I want to start a new topic around Hans H. Orberg’s “Lingua Latina” series. Since the series of readers, pamplets on grammar, exercises, etc. are all in Latin, I found some difficulties with the “implied/contexual” explainations.
I enjoy the methodology Orberg applies greatly. However, I find myself scratching my head and re-reading passages after long breaks before some of the meaning is clear to me.
My questions will follow shortly…
Thanks to all who contribute! 
Mark
I’m having trouble with the last part of the following passage on page 42:
“Iulius ab oppido ad villam suam it.”
Understanding that Julius is traveling from the city to his home, I can’t find any reference to the word “it” and it’s (no pun intended) driving me crazy… what does “it” mean? At first, I thought the word was a pronoun meaning “his” but after looking in dictionaries and grammars, no luck… “Suam” is the possessive pronoun…
I’m at a loss, please help me…
it is the third person singular present indicative active of ire “to go”
It comes from eo, I walk. eo, is, it, imus, itis, eunt. So it means: he walks
Oh, didn’t see you there, benissime. Well, there we are. Anyhow, the main parts of the verb are: eo, ivi, itus, ire 
So then the passage translates to:
Julius is going from the city to his home. Correct?
Wow, you people are fast! Thank you so much!
One of the frustrations is that there are no comprehensive dictionaries/tools that you can look up a word form if you don’t know the stem. This is a problem mostly with irregular verbs.
However, now that I’ve found this forum, I can get a number of my questions answered and not “stew” in frustration for a few days. This has been bugging me for three days now.
Thanks again!
You might find [u]this website[/u] useful. You can also download the program from [u]here[/u]. It parses words for you and gives their definitions, principal parts, etc. Parsing is good practice for learning, so don’t let it do all your parsing 
Thanks. The link to the Latin parser works great.
If you go to the publisher’s website, they have vocabulary lists for each book that you can download and print. Since the list itself is relatively short and the verbs are easy to see, you can usually find most of the irregulars pretty quickly (unless the first letter changes, like “ferre, tuli, latum” but I’m pretty sure there’s a list of these kind of changes at the end of Part I).
BUT –
One of the nice things about LL is that everything is in Latin, so I wouldn’t necessarily suggest that you actually use these vocab lists unless you’re really ready to pull your hair out. Trying to figure it out in context with Latin only is much more useful. I found that in Part II, though, the contextual clues were much less, the introduction rate of new words very high, and I had no choice but to resort to this list. Fortunately I didn’t know about it when I read the first book.
The construction of this sentance bothers me:
Dominus servos malos baculo verberat; itaque servi mali dominum et baculum eius timent.
My mind translates as follows (after a lot of shuffling):
Master’s bad servants are beaten with the staff/club; therefore, the master’s bad servants are afraid of him.
Now, not sure whether this is quite correct or not…
Am I correct in my thinking that baculo is ablative therefore I can tanslate as “with” the staff/club?
Why is the conjuction et used in this sentance? The placement of this conjunction throws me for a loop.
If I parse this and treat “itaque servi maili dominum” and “baculum eius timent” separately - the thought falls apart for me… if I conbine them and rearrage the words, I can make the translation fit for me… but I’m not sure this is correct translation.
I feel like I shuffle things around until they fit my english syntax to understand the latin… Is this a bad habit I should nip in the butt?
Any suggestions?
Thanks,
Mark
Mark,
Am I correct in my thinking that baculo is ablative therefore I can tanslate as “with” the staff/club?
Yes. Also, note that “dominus” is nominative and “verberat” is an active verb, so your translation of the first part isn’t completely accurate.
Why is the conjuction > et > used in this sentance? The placement of this conjunction throws me for a loop.
“dominum et baculum eius” together make up the direct object of “timent.”
I feel like I shuffle things around until they fit my english syntax to understand the latin… Is this a bad habit I should nip in the butt?
Any suggestions?
I’d say so, and the best thing, I think, is to try to “think in” Latin as you read it. I don’t know how Lingua Latina works exactly, but speaking from experience, I’d suggest making sure you know the various inflections pretty well, so you can recognize cases, etc. when you come across them.
Tim
You do need to shuffle words around to fit English syntax, but you have to do so with reason. For example, if you move a word to the beginning of the English sentence, you may have just changed its role to subject. This is obviously unacceptable if the given word was not nominative in the Latin sentence.
The construction of this sentance bothers me:
Dominus servos malos baculo verberat; itaque servi mali dominum et baculum eius timent.
My mind translates as follows (after a lot of shuffling):
Master’s bad servants are beaten with the staff/club; therefore, the master’s bad servants are afraid of him.
