38 Explōrātiō Octāva (VIII) Adventure Eight
Caesar, Dē Bellō Gallicō, About The Gallic War
Dative and Ablative Plurals Plural Pronouns
Ablative of Means Ablative of Time When
Introduction to Ablative Absolute
Forum, Rōma Mēnsis September
Cn. Pompeiō Magnō Q. Caeciliō Metellō Piō cōnsulibus
“B
The Forum, Rome September, 52 BCE
ring an umbrella,” she told me. “There’s a downpour in the City today.” And indeed, as soon as the magic drink placed us in the heart of the capital – in the middle of the Roman Forum, with its grand temples – we were pelted by a heavy rain. I raced to
open my umbrella while sprinting for shelter, Latinitas in the lead. The building we ran for was a massive structure. It looked like a temple, but it had no central statue; instead on the inside it looked more like an old shopping mall, with wooden architecture. (“It’s called a basilica,” she told me later, “and this is the Basilica Porcia, commissioned a century ago by Cato.”) After we climbed the steps, she stepped behind one of the columns, then jumped out at me, brandishing her umbrella like a sword, a gladius. I collapsed my umbrella to parry her thrusts. She was very fast and aggressive, slashing away at me:
Gladium habeō, gladiō pugnō, gladiatrix sum!
“I have a sword, I fight with a sword, I am a female gladiator!” I picked up a wooden pole for extra defense, and she shouted:
Duōbus gladiīs tū pūgnābis? Illī tē nōn prōtegent!
“With two swords you will fight? Those will not protect you!”
She knocked the pole out of my hand. I spun around to avoid her next thrust, hoping to catch her from the side. But my move was too slow: as soon as I turned my head around, she had the point of the umbrella pointed directly at my throat. With that she dropped her weapon and crowed: “Vīcī vīcī, I have won, I have won!”
Victor es, I bowed.
“Nōn victor sum, sed victrix,” she corrected me. “Victor est vir quī vīcit, A victor is a man who has won; victrix est fēmina quae vīcit. Victrix sum. But you showed promise. You were game, and you were not afraid to make a mistake. You cannot learn a language, or anything of value, if you don’t possess these traits. Never be afraid to make a mistake.”
A rumble of voices from a crowd on the other side of the building drew our attention. They had not noticed our fight; instead, they were listening intently to a man reading out loud from a book. The audience looked to be mostly made up of soldiers – real combatants, not gladiators. Their swagger, thick calves, and ugly scars were enough to give them away as veterans of old, hard wars. It was a large crowd, four- or five-hundred strong – nearly the size of a Roman cohort.
What they were listening to was a report composed by the general Julius Caesar and sent to Rome by messengers from the land to the north that the Romans called Gaul, roughly where France is today. Latinitas explained that this was the ninth year of a massive and violent campaign designed to bring Gaul under Roman control and secure Caesar’s reputation as a master general. The soldiers assembled in the basilica had fought under Caesar there, and managed to force most of the towns into submission. Recently an alliance of tribes led by a man named Vercingetorix had started a revolt. Several months of fighting reached a climax in the battle of Alesia. It was a complex operation, with Caesar’s army laying siege to Vercingetorix’s army in the city of Alesia while simultaneously fighting off a Gallic relief force. Someone had drawn a simple map in red chalk on the wall to illustrate the positions for the crowd. It looked like a donut, with the Gauls on the inside and outside, and the Romans in the ring in between. The reader was approaching the end of the general’s report. You will notice that Caesar refers to himself in the third person in the narrative and anchors his storytelling in the present tense, to heighten the drama:
“After learning of these facts, Caesar sends Labienus with six cohorts to help those who are struggling. He commands him, if he should be unable to hold out, to break down his cohorts and fight to break out; don’t do this unless necessary. He goes in person to the remaining troops, urges them not to yield to the struggle; he teaches them that the outcome of all the prior battles rests on this day and hour. The troops of the Gauls who are caught inside, despairing of the situation in the plain because of the size of our fortifications, probe the steep ground with a climbing action; to this location they bring what they have prepared. With a multitude of spears, they drive our frontline fighters from the towers, fill the ditches with earth and wicker sheets, and cut back the rampart and parapet with machetes.”
“Caesar first sends the young Brutus with his cohorts, and next, his lieutenant Gaius Fabius with others. Finally, when the fighting is at its peak, he leads fresh troops to the rescue, in person.
The battle resumes and the enemy is driven back. Next he heads where he sent Labienus. He leads four cohorts from the nearest fort; he orders some of the cavalry to follow, others to circle the outer fortifications and surprise the enemy from behind. When the earthen mounds and ditches are unable to hold off the enemy, Labienus gathers together 40 cohorts that chance presented to him, drawn from the nearest defenders, and informs Caesar through messengers what he thinks must be done. Caesar speeds to be present at the battle.”
“When his arrival is recognized by the color of his garment – a distinguishing mark which he was accustomed to use during battle – and when the squadrons of cavalry and cohorts he has told to follow him are seen, since our slopes and low areas are visible from the higher ground, the enemy joins the fight. A shout rises from both sides, answered in turn by a shout from the palisade and all the fortifications. Our men lay their javelins aside and carry out their task with swords.
Suddenly from behind our cavalry are seen; other cohorts come near. The enemy turns back; the horsemen meet those who flee. A great slaughter takes place. Sedulius, general and head man of the Lemovices, is killed; Vercassivallaunus of Arvernus is captured alive while fleeing. Seventy- four military flags are brought to Caesar; out of such a great host, few get back to camp unharmed… Given the situation, if our soldiers had not been exhausted by repeated relief efforts and a full day’s hardship, all of the enemy’s forces could have been destroyed.”
With that line, a round of roars and shouts rose from the crowd. They were cheering the Roman victory, and admiring their general’s relentless determination and skill. And he was their general
– the audience was made up largely of Caesar’s veterans. They loved him – maybe too much.
Latinitas gestured for me to take a seat on a stool. She had a text in her hands – but this time, not a papyrus roll; it was an old English schoolbook from the 19th century.
“When Latin was taught in schools many years ago, it often involved a few years of grammar, followed by a forced march through several books of Caesar’s Commentariī dē Bellō Gallicō, his Reports on the Gallic War. So I thought I would bring this along. Open your notebook, and let us begin. After you enter these words in your vocabulary, we will add the dative and ablative plural noun endings.”
1st Declension Nouns
fāma, fām-ae 1f.reputation, fame
fortūna, fortūn-aef.fortune glōria, glōri-aef.glory terra, terr-aef.earth
2nd Declension Nouns
annus, ann-ī m.year
locus, loc-īm.place
modus, mod-īm.measure, limit
numerus, numer-īm.number
3rd Declension Nouns
Caesar, Caesar-ism.Caesar pāx, pāc-isf.peace virtūs, virtūt-isf.virtue dux, duc-ism.leader
mīles, mīlit-ism.soldier
eques, equit-ism.horseman, knight
sanguis, sanguin-is m.blood
3rd Declension I-Stem Nouns “Notice they have the same Nominative and Genitive singulars.”
cīvis, cīv-ism.citizen
hostis, host-ism.enemy (foreign)
īgnis, īgn-ism.fire “The ablative singular is īgnī.”
4th Declension Noun
exercitus, exercit-ūs m.army
5th Declension Noun
rēs gestaef.(plural) achievements “Literally, things (rēs) accomplished (gestae)”