Gender Number and Case genus humānum mortem timet! cūr? vīta levis facilisque esse potest -- quoque misera difficilisque. vir quem cōgnoscō semper timēbat; cito igitur dēlētus est cūrīs gravibus. vīta est flūmen; omnia mūtāntur. habē amīcōs semper in memōriā; negelege omnia mala. mentem iūcundam tenē; itaque vīta quam inveniēs bona vidēbitur. Word Gender Number Case 1. humānum m f n s pl nom. gen. dat. acc. abl. 2. mortem m f n s pl nom. gen. dat. acc. abl. 3. levis m f n s pl nom. gen. dat. acc. abl. 4. quem m f n s pl nom. gen. dat. acc. abl. 5. cūrīs m f n s pl nom. gen. dat. acc. abl. 6. flūmen m f n s pl nom. gen. dat. acc. abl. 7. omnia m f n s pl nom. gen. dat. acc. abl. 8. amīcōs m f n s pl nom. gen. dat. acc. abl. 9. memōriā; m f n s pl nom. gen. dat. acc. abl. 10. mentem m f n s pl nom. gen. dat. acc. abl. 11. bona m f n s pl nom. gen. dat. acc. abl. 1. humanum: somebody or other fears death. Who? genus? Do we know that word? Well, do we know the form of our word? It’s humanus, -a, -um. So it is an adjective with genus, which has to be the subject. So, it is neuter, and singular, and nominative 2. mortem. The –em is a dead giveaway. It has to be singular and accusative. But what gender? Death is scary and mean, right? So it must be femimine! Know it or guess. 3. levis. 3rd declension adjective, levis, leve. If you’re not sure whether the –is is a nom/gen singular 3rd d., or a dat/abl. pl/ 1st-2nd d, then look for the macron. There is not any on the 3rd declension –is. So what does levis go with? vita, apparently. And if you can’t remember that word, note that the verb is singular, and the –a probably makes vita fem., s., nom. Which levis is. 4. Quem: We have a genuine relative pronound here. Look at your deeply incised mental chart and pick out what it is: m, s, acc. Alternately, see if you can figure out what it’s amtecedent is for the gender, and its use in the sentence for its case. But no, you know your relative pronouns, right? I have a quiz that proves it. 5. curis. –īs with macron means dative or ablative plural. Which case? Is there any special verb or “giving showing saying” verb to make it dative? No. Why would it be ablative? Because you use ablatives to show who is doing something with passive verbs (e.g. by heavycares). So it’s abl. pl. Gender? cura, -ae vs curus, -i or curum, -i. You choose. (Women are caring, so it’s feminine, right? ) 6. Flumen. Life is a river (and I’m going to ride it, all night long …) All right, obviously I need more sleep too. But if the 2 things are being equated, with only an est between them, you have a subject and a subject complement and both are nominative. An d apparently, singular. So what kind of a words ends in –en? Well, in this case, the neuter type. 7. omnia. You aren’t about to be fooled by the –a on omnia. You know it’s neuter plural. Nor are you about to be fooled by its dictionary definition. omnia means everything. And even though everything is singular in illogical English, you know it is plural in Latin, where –a’s (and esp. –ia’s) are often neuter plurals. Never doubt yourself. n, pl, and – in this particular two word sentence – subject. “Everything is changed.” (It would have to be made ablative if it were “they are changed by everything). 8. amicos: - os is almost dead easy. Masculine, plural, accusative. There are the occasionally odd words like “sacerdos” where the –os is something else, but we can just shoot those words if they mess us up and go with the percentages. 9. memoriā: -ā (with macron) another giveaway. ablative singular and (unless it is a weird word like poeta or agricola) feminine. 10. mentem. Another –em giveaway: accusative and singular, either m/f. But which? Check iucundam -- -am makes it feminine. 11. bona : well, this is an adjective, so it should go with something, right? Hmm, but what? Observe the relative clause in the middle of the sentence. This means that the “which you find” is grammatically a step away from the main sentence, vita bona videbitur. Life is the subject, videor has the sense of “seems”, and good describes the life. Once again, feminine, singular, nominative. Forgive the typos
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