01/08/93


                             CHAPTER 24

              "Ablative Absolute; Passive Periphrastic;
                        The Dative of Agent"


Once again, this is a chapter which only expands on principles
you've already been working with.  The two constructions
explained in this chapter all called "idioms" of the language.
To put it briefly, an idiom is a construction whose meaning is
more than the sum of its parts.  That is, you can't simply look
at the constituent parts of the construction and deduce the full
meaning.  For some reason, the language gives these construction
special, additional meanings which is not present in its parts.

     Just to give one example of an idiomatic construction from
English, consider this.  We form the present progressive tense in
the active voice by using the verb "to be" as an auxiliary verb
and the present participial stem of the verb.  Like this: "The
ants are crawling along the ground".  Obviously the ants are the
active subject of the verb "are crawling" -- they are the agents
performing the action.  Now look at this very idiomatic use of
the present progressive tense in the active voice.  "The tables
are crawling with ants".  Just like the "ants" in the first
sentence, "tables" is the subject of the verb "is crawling", but
this time the subject cannot be the active subject of the verb.
The tables are not crawling, but the ants are crawling all over
the tables.  Even though the verb form is the same in both
sentence -- "are crawling" -- the grammatical function of the
subjects are entirely different.  The "ants" are the active
agent; the "tables" are passive recipients of the action
performed by the ants, expressed in the prepositional phrase
beginning with "with".  The second construction is an example of
an idiom, since the active form of the verb -- "are crawling" --
is over-ridden.  The final meaning of the construction cannot be
deduced simply by adding up the meaning of its parts.  That's an
idiom.

REVIEW OF PARTICIPLES

As you learned in the last chapter, a participle is a verbal
adjective.  The formation of participles from the different
verbal stems obeys a few, very regular rules.  Let's run through
them again.  Write out the formulae for forming the different
participles:

FUTURE ACTIVE PARTICIPLE


     ____________________________________________________________

FUTURE PASSIVE PARTICIPLE (GERUNDIVE)


     ____________________________________________________________

PRESENT ACTIVE PARTICIPLE


     ____________________________________________________________

PERFECT PASSIVE PARTICIPLE


     ____________________________________________________________

As you can see, all the participles except the present active use
the "-us, -a, -um" adjectival endings, and so present no problem
in their declensions.  The present active participle, however,
declines in the third declension, and behaves like a third
declension adjective of one termination of the "-ns, -ntis" type,
with the exception of the short "-e-" in place of the "-i-" in
the ablative singular .  Decline a couple of present active
participles just to refresh your memory.

PRESENT ACTIVE PARTICIPLES DECLINED

          laudo (1)                       moneo (2)

  Masc/Fem.       Neuter           Masc/Fem.      Neuter

______________________________  ______________________________

______________________________  ______________________________

______________________________  ______________________________

______________________________  ______________________________

______________________________  ______________________________


______________________________  ______________________________

______________________________  ______________________________

______________________________  ______________________________

______________________________  ______________________________

______________________________  ______________________________


          duco (3)                       capio (3-i)

  Masc/Fem.       Neuter           Masc/Fem.      Neuter

______________________________  ______________________________

______________________________  ______________________________

______________________________  ______________________________

______________________________  ______________________________

______________________________  ______________________________


______________________________  ______________________________

______________________________  ______________________________

______________________________  ______________________________

______________________________  ______________________________

______________________________  ______________________________


THE ABLATIVE ABSOLUTE: CONSTRUCTION AND SYNTAX

You remember from Chapter 23 that Latin isn't so fussy as English
is about spelling out the exact temporal or logical relationship
between a subordinate and main clause.  In English, we have a
bumper crop of subordinating conjunctions for this purpose:
"since, because, although, if, even if, if and only if, being as
how, seeing as how, before, after, during, while, inasmuch as,
who", and on and on.  Latin has many of these conjunctions, too,
but, always aiming at compression, Latin likes to reduce
subordinate thoughts to participles.  A very popular way of
linking two separate ideas without spelling out the exact
relationship they have to each other is the "Ablative Absolute"
construction.  Let's look at both parts of the description
"ablative" and "absolute".

