74Heaven Posted October 17, 2010 Share Posted October 17, 2010 We are working on Henle Latin. On page 5 in the Grammar (blue book) in the first year, first lesson, the declension of terra is given. There is a brief note about the Romans not using article adjectives (a, an, the) and how we provide them in English and thus they are part of the English translations. But why does the text use "the" with nom, and accusative plural but NOT accusative singular: Case / Latin / English meaning SINGULAR Nom terra - land, the (a) land Gen terrae - of the (a) land Dat terrae - to or for the (a) land Acc terram - the (a) land Abl terra - - by/with/from the (a) land PLURAL Nom terrae - lands, the lands Gen terrarum - of the lands Dat terris - to of for the lands Acc terras - lands, the lands Abl terris - by/with/from the lands So my question is specifically the Accusative Singular plural translation. Is it a typo that Acc S Plural does not match the nominative singular? (I notice the accusative plural does *match* in nom and accusative.) The exact same situation exists in my LFC declension of the first declension model noun. Btw, one of my students (bright young man) asked this question. Thanks! Lisaj Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ester Maria Posted October 17, 2010 Share Posted October 17, 2010 Articles have, historically, developed from demonstrative pronouns (at least that was the case with Romance languages); there are even today a number of living and fully functional languages that do not use articles - Russian comes to my mind, for example. Or you have languages like Hebrew, which has a partial article use, limited only to a definite article. Even languages which do use articles often use them in a somewhat different fashion - I for one misuse the English ones occasionally, even though my native language uses articles even more. Latin is one of those languages that simply do not use articles to convey the notion of whether something is definite or indefinite, one needs to rely to the context to be sure. Can one ever be fully sure with the language that doesn't have this particular feature? Probably not, when it comes to isolated sentences. Poetae scribunt. I poeti scrivono. (definite plural) Poeti scrivono. (indefinite plural, no article) Dei poeti scrivono. (sort of "indefinite definite" plural) Poets write. (indefinite plural, no article) The poets write. (definite plural) How do you know what's the case? Context. If you have none, pretty much everything goes - it can be a general or a specific statement. A speaker of a language which uses articles must be careful in translation of big chunks of connected sentences for this very reason. In the tables you bring up, however, I see both options for the accusative singular: it can be that we see a land, or that we can see the land, right? If it were in the text, it would depend on the context. I don't get your second question about matching - matching of what? Articles in translation depend exclusively on the context, everything can be definite and indefinite, depending on the circumstances. English doesn't have an indefinite plural article (like my "dei" above, there is no equivalent, there is only "lands" and "the lands" in English, while in Italian there would be three possible forms). You know what, you'll do yourself a favor just by completely disregarding it. The concept of article, forget it when you read Latin. Apply it as it naturally comes in English when you translate. You're confusing yourself over nothing. It doesn't matter what they write, you know how to use articles in English if it's your native language - it all depends on the Latin context. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
74Heaven Posted October 18, 2010 Author Share Posted October 18, 2010 Case / Latin / English meaning SINGULAR Nom terra - land, the (a) land Gen terrae - of the (a) land Dat terrae - to or for the (a) land Acc terram - the (a) land Abl terra - - by/with/from the (a) land PLURAL Nom terrae - lands, the lands Gen terrarum - of the lands Dat terris - to of for the lands Acc terras - lands, the lands Abl terris - by/with/from the lands Btw, one of my students (bright young man) asked this question: the accusative singular case (above from Henle p. 5 Grammar) doesn't give the translation "land" - Acc Sing. only gives the translations, "the land", "a land". This was conufusing to us because the nom singular gives land, "a land, the land" which seems accurate for the (direct object) accusative case as well - so my only question, really, is why does the Henle book do this? Is this anything we should be concerned about as we start in Latin. Frankly, it looks like a typo to me? But I am new, so I didn't want to assume anything since this young man asked me? Btw, I apologize my first post was unclear. I was in a hurry, being constantly interrupted and it wasn't very clear. I appreciate the "don't worry about it"; I understand that it will likely always be clear in English when to use a definite or indefinite article. Thanks! Lisaj Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ester Maria Posted October 18, 2010 Share Posted October 18, 2010 Btw, one of my students (bright young man) asked this question: the accusative singular case (above from Henle p. 5 Grammar) doesn't give the translation "land" - Acc Sing. only gives the translations, "the land", "a land". This was conufusing to us because the nom singular gives land, "a