Latin declension is the set of patterns in the Latin language for how nouns and certain other parts of speech (including pronouns and adjectives) change form according to their grammatical case, number and gender. Words that change form in this manner are said to be declined.
Declension is normally marked by suffixation: attaching different endings to the declined word. For nouns, Latin grammar instruction typically distinguishes five main patterns of endings. The patterns are numbered from first to fifth and subdivided by grammatical gender. The term "declension" can refer either to the overarching phenomenon, or to one of these specific five patterns. For example, nouns that have a genitive singular form that ends in are said to belong to "the first declension".
Adjectives are of two kinds: those like 'good' use first-declension endings for the feminine, and second-declension for masculine and neuter. Other adjectives such as belong to the third declension. There are no fourth- or fifth-declension adjectives.
Pronouns are also of two kinds, the personal pronouns such as 'I' and 'you ()', which have their own irregular declension, and the third-person pronouns such as 'this' and 'that' which can generally be used either as pronouns or adjectivally. These latter decline in a similar way to the first and second noun declensions, but there are differences; for example the genitive singular ends in -ëus or -ius instead of -ë or -ae and the dative singular ends in -ë.
The cardinal numbers 'one', 'two', and 'three' also have their own declensions (à «nus has genitive -ëus and dative -ë like a pronoun). However, numeral adjectives such as 'a pair, two each' decline like ordinary adjectives.
Declension is a specific type of inflection, and is distinguished from other ways that words change form in the Latin language, such as the conjugation of verbs.
A complete Latin noun declension includes up to seven grammatical cases: nominative, vocative, accusative, genitive, dative, ablative and locative. The locative is limited to a few nouns: generally names of cities, small islands and a few other words.
Different cases commonly share the same form (called syncretism). The patterns of shared endings vary depending on a noun's grammatical number, gender, and declension class. The following are the most notable patterns of syncretism:
The Roman grammarian Aelius Donatus (4th century AD), whose work was used as standard throughout the Middle Ages, placed the cases in this order:
This order was based on the order used by earlier Greek grammarians, with the addition of the ablative, which does not exist in Greek. The names of the cases also were mostly translated from the Greek terms, such as from the Greek .
This traditional order was formerly used in England, such as in The School and University Eton Latin Grammar (1861). That order is still followed in most other European countries. Gildersleeve and Lodge's Latin Grammar (1895) also follow this order. More recent Latin grammars published in the United States, such as Allen and Greenough's New Latin Grammar (1903) and Wheelock's Latin (first published in 1956) follow this order except they list the vocative last.
However, in Britain and countries influenced by Britain other than the United States, the Latin cases are usually given in the following order: nominative, vocative, accusative, genitive, dative, ablative. This order was introduced in Benjamin Hall Kennedy's Latin Primer (1866), with the aim of making tables of declensions easier to recite and memorise (the first three and the last two cases having identical forms in several declensions). It is also used in France and Belgium. In Rosa (1962), a song in French by the Belgian singer Jacques Brel, Brel sings the declension of "rosa" as , following the British order of cases.
Old Latin had essentially two patterns of endings. One pattern was shared by the first and second declensions, which derived from the Proto-Indo-European thematic declension. The other pattern was used by the third, fourth and fifth declensions, and derived from the athematic PIE declension.
Regularly inflected Latin nouns have two principal parts: the nominative singular and the genitive singular. Each declension can be unequivocally identified by the ending of the genitive singular (-ae, -i, -is, -à «s, -ei). This ending can be removed from the genitive singular form to find the noun's oblique stem, which is shared between all inflected forms aside from the nominative singular. (The nominative singular sometimes, but not always has a distinct stem.)
Latin declension is commonly taught in terms of attaching different sets of vowel-initial endings to the oblique stem. For example, the first-declension noun 'cow' has the genitive singular , with the oblique stem . Its ablative singular can be formed by combining with the ending , forming . The second-declension noun 'bull' has the genitive singular , with the oblique stem . Its ablative singular can be formed by combining with the ending , forming .
There are five declensions (in other words, five such sets of endings) for Latin nouns:
Nouns of this declension usually end in -a in the nominative singular and are mostly feminine, e.g. ('road') and ('water'). There is a small class of masculine exceptions generally referring to occupations, e.g. ('poet'), ('farmer'), ('auriga, charioteer'), ('pirate') and ('sailor'). Neuter nouns do not occur in the first declension, with the sole exception of or ('Easter'), which is sometimes neuter and sometimes feminine.
