LESSON II
FIRST PRINCIPLES (Continued)
23. Inflection. Words may change their forms to indicate some change in sense or use, as, is, are; was, were; who, whose, whom; farmer, farmer's; woman, women. This is called inflection. The inflection of a noun, adjective, or pronoun is called its declension, that of a verb its conjugation.
24. Number. Latin, like English, has two numbers, singular and plural. In English we usually form the plural by adding -s or -es to the singular. So Latin changes the singular to the plural by changing the ending of the word. Compare
| Naut-a pugnat | The sailor fights |
| Naut-ae pugnant | The sailors fight |
25. Rule. Nouns that end in -a in the singular end in -ae in the plural.
26. Learn the following nouns so that you can give the English for the Latin or the Latin for the English. Write the plural of each.
- agri’cola, farmer (agriculture) [1]
- aqua, water (aquarium)
- causa, cause, reason
- do’mina, lady of the house, mistress (dominate)
- fīlia, daughter (filial)
- fortū’na, fortune
- fuga, flight (fugitive)
- iniū’ria, wrong, injury
- lūna, moon (lunar)
- nauta, sailor (nautical)
- puel’la, girl
- silva, forest (silvan)
- terra, land (terrace)
27. Compare again the sentences
| Nauta pugna-t | The sailor fights |
| Nautae pugna-nt | The sailors fight |
In the first sentence the verb pugna-t is in the third person singular, in the second sentence pugna-nt is in the third person plural.
- ↑ The words in parentheses are English words related to the Latin. When the words are practically identical, as causa, cause, no comparison is needed.
