Salvete.
In the marginalia of LLPSI, in chapter 32 adjacent to line 108 we find ‘oblitus esse’. The meaning is clear but I’m unsure quite why it’s not ‘oblitum esse’?
My learning style is very much focussed on following any leads I can spot and this question has me foxed. Would anyone be so kind as to suggest quite what may be going on?
The difference doesn’t really matter as it’s mostly a question of convention. I’d see that as a small inconsistency more than anything else.
Thanks for such an interesting reply. Sometimes following small leads opens up whole vistas of further lines of enquiry (I hope my metaphor works for everyone) and with the above reply this appears to be just such an occasion. Great.
I’d be really grateful if anyone could expand further on what was said.
I’m no expert in the field, but here is how I feel it.
Verbs are usually presented in the “primitive tenses”, īnfectum, perfectum and supīnum, for example -āre -āvisse -ātum. Well, in fact, that’s in LLPSI. The convention has -ō -āre -āvī -ātum, or -o -are -avi -atum in what I’d call bad sources.
But for deponent verbs, it would be -ārī -ātus esse, or after the convention -or -ārī -ātus sum / -or -ari -atus sum. And the -ātus form isn’t the supine but the past participle.
The trick is that the supine is almost always if not always identical to the past participle.
The second point is that oblītus esse suggests that oblītus is applied to someone as a subject although esse isn’t conjugated, while oblītum suggests the verb may be used as a subject. In other words, “oblītus esse” is okay for definition, but can hardly be used in a sentence, while “oblītum esse” may be used in an infinitive proposition, or as a subject: “oblītum esse malum est” (in English, that would be “forgetting something is bad”). This problem seems to be specific to LLPSI, because “oblītus sum” is much more standard.
My only question is to what extent “oblītus esse” is correct Latin, and when can it be used?
I hope this doesn’t sound too confused.
Hi, very quick response (and so apologies for any typos etc.), but oblītus esse can occur in good Latin (and in fact a quick search shows that it does occur in Cicero; nothing unusual there).
This comes under the broad heading of nominative (not accusative, which is what I think you were expecting) with infinitives after certain passive verbs that take a personal construction. These are discussed in e.g. Woodcock sec. 33:
https://archive.org/details/woodcock-e.-a-new-latin-syntax-1959/page/22/mode/1up?view=theater
And so just as we have in Cicero (with an adjective) e.g. quī tibi inimīcissimus esse vidēbitur (Verr. 2.2.152), rather than the arguments being in the accusative, he also writes in his letters, Fam. 15.13.1, with videar taking a personal construction (notice how it differs from the construction after putem with the accusatives):
nē aut ipse tuae perpetuae cōnsuētūdinis ergā mē oblītus esse videar aut tē oblītum putem.
(PS I can’t talk to the marginalia conventions used in LLPSI, I’m just commenting on oblītus esse from the original post.)
I hope that helps! Cheers, Chad
Excellent food for thought. Some really useful leads and references. Thanks for helping.
No probs! Cheers, Chad
Additionally, this discussion nine years ago might be of interest:
Just to add, also addressed in Gildersleeve 528; Reginald Foster, Ossa, 473-74. I remember being stumped on this construction when I came across it in Ovid. I don’t recall seeing it addressed elsewhere (but maybe that’s me).