Demonstrative Adjectives/Pronouns

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jaihare
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Demonstrative Adjectives/Pronouns

Post by jaihare »

I chapter 9, Wheelock gives the breakdown of ille/illa/illud and hic/haec/hoc.

I'm finding it extremely difficult to master these forms.

Do you have any advice for a novice?

Thanks!
Last edited by jaihare on Tue Dec 06, 2011 1:31 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Demonstrative Adjectives/Pronouns

Post by jaihare »

I noticed in the book that he actually said that we should memorize them "by repeating the forms aloud, from left to right," that is, from masculine to neuter and then moving down to the next case.

Do you agree with this?

ille... illa... illud
illīus... illīus... illīus
illī... illī... illī
illum... illam... illud
illō... illā... illō

etc.
Last edited by jaihare on Tue Dec 06, 2011 1:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Demonstrative Adjectives/Pronouns

Post by jaihare »

Actually, just repeating them this way is starting to work. :-D

But I'm still open to more suggestions on how to get this to settle into the ol' noggin.

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Re: Demonstrative Adjectives/Pronouns

Post by jaihare »

Knock knock knock.... Where is everyone?

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Re: Demonstrative Adjectives/Pronouns

Post by Craig_Thomas »

Knic, knaec, knoc --- it's me!

Ille illa illud basically follows the 1st declension for the feminine and the 2nd declension for the masculine and neuter, so if you can decline an adjective like magn-us -a -um (or nouns like anima, animus, and templum) most of its forms should already be familiar to you.

The genitive and dative singular, in -īus and , may seem odd, but they are in fact regular endings for pronouns: quī, is, iste, and ipse all decline similarly, as indeed does hic, and as do certain adjectives like ūnus and tōtus.

The nominatives ille and illud are the only other apparent oddities, but again these seem less odd once you've seen other pronouns. Ipse and iste have the same masculine nominative ending, and quī (quod), is (id), and iste (istud) all have neuters ending in -d.

Hic haec hoc roughly follows this same pronominal declension on the stem h-. The starkest complication in its declension is the addition of the ending -c to many of its forms (apparently the vestige of an old suffix, -ce, which gave extra demonstrative force to a word). The expected forms hum, ham, hui, hō, and are still easily visible behind the actual forms hunc, hanc, huic, hōc, and hāc.

The appearance of a -u- in the genitive and dative singular forms huius and huic wants some explanation, though you won't get it from me. Some solace can be found in the fact that they look like the queer forms of cuius and cui in quī's declension.

The nominative forms hic, haec, and hoc are properly strange, but will be remembered easily enough as being the "name" of the pronoun.

This leaves the neuter plural haec as the only remaining departure from regularity, but this is another one that is resolved upon meeting the other pronouns. It seems to be a feature of the pronominal declension that any pronoun with a feminine singular ending in -ae has a neuter plural ending in the same.

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Re: Demonstrative Adjectives/Pronouns

Post by jaihare »

Thanks for the general notes. Now that I look at it, yes, ille is regular except in the first three cases. I don't think this is going to be as hard as it originally seemed. I just need to get exposed to examples within sentences, to run those sentences through my head over and over, to practice it myself. It's not going to be too hard.

Thanks!

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