I would appreciate it if someone could tell me if I have translated this sentence correctly. It’s from A First Latin Reader by Nutting, chapter 31: ‘quare, cum ad bellum profectus esset, quamquam multa milia passuum per vias periculosas silvasque maximas iter legionibus erat faciendum, exploratores praemittere noluit’.
I have: 'therefore, although he (Braddock) had set out for war, although the journey to be made by the troops was many miles on dangerous routes and through great forests, he did not want to send scouts ahead.
I seem to have trouble especially when a form of ‘sum’ precedes the gerund/gerundive.
I would take erat faciendum as a passive periphrastic, which uses the dative of agent, “although a march…had to be made by the troops.” Nearly always better in English to make the dative the subject, “although the troops had to march through…”
The word order for the passive periphrastic is flexible. It can either precede the gerundive or follow it, or it may even have intervening words, depending on euphony or emphasis.
Palinurus, your translation looks about right, but I expect cum would be better translated “when” than “although.”
As for iter legionibus erat faciendum, it’s just “a journey had to be made by the troops” or better “the troops had to make a journey” (legionibus dative, faciendum gerundive). The construction is perfectly regular. Compare Iter est faciendum “a journey has to be made,” and Iter mihi est faciendum “I have to make a journey.” (You can call it “a passive periphrastic” if it pleases you).
The preceding “multa milia passuum” is accusative (acc. of extent or whatever you care to call it), they had to make a journey “for many miles.” Your translation is fine but it looks as if you may not have quite understood the grammar.
In this case, I think “iter legionibus erat faciendum” is an impersonal use of the neuter gerundive. The expression “iter facere” means “to march”, or literally “to make a journey”. Since the gerundive implies necessity, we would translate it literally as "it was necessary that the journey be made ". Legionibus is a dative of agent associated with the impersonal construction, so we have “it was necessary that the journey be made by the troops”. Again, this is a literal translation. In English, we would make its meaning active, so it would read “the troops had to march”. As far as the position of esse (erat in this case) is concerned, to be honest I’m not sure it really makes a difference in gerund/gerundive constructions, aside from its usual appearance as the last word or last but one, of a clause or sentence. When esse is used as a connecting word (as it is in this case), its position can be anywhere it sounds well. In the case of an impersonal construction, the implied subject is “id” joined by “erat” (serving as a copula)to the predicate adjective or noun (here faciendum)
EDIT: I see mwh has already answered your question and given you a much better answer than I can; I’ll post this anyway, in hopes that mwh can confirm the copulative use of erat.
EDIT: I see Barry also answered and addressed the position of esse. So between mwh and Barry’s posts, there’s really nothing new or different in my answer, except for the reference to A&G.
With all respect to Aetos, whose explanations are nearly always very full and helpful, I’m none too happy about saying that this is an impersonal use of the gerundive.. Isn’t iter nominative, and couldn’t it just as well be a person?
an corrigendus sum ego?
Edit. Now I look at the A&G entry, it’s the first part of the entry that’s relevant: “the gerundive is … in simple agreement with a noun.” As in “gravis iniūria facta est et nōn ferenda" and “non agitanda res erit.” I’m afraid Aetos’ post is misguided.
Perhaps I’ve been led astray by the third section:“the neuter gerundive …may be used impersonally in the second periphrastic conjugation.” Until I read that, I was perfectly happy with 500.1. You know me, Michael. No Occam’s razor for me! I’ll go for the complex explanation every time and that’s when this little voice started whispering: “Yes, but don’t we say “iter facimus”?”, so I started thinking since iter is the object of facio in that expression, why couldn’t it be the object of a neuter gerundive, with legionibus as the agent? But either way, the sense is still the same-they were marching to their doom, thanks to the bad judgement of their commander.
Yes we say iter facimus. So we can say iter (a nobis) fact’est and iter (nobis) faciendumst—in both cases iter is nominative, the subject.
But as to neuter gerundives used impersonally, the next section in A&G, well, just look at the verbs in the examples—serviendum est, parendum est, utendum (est). The verbs have no passive forms. (Never mind the last two exx., one archaic and the other eccentric—more on that if you want.) Yes we say Iter facimus, but we don’t say tempus servimus or leges paremus.
You wanted me to “confirm the copulative use of erat” in "iter legionibus erat faciendum.” Sorry, no dice. How could erat ever be a connective? It’s the main verb. I’m frankly baffled by your analysis, according to which erat is a copula and “the implied subject is ‘id’.” There’s no implied subject. There’s a stated subject (iter) and a verb (erat), with a gerundive in agreement (faciendum). There’s nothing complex about it.
I proffered “an corrigendus sum ego?” merely as a syntactic parallel. (But the answer would be Persaepe.)
EDIT. With apologies I withdraw my objection to calling erat a copula. As foolish as Braddock, I mistook your meaning. (So “persaepe” is right!) You’re free to call it a copula if you wish. But the idea that the construction is impersonal and that an implied id is the subject is wrong. The subject is iter, as I trust you will now accept.
Michael, thank you for correcting me on this. I think what I was missing and what was so painfully obvious to you was that the gerundive when used as a participle or adjective is always passive. Because in the expression “iter facimus”, iter is the accusative object of facimus, I tried to apply this to an impersonal construction, forgetting that even in the impersonal construction, faciendum is still going to be passive. That being the case, there is no way “iter” is ever going to be anything but the nominative subject.
As for “the copulative use of erat”, that’s a fundamental perceptual problem on my part. It comes from the idea that a participle is a verbal adjective, so rather simplistically, I saw “iter erat faciendum” and thought subject - connecting verb - predicate adjective. So far so good. Again, forgetting that “erat faciendum” is a passive form and thinking of iter as being the object of faciendum, I conceived of an impersonal construction that would mean “it was necessary to make the journey”. The problem is that requires an active form (such as “necesse est iter facere” where “necesse est” is the apparent subject) and I was trying to use a passive periphrastic form. As far as sum being used copulatively, I’ve always thought of sum as a connective (unless it’s being used as a substantive verb). On that point, I remain confused.
Michael, thank you for your patience and I’m glad you addressed this. When I first saw that you and Barry had already answered Palinurus’ question, I tried to delete my post, but the option was no longer available. Now I’m glad it stayed up. Your answer forced me to figure out what I was missing and it turned out to be something rather obvious.
Amice, te numquam dubito, sed aliquando aegre edisco.
EDIT: I just saw your edit! I am no longer confused!
Aetos, you’re very gracious. My “You’re free to call it a copula if you wish” was much too grudging. Of course it is a copula, no two ways about it. It’s just that I tend to think of faciendumst, the predicate, as indivisible (with the est optional), but if we break it down word by individual word of course you’re perfectly right. That’s basic grammar.
To compound my sins, in my simple-minded way I’ve always thought of “et” meaning “and” as copulative, since it couples A and B. But of course there’s more to it than that, and I suppose the approved term would be conjunctive (though that covers a multitude). Just as well I don’t teach elementary school!
PS I’ve just looked up “and” (something I never in my life imagined myself doing) and find it classified as a copulative conjunction. I’m happy to settle for that!
