Ludi Novi Romani/MMDCCLXIV/Certamen Latinum

Rules of the Certamen Latinum

One question a day will be posted, participants must send their answers not to this e-mail address but to <cnaeus_cornelius@yahoo.com> within 48 hours of posting. Please do *not* post answers to the list! Answers posted publicly or posted to the wrong address will not be awarded with points.

The correct answers of the previous day and interim results will be announced together with the posting of the next questions.

Questions and Answers for the Certamen Latinum

March 3rd - Day 3 of the Ludi Novi Romani – Question 1 of the Certamen Latinum

I. INTRODUCTION 1 - Dictionary Forms of Nouns

Latin is a heavily inflected language, which means that Latin indicates grammatical information by changing the ending of the words. Nouns are grouped into 5 declensions (noun inflection groups), verbs can be classified into 4 conjugations (verb inflection groups). If we change a noun’s ending to express its grammatical role, we say we “decline” it. If we change a verb’s ending to express the person or the time (tense), we say we “conjugate” it. To determine which declension or conjugation group a verb belongs to, you have to look into a Latin dictionary.

Today we will examine the dictionary forms of nouns only.

In the case of nouns, for example, “friend”, you will find:

amicus, -i, m.

This is 3 pieces of information:

(1) amicus;

(2) -i;

(3) m.

(1) This means that the word “friend” in nominative (subject) case is “amicus”. Learn more about what nominative case means here, on our website:

http://novaroma.org/nr/Nominative

(2) The abbreviated form “-i” means that the word “friend” in genitive (possessive) case is “amici” (something of friend, or friend’s something), thus the original ending “-us” changes to “-i”. Learn more about what nominative case means here, on our website:

http://novaroma.org/nr/Genitive

Well, this is the most important point. This ending “–i” determines that “amicus” belongs to the “second declension”, whose identifier is the genitive “–i”. As we have mentioned, there are 5 declensions, and each one of these has a unique, declension-specific genitive ending. It’s important because the genitive ending determines the other inflections as well. The five types of genitive ending and the five declensions determined by the different genitive endings are:

-ae = 1st declension, e.g.: Roma, -ae, f (Rome)

-i = 2nd declension, eg.: amicus, -i, m (friend)

-is = 3rd declension, e.g.: rex, regis, m (king)

-ús = 4th declension, eg.: senatus, -ús, m (senate)

-ei = 5th declension, eg. fides, -ei, f (loyalty)

(3) The “m.” means that it is a masculine noun. In Latin, all nouns have three genders, they are masculine, (abbreviated as “m”), feminine (abbreviated as “f”), and neuter (abbreviated as “n”). English has a similar phenomenon when we use “he”, “she” or “it”. The new thing in this is that Latin uses these genders for things or abstract concepts, too, like in the exemples above, “loyalty” (fides, -ei, f) is feminine in Latin, the “senate” (senatus, -ús, m) is masculine, “Rome” (Roma, -ae, f) is, again, feminine.

II. QUESTION 1

Find a Latin dictionary. Attention! If you use an online dictionary, be aware that most of the online dictionaries are incomplete and do not give the full, correct dictionary forms of the Latin words. If you can use only online resources, please use one of the following Google Books digitalized Latin dictionary:

http://books.google.com/books?id=k1ZFAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&hl=en#v=onepage&q&f=false

Look into the dictionary and determine which declensions the following 10 nouns belong to (10 x 1 pts).

Solve the abbreviations and spell out, write out the full forms of their possessive form (genitive) (10 x 0.5 pts) and their gender (10 x 0.1 pts).

forum

consul

gloria

dignitas

res

pax

nomen

gladius

legio

porticus

III. AN EXAMPLE HOW TO DO IT:

praetor;

- after looking into a dictionary, you will find its dictionary form is “praetor, -oris, m”, so you will give the following data:

praetor, 3rd declension (1pt); praetoris (0.5pt), masculine (0.1pt)

Comments: It’s 3rd declension, because in the abbreviated genitive form given as “–oris” for "praetoris", the genitive ending “-is” determines that it must belong to the 3rd declension.

March 4th - Day 4 of the Ludi Novi Romani – Question 2 of the Certamen Latinum

I. INTRODUCTION 2 - Dictionary Forms of Verbs

Previously we discussed the dictionary form of the Latin nouns. We have learned that the dictionary forms of the nouns include the genitive (possessive) form of the noun, and its ending determines the entire inflection of the noun, the declension of the noun.

Today we study the dictionary forms of the verbs. How can we decide what conjugation (verb inflection group) a verb belongs to?

In the case of the verb “have”, you will find:

habeo –ére, -bui, -bitum

This is 4 pieces of information:

(1) habeo; it is the first person singular of the verb “have”. It means “I have”. (2) –ere; it’s an abbreviation of “habere”, the infinite of the verb. It means “to have”. (3) –bui; it’s an abbreviation of “habui”, the perfect tense of the verb. It means “I have had” or “I had”. (4) –bitum; abbreviation of “habitum”, it’s the supine (or the past participle).

This verb’s infinitive, “habére” (to have), indicated in the dictionary form as “–ére” shows that this verb belongs to the 2nd conjugations, as all verbs that have the infinitive ending “-ére” belong to the 2nd conjugation. The second dictionary element, the infinitive, determines which conjugation the verb belongs to. The four types of infinitive endings and the four conjugations determined by the different genitive endings are:

-are = 1st conjugation; e.g.: amo, -are, -avi, -atum (I love) -ére = 2nd conjugation; e.g.: habeo, -ere, -bui, -bitum (I have) -ere = 3rd conjugation; e.g.: dico, -ere, dixi, dictum (I say) -ire = 4th conjugation; e.g.: audio, -ire, -ivi, -itum (I hear)

Note that “–ere”, which is short vowel, is different from “–ére”, which is long vowel.

II. QUESTION 2

Use the Latin dictionary that we used last time, or, if you have to use an online Latin dictionary, use this one:

http://books.google.com/books?id=k1ZFAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&hl=en#v=onepage&q&f=false

Look into the dictionary and determine which conjugations the following 10 verbs belong to (10 x 1 pts).

Solve the abbreviations and spell out, write out the full forms of their infinitive form (10 x 0.5 pts) and their perfect tense form (10 x 0.5 pts), and their supine/past participle (10 x 0.5 pts).

impero facio debeo veto edico laudo respondeo servio

III. AN EXAMPLE HOW TO DO IT:

ago;

- after looking into a dictionary, you will find its dictionary form is “ago, -ere, egi, actum”, so you will give the following data:

ago, 3rd conjugation (1pt); agere (0.5pt), egi (0.5pt), actum (0.5pt)

Comments: it’s 3rd conjugation because the infinitive (second dictionary form) “–ere” ending shows it. If it were “–ére” with long vowel “é”, it would have been 2nd conjugation.

Final Results

The final results for the Certamen Latinum for Ludi Novi Romani 2764:

• 1st Place:
• 2nd Place:
• 3rd Place:
• 4th Place:
• 5th Place: