Latin grammar

Latin has a very flexible word order, unlike English, because the language is highly inflected. In Latin there is no indefinite or definite article. They can be replaced by other adjectivals such as ille (forms of ille gradually changed into simply le or la like what we have in the modern Romance languages today), haec, ea, id, is etc.

Table of contents

1 Nouns

1.1 Cases
1.2 Declensions

1.2.1 First Declension
1.2.2 Second Declension
1.2.3 Third Declension
1.2.4 Fourth Declension
1.2.5 Fifth Declension

2 Adjectives
3 Verbs

3.3 Uses of the Tenses
3.4 Active Voice

3.4.6 Indicative
3.4.7 Subjunctive

3.5 Passive Voice

3.5.8 Indicative
3.5.9 Subjunctive

Nouns

Cases

On the noun tables there are usually 6 casess:

Nominative: indicates the subject of the sentence: Cornelia is a girl.\n*Genitive: indicates possession (most of the time): The hair of Cornelia is long.\n*Dative: indicates an indirect object: He gave the cookie to the boy.\n*Accusative: indicates a direct object: Cornelia killed Marcus. Also can be used with a preposition: We went into the bedroom.\n*Ablative: many uses, including conditions where English would use a preposition instead\n**the object of a preposition: He is inside the palace. \n**time: At the tenth hour he died.\n**instrument: He beat me with a stick.\n**means: He yelled with a great voice.\n**agent of a passive verb: The cookie was thrown by Cornelia across the room.\n*Vocative: direct address: O Cornelia

There is also something called the locative case, used to describe the location of something. However, only a few nouns survived (such as domus). \n

Declensions

There are 5 declensions. Most nouns in the 1st are feminine, most in the 2nd are masculine and neuter (usually distinguished by the m. -us and n. -um endings), 3rd can either be masculine, feminine, or neuter, 4th is either masculine or feminine, and 5th is usually feminine with some masculine. Basically, you will have to learn the gender of each noun independently. For each noun, make sure you know which declension it is in, in order to decline it, and what gender it is, so that adjectives agree.

First Declension

\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

	singular	plural
Nominative	puella	puellae
Genitive	puellae	puellārum
Dative	puellae	puellīs
Accusative	puellam	puellās
Ablative	puellā	puellīs

Second Declension

\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

	singular	plural
Nominative	amicus	amicī
Genitive	amicī	amicōrum
Dative	amicō	amicīs
Accusative	amicum	amicōs
Ablative	amicō	amicīs

Third Declension

\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

	singular	plural
Nominative	rēx	rēgēs
Genitive	rēgis	rēgum
Dative	rēgī	rēgibus
Accusative	rēgem	rēgēs
Ablative	rēge	rēgibus

Fourth Declension

\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

	singular	plural
Nominative	spiritus	spiritūs
Genitive	spiritūs	spirituum
Dative	spirituī	spiritibus
Accusative	spiritum	spiritūs
Ablative	spiritū	spiritibus

Fifth Declension

\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

	singular	plural
Nominative	diēs	diēs
Genitive	dieī	diērum
Dative	dieī	diēbus
Accusative	diem	diēs
Ablative	diē	diēbus

Adjectives

All adjectives must agree with the noun they describe in number, case and gender. All nouns are either feminine, masculine, or neuter. Genders are grammatical, and do not necessarily correspond to the sex of the object. Adjectives are either 1/2nd declension or 3rd declension. In 1/2nd declensions, -a endings are treated as feminine and are declined like 1st declension nouns, and -us endings are treated as masculine, and -um endings are treated as neuter and both are declined like second declension nouns. \nFor example:

Cornelia bona (feminine) (good Cornelia)\n*Cornelius bonus (masculine) (good Cornelius)\n*bellum bonum (neuter) (good war)

In 3rd declension adjectives, for masculine and feminine, most of the time there are no changes which are needed to be made to match gender as both masculine and feminine decline the same (make note that in the ablative usually you use an -i instead of -e as most 3rd declension adjectives are -i stemmed.). Neuter has one important difference, as nominative and accussative in all declensions are the same (-um for 2nd etc.) and for plural nominative and accussative have -a (all neuters in all declensions do this as well). Adjectives can also have comparative forms and superlative forms. Fortior is 'braver' (comparative). Fortissimus is 'bravest' (superlative). Basically, you drop the ending (-a, -us, -um) and place -ior to get the comparative ('braver') or add -issimus to make 'most brave'.

Cornelia est fortior quam Cornelius.
\nCornelia is braver than Cornelius.\n(quam after a comparative is 'than', otherwise it usually is feminine singular relative pronoun).\n*Cornelia est fortissima. (Cornelia is the bravest.)

Verbs

There are four conjugations in Latin. A verb either falls into one of these conjugations or is considered irregular. In Latin, a verb is defined by its person, number, tense, mood and voice. This gives rise to a large number of forms of each verb - 120, in fact. They are generally learnt in groups of 6, corresponding to a particular mood, tense, and voice. Each verb has two stems - a present stem and a perfect stem, to which various endings are added to make individual forms of verbs.

Uses of the Tenses

There are six tenses in Latin. They are:

Present, indicates actions happening at the time of speaking: The slave carries the jar\n*Imperfect, describes actions which were going on over a period of time: The crowd were cheering the gladiators\n*Future, used for actions which have not yet taken place, but will do so at some point: He will write the letter tomorrow\n*Perfect, describes actions in the past which have finished: He has taught the boy\n*Pluperfect, describes actions further in the past: He had taught the boy - notice the difference, it's important\n*Future Perfect, used for actions which will be completed some time in the future: By tomorrow, he will have sent the letter

There are three moods:

Indicative, which states indisputable facts: That slave is carrying a wine jar\n*Subjunctive, which is used for possibilities, intentions, necessities etc: The centurion chose a fortified location in order to defeat his enemies.\n*Imperative, used for commands: "You, slave! Carry this wine jar!"

There are two voices:

Active, where the verb is done by the subject: The slave carried the wine jar\n*Passive, where the verb is done to the subject: The wine jar was carried by the slave

With this information, we can sort the verbs into their groups of six, starting with the first conjugation, portare, to carry

Active Voice

Indicative

\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Present	Singular	Plural
1st Person	porto	portamus
2nd Person	portas	portatis
3rd Person	portat	portant

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Latin grammar

Nouns

Cases

Declensions

First Declension

Second Declension

Third Declension

Fourth Declension

Fifth Declension

Adjectives

Verbs

Uses of the Tenses

Active Voice

Indicative

Subjunctive

Passive Voice

Indicative

Subjunctive