I have decided to try to work through N&H and stumbled at my first attempt. In exercise 2 the 5th sentence to translate is:
Do not send me to ask for peace.
The answer key has:
Ne me miseris ut pacem rogem
I had
Noli me mittere ut pacem rogem
The answer key, to me, sounds more like you should not have sent me to ask for peace, or you will not have sent me to ask for peace.
What am I missing?
Thanks,
Ed
edonnelly,
Both are acceptable. You did it by stating a negative command in the imperative; they did it with a subjunctive prohibitive (in that case, it’s gotta be in the perfect tense). You haven’t stumbled at all.
That’s what I was looking for. I assumed there was something like that I was missing. Now I have something to go look up.
Thanks!
Salvete edonnelly et nostos
Nostos is correct that either translation is acceptable but incorrect, I believe, when he states that the perfect subjunctive must be used in such a construction.
Ne me miseris ut pacem rogem
This is an example of an “independent use of the the subjunctive”; I don’t have anything before me but if I am right it is example of “hortatory subjunctive in an independent clause”, which, I believe can be rendered either the perfect or presente subjunctive. Thus,
Ne me mittas ut pacem rogem.
Correct me Nostos if I’m wrong.
Curate ut valeatis quam latinissime.
By the way what is N&H ?
This is along the lines of my initial thought, which is why the perfect tense confused me.
It’s a latin composition book available here on textkit:
Latin Prose Composition by North and Hillard
It’s appealing to self-learners because the answer key is here, too.
I went to Bennet’s New Latin Grammar and found the following:
PROHIBITIVE SUBJUNCTIVE.
- The Subjunctive is used in the second and third persons singular and plural, with nē, to express a prohibition. Both Present and Perfect occur, and without appreciable difference of meaning; as, -
nē repugnētis, do not resist!
tū vērō istam nē relīquerīs, don’t leave her!
impiī nē plācāre audeant deōs, let not the impious dare to appease the gods!a. Neither of these constructions is frequent in classical prose.
b. A commoner method of expressing a prohibition in the second person is by the use of nōlī (nōlīte) with a following infinitive, or by cavē or cavē nē with the Subjunctive; as, -nōlī hōc facere, don’t do this (lit. be unwilling to do)!
nōlīte mentīrī, do not lie!
cavē ignōscās, cavē tē misereat, do not forgive, do not pity!
cavē nē haec faciās, do not do this (lit. take care lest you do)!HORTATORY SUBJUNCTIVE.
- The Hortatory Subjunctive expresses an exhortation. This use is confined to the first person plural of the Present. The negative is nē. Thus: -
eāmus, let us go;
amēmus patriam, let us love our country;
nē dēspērēmus, let us not despair.
So, to me, it looks like it is a prohibitive subjunctive, and I suspect that N&H used the perfect tense (as opposed to the present which would have have had the same meaning and matched the English) for the exact purpose that it had on me, which was to reinforce the different possible ways to say the same thing. Later, in Exercise 8, they use ‘noli’ for a similar sentence. Thanks to you both for your help.
It’s the North and Hillard “Latin Prose Composition for Schools” in the Ebooks section on this site. There is also a Greek one (I think?).
It is a great textbook - we were using it for our Uni course back in 2nd year. I am going to do some serious revision with this book (the Latin)when my semester exams are finished and then start on the Greek.
Kynete, yer right, again my grasp of & hold on the subjunctive proves very slight 
But it’s getting more substantial, slowly.
Thank you edonnelly for clearing that up for me 
A&G say pretty much the same thing, they just say it very differently and separate the present subj from the perfect subj in their rendering of how you say ‘Don’t!!!’
Yes, nostos, I was right! But only partially. Because I got one part wrong. I was right in thinking that that type independent clause in the subjunctive, which is substitute for a direct command or the “noli” construction, could take either present or perfect subjunctive. I was wrong however in calling that construction a “horatory subjunctive”. So my labelling of the construction was incorrect.