grammatical genderunrelated to biological sex

grammatical genderunrelated to biological sex

Masculine: rivers, winds, months and mountains. endings in -us, -er, -or

Feminine: cities, countries, plants, trees and most abstract qualtities. endings in -a, -as, - do, -io

Neuter: endings in -um, -men, -e, -al, -ar

order versus endingorder versus ending

In English: by the order of words in a sentence

The girl looks at the bull.

The bull looks at the girl.

In Latin: by the endings of the nouns:

Puella taurum videt.

Puellam taurus videt.

Genitive case - “of”possession

Genitive case - “of”possession

possesion: the book of the teacher

(liber magistri)

modification: a boy of ten years

(puer decem annorum)

objective genitive: his hatred of me

(odium mei)

Dative case - “to”,”for” indirect object

Dative case - “to”,”for” indirect object

The boy gives a present to his mother. (The boy gives his mother a present.)

Puer matri donum dat.

Mark did a favour for me. (Mark did me a favour.)

Marcus mihi gratum fecit.

Accusative case - “through” direct object of a sentence

object of a preposition

Accusative case - “through” direct object of a sentence

object of a preposition

The god loves the girl.

Deus puellam amat.

The bear wandered through the forest.

Ursa per silvam errabat.

Ablative case Ablative case

object of a preposition (situation, agent, means)

The tree is in front of the temple. [Arbor est pro templo.]

The food is touched by the king. [Cibus a rege tangitur.]

ablative absolute

The Minotaur having been killed, Theseus left the island. (After the Minotaur had been killed, Theseus left the island.) [Minotauro necato, Theseus ab insula discessit.]

reference materialreference material

Norma Goldman and Ladislas Szymanski: English Grammar for Students of Latin, The Olivia and Hill Press, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1993.