Latin/1st Declension Lesson 4

Salvēte omnēs! Welcome to Latin for Wikiversity, especially if this is your first visit. Please feel free to see them in sequential order linked on the right. Note that each section listed has a number of lessons, navigate to the next one each time from the foot of the page.

New Grammar
This week we are ready to introduce the dative case for 1st declension nouns (and adjectives). There are 5 cases in common use in Latin, and now we will know all 5, but just for this declension – there are still 4 more declensions to learn!

The dative case is used for indirect objects, and for the objects of a few specific verbs. This is a complicated concept for some English speakers, so take a look at this sentence:

“The boy gives the girl a gift.”

(It could also be expressed with the same meaning using a prepositional phrase, “The boy gives a gift to the girl”, but in Latin there is no distinction). In this sentence, “the girl” is the indirect object, “a gift” is the direct object.

The indirect object receives whatever is named in the direct object, and must be put in the dative case in Latin. Often the dative case is remembered as the case expressing “to/for”, but you need to be careful. It is NOT the case that we use to say “We go to Rome” or “I am voting for you.” If you remember that “dative” comes from the Latin word for “give” it may help.

Since the easiest use of the dative case is with the verb “to give,” let’s learn its conjugation in present tense:

Practice
This will be our last lesson specifically dealing with the 1st declension for now. Next time we’ll start exploring the 2nd declension, home of masculine and neuter nouns. We’ll go slowly through it just like we did through the 1st. We hope you all are enjoying these Latin lessons as much as we enjoy writing them!