Dido promisit 'se Troianos tutos dimissuram esse

Here you can discuss all things Latin. Use this board to ask questions about grammar, discuss learning strategies, get help with a difficult passage of Latin, and more.
Post Reply
pmda
Textkit Zealot
Posts: 1339
Joined: Tue Apr 27, 2010 5:15 am

Dido promisit 'se Troianos tutos dimissuram esse

Post by pmda »

I'm a mystified by part of this sentence - an answer to one of the questions - from Orberg's Exercitia Latina Cap XXXIX ...

Dido promisit 'se Troianos tutos dimissuram esse iisque auxilium laturam.'

She was about to send the Trojans safely on their way...

What does 'dimmissuram' agrees with (f. acc. sing.)? Are future participles in agreement with their subject... she is doing the sending and it's reported speech '... se...dimissuram...' ?

whsiv
Textkit Neophyte
Posts: 91
Joined: Fri Jan 04, 2013 11:33 pm

Re: Dido promisit 'se Troianos tutos dimissuram esse

Post by whsiv »

As you say, the future participles agree in gender, number, case with their subject. This explains laturam as well.

Qimmik
Textkit Zealot
Posts: 2090
Joined: Mon Mar 18, 2013 10:15 pm

Re: Dido promisit 'se Troianos tutos dimissuram esse

Post by Qimmik »

You've figured it out more or less correctly. dimissuram agrees with se, which is accusative (because it's the subject of the future infinitive dimissuram esse) and feminine (because the antecedent is Dido). It's reported speech after promisit.

But dimissuram esse doesn't necessarily mean "about to send the Trojans away". It's just a (periphrastic) future infinitive. "She promised that she would send the Trojans away safely." The future participle alone, when not part of an infinitive, can usually be translated "about to." (This is an instance where a Latin adjective tutos is best translated as an adverb "safely".)

laturam is also a future infinitive agreeing with se. esse does double duty for both dimissuram and laturam. (esse could be omitted and merely understood, and probably would be in "real" Latin.)

pmda
Textkit Zealot
Posts: 1339
Joined: Tue Apr 27, 2010 5:15 am

Re: Dido promisit 'se Troianos tutos dimissuram esse

Post by pmda »

Gratias vobis ago.

Post Reply