I have been working on some model sentences that I can use daily, and can change verbs and nouns in.
My wife wants me to wear leather shoes to church (when I go to church)
This is my guess how to say it in Latin.
Uxor/conjuge vult mē calceōs scorteōs/ ē coriō gerens cum in templum eam.
I’m interested in both the correct forms and word order. And alternative ways of expressing the thought are good too. So I want to move into subjunctives and gerundives etc. Any suggestions would be appreciated.
So I go through putting my right shoe on, and tying the laces etc.
Thank you
Jim
coniuge is ablative. You need nominative coniunx.
gerens is nominative. You would need accusative gerentem in agreement with me, but vult requires accusative + infinitive, not a participle: vult me gerere..
Instead of e corio you could use a genitive “of material”, cori.. If you use e corio, I think adding factos is a little clearer, though not strictly necessary.
cum = whenever, in a “general” relative/conditional clause, generally takes indicative, eo (except when second person singular is used as an indefinite pronoun).
See Allen & Greenough 548:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=AG+548&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0001
However, while me uult gerere is not strictly speaking indirect discourse, I think eam would be correct, since “when I go to church” is implicitly part of indirect discourse – part of the wife’s expression of her wish. I’m not completely sure about this and couldn’t find a clear answer in the grammars.
Word order is not fixed, but I might put it this way: Vxor me uult calceos e corio factos gerere cum in templum eam. Or maybe Vxor me uult calceos e corio factos in templum euntem gerere.
Of course, ancient Romans, at least in pre-Christian times, didn’t “go to church” on a weekly basis as a regular religious rite. Sacrifices were special occasions, and the altar was typically outdoors. And there were multiple temples to different divinities. in templum in your sentence would mean “into a temple”. I’m not sure that Christians would refer to their houses of worship as templa..
Because the words Temple and church seem so different in English, it is surprising that Christians call a church Building a temple but Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin “témplum -i: n.; temple, church, shrine” and Orbis Pictis by Comenius, and George Adler (both Catholic and protestant writers). Perhaps it’s because the Greek word ecclesia technically refers to the gathered people, not the building.