Questions tagged [genitive]
For questions about the genitive case.
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Translating "Nocte volat caelī mediō"
Line 184 of Vergil's Aeneid, Book IV, begins as follows:
Nocte volat caelī mediō
Would this be translated as "She of the sky flies in the middle of the night", or "At night she flies in the middle ...
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1
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Prepositions/adpositions with genitive?
In Latin, there are prepositions that may be followed by a noun in accusative (like ad), ablative (cum) or both (in).
I once thought ope was a preposition to be used with genitive, which I found ...
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Expressing a possession relationship without the genitive?
I have the following sentence:
Clara est insula Sicilia
What I initially thought:
Sicily is a famous island
(This doesn't seem to make sense considering how the sentence is set up, but who ...
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Genitive vs Ablative of Price
In Latin, worth or value can be expressed by the genitive or by the ablative. Here are some examples:
Genitive
Non pono utrique par pretium: pluris aestimo beneficium quam iniuriam. (Sen Ep. Mor. 81....
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How to form the plural of "noun plus noun in possessive case"?
I would like to know what are the rules to form the plural of a noun plus a noun in possessive case. I am not sure if this is a correct description of what I am interested in let me give an example.
...
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3
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How to work around the missing cases of vis?
The word vis does not have singular genitive and dative forms.
This makes it difficult to use vis.
(I was reminded of this difficulty by this Star Wars question.)
Can you suggest methods of working ...
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Is -um (instead of -ōrum) a typical genitive plural ending outside of poetry?
I understand that Vergil often uses the -um genitive plural ending for some second declension nouns, instead of -ōrum. For example:
huc delecta virum sortiti corpora furtim (Aeneid, Book II, line ...
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Miserere mei! Miserere nostri! Why genitive?
Why is the object of mercy ("me", "us") rendered in the genitive in these two cases?
miserere mei (Psalm li)
miserere nostri (Psalm cxxi)
I would expect accusative, or even dative. But, genitive ...
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Forms of 2nd Declension Neuter Nouns ending in -ium
The 2nd Declension Neuter endings are:
Singular
Nom: -um
Gen: -ī
Dat: -ō
Acc: -um
Abl: -ō
Plural
Nom: -a
Gen: -ōrum
Dat: -īs
Acc: -a
Abl: -īs
With a word such as auxilium (meaning help, aid), which ...
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Ambiguitas casus genitivi?
The first sentence of the introduction to the Systema Naturæ by Linnaeus is:
Homo mundi intraturus theatrum quæritur Quis sit.
How do you tell what noun goes with mundi? Grammatically, two ...
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Use of the Genitive
I am new to learning Latin. I have been doing exercises related to the genitive and got one wrong and I am not understanding why. The question was to translate the following into Latin - "We ...
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How to write a sentence with two genitives describing one noun
I would like to translate the following sentence into Latin.
Minerva is the goddess of wisdom and of wool.
My first guess would be,
Minerva est dea sapientiae et lanae.
But I'm not sure ...
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3
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Is it grammatically correct to attributively use nominative forms of nouns in New Latin?
There are some muscle names in New Latin that seem to be nouns as far as I can tell, such as flexor and extensor. However, according to several Wikipedia articles for these muscles, they behave as if ...
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Why are descriptive subjects in the genitive?
I notice that in the De Naturis Animantium of Suetonius, he uses the genitive to describe the subjects of behavior. So, for example, he writes est [...] anatum tetrissitare ("it is of ducks to ...
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When to use a genitive pronoun instead of a possessive adjective
The genitive form of the personal pronouns (e.g. mei, tui, nostri, nostrum, etc.) seem to occur fairly often in the following contexts:
Partitive genitive: to indicate a part of some whole.
Quis ...
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Is "Jacob" genitive in "jubilate deo jacob"?
"Jubilate deo Jacob" is translated everywhere as "rejoice unto the god of Jacob". But from what little I know, Jacob is not in the genitive case. May I ask if this was a ...