The predominant letter in the ending forms of this declension is a. The nominative singular form consists of the stem and the ending -a, and the genitive singular form is the stem plus -ae.
The locative endings for the first declension are -ae (singular) and -ës (plural), similar to the genitive singular and ablative plural, as in ' 'in war' and ' 'at Athens'.
The first declension also includes three types of Greek loanwords, derived from Ancient Greek's alpha declension. They are declined irregularly in the singular, but sometimes treated as native Latin nouns, e.g. nominative ('athlete') instead of the original athlÃÂtÃÂs. Archaic (Homeric) first declension Greek nouns and adjectives had been formed in exactly the same way as in Latin: nephelÃÂgeréta Zeus ('Zeus the cloud-gatherer') had in classical Greek become nephelÃÂgerétÃÂs.
For full paradigm tables and more detailed information, see the Wiktionary appendix .
The second declension is a large group of nouns consisting of mostly masculine nouns like ('horse') and ('boy') and neuter nouns like ('fort'). There are several small groups of feminine exceptions, including names of gemstones, plants, trees, and some towns and cities: these take the same endings as masculine nouns.
In the nominative singular, most masculine nouns consist of the stem and the ending -us, although some end in -er, which is not necessarily attached to the complete stem. Neuter nouns generally have a nominative singular consisting of the stem and the ending -um. Regardless of gender, every second-declension noun has the ending -ë attached as a suffix to the stem of the noun in the genitive singular form. The predominant letter in the ending forms of this declension is o.
The locative endings for the second declension are -ë (singular) and -ës (plural); "at Corinth", "at Milan", and "at Philippi".
Nouns ending in -ius and -ium have a genitive singular in -ë in earlier Latin, which was regularized to -ië in the later language. Masculine nouns in -ius have a vocative singular in -ë at all stages. These forms in -ë are stressed on the same syllable as the nominative singular, sometimes in violation of the usual Latin stress rule. For example, the genitive and vocative singular Vergilë (from ) is pronounced VergÃÂlë, with stress on the penult, even though it is short. In Old Latin, however, the vocative was declined regularly, using -ie instead, e.g. fëlie "[O] son", archaic vocative of .
There is no contraction of -ië(s) in plural forms and in the locative.
In the older language, nouns ending with -vus, -quus and -vum take o rather than u in the nominative and accusative singular. For example, ('slave') could be servos, accusative servom.
Some masculine nouns of the second declension end in -er or -ir in the nominative singular. The declension of these nouns is identical to that of the regular second declension, except for the lack of suffix in the nominative and vocative singular.
Some (but not all) nouns in -er drop the e in the genitive and other cases. For example, ('father-in-law') keeps its e. However, the noun ('(school)master') drops its e in the genitive singular.
For declension tables of second-declension nouns, see the .
The vocative puere is found but only in Plautus. The genitive plural virum is found in poetry.
The second declension contains two types of masculine Greek nouns and one form of neuter Greek noun. These nouns are irregular only in the singular, as are their first-declension counterparts. Greek nouns in the second declension are derived from the Omicron declension.
Some Greek nouns may also be declined as normal Latin nouns. For example, can appear as theÃÂtrum.
The inflection of ('god') is irregular. The vocative singular of deus is not attested in Classical Latin. In Ecclesiastical Latin the vocative of Deus ('God') is Deus.
In poetry, -um may substitute -Ã Ârum as the genitive plural ending.
Three words, although second declension neuter, end in -us. These are "common people, crowd", "slime, poison", and (borrowed from Greek) "sea".
The word means "1. slimy liquid, slime; 2. poison, venom", denoting the venom of a snake. This Latin word is probably related to the Greek (ios) meaning "venom" or "rust" and the Sanskrit word ' meaning "toxic, poison".
Since in antiquity denoted something uncountable, it was a mass noun. Mass nouns pluralize only under special circumstances, hence the non-existence of plural forms in the texts.
In Classical Latin, the noun is either indeclinable (all case forms are ) or declined according to the second declension, but with the ending -us instead of -um in the nominative, vocative and accusative.
