Gerundive or Gerund II: this time it's personal

Latin Learning Latin
1

I’m seeing what I think are two completely contradictory accounts of the use of the gerund / gerundive in Latin.

The question was inspired by this question I asked earlier about ‘Dido puero tuendo’. The consensus appears to be that this is a gerundive.

Now I then went to find out more about the gerund and gerundive and their use in the ablative case.

Here’s what I found:

First see this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZsI3EC8AxQE from Dr. Keith Massey where he says:

  1. When a gerund has an object, that object can be put in the accusative. He then provides this example:

Discimus docendo Latinam.

We learn by teaching Latin.

but then he immediately says

  1. Most of the time 1. above doesn’t happen. Instead:

Gerunds don’t take direct objects (but he says a gerundive can) but when a gerund has an (I assume he means indirect) object then that object is usually in the same case as the gerund. In fact the gerund takes on the same case as the object rather than the other way around. I don’t understand this latter point so much but I will let it pass for now.

So we get Discimus docenda Latina. We learn by teaching Latin.

or even

Discimus docendis Linguis.

We learn by teaching languages.

OK but then I saw this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IiXK9eKwfvYvideo:

by Shanon Aquirre who says that the phrase:

Marcus learns by means of reading books.

  • a pretty identical construction - CANNOT be rendered by a gerund because a gerund ‘cannot take an object’ - this directly contradicts Massey who seems to say it can (though indirectly). In fact she says the phrase ‘Marcus learns by means of reading books’ has a ‘direct object within it’. Really? I don’t think it does. Surely the main verb is ‘learns’ and that doesn’t have any direct object…?

She offers: Marcus libris legendis discit

as the gerundive solution to Marcus learns by reading books - producing pretty much the identical construction which Massey says is gerund and which she says is gerundive.

It seems to me that Phoenissa puero tuendo incenditur could, if I believe Massey, be an active gerund:

Dido by looking at the boy was inflamed.

Or (If I’m to believe Shanon Aquirre and others) a (passive of course) gerundive:

Dido, the boy having been gazed upon, was inflamed.

2

Massey is right, surely. Rarely the gerund has an object when the gerund is not genitive or ablative .
Nonnè rectus Massey. Rarè objectum habet gerundum ubi non genetivo non ablativo casu gerundum.

On “puero tuendo”, a gerund with object would be “puerum tuendo” (“by/from looking at the boy”,—tueor = “I look at”). It isn’t. So it’s a gerundive.
De collocatione “puero tuendo” enim, gerundum cum objecto sic scribitur, ut opinor: “puerum tuendo”. Non scribitur. Ergo gerundivum.

Post Scriptum

I’ve just read the other thread and the same thing is written there.
Aliud filum modo legi. Eadem res ibi dicitur.

3

Yes but Massey gives us:

Discimus docendis Linguis.

Which he says is gerund and ablative - how does that work?

Paul

4

In your last case, I can’t see any way for it not being a gerundive, since gerunds - as we all well know - decline in the neuter singular.

I’m not sure I understand your initial question, though. I’m no scholar of Latin linguistics, but I’m quite confident that when a gerund does (rarely) take a direct object, it does so as any verb would take an object - i.e. in your case, as has been pointed out, puerum and not puero. Since puero agrees with tuendo, tuendo is a gerundive, unless puero somehow slotted it somewhere else as forming a different ablative/not agreeing with tuendo (but that obviously doesn’t seem the case).

If you translate it literally: Dido was inflamed by looking at the boy. In this case the gerundive simply works the way a gerund does, in my view (although I certainly will be corrected if I am mistaken); its function as a gerundive and not a gerund is merely an idiomatic change (of which there are a few theories, but that’s another matter). The same could be said, for instance, with the ad + acc. ambiguities:
ad librum legendum veni (ambiguity, although technically it is a gerund; see 343(i))
On the other hand:
ad pugnam spectandam veni
is much more natural to Latin ears (for whatever reason/s) than
ad pugnam spectandum veni
even if one would grammatically expect the latter. It doesn’t change the meaning, but here - as with puero tuendo - a gerundive is being used.

That said, I actually distinctly remember reading this at the end of Book 1 - one of the few times I’ve read Virgil in the Latin. The original, with different syntax and - it appears - rather a subtly different meaning to your version, has the gerund tuendo, with puero part of a different phrase. The text is “… ardescitque tuendo Phoenissa, et pariter puero donisque movetur”, and we can see that, while the overall meaning is retained (… Dido became inflamed by gazing [at him], and was equally moved by the boy and his gifts), the syntax is all different. Since everything is reduced down to that phrase you posted in the other thread, it makes sense to convert it to a more conventional gerundive than use an accusative object of the gerund tuendo.

That’s at least how I’d see it.

5

I looked again at the video. I see what you mean. I believe he is not expressing himself properly there. I believe he should explain that, in becoming adjectival, the gerund is now called the gerundive. (The title of the video mentions gerund and gerundive but he doesn’t actually explain the gerundive otherwise.)
Iterùm pelliculam inspici. Quod vis dicere nunc video. Malè is id gerundum esse dixit, credo. Meliùs gerundivum dixisse in gerundo spectando quod in adjectivum transmutatur. Gerundi gerundivique vocabula continet titulum. Gerundivum aliter non tractatur.

Etiam - Roma Aeterna XLII Line 34
6

Caecili / Adriane

Gratias vobis ago.

Caecilius I’m not sure if I followed everything you said. I will take time to read it carefully again.

paul

7

This may interest you, pmda/Paul. The vocative ending for names ending “-ius” is “-i” usually, so Caecili and not Caecilie.
Forsit hoc tibi curae sit, Paule. Nomina propria per “-ius” terminata per “-i” casu vocativo terminari solent; proinde Caecili non Caecilie.

8

Gratias tibi ago. Id correxi.