I am afraid you have read this sentence much too assumptively, without much regard to the case endings - a common mistake for beginners. First, keep these two things in mind:
nominative = subject
accusative = direct object (unless directly preceded by a preposition)
When translating a sentence into English, you generally must put the subject (= nom.) before the verb and the direct object (= acc.) after the verb, if the sentence has a direct object. This will give you the basic skeleton of a sentence, to which other things like adverbs, prepositonal phrases, conjunctions, etc. can be added.
So take your nominative subject, dominus; take your accusative direct object, servos malos; and take your verb verberat. Translate them in the order S (the lord) - V (beats) - DO (the bad servants), then add the other stuff (with a staff).
Now try that with the second clause, the part after the semicolon.
Am I correct in my thinking that baculo is ablative therefore I can tanslate as “with” the staff/club?
This is correct.
Why is the conjuction > et > used in this sentance? The placement of this conjunction throws me for a loop.
because it is “the lord AND (his) staff”
Dear all,
I can appreciate the difficulties that Mark is having having with the Orberg method. I’ll give my expereince with it. I bought both books in the very early summer and worked my way about half way through each. The titles are “Familia Romana” and “Roma Aeterna”. I had already had some training, more than some really, so my experience with Familia Romana was probably different than Mark’s has been. In other words, for me in was more of a review - especially with the first book. But he is approaching the book, I believe, as a first time learner. That’s completely different. I think the Orberg method (an an example of the “direct method”) is terrific but I would hesitate recommending it to someone who does not have an actual teacher to clarify difficulties. On the other hand, I wouldn’t give up now unless it became absolutely frustrating. In another section of this forum, I mentioned efforts to reform latin instruction. Orberg is one such effort. Correspondence with teachers who use Familia Romana, primarily European. As I recall those teachers try to bring latin into active classroom use. Working without a teacher, I think it would greatly help to try to read everything out loud after you’ve sure you are understanding what you are reading.
I liked Orberg but didn’t finish working through the two books. The reason, I switched to “Latin sans Peine”, another “direct method” that comes with tapes to support the readings.
Best of luck and stay with it. The rewards are great.
Kenneth Walsh
Kynetus Valesius
The CD ROM for Lingua Latina Pars I - Familia Romana has an audio recording for the first 30 chapters. I’ve been using it and like it quite a bit.
I do think the grammar explanations in Lingua Latina are brief to say the least. They do need to be supplemented with something else, but if you have some knowledge of Latin, I think Lingua Latina is a great way to review and progress in the language.
Salve Domne Boethi
Thanks for the info re the audio on the Familia Romana. I was aware of the existence of this item but took a pass on it, figuring I spend too much time in front of a computer as it is. However, I’m very big on the idea of learning via audio and so IF there a way to exatract the audio portions from the CD for eventual use on a .MP3 player, I would change my mind quickly about this and other computer CD programs with audio content. The problem is I’m an idiot when it comes to these things. Any ideas, Boethius or anyone else?
Salve Benissime: It was you, nisi fallor, who suggested Whittiker’s “Words” program to our student. I strongly concur. That program is invaluable for word lookup and parsing. It would seem particularly important in a case like this where there is no general glossary of previously introduced words.
Back to you, Boetius. One of the works that first drew me to these studies was “Consolatio Philosophiae”. I take it you are fan?
Now to Mark: Nobis perseverantia difficilia vincenda sunt; we must overcome difficulties by perseverance. I am not suggesting that you are not a hard worker or anything - I’m sure that you are are or you would not be taking latin. My only thought is this: latin can be darn tough and sometimes I myself have wanted to give up. No doubt you have other stuff going on your life - that’s good. But whatever you do, I urge you to stay with this project for the long haul - even if sometimes it seems as if we have to learn each rule and word sescenties (six hundred times). Once again, good luck.
Hi Ken,
I have the audio and find it invaluable for understanding the pronounciation and cadence of the language.
However, I’m very big on the idea of learning via audio and so IF there a way to exatract the audio portions from the CD for eventual use on a .MP3 player, I would change my mind quickly about this and other computer CD programs with audio content.
Actually, I just copied the files from the CD to my computer then transferred them to my memory card and listen to the audio files using my PocketPC Phone… I had to rename the files so they are arranged in the proper order:
Otherwise, the order would be:
So you just have to rename the first 9 files and you are good to go.
I purchased all the other companion items as well:
In my opinion, Orberg should have combined all of these into a single book and expanded the Grammatica, providing more explainations and examples.
