15 Imperatives

 

“Now pay attention. Terence was telling his actors to do things, commanding them: vidēte, servāte. These forms of the verb are for commands; they are called Imperatives. Remember that.”

“Commands are a very basic form of language, so their forms are simple. There are singular forms for commanding one person and plural forms for commanding many people. The singular form ends with the vowel of the verb conjugation (–ā or –ē); the plural is formed by adding –te to the singular form:”

Imperative endings (E)

SingularPlural

A-Verbs-ā-āte

E-Verbs-ē-ēte

 

“The English translation requires the verb by itself and, if you like, an exclamation mark. The pronoun ‘you all’ is optional in translation.”

Cōgitā aliquid!“Plan something!” (5)

Spērāte!“Hope, (you all)!”

 

Movē eum!“Move him!”

Timēte!“Fear, (you all)!” “Imperative forms are often used for greetings.”

Salvē!“Be healthy! This is how you say ‘hello’ in Latin.”

Salvēte!“Be healthy, (you all)! This is how you say ‘hello’ to several people.”

Valē!“Be strong! This is how you say ‘goodbye’ in Latin.” Valēte!“Be strong! This is how you say ‘goodbye’ to many people.”

What is the Imperative for sum? I asked.

 

“That’s an excellent question. Normally Latin speakers use sīs, ‘may you be’ and sītis, ‘may you all be’. In Cato’s book we saw a related form, sit, ‘let it be’, several times. We will study these forms more another day.”

“In early spoken Latin, like that which we are studying now, the Imperative ending often has an added syllable: tō in the Singular, and tōte in the plural. That is why Cato said sīc in animō habētō rather than sīc in animō habē; and when Messenio said goodbye, he said salvētō. The translation is the same in English, but the tone is formal, like adding the word ‘sir’. In later Latin, these forms become rare. Languages are like people, slowly but forever changing.”

“Now translate these sentences with imperatives:” Habēte aliquid! (13)

Cōgitā, quisquis es! (14)

Iubēte eum manēre! (15)

Charīnum videō. Salvē. – Ō salvē, Pamphile. (16)

You, move! I was moving. You were moving? He was moving. (17)

 

“Use no pronouns for these. Each sentence will be one word in Latin.” Fear, you all! We were fearing. You all were fearing? They were fearing. (18)

 

“For the final practice, translate this:”

 

I order you to prepare something, not nothing.Tē aliquid parāre iubeō, nōn nīl. We have nothing, they too have nothing, nor is it good. What do you have? (19)

It sucks: I too have nothing. It is not good. (20)

What do the twins need to give? (21)

When they will see neither you nor me, what will they think? (22)

The young man needs to call both you and me. (23)

 

“Here is a final comparison of A-Verb and E-Verb endings. Notice how similar they are, but also where they differ. The English is in the middle.”

A-VerbsE-Verbs

Present Tense“I verb / am verbing / do verb”Present Tense SingularPluralSingularPlural

-ō-ā-musIwe-e-ō-ē-mus

-ā-s-ā-tisyouyou all-ē-s-ē-tis

-a-t-a-nthe she itthey-e-t-e-nt

 

Imperfect Tense“I was verbing”Imperfect Tense SingularPluralSingularPlural

-ā-bam-ā-bāmusIwe-ē-bam-ē-bāmus

-ā-bās-ā-bātisyouyou all-ē-bās-ē-bātis

-ā-bat-ā-banthe she itthey-ē-bat-ē-bant

 

Future Tense“I will verb”Future Tense

SingularPluralSingularPlural

-ā-bō-ā-bimusIwe-ē-bō-ē-bimus

-ā-bis-ā-bitisyouyou all-ē-bis-ē-bitis

-ā-bit-ā-bunthe she itthey-ē-bit-ē-bunt

 

Afterward, as we walked off to the city, Latinitas shared a little more information about the playwright Terence.

“Terence’s life ran between extremes of good luck and bad luck. His homeland was north Africa, outside of Carthage. He was enslaved at some point early in his life, but he learned Greek and Latin while young, and ended up in the household of a Roman senator, Publius Terentius Lucanus, who freed him and gave him his Roman name, Terentius. Freed slaves acquired their nōmen from their former masters; the last of his three names – Afer, African – reflects his birth in Africa. His plays were such a success that he became very wealthy, and was friends with the most powerful Romans of his day. But he disappeared without a trace while taking a vacation in Greece; people speculated that the ship he was sailing on went down in a storm.”

Did he?

 

“Sorry, dear, I can’t reveal lost truths like that. But I can tell you he was only 25 years old when he died.”

“His luck with his audiences was just as mixed. At the debut of the Hecyra, the Mother-in-Law, the entire audience left the stands so they could watch a performance of boxers and tightrope walkers. At the play’s second performance, a crowd leaving a gladiator show rampaged through the theater and caused the production to be shut down. On the other hand, his play the Eunuch proved to be so successful in its debut performance that the audience demanded it be performed again immediately, all the way through.”

“A thousand years later, his plays were among the most popular pieces of Latin literature in European monasteries, where they were studied and performed by monks and nuns. Later they set the pattern for the whole genre of domestic drama and situation comedy. It is, if you think about it, a rather remarkable achievement for someone who was a slave as a teenager and died when he was young.”

And with that Latinitas snapped her fingers (crepitābat digitīs), and I was back in my apartment, with notebook in hand, wondering why I had not heard Terence’s name before.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

7.

Mosaic showing theatrical masks for a fēmina et vir, a woman and a man. Second-century CE.

 

 

 

8. Map of the Seven Hills of Rome and other important features. A ‘hill’ in Latin is called a

collis, while a ‘mountain’ is called a mōns. What are the Latin words for ‘field’, ‘island’, and ‘wall’?