In Neo-Latin, a plural form is necessary in order to express the modern concept of 'viruses', which leads to the following declension:
The third declension is the largest group of nouns. The nominative singular of these nouns may end in -a, -e, -ë, -à Â, -y, -c, -l, -n, -r, -s, -t, or -x. This group of nouns includes masculine, feminine, and neuter nouns.
The stem of a consonant-stem noun may be found from the genitive case by removing the ending -is. For example, the stem of 'peace' is pÃÂc-, the stem of 'river' is flà «min-, and the stem of 'flower' is flà Âr-.
Masculine, feminine and neuter nouns often have their own special nominative singular endings. For instance, many masculine nouns end in -or (, 'love'). Many feminine nouns end in -ëx (, 'phoenix'), and many neuter nouns end in -us with an r stem in the oblique cases ( 'burden'; 'time').
The locative endings for the third declension are -ë or -e (singular) and -ibus (plural), as in 'in the country' and 'at Tralles'.
The third declension also has a set of nouns that are declined differently. They are called i-stems. i-stems are broken into two subcategories: pure and mixed. Pure i-stems are indicated by special neuter endings. Mixed i-stems are indicated by the double consonant rule. Stems indicated by the parisyllabic rule are usually mixed, occasionally pure.
The mixed declension is distinguished from the consonant type only by having -ium in the genitive plural (and occasionally -ës in the accusative plural). The pure declension is characterized by having -ë in the ablative singular, -ium in the genitive plural, -ia in the nominative and accusative plural neuter, and -im in the accusative singular masculine and feminine (however, adjectives have -em).
The accusative plural ending -ës is found in early Latin up to Virgil, but from the early empire onwards it was replaced by -ÃÂs.
The accusative singular ending -im is found only in a few words: always in 'cough', 'thirst', 'River Tiber'; usually in 'axe', 'tower', 'poop', 'fever'; occasionally in 'ship'. Most nouns, however, have accusative singular -em. The ending -im is not found in any adjectives, even those that have a separate feminine such as 'swift' or 'keen', or in any masculine common nouns.
The ablative singular -ë is found in nouns which have -im, and also, optionally, in some other nouns, e.g. or 'in the fire'.
There are two mixed-declension neuter nouns: ('heart') and ('bone'). The mixed declension is also used in the plural-only adjective ('most').
The rules for determining i-stems from non-i-stems and mixed i-stems are guidelines rather than rules: many words that might be expected to be i-stems according to the parisyllabic rule actually are not, such as ('dog') or ('youth'), which have genitive plural 'of dogs' and 'of young men'. Likewise, ('father'), ('mother'), ('brother'), and ('parent') violate the double-consonant rule. This fluidity even in Roman times resulted in much more uncertainty in Medieval Latin.
Some nouns in -tÃÂt-, such as 'city, community' can have either consonant-stem or i-stem genitive plural: or 'of the cities'.
In the third declension, there are four irregular nouns.
The fourth declension is a group of nouns consisting of mostly masculine words such as ('wave') and ('port') with a few feminine exceptions, including ('hand') and ('house'). The fourth declension also includes several neuter nouns including ('knee'). Each noun has the ending -à «s as a suffix attached to the root of the noun in the genitive singular form. The predominant letter in the ending forms of this declension is u, but the declension is otherwise very similar to the third-declension i stems.
('house, dwelling, building, home, native place, family, household, race') is an irregular noun, mixing fourth and second declension forms at the same time (especially in literature). However, in practice, it is generally declined as a regular -us stem fourth declension noun, except for ablative singular -Ã Â, accusative plural -Ã Âs, and the use of the locative.
The fifth declension is a small group of nouns consisting of mostly feminine nouns like ('affair, matter, thing') and diÃÂs, diÃÂë ('day'; but in names of days).
Nouns ending in -iÃÂs have long ÃÂë in the dative and genitive, while nouns ending in a consonant + -ÃÂs usually have short eë in these cases. Other forms of the genitive singular are also found, such as (Aeneid 1.636), (Georgic 1.208), (Ennius).
The locative ending of the fifth declension was -ÃÂ (singular only), identical to the ablative singular, as in ('today').
The first and second persons are irregular, and both pronouns are indeclinable for gender; and the third person reflexive pronoun sÃÂ, suë always refers back to the subject, regardless of whether the subject is singular or plural.
