Questions tagged [morphologia]
For questions about morphology.
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How to choose correct word variants?
I asked a question earlier.
For some time now, it's occured to me that a pattern is forming: All my questions about the Latin language are basically the same. The subjects change, but the underlying ...
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1answer
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Plural in 4th declension
I know that virtually all masculine and feminine nouns in Latin have an e or i in the nominative plural and that the genitive singular is often similar. This is quite widespread in Indo-European ...
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Do non-Attic-Ionic dialects distinguish the accusatives of the ἀσπίς and χάρις types?
In Attic-Ionic Greek, nouns with dental stems show two types of accusative singular endings, depending on the position of the accent:
If the accent is on the final syllable of the stem, the ...
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Can enclitics be chained?
I am active in a small Latin Discord group; a member brought up a question concerning the validity of the following phrase with chained enclitics:
Valēsneque?
(with the enclitics distinguished) ...
5
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1answer
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What’s the difference between meminisse and memini?
I’d love to get a tattoo saying ‘remember’ in Latin, but would rather not use memento. Would it be possible to either use meminisse or memini? I’d like remember to be like a reminder for myself to ...
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1answer
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Forming compound words in Latin: helicopter
I would like to understand the formation of Latin compound words through the example of the word "helicopter".
This obviously has a Greek origin, and I would like redo the construction with two Latin ...
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Future: why -am instead of -em?
The future tense of third and fourth conjugation verbs is marked by -ē-, as in trahes and audies.
The regular personal endings are added after this vowel.
But in the first person singular the ...
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Third conjugation passive infinitive: why -i and not -eri?
The active infinitive is uniform (-re from -se by rhotacism) across the regular Latin conjugations, but the passive one is not: the third conjugation loses the consonant.
We have amare/amari, habere/...
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1answer
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Does 'fiebam' contain the same root twice?
I learned from this question and its answers that the imperfect marker -ba- comes from the same PIE root as fui and fio.
What about the form fiebam (and other persons) then?
Does it contain the same ...
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What is the origin of the future suffix -b-?
I read in this answer that there may be a relation between the future endings -bo, -bis, etc. on the one hand and the verb fio "become" on the other. Is this true? If so, do we have any more details ...
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1answer
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Where does the infinitive 'fieri' come from?
What is the origin of the infinitive fieri?
It is unusual in many respects.
The stem seems to be fi- and the infinitive ending -eri is only found in the second conjugation.
However, the second ...
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1answer
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Active perfect stem conjugation and forms of esse
Many forms formed from the perfect stem (habitav-, fec-, tetig-, and others) resemble forms of esse.
It looks as if a form of esse was directly attached to the perfect stem.
In perfect conjunctive an -...
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Vowel length in future perfect indicative and perfect conjunctive
I want to compare future perfect active indicative and perfect active conjunctive.
They look identical, apart from first person singular (cogitavero ≠ cogitaverim).
But is there a difference in the ...
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2answers
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Understanding 'percepset' instead of 'percepisset'
When looking at the L&S entry for percipio, I came across a surprising perfect form: percepset.
The contraction percepisset > percepset lookst similar to cogitavisset > cogitasset.
Are ...
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1answer
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Why vesperascit instead of vesperescit?
I was recently working on a little translation project and my intuition and memory suggested that "evening comes" is vesperescit.
Checking dictionaries corrected me: it is vesperascit instead.
Why is ...
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1answer
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Why does Latin use declensions instead of just cases and gender?
What is the purpose of declensions? I know that 1st declension is female second is male and 3rd is neuter, but then why 4 and 5? What is the purpose of several declensions?
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1answer
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Why do some pronoun nominatives look like vocatives?
The forms ipse, ille, and iste look like vocatives instead of nominatives, and one would expect to see ipsus, illus, and istus instead.
In fact, ipsus is attested but far rarer than ipse, but the ...
