Latin from scratch #6.14: The four adverbials of place

In the fourteenth class of the Latin from Scratch course, we’ll study the adverbials of place, which are very frequent in texts. It is also important to distinguish between the four types: “to”, “from”, “through” and “in”.

I explain everything in the following video (⏳ 10m 19s ⌛):

Syntax of the adverbials of place

There are four types of adverbials of place: “to”, “from”, “through” and “in”. Each of them has its own cases and prepositions.

Of course, we are not going to learn absolutely all of the details, but what appears most of the times. These details have to be understood and learned by heart.

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Place “to” (direction, quo)

Adverbials of place “to” are expressed in the accusative case, most of the times with preposition, but sometimes without.

• Without preposition: cities, small islands and the words domus, ‑i ‘house’; humus, ‑i ‘ground, earth’; rus, ruris ‘land, estate’.
• With preposition (usually in and ad): all the rest.

The difference between the two prepositions is that in indicates that you enter the place, whereas ad expresses movement toward something or someone, but without making it explicit whether you enter or not.

Eo in castra.
I go (and enter) to the camp.

Eo ad castra.
I go toward the camp.

Eo ad Caesarem.
I go to (the presence of) Caesar.

Place “from” (origin, separation, unde)

Adverbials of place “from” are expressed in the ablative case.

• Without preposition: cities, small islands and the words domus, ‑i; humus, ‑i; rus, ruris.
• With preposition (usually e/ex, a/ab, de): all the rest.

There’s no urgent difference between e/ex and a/ab, while de indicates a movement from top to bottom.

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Also, please note the difference between ad (direction) and a/ab (origin)!

Place “through” (qua)

Adverbials of place “through” are expressed in the ablative case without preposition or in the accusative with per.

• Ablative without preposition: nouns which refer to places intended to go through (e.g. a door, a bridge) and some other words.
• Accusative with the preposition per: all the other words.

Place “in” (location, ubi)

Adverbials of place “in” can appear in several ways:

• Locative case: singular nouns of the 1st and 2nd declensions (also 3rd, borrowed), names of cities, small islands and the words domus, ‑i; humus, ‑i; rus, ruris.
• Ablative without preposition: cities and islands declined in the plural of the 1st and 2nd declensions, and cities and islands of the 3rd declension.
• Most of the times we just have in + ablative.

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You need to be careful with the preposition in, which is the only one changing its meaning depending on the case:

• in + accusative: direction
• in + ablative: location

Even if all this looks like a lot of information, you’ll get used to it pretty soon. Ouf course, by practicing!

Next: The four adverbials of place →