The genitive forms , , , , are used as complements in certain grammatical constructions, whereas , are used with a partitive meaning ('[one] of us', '[one] of you'). To express possession, the possessive pronouns (essentially adjectives) , , , are used, declined in the first and second declensions to agree in number and case with the thing possessed, e.g. 'my father', 'my mother'. The vocative singular masculine of is : 'my dear Atticus'.
The possessive adjective has an archaic variant, ; similar to . Vocative of is usually , and rarely also, like the nominative.
Usually, to show the ablative of accompaniment, would be placed before the ablative form. However, with personal pronouns (first and second person), the reflexive and the interrogative, -cum is added onto the end of the ablative form. That is: 'with me', 'with us', 'with you', , and (sometimes ).
Pronouns have also an emphatic form bi using the suffix -met (, /, , ), used in all cases, except by the genitive plural forms.
In accusative case, the forms mÃÂmÃÂ and tÃÂtÃÂ exist as emphatic, but they are not widely used.
has a possessive adjective: , meaning 'his/her/its/their own':
When 'his' or 'her' refers to someone else, not the subject, the genitive pronoun (as well as eà Ârum and eÃÂrum) 'of him' is used instead of suus:
Despite its resemblance to the possessive adjectives and , does not decline in agreement with the noun it refers to, in the way that an adjective would. For instance, "his father" in the accusative is (literally, "father of him"), not *eium, in contrast with the reflexive formation ("his [own] father").
When one sentence is embedded inside another with a different subject, sÃÂ and suus can refer to either subject:
For the third-person pronoun 'he', see below.
Relative, demonstrative and indefinite pronouns are generally declined like first and second declension adjectives, with the following differences:
These differences characterize the pronominal declension, and a few special adjectives ( 'whole', 'alone', 'one', 'no', 'another', 'another [of two]', etc.) are also declined according to this pattern.
All demonstrative, relative, and indefinite pronouns in Latin can also be used adjectivally, with some small differences; for example in the interrogative pronoun, 'who?' and 'what?' are usually used for the pronominal form, and 'which?' for the adjectival form.
The weak demonstrative pronoun , , 'that' also serves as the third person pronoun 'he, she, it':
This pronoun is also often used adjectivally, e.g. is homo 'that man', ea pecunia 'that money'. It has no possessive adjective; the genitive is used instead: pater eius 'his/her father'; pater eà Ârum 'their father'.
The pronoun or pronominal adjective means 'the same'. It is derived from is with the suffix -dem. However, some forms have been assimilated.
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Similar in declension is 'another'.
The interrogative pronouns are used strictly for asking questions. They are distinct from the relative pronoun and the interrogative adjective (which is declined like the relative pronoun). Interrogative pronouns rarely occur in the plural. The plural interrogative pronouns are the same as the plural relative pronouns.
For the most part adjectives are declined like nouns, with the difference that adjectives can normally be used in all three genders.
Nearly all adjectives can be categorized into one of two types:
An adjective agrees with its corresponding noun in number, gender, and case; they do not agree in declension type. Therefore, adjectives do not necessarily take the same ending as their nouns, although this often happens to be the case.
First- and second-declension adjectives are inflected in the masculine, the feminine and the neuter; the masculine form typically ends in -us (although some end in -er, see below), the feminine form ends in -a, and the neuter form ends in -um. Therefore, some adjectives are given like .
Adjectives ending -ius use the vocative -ie (ÃÂbrie, "[O] drunk man", vocative of ÃÂbrius), just as in Old Latin all -ius nouns did (fëlie, "[O] son", archaic vocative of fëlius).
Some first- and second-declension adjectives' masculine forms end in -er. As with second-declension -r nouns, some adjectives retain the e throughout inflection, and some omit it. omits its e while keeps it.
Nine first and second declension pronominal adjectives are irregular in the genitive and dative singular in all genders. They can be remembered by using the mnemonic acronym . They are:
Third-declension adjectives are normally declined like third-declension i-stem nouns, except for the fact they usually have -ë rather than -e in the ablative singular (unlike i-stem nouns, in which only pure i-stems have -ë). Some adjectives, however, like the one-ending ('old, aged'), have -e in the ablative singular, -um in the genitive plural, and -a in the nominative and accusative neuter plural.