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How did “glutaeus/gluteus” come from Greek “gloutos”? Would “glutiaeus” be more correct?
In anatomy, the muscles of the buttocks are referred to collectively as the "glut(a)eal muscles" in English, and are individually given the following Latin names: glut(a)eus maximus, glut(a)eus medius ...
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2answers
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Is visne > vin unique?
There is a contraction from the regular visne to vin.
Is the same contraction with -ne attested with other verbs in classical Latin?
I don't recall seeing questions like loquerin Latine or haben equum ...
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Plura or pluria?
Before answering this recent question about the US motto, I had to check whether the neuter version of plures is plura or pluria.
I had recalled right: plura appears to be indeed the sole form used in ...
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1answer
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The length of the final vowel in first declension nouns (Greek)
How can you tell whether a first declension noun ends in a short or long vowel?
Background
When the word is written and accented, I may be able to tell. (Not always. E.g. θύρᾱ if without the macron)...
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1answer
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What is the origin of the -a in words like “collega, advena”?
There are a couple of masculine (or common) nouns of the first declension. Some are from masculine Greek -ês, like poeta, nauta. But others, like collega, advena, parricida, scriba, incola, agricola, ...
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Regular passive forms of “facere”
Have regular passive forms of the verb facere ever been used?
If so, what is the first occurrence?
In all of the Latin I have seen, the passive forms of facere are replaced by fieri.
Regular passive ...
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0answers
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Is there a neuter noun (word) that has different nominative and accusative form? [duplicate]
I thought neuter noun's accusative and nominative forms are always the same but is there any exception? I need any neuter word that has different nominative and accusative form. Doesn't matter if it's ...
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1answer
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How do we end up with three vowels at the end of Περικλέους? (Greek)
According to Wiktionary, the genitive of Περικλῆς, or Περικλέης, is Περικλέους; and similarly, that of Σοφοκλῆς, or Σοφοκλέης, Σοφοκλέους.
Question: How do we end up with three vowels, εου, at the ...
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3answers
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What is meant by “collateral” in dictionaries?
Lewis & Short often use the abbreviation collat., standing for collateral according to the appendix of abbreviations. An example:
ŭtĕrus, i, m. (collat. form ŭter, Caecil. ap. Non. 188, 15; ...
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2answers
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Rules to constructing a proper compound noun in Ancient Greek
I know this StackExchange is dedicated to Latin, but since one for Greek/Ancient Greek is currently under proposal, I was advised to post my question here after having posted it on Linguistics. I am ...
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2answers
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How did the mixed-root “anticipātiō, anticipātiōnis” form?
I was considering the English word anticipation the other day, and wondered at how it ended up with a Greek prefix followed by a Latin root.1 After a quick search I found that the word derives from ...
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2answers
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Why is the comparative adjective of “clarus” not “clariusis”?
The neuter genitive singular comparative of clarus is clarioris. Why is this? Shouldn't it be 'clariusis', since the form of neuter adjectives in the comparative form ends on -us?
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Why homicide instead of hominicide?
The word homicida is attested in classical Latin, and the English "homicide" is an obvious loan.
The word seems to come from homo and caedere.
Why is the first part homi- instead of homini-?
The stem ...
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1answer
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Quinquies and quinquiens
Consider the word quinquies/quinquiens ("five times").
It has two alternative spellings.
Having the options -ies and -iens seems to be common for numerals of this kind.
What is the origin of these ...
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2answers
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How productive was the participle in -menus in Latin?
Greek has the medium participle ending in -menos.
It has a couple of occurrences in Latin, too, of which I only seem to remember alere > alumnus now.
How many words are there in Latin that contain ...
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2answers
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Comparing decem and -decim
The Latin cardinal numbers starting at ten are decem, undecim, duodecim…
Does the -decim (roughly "-teen") come from decem or from the same root?
(I faintly recall decem and δέκα coming from ...