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Where does the final -ς in genitive feminine singularis -ᾱς/-ης/τῆς come from?
The declination pattern for the case endings, as well as the article ὁ, ἡ, τό, seems to fairly closely match that of the grammatical endings you find in Latin:
Case
Latin
Greek
Latin
Greek
Latin
...
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3
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What are the normal genitive and dative singular forms of "alius"?
Some sources mention a genitive singular alius, but I've also seen aliae. And I don't recall seeing a dative singular ali, but neither do I remember alio. I think several forms exist, including even ...
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Expressing the relationship "his" in latin
So I have the following sentence which I have to translate into Latin:
The farmer gives his daughter water.
The parts which I found easy: Agricola ... aquam dat.
I don't know how to express "his" ...
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3
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Differentiating possessive and non-possessive uses of the genitive
In English, genitives formed with " 's " often have a possessive meaning, while "of" may function to form a kind of "genitive" with a non-possessive meaning, e.g., compare "John's photo" and "a photo ...
8
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1
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How common is the genitive plural ending -um in the first declension?
In an answer, Draconis said the genitive plural -um (instead of -arum) is sometimes used in the first declension. Now, while -um is fairly common in poetry and with certain specific words, like deum, ...
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8
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2
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Semantic difference between genitive and relational ("belong-to") adjectives
There is class of relational adjectives that their meaning is "belong to" "pertain to" like grammaticus. (maybe that distinction is somewhat artificial, as one can say that magnus ...
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2
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What is the difference between suus and eius?
What is the difference between the possessive adjective
suus (his, hers, its, theirs)
(and its declensions)
and the genitive, possessive pronoun
eius (of her, of him, of it)?
Can these words be ...
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7
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1
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Unnecessary genitive being used with 'suum'
I am not sure how to translate
Augustus affirmāvit genūs suum ab Iove ortum esse.
One can logically conclude that this much of the sentence is correct...
Augustus affirmed that ... ...
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1
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What does "facti" mean in this sentence?
I am starting to read the "Novellae" in the Corpus Iuris Civilis and this sentence from the first one is confusing to read: 'et Tzanī nunc prīmum sub Rōmānōrum factī rēpublicā inter ...
7
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Do we use "satis multum" + genitive to convey "a sufficient amount of"?
The following sentence comes from lines 126-128 of chapter XVI of Lingua latina per se illustrata. Familia Romana:
Nāvis aquā implērī incipit, neque enim nautae satis multum aquae haurīre possunt.
...
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Comparing ablative and genitive of quality
The ablative and genitive of quality (ablativus qualitatis and genetivus qualitatis) are similar.
One can describe a high mountain as mons magna altitudine or mons magnae altitudinis.
Is there any ...
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2
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Mors mea or mors meī?
If I wanted to talk about "the death of Caesar", I wouldn't think twice about using the genitive (mors Caesaris). But if you asked me what sort of genitive this is—possessive, partitive, or objective—...
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Was -i used as genitive ending for first declension masculines?
In Greek masculines of the first declension borrow the singular genitive ending -ου from second declension.
Latin uses the ending -ae for all of first declension: puellae, nautae, Anchisae, Aeneae.
...
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Habeo with genitive
Sīc scrīpsit Forcellīni:
K Græcorum littera est, non Latinorum, qui ejus loco c habent ejusdem potestatis.
What is the significance of the genitive case with habeō?
I gather that the sentence above ...
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1
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What is the syntax of ‘quamquam omnis secrētī capācissima’?
In Pliny’s letter 1.12, when he describes his meeting with his Domitian-hating friend, he mentions how all servants would leave when close friends came by, and even his wife ‘who was fully capable of ...
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Which noun is the genitive describing in this sentence?
Beginner here. In "Ad familiam nautae pecuniam portabo", is nautae describing familiam or pecuniam? That is, does this translate to "I will carry the money to the sailor's family" ...
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Are there Roman examples of "of Rome" instead of "Roman"?
