BLD will cover all of that in time!
and thanks beniss! I feel more free knowing that I can put words wherever I feel!
So it’s a rather structured, yet slightly freeformed, language. It’s that freeformedness (is that a word?) which makes learning the language a challenge.
Remember how we studied the three main parts of a language, Morphology, Syntax, and Lexicon? A basic rule is that the more you put into one, the less you need of the others. Latin is heavy on morphology, so it does not depend as heavily on syntax as most of our modern languages (though it certainly does adhere strongly to syntax in certain constructions).
i was going to start a brand new thread for my two questions but going through all the forum i just got the answer for one of those 
my question is about exercise 3 :
quid ancilla equō lēgātī dat ?
shouldn’t it be equum instead ? can’t consider equus as a direct object in the phrase instead of dative case (to the horse) ? why ?
look at number 4 :
cuius equum ancilla cūrat ?
thanks in advance your opinions !
In this sentence, quid is the direct object of the verb ‘dat’. Usually, you can find the direct object by asking “what?” e.g. what does the maid servant give? Even though this is the translation of part of the sentence in this case, it it still valid: the direct object is ‘quid’.
Then, you can find the indirect object by asking: ‘to whom’. To whom does the maid servant give something? To the horse -ergo: the horse is in the dative case.
If you put the horse in the accusative, equum, the maid servant would be giving a horse (and you would have to leave the ‘quid’ out of the sentence)
look at number 4 :
cuius > equum > ancilla cūrat ?
cūrat takes an accusative, even though it is translated by care for. English uses a lot of phrasal verbs, where Latin would use a verb + direct object.
Hope this helps.
Ingrid
thanks for replying
to be honest, i don’t understand why “quid” is the direct object in the sentence… maybe it’s explained later in the book, but til now it does not say anything about it, except for nouns / adjectives in cases
i still see equō in dative case because of my rough translation into english : to the horse; so to is indeed influencing in the meaning of the sentence, then i can’t consider equus as in accusative case, but in dative case
am i sooooooooooo wrong ? please tell me i just don’t understand it 
Hi Meowth,
I gather your problem lies in the use of cases, if not, skip this mail .
The verb is the main part of the sentence, without verb no full sentence. It tells you what’s been done.
The subject (in Latin the nominative) is the ‘acting’ person or thing, who/what is doing what the verb says. For example:
The boy is standing: ‘the boy’ is subject, ‘is standing’ is the verb.
You can check which part of the sentence is the subject, by putting the verb in the plural when it is singular, or the other way around:
The boys are standing: the verb is now plural, and so is the subject.
You can also ask the question: who is doing the verb?: in this case: who is standing? The boy.
The direct object (in Latin the accusative) is the person or thing acted upon. For example:
The boy reads a book : ‘the boy’ is still the subject, ‘reads’ the verb, and ‘a book’ is the direct object.
You can ask the question: what is the subject doing?; in this case: what is the boy reading? A book.
A trick that is not fail safe in English: usually the direct object becomes the subject when you turn the sentence into the passive: the book is read by the boy. Now you can do the singular/plural trick again: the books are read by the boy
(NB: in English, the indirect object can become the subject of the sentence too, in Latin, it can’t)
Not every verb can take a direct object. In my earlier example, you cannot be standing something (OK, with a different meaning, there may be quite a lot what you can’t stand ). Verbs that can take a direct object are called transitive verbs, verbs that cannot take a direct object are called intransitive.
The indirect object (in Latin the dative) is the thing or person affected by the verb, but not the direct object of it. In English, it is usually preceded by ‘to’ or ‘for’, but changing the word order will enable you to skip the preposition. Indirect objects are most often found with verbs meaning ‘give’.
The boy gives a book to his friend . ‘the boy’ is subject, ‘gives’ is the verb, ’ a book’ is the direct object, and ‘to his friend’ is the indirect object.
The boy gives his friend a book . Same as above, but as you can see, the ‘to’ has gone.
In it’s simple form, the indirect object is the person or thing who benefits (or suffers) from the thing that is done to the direct object.
I’m sure there are people who can explain all this a lot better than I can. Google on ‘indirect direct object’, and browse through the results.
Ingrid
oh i’m feeling so dumb 
i have been studying everyday latin but i forgot about transitive verbs… yeah, it explains it all !!!
you made it clear for me, so i just can say THANK YOU
to be honest, i don’t understand why “quid” is the direct object in the sentence…maybe it’s explained later in the book, but til now it does not say anything about it, except for nouns / adjectives in cases
The book does cover this in enough detail for this point in the language.
First, look at the section on the Dative Relation, § 43.
Here you are told that the relation is expressed by the preposition “to/towards/for”. However…you are immediately told that it does not cover motion towards. You are given examples of such motion: “She went to town; he ran towards town; Columbus sailed for America.” So keep in mind the idea that motion is not the dative case.
Now he describes the Indirect Object in § 44. The two examples given are:
- The sailor announces the flight.
- The sailor announces the flight to the farmers.
In the first sentence you can identify the subject object and verb. In the second sentence, they haven’t changed but we’ve added an indirect object, “to the farmers”.
Let’s play a little substitution game here. The accusative case is in § 37 and tells us that it answers the question “What?” so everyplace we ws have the accusative case, we’ll substitute the word WHAT.
- The sailor announces WHAT.
- The sailor announces WHAT to the farmers.
You can see how to turn the first sentence into a question:
1a. WHAT does the sailor announce?
If you use the table from § 33 you might think that the farmers answers the question WHOM…except for that preposition to. TO WHOM is what § 44 tells you the dative case covers.
2a. The sailor announces WHAT TO WHOM.
Now let’s take the current sentence: quid ancilla equo legati dat?
First let’s use our substitution, which in this case is really easy because we are given the WHAT.
WHAT does the maid give?
From our example above, we can turn this question back into a statement:
The maid gives WHAT.
So quid is the direct object.
Now the rest…
The maid gives WHAT TO WHOM.
TO WHOM does the maid give the WHAT? equo legati. indirect object, dative case.
OK, now the real problem sentence: cuius equum ancilla curat ?
Ingrid has mentioned to you that curat takes the accusative. This is mentioned in the text as well but you may have missed it. At the beginning of § 77 you are told to learn the special vocabulary. In that vocabulary you are given the verb curat and told its meaning is to care for and you are told that it takes the accusative case. That last part is the important part.
When you are given a word definition and told that it takes a particular case you are being directed to use that case over another according to the rules of the language. In this case, the verb carat, to care for, has a preposition built into it. so there is no preposition “for” to add when it is used in a sentence, like the one we have.
The made cares for WHOM?
Back to § 37 and we find the accusative case answers the question WHOM. So the definition of the verb and the sentence match up.
This leaves us with cuius, which you were given in the first special vocabulary as whose. So you end up with:
WHOSE WHAT does the maid care for?
I hope this helps.
- Tim
thanks
i see the point but sometimes there’s a lot of information to learn
i’m trying my best to learn every vocabulary, personal ending and such; i just need to review more frequently, maybe a few things i’ve learned before, two or three days later i just forgot 'em, and that’s such a shame !