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The Vocative Case

While you will rarely need to ask Lupus where the bathroom is in Latin, you may find yourself reading either quotes or letters in which a person is being directly addressed. The case it will be in is the vocative.

For example, "Hail, Augustus" will appear in Latin as Ave Auguste, and not Ave Augustus.

Each declension has its own form of the vocative singular and plural. They are listed in the table below.

Furthermore, in all but the second declension, the nominative and vocative are exactly the same! {|border="1" |- | Number || First || Second* || Third || Fourth || Fifth |- | Singular || a || us->e, ius->i, r->r|| -- || us || es |- | Plural** || ae || i || es || us || es |- |}

• In the second declension singular, there are three separate possibilities for the vocative, depending on its nominative ending. Hence, if it is a us word, it will become an e and so forth.

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Examples for different declensions in the second declension

• -us:
• : Lupus ->Lupe (given name, wolf)
• -ius:
• :Filius -> Fili (son)
• :Horatius-> Horati (given name)
• -r:
• :Puer-> Puer (boy)

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Examples

1. Hello, Sextus.(Hello= Salve)*
2. : Salve, Sexte.
3. Speak, girl! (Speak= dico, dicere, dixi)*
4. : Dic, puella.
5. Knee, run!*(Knee= genu; run= curro, currere, cucurri)*
6. : Genu, curre!
7. Oh, heart, why do you lead me? (Oh-o; heart- cors, cordis-f.; lead-duco, ducere;
8. : O, cors! Cur ducis tu me?

• Note that the first three also require use of the imperative. The imperative is used when ordering or telling someone what to do, e.g.- "Stop," or "Get away from me."

The basic form of the imperative is created by dropping the "re" off of the infinitive form of the verb, as in: Amare, which becomes Ama; at least in the singular active form, which is all that these exercises require. More can be found about this subject in the chapter on verbs.

For learning Latin Category Uncategorized Level Unspecified Second language English Created Aug 01, 2008 16:47 Views 2923 Share:

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