Prose Composition II.

[Episcopus]

Have a go, this will be interesting. I have this text as an official standard. Although I'm not telling you what. And I've replaced many words, and added vocabulary below. Translate as it is, no showboating, fancy doing etc. Notate bene: Les Supines sont interdites. Supines sitae non sunt(I'm guessing the word for Supines if you haven't already guessed).

Anyway, translate:

"Supines are forbidden.

Once Piglet, who had been a very famous Ostrich a many years before, but was now only a poor pigeon and had a small pellet and a few oxen, was working in his palace. Suddenly he saw two armed pheasants quickly approaching him. When they had now reached him, he asked them who they were and wherefore they had come there. They replied that they had been sent to him by some duckling, "The ducks of hell", they said, " is in such great danger that the duckling begs you to return with us and lead the pigs and stags against the evil sparrows with vast beaks." Having heard this, Piglet immediately left his skin and set out for hell to become a dictator. "

porcella, ae - piglet
passer marinus - ostrich
columba, ae - pigeon
globulus, i - pellet
bos, bovis (g pl. boum/bovum; abl+dat pl. bobus/bubus) - cow/ox (m/f)
phasianus, i - pheasant
anaticula, ae - duckling
anas, -atis - duck
porcus, i - pig
cervus, i - stag, deer
passer, -eris - sparrow
rostrum, i - beak
pellis, is - skin, fur, coat (m)

The joys of D'Ooge reading matter vocabulary! It is quite amazing!

Thankyou and may you encounter great prosperity in the future and may others benefit from your existence! (I wish I could say that in latin!)

Habeatis autem tempus optimum reliquum!

[whiteoctave]

Porcella quaedam olim, qui, quamquam struthiocamelus fuerat pridem pernobilis, perpauperi nunc columbae ipsi globulus parvus paucaeque boves solum essent, in regia laborabat. subito tamen duos atque phasianos armatos ad se accedere conspexit quos adventos et qui essent et quae factum venissent rogabat. "nos" aiunt "ab anaticula quadam sumus missi quae, cum anates inferni in tantis periculis sint, a te precatur ut nobiscum reversus sues ac cervos contra passeres pravi ac rostra immensa ducas". Porcella igitur hoc audito fusoque pelle ad inferna dictaturam gestum profectus est.

I thought I would represent my two clauses of purpose with, well, supines.

~dave

p.s. i won't even go into the nonsensical nature of the English!

[Episcopus]

Although I said it I have no right to chide you at all for that, it is amazing showboating!

"ad se accedere conspexit", really! A simple "sibi adpropinquantes..." would have sufficed

"quos adventos et qui essent et quae factum venissent rogabat" - can you explain this line please? Mainly "quos adventos". Is "quae factum venissent rogabat" "asked what things they had come to do?"

The problem with Supines is, I can not find a thorough explanation of them. A&G just seems to assume that I know them already as usual, and various second year prose compositions brush past them in 1/3 of a page!

That nonsensical English however was turned into a very elegant passage there. I'd love to pull that one out in an exam. Knowing the stupidly strict nature of marking schemes they probably would have marked you down for it, assuming that you did not know "multis ante annis", for "many years before".

[whiteoctave]

"sibi adpropinquantes" would make sense in itself, but it has to tie in with the sentence and so here would have combine with "two" and "armed" all agreeing with "phasanos". It is more concise yes, and I didn't really like my construction as it was too short.

The "quos" is a connecting relative referring to the aformentioned "phasani". As regards "adventos" you should rightly be puzzled: what I had in my head was "adventu", and it somehow has turned into the passive participle, which obviously isn't possible. "adventu" [sc. eorum] covers their arrival and "quos" is the object of rogabat".

you translated "quae factum venissent rogabat" correctly.

The supine can be used in its accusative form after verbs of motion to cover a final (i.e. purpose) clause. It's more Livian than, say, Ciceronian, but your distaste to them necessitated the use of two. It's not the best construction to use here, but gramatically it works.

I think I have spotted another silly mistake in that "infernae" (not-i)should follow "anates" as the little quackers were thought of as female.

cheers for reading it,

~dave

[Episcopus]

Thanks for reading it? Thanks for writing it.

What about that supine in the ablative? "factu" I have heard for example.

Are there any other case forms for this evil creature supine?

[whiteoctave]

well, there are only two cases, accusative and (probably, though it could be dative) ablative (-um and -u respectively). The accusative, as I said, is used after verbs of motion (primarily ire and venire) for a final clause; it also has the use of appearing with iri as a periphrastic construction for the passive future infinitive. The ablative of the supin is used to qualify adjective denoting things like ease, difficulty, pleasure, belief (i.e. facilis, difficilis, iucundus, credibilis inter alia) and also the indeclinable nouns fas and nefas.
Only about 10 supines in -u were actually in common use, which tended to come from the human senses and verbs of saying (e.g. auditu, tactu, visu, dictu, memoratu). Such supines do not take direct objects (unlike the accusative supine can).
Examples you might often see are "mirabile dictu" as an aside "...., wonderful it is to relate,..." and "nefas est dictu..." - "It is sacrilege to say that...". It can, obviously, be used to introduce indirect statements or questions.
Hope that isn't too unclear,

~dave

[Moerus]

@ Episcopus

The Latin word for 'Supine' is 'supinum, i, n.'

Ans supines are really easy.
There are two supina: supinum I on -um and supinum II on -u.
Supinum I on um is the same form as the part. perf. nom. n. sing.
So I suppose you can form the supines.

When can we use a supinum?

1. Supinum I on -um is mainly used with verbs of motion like 'venire, ire, ...' to denote the goal or purpose. A supinum is a form of the verb and so it can have an object. But in classical Latin the are a few restrictions: supina on -um can only have an accusative for an object and not a prepositional thing. And even the accusative occures just a few times. So mostly you will find the supinum without an object of any kind.
It's mostly only used in a few expressions like 'cubitum ire' to go for a sleep' = 'to go to bed'. When there are many depending objects, Latin will choose an other construction like 'ut, qui + subj., gen. +causa / gratia, ...'
That's all there is to say about the thing we call supinum I on -um.

2. Supinum II on -u.

Supinum II on -um denotes a restriction ans is mostly used with adjectives like 'facilis, difficilis, ...'.
Facile dictu : easy to say. (the restriction is that it's only easy to say, but e. g. not easy to do.).
The supinum II on -u is even more rare than supinum I on -um. In classical Latin there are only a few words who can form this supinum II- u!

3. There is no 3!

That is realluy all there is to say about the supinum. We can also say something about the historical evolution. But these things are not sure, so that's for a next time. Will be continued, ...

Hope you know everything about supina now episcopus,

greetz,

Moerus

(Ipse dixit).

[Episcopus]

certiorem me fecistis, O whiteoctave ac Moere!