In my experience it is extremely common to say, for example, rex Romanus instead of rex Romae.
In fact, I do not recall ever seeing a genitive when a local adjective can be used.
Translating to ...
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Peneus River (Metamorphoses 1.567–572)
I just worked on translating a passage that was very difficult for me, and not without a lot of help from online resources. Here is the passage below:
Est nemus Haemoniae, praerupta quod undique ...
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1
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"Habere" VS dative and genitive of possession?
To mean something that is not owned legally, not owned with the meaning of "being the owner", like when I say "We have a pope", could I use "habere" or only the dative or genitive of possession?
Is ...
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Translating "order of protection and conservation"
An author friend recently asked me for help with a Latin name: in his book, a group calls itself the "order of protection and conservation", but in Latin to be pretentious (altum videtur…).
My ...
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How to Translate "His is better"
So I too was confused about the difference between suus and eius, and came across this question and its great answers.
TL,DR; suus refers back to the subject of the main clause as the possessor, ...
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Using "ad" vs. dative
The self-exercises in CAPVT VIII of Wheelock's Latin (7th Edition) include the following sentence (#11):
Litterās ad virginem scrībit.
He is writing a letter to the maiden.
I'm confused about ...
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Is unius an irregular genitive?
I notice that the genitive of unus can apparently be either the regular uni, or can also be unius.
Is this form, unius, just a completely irregular oddity, or is there some logical precedent for it? ...
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Forming compound word using "Cognitio"
Based on the existing English words describing the diet type of a species with Latin origins, I am struggling to see a clear pattern...
Herbivore: "Herba" + "-vore(vorare)"?
...
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The instances where verbs might take the genitive case
In Sixto-Clementine Vulgate we find in Genesis this verse:
poenituit eum quod hominum fecisset in terra (Genesis 6:6)
"hominum" is in the genetive case which I find strange. I try searching for ...
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Can I combine a possessive pronoun and the genitive of a noun?
Today in chat we spoke briefly about an earlier discussion I had had with Cerberus in Latin.
(In case you did not know, we have a chatroom for this site.)
I realized that I do not know how to put both ...
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Sub specie precariae linguae or sub specie linguae precariae?
This is a rather small doubt, but I'm currently a bit confused regarding the proper word order of an adjective-noun under a genitive form of the sort "sub specie..." Am I correct in assuming ...
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Translation: Out of my death, new life
I took a Latin course a few years ago, and now I'm trying my hand for a friend's tattoo.
Is my translation of the title correct?
English: Out of my death, new life.
Latin attempt: Ex mei mortis ...
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2
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Plural genitive endings in -i
This is a speculative question that (I hope) has a good answer from historical linguistics.
My starting observation was that all nouns appear to have a plural genitive ending in -um: -arum, -orum, -(...
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What is the proper translation of "Victoriarum Romae" (two genitives in a row)?
I was given the exercise to translate Victoriarum Romae into English.
It's not a part of some bigger text: that's all I was given. I don't feel confident about my translation, "Of the victories of ...
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How would you translate the title "A Song of Ice and Fire" into Classical Latin?
I've seen "Carmen Glaciei Ignisque", but I have some doubt with the use of genitive here.
Can someone help me find examples from classical works that support the use of genitive?
Or find an ...
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Colonna as cognomen
I am working on the Italian Renaissance soldier Stefano Colonna.
How would his name be written in Latin, as a label or signature,
Stephanus? What is the proper genitive for "of the Colonna family"?
...
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Genitive case: why "litterarum vetustatem" and not "litteras vetustatis"
From time time I encounter a pair of nouns; one noun is in a genitive case, apparently modifies the other, but where I expect them to behave differently. examples:
memoriae tradere litterarum ...
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Ambiguity in "Illīus hominis fīlium laudābant omnēs"?
Each question below assumes that any previous question has been answered with a yes.
Is ille ever used alone as that is used in this sentence?
That is a good idea.
Is illīus ever used alone as of ...
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