Latin/Prepositions

Salvēte omnēs! Welcome back to Latin for Wikiversity. Here you can peruse a new lesson in Latin, in a simple format. If you would like to catch up, you can find a directory of lessons, a classified vocabulary list, and Memrise courses at the links on the right.

New grammar
Prepositions in Latin must be used with one of two cases; the accusative or the ablative. Most prepositions “govern” only one case, a few such as “in” can take either, but with a change of meaning. “In” with the accusative means into, onto, against... it has the idea of forward motion, whereas “in” with the ablative denotes simply position, in or on. “Sub” can also take both cases. It’s also helpful to remember that expressions that in English require a prepositional phrase may be handled in Latin with no preposition. For example, the dative case is used to show indirect objects, or “to/for” expressions, and the ablative case is used to express means, manner, place, or time, and frequently without a preposition. We’ll explore ablative uses more in a future lesson. Following is a list of prepositions for this lesson, with the new ones in bold.

Practice
Thank you once more for following along with these lessons. In the near future we’ll cover time and numbers. Bonam fortūnam omnibus vōbīs!