Latin from scratch #3: Imperfect past and future indicative

In the third module of the Latin from Scratch course, we’ll be adding two new tenses: the active indicative imperfect past and the active indicative future. The former is the most important and frequent, since it is a very common tense in narration, history, etc.

Classes on the imperfect and future tenses

9. The active indicative imperfect past tense (12m 03s)
10. The active indicative future tense (09m 24s)

Practice: morphosyntactic analysis and translation (3)

We are already in the third module, so we start directly with the translations. Analyze and translate the following sentences, and the short text about the childhood of Romulus and Remus, the Capitoline she-wolf and Faustulus and Larentia:

Servi hortum fluvii aqua rigabant.

Libri antiquorum poetarum pleni bonorum consiliorum erant.

Romani magna templa aedificabant et argento auroque multa cura ornabant.

Lupus et agnus in fluvii ripa aquam potabant. Agnus parvus et innoxius erat, sed lupus causam iniuriae quaerebat. «Tua causa», dicit, «aqua turbida est». Sed agnus respondet: «Aqua descendit a te». Lupus iniustus agnum necat et vorat.

Secundum Romanos, Romulus et Remus filii dei belli erant, sed familiam in Terra non habebant. Lupa in fluvii ripa aquam bibebat cum duos pueros invenit. «Nunc», cogitat, «mater puerorum ero et ambos curabo!». Sed agricola regius lupam invenit cum gemellis et pueros capit. Diu agricola Faustulus et femina Larentia Romulum et Remum educabant et tamquam filios amabant. «Pueri», cogitabant, «ampli viri erunt!».

Here you have the statements of the words appearing in the translation for this module. It is important for you to learn the vocabulary. To compel you to do so, I won’t usually repeat words from previous modules.

For the sentences:

• servus, servi — slave
• hortus, horti — garden
• rigo, rigare, rigavi, rigatum — water, irrigate
• liber, libri — book
• antiquus, antiqua, antiquum — ancient
• plenus, plena, plenum — full
• bonus, bona, bonum — good
• consilium, consilii — advice
• magnus, magna, magnum — big
• templum, templi — temple
• aedifico, aedificare, aedificavi, aedificatum — build
• argentum, argenti — silver
• aurum, auri — gold
• multus, multa, multum — a lot
• cura, curae — care
• lupus, lupi — wolf
• agnus, agni — lamb
• parvus, parva, parvum — small
• innoxius, innoxia, innoxium — harmless
• sed — but
• iniuria, iniuriae — argument, dispute
• quaero, quaerere, quaesivi, quaesitum — look for
• tuus, tua, tuum — your (thy)
• dico, dicere, dixi, dictum — say
• turbidus, turbida, turbidum — dirty
• respondeo, respondere, respondi, responsum — respond
• descendo, descendere, descendi, descensum — descend
• a — from
• te — ablative 2nd person singular of the personal pronoun
• iniustus, iniusta, iniustum — unfair
• neco, necare, necavi, necatum — kill

For the text:

• secundum — according to (accusative preposition)
• Romulus, Romuli — Romulus
• Remus, Remi — Remus
• filius, filii — son
• deus, dei — god
• familia, familiae — family
• Terra, Terrae — Earth
• lupa, lupae — she-wolf
• in — in (ablative preposition)
• fluvius, fluvii — river
• ripa, ripae — shore
• bibo, bibere, bibi, bibitum — drink
• cum — when (introduces a temporal subordinate clause)
• duos — two (accusative masculine plural)
• invenio, invenire, inveni, inventum — find
• nunc — now
• cogito, cogitare, cogitavi, cogitatum — think
• mater, matris — mother (nominative femenine singular)
• ambos — both (accusativo masculine plural)
• curo, curare, curavi, curatum — care for
• regius, regia, regium — of the king
• cum — with (ablative preposition)
• gemellus, gemelli — twin
• capio, capere, cepi, captum — take, seize
• diu — for a long time
• Faustulus, Faustuli — Faustulus
• femina, feminae — wife
• Larentia, Larentiae — Larentia
• educo, educare, educavi, educatum — raise, educate
• tamquam — like (comparative)
• amo, amare, amavi, amatum — love
• amplus, ampla, amplum — important

Review of the translations

Once you have finished with the analysis and translations, now it’s time to review them on the screen.

⚠️ Even if you think you’ve done everything correctly, it is very important for you to always check the review, since that’s where we actually practice and check what we have learned. You’ve already seen that the analysis-translation process is quite systematic and strict at first, precisely so we can absorb everything we’re doing.

In the following video (⏳ 17m 51s ⌛) I analyze and translate the sentences:

And now the text (⏳ 12m 44s ⌛):

In the next module we’ll learn the third declension, which will allow us to finally use most of the Latin nouns and adjectives.

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