    We call a subordinate clause "absolute" when it stands
entirely outside of the grammar of the main clause and contains
no finite verb.  We have a common "absolute" construction in
English, which we call the "nominative absolute".  Watch:

         "The door being open, everyone could see inside".
         "The key having been lost, I couldn't get in".
         "That said, I now move to my next point.
         "All other things being equal, the procedures are
         identical".

    The first clause in each of these sentences are simply
stating a fact that is given as a circumstance under which the
action of the main clause takes place.  And none of the absolute
contructions has a finite verb.  Now, obviously there is a
logical or temporal relationship between the absolute clauses and
the main clauses in each of these sentences, and you could easily
recast the sentences to make them explicit.  For example,

         "Because the door was open..".
         "Because the key was lost..".
         "Now that that has been said..".
         "If all other things are equal..".

But the speaker has chosen to keep the relationship unstated or
implicit.  For that reason, the verb is left as a participle and
-- this is important -- the participle is not attached to
anything in main clause.  For example, let's rewrite the original
absolute construction in "The key having been lost, I couldn't
get in" to "Having lost my key, I couldn't get it".  Now the
participle agrees with something in the main clause -- "I"
and the act of losing the key is specifically attributed to "I"
and not left ambiguous.
In the original sentence, the speaker may or may not have been
the one who lost the key.  It may have been lost by someone else.
But in the rewritten version, the guilty party is fingered: "I"
lost the key.  An absolute construction doesn't do that.

    So here are two things to remember about clauses which are
absolute:  the verb is a participle, and it agrees with something
in the absolute clause, not in the main clause of the sentence.

    Now for the "ablative" part of the construction called the
"Ablative Absolute".  Just as the word "ablative" tells you, in
Latin the participle and the noun it agrees with are both in the
ablative case.  For example:

         "Hac fama narrata, dux urbem sine mora reliquit".

In this sentence, the main clause is "dux...reliquit".  The
Ablative Absolute clause is "hac fama narrata".  The verb of the
clause is the participle "narrata", which in turn agrees with the
ablative "hac fama".  So how do we translate the Ablative
Absolute clause it into English?  As always, let's start with the
roughest, but most accurate, way.  The quickest way to translate
an Ablative Absolute clause is to use the preposition "with",
followed by the noun, and then the participle in it correct tense
and voice: "with this story having been told".  So this sentence
would come out:

    "With this story having been told, the leader left the city
    without delay".

1.  Cane currente, equus magno cum timore campum reliquit.

    "With the dog running, the horse left the field with great
    fear".

2.  Equo cursuro, canis magno cum timore campum reliquit.

    "With the horse about to run, the dog left the field with
    great fear".

As you can see, the relationship between the clauses of these
sentences is clear enough, even though it's unstated.  In the
first sentence, perhaps we could say, "Because the dog was
running, the horse left the field".  That is, the horse has some
fear of running dogs.  In the second, the dog doesn't like
running horses, so when it realized that the horse was going to
run, it ran away: "Bcause the horse was going to run, the dog
left the field".

    One last item about the Ablative Absolute clause is that
when the participle is in the active voice, it can be followed by
objects of its own which are not in the ablative case.  That is
to say, not every word in the Ablative Absolute clause has to be
in the ablative case.  Only the noun and the participle agreeing
with it are necessarily ablative; the rest of the Ablative
Absolute clause will follow the normal rules of Latin grammar.
For example:

    "Rege haec dicente, omnes cives terrebantur". (With the king
    saying these things, all the citizens were terrified.)

The Ablative Absolute clause in this sentence is "rege haec
dicente", as you can see by looking at the case of "rege" and
"dicente" and by recognizing that the verb of the clause is in
the participial mood.  These are the two parts of an Ablative
Absolute clause: noun and participle in the ablative case.  But
what about "haec"?  Why is it in the accusative case if it's in
an Ablative Absolute clause?  The answer is that "haec" is the
direct object of the action of the participle "dicente", and
direct objects are always in the accusative case, regardless of
the mood or construction of the verb.  Remember, once you have a
noun -- "rege" -- and a participle -- "dicente" -- in the
ablative case, you have an Ablative Absolute construction.
Everything else in the clause is simply additional material which
follows the predictable rules of Latin grammar.  Let's look at a
few more examples.