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2answers
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Latin passive endings: Why is -mini sticking out
The Latin passive ending usually feature an additional letter R compared to the active endings: laud-or, -aris, -atur, -amur, -antur. However, the second person plural is different, using the ending -...
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Why ĭdem instead of iddem or īdem in neuter?
The pronoun idem/eadem/idem appears to be the combination of is/ea/id and -dem.
I can understand why isdem > īdem in the masculine, but why do we have iddem > ĭdem?
Shouldn't the vowel be ...
5
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1answer
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The middle A of quadraginta
Consider these Latin cardinal numbers:
quadrAginta,
quinquAginta,
sexAginta,
nonAginta.
The -ginta seems to stand for tens (cf. triginta, octoginta) and the initial parts quadr-, quinqu-, sex-, and ...
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1answer
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Why sequundus > secundus?
It seems quite clear that secundus comes from sequundus, a gerundive of sequi.
But why did -quu- become -cu-?
This change is not universal, since some Latin words do preserve -quu-, at least the end ...
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2answers
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When is there a U instead of an E in gerund(ive)?
Tuomo Pekkanen's Latin grammar mentions (§52.3) that the -e- added to the present stem before -nd- in the gerund and gerundive (in the third and fourth conjugations) can be replaced with a -u-.
For ...
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0answers
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When and how did the distinction between the gerund and the gerundive develop?
The gerund and the gerundive look similar and have similar meanings, but they are still distinct as any Latin grammar will tell us.
But how did classical Latin come to have these two close but ...
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1answer
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Why is it “dare” and not “dāre” when most first conjugation verbs spell like “amāre”?
Why does dō conjugate differently from other first conjugation verbs in that you find a short a where otherwise you might expect a long ā?
BACKGROUND
Examples:
amāre (dare), amārī (darī), ...
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3answers
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Did the Romans ever combine Greek and Latin morphemes?
Recently I was thinking about words in English which were formed from a Greek and Latin morpheme pair. An example of this is 'television', where 'tele-' is a Greek-originating prefix while 'vision' is ...
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1answer
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How did the Latin past participle suffix -atus develop into modern French -é?
How did the Latin past participle suffix -atus develop into modern French -é?
Considering the two following examples: modern French état ("state; status") and été ("been"). Both derives ultimately ...
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Understanding the stem(s) of 'struere'
The present, perfect, and participle stems1 of the verb struere are stru-, strux-, and struct-.
The -s- in the perfect stem and the -t- in the participle stem are nothing unusual, but they seem to ...
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How is the supine related to the derived fourth declension noun?
I asked yesterday about the word venatu.
There was a good answer and good comments, but I want to ask a broader related question more specifically — especially due to TKR's comment.
I want to ...
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1answer
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Do the locatives militiae, terrā, marī occur by themselves?
Textbooks tell us that the only common (in the sense of not proper) nouns that have a locative case are rūs "countryside" and domus "home". However, I'm familiar with two expressions that use ...
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Why do Latin nouns (like cena, -ae) include two forms?
So I recently learned the first declension nouns concept and my list of new vocabularies to learn suddenly changed.
Words were usually presented as:
sagitta
pecunia
etc.
Now, they indicate the ...
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1answer
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Did the Romans borrow any inflection from other languages than Greek?
Some Greek loan words in Latin use Greek declension.
For example, I recall seeing Aeneida and Aeneidos instead of the regular Latin declension Aeneidem and Aeneidis.
Some elements of Greek inflection ...
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1answer
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What is the optative?
Some conjunctive forms end in -im (and -is, -it, -imus, -itis, -int), but this is rare.
The examples I recall are sim, possim, velim, nolim, malim, and duim (alternative to dem).
These forms are ...
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Why does Ago become agit, agitis, agis, etc? [conjugate with an *i*?]
I am working on word endings in Latin, and I came across the word Ago.
And I was looking at the different conjugations for this word and it did not make sense to me.
Observe:
Endings are:
...
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3answers
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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 ...
