Sententiae, Unit 24

  1. Haec omnia vulnera belli tibi nunc sananda sunt.
haec omnia vulnera - Neuter plural nominative- "All these wounds". Vulnus and omnis are members of the third declension, vulnus being a noun and omnis being an adjective. Since the gender of vulnus is neuter, the nominative plural ending for the neuter third declension is "a". "a" is also, remember, the accusative plural ending for the neuter in the 3rd declension, but in this sentence the verb construction is the clue todetermining that these three words are indeed in the nominative. To find out more about the verb construction in this sentence, click on sananda sunt. Remember, the form haec, occurs in the neuter plural nominative.
 
belli- genitive singular, bellum. "war" Beware being fooled by neuter 2nd declension nouns. The ending for the nominative plural for nouns such as bellum is "a", not "i" as is the case for the masculine nouns of the second declension.
 
tibi - dative of the personal pronoun, 2nd person singular. In this sentence, tibi is the dative of agent. To view how a dative of agent can be translated with a passive periphrastic click on sananda sunt.

sananda sunt - "must be healed" - Passive Periphrastic construction. sunt - 3rd person plural(plural number since vulnera is a neuter plural) sananda - gerundive or future passive participle. a ending because the subject is neuter plural. (Remember that the gerundive uses the 1st and 2nd declension endings.) In this sentence the wounds are described as requiring healing (wounds that must be healed); the obligation to heal falls upon the person designated by the dative case: tibi. Thus, the sentence is translated "All these wounds must be healed by you" or "For you, all these are the wounds to-be-healed."


All these wounds of war now must be healed by you.

  1. Nec tumultum nec hastam militis nec mortem violentam timebo, Augusto terras tenente.

nec…nec means "neither…nor." Nec's are usually found in pairs, but sometimes a sentence will contain three or more of them: nec…nec…nec: "neither…nor…nor."

tumultum: accusative masculine singular from the 4th declension noun tumultus, tumultus. It is in the accusative because it is a direct object of the verb timebo.

hastam: accusative feminine singular from the 1st declension noun hasta, hastae. It is in the accusative case because it is the direct object of the verb timebo.

militis - "of the soldier" - genitive singular masculine. It's easy to forget that militis is the genitive of miles. Note also the position of the genitive; genitives tend to fall after the nouns they modify.

mortem: accusative singular feminine of the 3rd conjugation noun mors, mortis. It is accusative because it is one of the direct objects of timebo.

violentam: accusative feminine singular of the 1st/2nd declension adjective violentus, -a, -um. It modifies mortem, so it agrees with it in number, case and gender.

timebo: 1st person singular future indicative active from the 2nd conjugation verb timeo, timere, timui.

Augusto terras tenente - "Since Augustus rules the world." Augusto - ablative sing. masc. in an ablative absolute. Tenente- present participle active, ablative masc. sing., modifying Augusto. Terras - accusative singular feminine, object of tenente.

Literally, this phrase could be rendered, "since Augustus holds the lands," but that doesn't sound very impressive in English. We don't talk about rulers holding lands - that sounds stilted. The meaning behind the phrase is that Augustus controls (i.e. holds) many different nations (i.e. lands) under his power. The better English translation would be "since Augustus rules the world."

If you chose to translate the ablative absolute with a "when", it would be equally acceptable.


"I will fear neither the uprising nor the spear of the soldier nor a violent death, since Augustus rules the world.

  1. Tarquinio expulso, nomen regis audire non poterat populus Romanus.

Tarquinio expulso: Tarquinio here is the ablative singular form of the name Tarquinius, who was the last king who ruled the Romans before the Republic. expulso is the singular ablative masculine form of the perfect passive participle (fourth principle part) of the verb expello, expellere, expulsi, expulsum. This here is an ablative absolute. A good way to translate ablative absolutes is in it's own subordinating clause (Since, when, although, after...), so: after Tarquin was expelled. Learn more about ablative absolutes.

audire: This infinitive here is used as a complementary infinitive. Verbs such as audeo, audere, ausus sum; debeo, debere, debui, debitum; and possum, potesse, potui tend to take a complementary infintive, whcih completes or finishes the idea which the main verb introduced. Here, the verb poterat has been completed with the infinitive: was able to hear.


"After Tarquin had been expelled, the Roman people were not able to hear the king's name."