1. Inter may appear after its corresponding object.
2. Except (perhaps?) for metrical purposes, intra will always proceed it’s corresponding object.
The Essential AG: 435
In my last post, I introduced intra, to which I will now compare and contrast intra, a considerably more common and complex preposition, individuated from intra through the following uses.
1. The et double-accusative.
2. The inter sē construction.
3. The ‘amid’ construction.
4. The temporal ‘while’ construction (with a gerund)
The Essential AG: 221.15
I trust that if you’re reading this, you understand that many English words ‘are derived from’ Latin counterparts, though we can further distinguish this by stating that there are two varieties of derivation: direct and indirect.
Direct Latin derivatives (for instance ‘fact’ from the Latin factum) are more or less coequal adoptions, whereas indirect Latin derivatives (such as ‘feat’ from the French ‘fait’ from the Latin factum) feature a few sound shifts which echo the modifications of the mediating language. Another example: from dāta we have both ‘data’ (direct) and ‘date’ (indirect, through Old French ‘date’).
[A more interesting etymology, while we’re at at it: the English homograph ‘date’ (the fruit) is from the Old French ‘datte’ from the Old Provençal ‘datil’ from the Latin dactylus (the same fruit), so named because it resembled the human finger and/or because this word resembled the Semitic names for date palm: deqel/daqal, etc, which have nothing to do with fingers.]
If you’d like to rabbit-trail even further, here’s a post offering the Latin names of the five fingers, including the pinky finger, whose name made my day: (http://www.omniglot.com/blog/?p=442)
If anyone knows of a Latin derivative which is indirect but not mediated by French or Old French, I would love to see it in the comments below.
The Essential AG: 19n2
In this post, I’d like to differentiate between the three ways that habeō takes a direct object: (a) an accusative, (b) an accusative perfect participle, and (c) an infinitive.
Habeō takes an accusative direct object in the sense of ‘possessing’ that object.
Habeō with the perfect participle bears the same sense as ‘habēbat‘ above: possession extended over a period of time.
Habeō with an infinitive completes a construction of purpose.
The Essential AG: 460a, 497b
Pardon the vacation, everyone. I’ve spent the last week cramming for and completing the GRE.
Direct Objects are “immediately affected by the action of a verb” within a standard sentence.
Indirect Objects are less than immediately affected by the action of the verb
The accusative is the case proper to direct objects, yet an English sentence containing a direct object, where translated to Latin, may feature the other cases as well.
Direct and Indirect in Latin
The following sentences, in English, all feature ‘girl’ as direct object, yet in Latin receive either direct or indirect variations, dependent on the particular syntax of the Latin verb:
Note that the dative usage holds the regular ‘recipient of gift’ formula that we’d imagine in English, yet the genitive and ablative examples feature non-active verbs, which couldn’t take any object in English without a preposition.
Indeed, the conservative structure of Latin syntax allows Latin to omit many English prepositions when constructing subject-verb-direct object units:
Where the direct object/subject transition, in English, requires a preposition, Latin merely requires a shift in case:
The Essential AG: 274-5
Latin for Addicts 