Cheers,
Mark
Ken,
Regarding your following comments:
Nobis perseverantia difficilia vincenda sunt; we must overcome difficulties by perseverance. I am not suggesting that you are not a hard worker or anything - I’m sure that you are are or you would not be taking latin. My only thought is this: latin can be darn tough and sometimes I myself have wanted to give up. No doubt you have other stuff going on your life - that’s good. But whatever you do, I urge you to stay with this project for the long haul - even if sometimes it seems as if we have to learn each rule and word sescenties (six hundred times). Once again, good luck.
I won’t give up… I was only seeking some help from good people like yourself… It’s been awesome seeing all these responses and I appreciate all the commentary and advice - it’s been taken to heart and some of it applied already!
I like the fact that Latin is tough. Given this fact, makes Latin all the more appealing to me! Someone once said, “It wouldn’t be worth doing if it wasn’t difficult” or something like that…
When I was a young boy, long ago… I was told many times by many people that I was “dumb” and “stupid”… What I came to realize over time was that I wasn’t “dumb”, “stupid”, or incapable for that matter - it was that I was lazy and gave up too easily. “Why bother? I can’t understand this stuff, it’s too hard.” Once I realized that if I worked hard and sought help when necessary, I would eventially overcome the difficulties. I’ve been a hard worker (at things I care about) ever since and it has served me well!
Regards,
Mark
Marco Kynetus salutat
Kenneth salutes Mark
Magno gaudio epistiolas quas mihi misisti legi.
I read the letters you sent to me with joy.
Illud de plicas audibiles magno auxilio mihi erit.
That [part] concerning the audible files will be a great help to me.
Immo nunc rem ipse probare volo.
Indeed I want to try it myself now.
Sine ullo dubio bonam viam sequeris.
Without any doubt you are on the right path.
Nam methoda Orbergiano quo uteris optima est.
For the Orberg method you are using is terrific. (method I believe is feminine and in case you haven’t gotten that far the verb utor takes an ablative object).
Te magno ingenio studioque iuvenem es, ut puto.
As I see it, you are a youth of great character and energy (zeal).
Perge iter usque ad ad astra.
Continue your journey even unto the stars.
Volenti discipulo omnia possibilia sunt
To a willing student all things are possible.
Attamen, ut vera dicam, bonus homo omnino non sum.
However, to say the truth, I’m not a good person at all.
Una tantum virtus mihi est.
I have only one virtue.
Amore latinitatis vivae ardeo.
I am on fire with love for [of] living latin.
Vale Marce
Good-bye Mark.
Hi Ken,
I wanted to thank you for the nice reply in both Latin and English!
Te magno ingenio studioque iuvenem es, ut puto.
As I see it, you are a youth of great character and energy (zeal).
Actually, I’m hardly a youth… I’m rather middle-aged (44 in a week)!
Regards,
Mark
I made it through Capitulum VII with ease. I am trying really hard to think in Latin and not translate as much as possible and it seems to be helping.
However, in Capitulum VIII on Page 54-55, I was reading the following Passage:
“Qui magnum pecuniam habent ornamenta emunt et feminis dant; ceteri rursus abeunt.”
Here’s my translation of the sentence:
Those who have lots of money buy jewelry and give them to [thier]women; others [those without lots of money], on the contrary, go away."
Here’s where I have problems with the use of the word “abeunt”
ab-it “from - go” or “go away”
From Whitaker’s Words:
abi.t V 6 1 PRES ACTIVE IND 3 S
abeo, abire, abivi(ii), abitus V INTRANS [XXXAO]
depart, go away; go off, go forth; pass away, die, disappear; be changed;
Perhaps I need to refine the meaning to be “stay away” or “refrain”
If I expand the context further to the paragraph which is “supposed to be a complete thought” I can understand the use of abeunt as “Stay Away” or “Refrain from stopping”.
Here’s the entire Paragraph:
Multae feminae quae in hac via ambulant ante tabernam Albini consistunt, nam feminae ornamentis delectantur. Eae quae magnam pecuniam habent multa aornamenta emunt. Quae nullam aut parvam pecuniam habent ornamenta aspiciunt tantum, non emunt. Etiam viri multi ad hanc tabernam adeunt. Qui magnum pecuniam habent ornamenta emunt et feminis dant; ceteri rursus abeunt.
Here’s my translation of the entire paragraph:
Many women, who walk on the street stop in front of Albini’s [jewelry] store, for jewelry please women. Those [women] who have lots of money buy lots of jewelry. Those who don’t [have money] or little money stop and look [quite a bit] at the jewelry, [but] don’t buy. Also, lots of men, buy [jewelry] at this jewelry store. Those that have lots of money buy jewelry and give them to women; others, on the contrary stay away [or refrain altogether].
Any comments?
Thanks,
Mark