Beginners Latin vocab?

[Aeolus]

Salve,<br /><br />I'm looking for a good book, or online resource to try and work on building up my Latin vocabulary. I've had 2 semesters of Latin, and I feel fairly confident with it, but I can never seem to remember word definitions. I'm looking for something to build up my vocab so that I can eventually take on the Vulgate, or possibly the Aeneid or one of Caesar's commentaries. I've tried looking at the books provided at this site, but for some reason Acrobat crashes on me when I try to open them(after I've downloaded them). Any and all help would be appreciated. <br /><br />Thanks

[Milito]

I had the same crashing problem, and discovered, thanks to the request for info on download problems in (I think) the Open Forum, that it has to do with using Acrobat 4 instead of 5....<br /><br />As for vocab books, I'm afraid I can't suggest anything in particular, but what I found over the last course I took (and I was VERY rusty on my vocab when I started) was that it slowly improved just through use and reading. It was annoying to know I'd seen a word fifty times (okay, that's an exaggeration) before, but still have to look it up; that did go away over time. Now I'm carrying on with reading just to make sure it doesn't happen again!<br /><br />I would suggest just diving into the text you want to read, keeping a dictionary and grammar book very close at hand, and just going for it. There's a discussion in the Greek Forum on translation approaches which has some good ideas in it. ("Exercises", I think the thread is called.)<br /><br />And if you want some lighter reading, you can find the occasional Latin translation of some English classics around - one of my favorites is "Quomodo invidiosulus nomine 'Grinchus' Christi Natum abrogavit", which does have a vocabulary list at the back of it.<br /><br />Kilmeny

[benissimus]

I totally agree. Simply by reading texts, you will familiarize yourself with common vocabulary and also have a more stimulating introduction with which to remember words. I have a strange habit of flipping through my Latin dictionary, which gives me a sense of having seen many words before, but I rarely ever remember their meanings using that method :-/