Unit 8 Exercise II. 1. Clarification needed please!

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tadams052012
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Unit 8 Exercise II. 1. Clarification needed please!

Post by tadams052012 »

Hello folks,

For this exercise I have been told to translate the following sentence into Latin -

He felt that the enemy was serving as the author of evil for that city which had been oppressed for many years by all sorts of destruction.

We are told to use a double dative construction (dative of purpose and reference).

I have the following: sensit hostem auctori mali esse illi urbi quae multos annos a ruina omnia generum oppressa esset.

My answer key gives: Sensit hostem esse auctori mali illi urbi quae multos annos oppressa erat omnibus generibus ruinae.

I have a few questions on this, if someone would be so kind as to aid me -

1. I have used the pluperfect subjunctive in the subordinate clause as it occurs within an indirect statement, was I correct to do so here? The compiler of my answer key has not done so...

2. I have used an ablative of personal agent here rather than an ablative of means, since it would appear to me that in this case ‘oppressed by all kinds of destruction’ would appear to be almost a personification of destruction, rather than referring to destruction as the means by which the oppression occurred. However clearly destruction is not a person carrying out an action so I’m not sure whether I am correct in doing this, should I have used the ablative of means here instead?

3. Omnibus generibus ruinae or ruina omnium generum, or is either OK?

Many thanks in advance!

Aetos
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Re: Unit 8 Exercise II. 1. Clarification needed please!

Post by Aetos »

tadams052012 wrote: Sat Oct 24, 2020 3:09 pm 1. I have used the pluperfect subjunctive in the subordinate clause as it occurs within an indirect statement, was I correct to do so here? The compiler of my answer key has not done so...
Here I think the relative clause (quae ...oppressa erat...ruinae) is simply a statement of fact, hence the indicative. If it were a relative clause of characteristic (thus requiring the subjunctive), the clause would have to mean that the city was of such a character that it was oppressed.
Check Allen&Greenough , para. 534.:
http://dcc.dickinson.edu/grammar/latin/ ... acteristic
tadams052012 wrote: Sat Oct 24, 2020 3:09 pm 2. I have used an ablative of personal agent here rather than an ablative of means, since it would appear to me that in this case ‘oppressed by all kinds of destruction’ would appear to be almost a personification of destruction, rather than referring to destruction as the means by which the oppression occurred. However clearly destruction is not a person carrying out an action so I’m not sure whether I am correct in doing this, should I have used the ablative of means here instead?
I'd go with ablative of means-there are many types of destruction that could plague a city, such as wars with direct engagement, siege warfare with consequent famine, disease, poor trade opportunities resulting in poverty. The idea of the sentence is that the city had been visited by all these calamities. The speaker simply thinks the enemy is to blame.
tadams052012 wrote: Sat Oct 24, 2020 3:09 pm 3. Omnibus generibus ruinae or ruina omnium generum, or is either OK?
I think it depends on what you want to emphasise-destruction in general (ruina omnium generum) or being oppressed by many different types of destruction (Omnibus generibus ruinae).

Those are my thoughts, anyway.

tadams052012
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Re: Unit 8 Exercise II. 1. Clarification needed please!

Post by tadams052012 »

Perfect, much appreciated, thank you!

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