1.  "Bonis viris imperium tenentibus, res publica valebit".
    (With good men holding power, the republic will be strong.)
2.  "Civibus patriam amantibus, possumus magnam spem habere".
    (With the citizens loving the fatherland, we are able to
    have great hope.)
3.  "His rebus gravibus ab oratore dictis, omnis cupiditas
    pecuniae expulsa est". (With these serious matters having
    been said by the orator, all longing for money was driven
    out.)

THE ABLATIVE ABSOLUTE WITH "BEING"

The Ablative Absolute construction, as you now know, is made up
of a noun and a participle agreeing with it in the ablative case.
This brings up an interesting problem with the verb "sum", which
has no present participle.  How would you say, for example, "The
king being good, the people were happy"?  The clause you would
turn into the Ablative Absolute contains the present participle
"being", but Latin has no translation for it.  In occasions like
this, Latin simply leaves the participle out and uses the noun in
the ablative case with the adjective agreeing with it: "Rege
bono, populus beatus erat". So if you see a clause set off with
commas containing a noun and adjective in the ablative case
without a participle, just plug in our participle "being".

ABLATIVE ABSOLUTE: TRANSLATIONS

The literal translation of Ablative Absolutes -- "having..",
"with..., etc. -- makes for some hellish English.  A translation
is not complete until we've rendered a thought in one language
into a the target language in a smooth, fluent epxression that
wouldn't suprise a native speaker.  We have to message Ablative
Absolutes a little to get them into English.

    Because the Ablative Absolute is essentially a participial
construction, the same rules that applied to translating
participles will apply to the translating the Ablative Absolute.
That is,

    (1)  the Ablative Absolute shows time relative to the time of
         the verb of the main clause -- future participles show
         time subsequent, present participles show time
         contemporaneous, perfect participles show time prior;
    (2)  the exact logical relationship between the main clause
         and the Ablative Absolute has to be reconstructed from
         the context and expressed by one of our subordinating
         conjunctions: because, since, after, although, if,
         inasmuch as, and so on.

So recognizing that an Ablative Absolute clause in a Latin
sentence and pluging in the "with" to bring it into English is
only the first step in translation.  Next you must "promote" the
participial clause into a subordinate clause with a finite verb
(a verb with person) and decide on the most likely subordinating
conjunction.  Obviously, this is going to involve some judgment
on your part, since the possible subordinating conjunction have
very different meanings.  For example, here are two possible
translations of this Latin sentence: "Civibus patriam amantibus,
possumus magnam spem habere".

    (a)  Because the citizens love the fatherland, we are able to
         have great hope.
    (b)  Although the citizens love the fatherland, we are able
         to have great hope.

The meaning of (a) and (b) are flatly contradictory; (a) is
saying that it's a good thing for citizens to love the
fatherland, but (b) says that it's not.  But both are possible
translations of the Latin sentence.  You must first examine the
general intention of the author as it appears in the context of
his writing before you can translate this sentence into
meaningful English.  It'll take some practice and patience.

    The relationship of tenses should present you little
difficulty -- your natural instincts will serve you well.  But
one item should be mentioned.  As you know, a perfect participle
shows time prior to the time of the verb in the main clause.  If
therefore, the participle in the Ablative Absolute is perfect,
and if the tense of the main verb is one of the past tenses --
imperfect, perfect, or pluperfect -- then how should you
translate the participle when you promote it to a finite verb?
Think about it a moment.  If the perfect participle is showing
time prior to another past event, then what finite tense should
you use?  The tense which shows time prior to another past event
is the pluperfect tense, so you should choose the pluperfect
tense to represent the perfect participle of the Ablative
Absolute clause.  Like this:  "Omnibus bonis civibus ex urbe
expulsis, tryannus imperium accepit".  (When all the good
citizens had been expelled from the city, the tyrant took power.)

    Take a moment now do these sentences from Wheelock's
Self-Help Tutorial.  First analyze the sentence literally, then
smooth it over into English you'd expect to hear in civil
conversation.


