - Titus is buying a hat from the forum. Fourth Conjugation - stems in -i Verbs of this group end in -īre in their present infinitive form. Replace -īre with following endings I -i.ō We -ī.mus You -ī.s You -ī.tis He/ She/ It -i.t They -i.unt Some examples: dormiunt. - They are sleeping. Lucius invenīs. - Lucius is finding. You can try it with different persos and verbs. I will post some verbs and nouns for you to expend your vocabulary knowledge. I will also post reading samples to increase reading comprehension and overall Latin fluency. There are five declensions for nouns in Latin language: they are first, second, third, fourth and fifth declensions. Although, there are minority of nouns which do not fallow the same patters, or have some peculiarities, most of the nouns are regular. It might seem hard to learn them in one day, but writing nouns in Latin sentences will make learning process easier. Here are the declensions:
First Declension Nouns of this declension usually end in -a. Most nouns are feminine in first declension with a few exceptions. Such as, m.nouta (sailor), m.agricola (farmer), m.scrība (clerk). Genitive case of this group's nouns end in -ae. There are some nouns from Greek, and their endings might differ. Consequently, they can be declined differently. Please click and see how nouns are decline in table 1 and 2. Second Declension It's a large group of nouns. Most of the nouns are masculine with some neuter, and feminine nouns in this group. Most of the masculine nouns end in -us, -er and -r. Neuters end in -um. They have their genitive case in -ī. Once again, some nouns were borrowed from Greek and are inflected with a varying mixture of Greek and Latin endings . Please click and see how nouns are decline in table 3 and 4. Third Declension It is the largest group of nouns with various endings. When a new word was absorbed into Latin, it was added to this group. This is probably the reason for nouns with various endings in this group. Their endings can be in: -a, -e, -i, -o, -y, -c, -d, -l, -n, -r, -s, -t, -x. There are masculine, feminine, and neuter nouns with various nominative endings. Without certainty, some masculine, feminine and neuter nouns' endings can be given: neuter: -a, -e, -i, -y, -l and -t, masculine ( sometimes of other genders' endings): -o, -or, -os, -eus, feminine (sometimes masculine): -as, - aus, -es, -is, -ys, -bs, -ns and -ps. This groups' genitive ending is -is. Please click and see how nouns are decline in table 5 and 6. Fourth Declension Most of the nouns are masculine except some feminine nouns, such as: manus (hand), donus (house), and neuter nouns like genū (knee). Masculine and feminine nouns end in -us and neuter ones end in -ū. Their genitive ending is -ūs. Please click and see how nouns are decline in table 8. Fifth Declension It is a small group of nouns which are mostly feminine except diēs (day) (note: diēs can be masculine on notable days). Their genitive ending is i -ei, and nominative ending is in -es. Please click and see how nouns are decline in table 9. Latin is an inflected language. Unlike English, words change according to their functions in Latin. Though, some words change in English as well.
For instance: I see you, but you can't see me. In this sentence, "I" is replaced by "me". (objective pronoun) In Latin, nouns, pronouns, and adjectives change according to their functions in a sentence. In this process, endings of nouns change with a number of regular patterns. These patterns are called declensions. There are 5 declensions of Latin nouns which I will mention later. Now, we will take a look at cases in order to learn how they function in a sentence. There are 7 cases which are nominative, vocative, accusative, genitive, dative, ablative and locative. (note: 'locative case' is rarely used.) 6 cases are used frequently. Another important point to mention is that case of a word also varies according to its gender (masculine, feminine, and neuter), singularity, and plurality of it. I will demonstrate only how cases operate in a sentence. So, don't worry if you don't figure out everything. 1. Nominative Case It is the case of subject in a sentence. (note: highlighted word is in nominative case) Marcus laborat. Mark works. 2. Vocative Case It is the case which is used to address or call someone or something. o fortuna! Oh fortune! 3. Accusative Case It is the case of object in a sentence. Quintus Marcum salūtat. Quintus salutes Mark. 4. Genitive Case It is used, as 'of' in a sentence, or to show possession. bellī deī. War of gods. 5. Dative Case It is used, as 'to' and 'for'. lactem felibus do. I give milk to the cats. 6. Ablative Case It is used, as 'by', 'with', 'from', 'at', 'in', or 'on' in a sentence. Ablative case operates like a proposition. However, it can be used with a preposition as well. In classical Latin, usage of propositions with ablative case is less frequent than in Vulgar or, Medieval Latin. Moreover this gives us more clues about evolution of Latin through oromance languages. I will give examples in advanced posts. Marcus vīnum forō emit. Mark buys vine from the forum. 7. Locative Case It is used to indicate the place where something is happening: Rōmae At Rome Latin alphabet is widely used world wide. Some letter that we use today were not used in Classical Latin. Classical Latin contains 23 letter.
They are: A B C D E F G H I K L M N O P Q R S T V X Y Z a. Pronunciation of consonants. There are consonants which are pronounced the same as in English. I show how to pronounce consonants which are pronounced differently.
A vowel can be pronounced long or short. It depends on the position of vowel in a word. Long vowels are marked with macrons. Macrons are used to make pronunciation easy for tvowels. A macron appears as a mark on a vowel. For example: ā, ē, ī, ū
A diphthong is a vowel which is followed by another one.
| ArchivesApril 2010 CategoriesAll |
RSS Feed