These have a single nominative ending for all genders, although as usual the endings for the other cases vary. As with nouns, a genitive is given for the purpose of showing the inflection.
Third-declension adjectives that have two endings have one form for the masculine and feminine, and a separate form for the neuter. The ending for the masculine and feminine is -is, and the ending for the neuter is -e. It is not necessary to give the genitive, as it is the same as the nominative masculine singular.
Third-declension adjectives with three endings have three separate nominative forms for all three genders. Like third and second declension -r nouns, the masculine ends in -er. The feminine ends in -ris, and the neuter ends in -re. The genitive is the same as the nominative feminine singular.
As in English, adjectives have superlative and comparative forms. For regular first and second declension and third declension adjectives with one or two endings, the comparative is formed by adding -ior for the masculine and feminine, and -ius for the neuter to the stem. The genitives for both are formed by adding -ià Âris. Therefore, they are declined in the third declension, but they are not declined as i-stems. Superlatives are formed by adding -issimus, -issima, -issimum to the stem and are thus declined like first and second declension adjectives.
Adjectives (in the first and second as well as third declensions) that have masculine nominative singular forms ending in -er are slightly different. As with normal adjectives, the comparative is formed by adding -ior to the stem, but for the superlative, -rimus is added to the nominative masculine singular.
Some third declension adjectives with two endings in -lis in the masculineâÂÂfeminine nominative singular have irregular superlative forms. The following are the only adjectives that do.
First and second declension adjectives that end in -eus or -ius are unusual in that they do not form the comparative and superlative by taking endings at all. Instead, ('more') and ('most'), the comparative and superlative degrees of ('much, greatly'), respectively, are used.
Many adjectives in -uus, except those in -quus or -guus, also follow this rule.
As in most languages, Latin has adjectives that have irregular comparatives and superlatives.
There are several different kinds of numeral words in Latin: the two most common are cardinal numerals and ordinal numerals. There are also several more rare numerals, e.g., distributive numerals and adverbial numerals.
All cardinal numerals are indeclinable, except ('one'), ('two'), ('three'), plural hundreds ('two hundred'), ('three hundred') etc., and ('thousand'), which have cases and genders like adjectives. is declined like a first- and second-declension pronoun with -ëus or -ius in the genitive, and -ë in the dative. is declined irregularly, is declined like a third-declension plural adjective, -centë ('hundred') numerals decline like first- and second-declension adjectives, and is invariable in the singular and declined like a third-declension i-stem neuter noun in the plural:
The plural endings for à «nus are used with plà «rÃÂlia tantum nouns, e. g. à «na castra (one [military] camp), à «nae scÃÂlae (one ladder).
The word ('both'), is declined like duo except that its o is long. Both declensions derive from the Indo-European dual number, otherwise defunct in Latin, rather than the plural.
The numeral ('one hundred') is indeclinable, but all the other hundred numerals are declinable (, , , , , , , ).
The word mëlle 'thousand' is a singular indeclinable adjective. However, its plural, mëlia, is a plural third-declension i-stem neuter noun. To write the phrase "four thousand horses" in Latin, the genitive is used: quattuor mëlia equà Ârum, literally, "four thousands of horses".
The rest of the numbers are indeclinable whether used as adjectives or as nouns.
For further information on the different sets of Latin numerals, see Latin numerals (linguistics).
Adverbs are not declined. However, adverbs must be formed if one wants to make an adjective into an adverb.
First and second declension adjectives' adverbs are formed by adding -ÃÂ onto their stems.
Typically, third declension adjectives' adverbs are formed by adding -iter to the stem. However, most third declension adjectives with one ending simply add -er to the stem.
Adverbs' comparative forms are identical to the nominative neuter singular of the corresponding comparative adjective. Adverbs' superlative forms are simply formed by attaching the regular ending -ÃÂ to the corresponding superlative adjective. As with their corresponding adjectival forms, first and second declensions adjectives ending in -eus or -ius use and as opposed to distinct endings.
As with adjectives, there are irregular adverbs with peculiar comparative and superlative forms.
Some nouns are only used in the singular (singulare tantum) such as:
Some nouns are only used in the plural (plurale tantum), or when plural have a singular meaning such as:
Indeclinable nouns are nouns which only have one form in all cases (of the singular).
Heterogeneous nouns are nouns which vary in respect to gender.