land, the land" which seems accurate for the (direct object) accusative case as well - so my only question, really, is why does the Henle book do this? I think I finally got your question. Well, I don't use Henle, but I do know Latin; the only thing which comes to my mind as a possible explanation is that first they give you the "translation" of the word lexically (what does it mean - terra means land) in the first form of the first scheme (nominative singular), and then they list the actual translation when the Latin word is IN its case - so, in a nominative case of singular, it can be "a land" or "the land", depending on the context. Nominative plural lists "lands" and "the lands" because those are exact equivalents of "a land" and "the land". Lands, with no article whatsoever, is there in a plural indefinite form. In Italian they'd mark it with "delle terre", but in English you can't say "a lands" (unless you're some Ester from Italy which has such "typos" rather often ;)). If you watch it more closely, the only 'extra' "land" is in nominative singular, i.e. they're first giving you a lexical translation, then a translation-in-case. Their accusative is perfectly good: We see [-> direct object] a land. (indefinite) Or: We see [-> direct object] the land of our ancestors. (definite) You can't really say We see land. In Italian you could, but in English it doesn't quite sound right. Same goes for other cases too: These are flowers of a land (some land, undefined) / These are the flowers of the land of our ancestors. (My apologies for the silly examples, I'm trying to type this quickly.) Basically, first in nominative singular they translate "the word per se", then give options for "the word in that particular case"; in other cases, they only give the latter option, since they already translated the word lexically. That's my interpretation. Ceterum censeo that Wheelock's is a better text. :D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
angela in ohio Posted October 18, 2010 Share Posted October 18, 2010 (edited) I'm currently teaching LFC 1, Latin Alive!, and Wheelock's. I looked it up in LA and Wheelock's. (LFC is in ds's room, though, and he is asleep. :001_smile:) They use different example words, but the effect is the same... Latin Alive!: Singular femina the woman feminae of the woman feminae to/for the woman feminam the woman femina by/with/from the woman Plural feminae the women feminarum of the women feminis to/for the women feminas the women feminis by/with/from the women Wheelock's (they include an adj and the vocative, but I'll skip those): Singular porta the (a) gate portae of the gate portae to/for the gate portam the gate by/with/from, etc. the gate Plural portae the gates or gates portarum of the gates portis to/for the gates portas the gates portis by/with/from, etc. the gates And from Latin in the Christian Trivium that I taught a few years ago (and will sell, if anyone wants it :D): Singular patria a (the) country patriae of a (the) country, the country's patriae to, for a (the) country patriam a (the) country patria by or with a (the) country Plural patriae the countries patriarum of the countries, the countries' patriis to, for the countries patrias the countries patriis by or with the countries I taught LNST last year, but I've sold that, so I can't check, but I think it was about the same as Latin Alive! So, there is some variance in the way they are listed. I think it is a matter of author's style. I would congratulate him for being a sharp boy and then tell him not to worry about it, as he can translate it 'land' if he needs to. I had students who would even get hung up on whether 'a' or 'the' was correct in a translation. I always told them to just enjoy the fact that they could pick their own right answer, because that doesn't happen often. ;) I played up the fact that students could express themselves in the sentences by choosing which words they used, and they really seemed to like that. HTH! Edited October 18, 2010 by angela in ohio Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
74Heaven Posted October 18, 2010 Author Share Posted October 18, 2010 I'm currently teaching LFC 1, Latin Alive!, and Wheelock's. I looked it up in LA and Wheelock's. (LFC is in ds's room, though, and he is asleep. :001_smile:) They use different example words, but the effect is the same... So, there is some variance in the way they are listed. I think it is a matter of author's style. I would congratulate him for being a sharp boy and then tell him not to worry about it, as he can translate it 'land' if he needs to. I had students who would even get hung up on whether 'a' or 'the' was correct in a translation. I always told them to just enjoy the fact that they could pick their own right answer, because that doesn't happen often. ;) I played up the fact that students could express themselves in the sentences by choosing which words they used, and they really seemed to like that. HTH! Ester Maria & Angela - Thanks!! I should have you on speed dial this year! Btw, if anyone wants to give me "Latin names" for my scholars to adopt, I'd love to have some available in case they can't think of any: Caesar, Cicero, Hercules, Italia, Dahlia, Diana, Maria, Julia... (Classical pronunciations would be a bonus!) Lisaj Lisa J, who is excited and scared about teaching high school Latin Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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