How does latin express the English “to keep + noun + adj” as in:
He keeps his beard short
She keeps her garden tidy, etc.
?
the best way, i suspect, is to use habeo with pred. adj., which is often used of something being, and persisting, in a given state. word order can aid the demonstration of the adjective’s being predicative.
~D
Thanks ,W, for the reply. I’m not sure I get it though. So how would you translate the examples? And what’s all this about word order?
well the thing to remember about word order, and it is something that I tend to think teachers do not impress well enough upon their pupils, notwithstanding Latin being an SOV language, they spoke their words in an order that made sense to their listener. Accordingly it is no fallacy to begin a sentence with a grammatical accusative if it is the focus of that sentence. For instance, should a Roman say “I like Augustan poets”, the response from an interlocutor “Yes, you are always praising Virgil” would be said in a perfectly sensible manner as “Vergilium uero [tu] sine fine laudas”. when translating Latin or Greek it should always be read in the order it is written, with the brain taking everything on in Latin or Greek, and only construing matters having reached the end of the sentence or, perhaps, clause. do not “look for the verb”!
perhaps that was a slightly tangential point. nonetheless, with regard to predicative and proleptic adjectives (and copulative verbs often) it is likely in one’s train of thought, even in an SOV language, that they follow the verb. so translating your sentences in order to make a distinction between “he has a short beard” and “he keeps his beard short” one would write “[ille] barbam [eius] habet (or here gerit) breuem”, and for the latter sentence, “[illa] hort[ul]um [eius] habet concinnum”.
~D
whiteoctave makes a good point, but of barbam brevem habet / ille barbam eius habet brevem, the latter would mean he keeps some other guy’s beard short, which might be considered somewhat fructual 
indeed! but i thought ambiguities of English at least deserve a square-bracketed mention. in élite Rome I don’t think there would have been to many reflexive barbers or gardeners.
~D
Look whiteoctave, I am sitting in St John’s student union Oxon., every one is laughing at you, occasional Budé in hand, for we all know that you did not realise the difference between the genitive of demonstrative is ea id and the reflexive possessive. I am incredulous as to how you manage to fill your room with classics books yet you are incapable of not errrrrrrring so shamefully. thanks again you twat,
~e-
hah! i recognise the ‘occasional Budé’ and ‘thanks…twat’, and St. John’s Oxon. is far better than its Cam. namesake. if i didn’t know you so well, i’d bother repeating what i said below. (i think neither of us can read clearer point 318 in the little book i sent you).
more importantly, how’s the revision?
~D