Pandora's Box

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Feles in silva
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Pandora's Box

Post by Feles in silva »

In the Pandora's Box story of 38 Latin Stories, the last sentence ends:

Etiam si vita plena malorum est, spem semper habemus.

The vita here appears to be in the ablative. I don't understand quite why, other than running through all the other cases and determining that none of the other ones seem to apply.

I'm only on Ch.5 of Wheelock's and I know the ablative is covered in later chapters but I was just wondering why vita is in the ablative. I was able to understand the why of the other cases in the story, so this one is kind of bothering me since I don't quite understand it.

As an aside, would "Pandora's Box" be Pandorae Arca?

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Deses
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Post by Deses »

Vita here is a garden variety Nom. Sing. Syntactically it is a subject.

How else would you translate it?
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Feles in silva
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Post by Feles in silva »

Deses wrote:Vita here is a garden variety Nom. Sing. Syntactically it is a subject.

How else would you translate it?
I think what is throwing me here is that vita in this sentence has a macron over it, and that is making me think ablative (long a as opposed to the short a in the nominative).

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benissimus
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Post by benissimus »

If you are sure that the A in vita has a macron, there is probably a typo in the book.
flebile nescio quid queritur lyra, flebile lingua murmurat exanimis, respondent flebile ripae

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Deses
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Post by Deses »

Feles in silva wrote:I think what is throwing me here is that vita in this sentence has a macron over it, and that is making me think ablative (long a as opposed to the short a in the nominative).
How about plena? Does it have a macron?
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Feles in silva
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Post by Feles in silva »

Deses wrote: How about plena? Does it have a macron?
No, plena doesn't. Maybe it is a typo. Thanks for all your responses.

karendawn
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Post by karendawn »

I checked my copy of the book and there is no macron over the a in vita (there is one over the i). Are our books different?

Feles in silva
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Post by Feles in silva »

karendawn wrote:I checked my copy of the book and there is no macron over the a in vita (there is one over the i). Are our books different?
No, I think I am mistaken. My copy is 5th ed. Sorry for the confusion.

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