8.
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9.
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10.     _________________________________________________________
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12.     _________________________________________________________
        _____________


14.
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15.
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16.
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17.
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22.
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25.
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THE PASSIVE PERIPHRASTIC WITH THE DATIVE OF AGENT

Look at these English sentences:

           "This button is not to be pushed".
           "You are to remain right here until we get back".
           "This door is to be left open".
           "You are to do all your homwework".
           "This lesson is to be done by tomorrow".

In each of these the subject of the sentence is linked to an
infinitive in the predicate by a form of the verb "to be", and
they show a sense of duty, necessity, or obligation.  This is an
idiomatic construction in English.  A conjugated form of the verb
"to be" plus an infinitive -- either passive or active -- show
obligation or necessity.  Each of these sentence could have been
written in several different ways.  We could just as easily say

     "This button         should          be pushed".
                          must
                          ought to
                          has to

     As I warned you in the last chapter, Latin has an idiomatic
use of the future passive participle.  If the future passive
participle is linked to the subject with a form of the verb
"sum", it takes on a sense of obligation or necessity.  When it
is used this way, we call the future active participle a
"gerundive".  Do you remember the future passive participle?
Let's review its formation for a moment.  You for the future
passive participle this way:

           1st principal part  +   nd +   -us, -a, -um

     Since there is no way to translate this construction
directly over into English -- that is, you can't simply translate
each word and come up with a true representation of the original
intention -- you have to periphrase it.  You have to "talk
around" (peri) it to translate it.  For this reason, the
construction "sum + gerundive" is called a "periphrastic"
construction, because you must periphrase it to translate it.
Let's note three more things about this construction before we
look at some examples.

     (1)   The construction links a participle with the subject
           through a form of the verb "sum".  Since participles
           are verbal adjectives the participle -- the gerundive
           -- will agree in number, gender and case with the
           subject to which it is linked.  That is, the gerundive
           modifies the subject of the verb "sum".
     (2)   Because the gerundive is the future passive participle,
           this construction will always be in the passive voice.
           That is, the construction will always be saying what
           should be done.
     (3)   When the passive periphrastic construction expresses
           the person agent who should be performing the action,
           the agent is put into the dative case; the agent is
           not, as is normal for the passive voice, shown by "ab +
           ablative.

Now let's look at a couple of simple examples of the passive
periphrastic.

"Carthago delenda est".

     "Carthago" (Carthago, -inis (f) "Carthage") is the subject
     and is feminine;  so the gerundive, "delenda" (from "deleo"
     "to destroy") agrees with it.  A literal translation,
     therefore, would be "Carthage is to be destroyed".  Some
     acceptable variations may be: "Carthage ought to be
     destroyed", "Carthage should be destroyed", "Carthage has to
     be destroyed", "Carthage must be destroyed".  Each of these
     translations has a different flavor in English, but they are
     all legitimate renderings of the Latin "Carthago delenda
     est".

"Carthago nobis delenda est".

     What about the "nobis"?  It is in the dative case, so it is
     expressing the agent of the passive construction.  So we
     should add to our translation "by us".  "Carthage is to be
     (should be, ought to be, has to be, must be) destroyed by
     us".

Written English tries to be parsimonious of the passive voice, so
a final translation of the passive periphrastic might be a
conversion to the active voice: "We are to (must, ought to,
should, have to) destroy Carthage".

"Haec puella meo filio amanda est".

     "This girl is to be (ought to be, should be, must be, has to
     be) loved by my son".  Or, in the active voice "My son is to
     (must, ought to, should, has to) love this girl".

"Haec omnibus agenda sunt".

     "These things are to be (must be, ought to be, should be,
     have to be) done by everyone".  Or "Everyone is to (must,
     ought to, should, has to) do these things".

     Finally, the conjugated form of "sum" can be in any of the
tenses -- naturally -- so the translation has to reflect the
different tenses.  Watch:

"Haec omnibus agenda erunt".  (Everyone will have to do these
things.)
"Haec omnibus agenda erant".  (Everyone had to do these things.)

VOCABULARY PUZZLES

quisque, quidque                The inflected part of the word come
                                before the suffix "-que".  This is
                                the interrogative "quis, quid" +
                                the suffix, so you already know how
                                it is declined.  It means "each
                                one", so obviously should have no
                                plural forms -- and it doesn't
                                until after Classical Latin.  And
                                that's not your concern for now.

