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LESSON 1
Introduction 1
Pre Grammar
Dictionary 1
First Translation
Grammar 1
Exercises 1
Runnning Vocabulary 1
L.LT1.- Ovid
Self Test 1
LESSON 2
Introduction 2
Verb Example
Verb Practice
Declension 2
Adjectives 1st Class
Translation Exercise 2
L.LT.2- Plautus
L.LT.2- Lucretius
Exercises 2
VERB - VERBUM                                                                                                            
Let's start with two verbs: "To Be" = "Esse" and "To Love" = "Amare".
The process of writing down all the inflexional forms belonging to a verb, the verb endings,  is called conjugation.  In Latin: coniugatio (sing.) and coniugationes (pl.)

 To Be

To Be
Pres. Ind.

Esse
Pres. Ind.

 To Be
Simple Past

 Esse
Imperfect

 To Be

Simple Fut.

Esse
Simpl. Fut.

I

 

am sum was er-am shall beer-o
You (thou)

are

(art) 

es

were

(wast)

er-as

 will be

(wilt be)

er-is
He,She,It
isestwaser-at will beer-it
We
aresumuswereer-amus shall beer-imus
You
areestiswereer-atis will beer-itis
They
aresuntwereer-ant will beer-unt

 To Love

To Love

Pres. Ind.

Amare

Pres. Ind.

 To Love

Simple Past

 Amare

Imperfect

To Love

Simple Fut.

Amare

Simple Fut.

I

 love

am-

loved

 am-abam

shall love 

 am-abo

You (thou)

 love

(lovest)

am-as

loved

 am-abas

will love

 am-abis

He,She,It

 loves

am-at

loved

 am-abat

will love

 am-abit

We

 love

am-amus

loved

 am-abamus

shall love

 am-abimus

You

 love

am-atis

loved

 am-abatis

will love

 am-abitis

They

 love

am-ant

loved

 am-abant

will love

 am-abunt

 

 
Let's make some observations about the conjugation of these two verbs. Let's start with the verb "To Be".

 

1- For each person (I, you, he-she-it, we, you & they) the Latin verb takes a different conjugation, (sum, es, est, sumus, estis and sunt) respectively.   In English all single persons (I, you, he-she-it) used to change conjugation with the corresponding (am, art, is). Then "art" became obsolete and was replaced with "are". Likewise, its pronoun originally was "thou" which was identical to the latin "tu" pronounced though with the anglo-saxon accent "th".  If you want to practice the "thou art" sound, just read the Authorized Version of the Bible and enjoy its sound and focus; or read Shakespeare. The plural persons (we, you and they) maintain the same conjugation, "are".

 

2- The same considerations apply to the past tense: in Latin, all the conjugations are different whereas, in English, they follow the same pattern of minimal change as for the present tense.

 

3- The Latin conjugation for the future tense has also a unique paradigm, whereas in English the conjugation takes a different form altogether: it uses a compund verb made up of the auxiliary verb "will" and the part of the infinitive of the verb "To Be" without the "To". It still maintains one conjugation change, "shall be" and "will be": and you know that the "shall be" form has disappeared in the American English and almost disappeared in English, too. Colloquially one says, "I will be", "we will be" unless we want to put emphasis on the statement and use the "shall" form.


4- In the case of the other verb, "To Love", you should notice that in the Latin forms all conjugations change for each tense, present, past and future.  In the English forms, the conjugations change for each tense, too, but within each tense the conjugation changes minimally. In fact, for the present tense the change is just the addition of the (s) to the 3rd person singular. For the past tense there is no change at all, "loved" forms the conjugation for all persons.   Likewise, for the future tense the conjugation is the same except for the auxiliary verb "will" for which apply the same comments that were mentioned in point 3 just above.

 

5- The substantive change in the Latin conjugation vis-a-vis English implies that in Latin the use of the pronouns that precede the verb conjugations are unnecessary.  This is because the person of the verb is implied by its conjugation, which is unique to each person.   In fact, you would not say "ego amo", "ego" being "I"; you would just say "amo" and it's obious that the person is "I".  If you were to say "amamus", it would be clear to all that you meant, "we love".

 

6- To make things confusing, there is an exception, associated with the verb "esse", i.e. "sum".  In this case, but not always, you would say "ego sum". This is because the verb to be, esse, is a special kind of verb. In fact, this reminds me of the French philosopher Descartes, a contemporary of Isaac Newton, who made three little words famous: "Cogito ergo sum", two verbs (cogito & sum) and one conjunction, "ergo".  Neither verb uses the pronoun "ego". 

I leave the translation as an exercise to you.

(Answer (back to front): ma I erofereht kniht I)