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- Topic: Latin >
- "Vos amamus."
9 Comments
You should have to distinguish between singular and plural "you."
"We love you (pl.)" or "We love you all" should be accepted.
Well since they're using "vos," you know they mean the plural and in english (regrettably) "you" can be singular or plural. Regardless, there are time when they should distinguish the quanity of the noun but i don't see why that's necessary in this example.
People familiar with Latin will know know they mean the plural. But because that distinction is not clear in English, learners can become confused and lose the distinction in Latin (a very fundamental one) because it doesn't exist in English.
Most text books I've used and taught from demand some distinction in translation, and I think that's the right way to go.
19
Is this word order common in Classical Latin, and is "Amamus vos" acceptable or better? From what I know unstressed object pronouns never start a sentence in Vulgar Latin.
From what I've taken before Duolingo, this is the standard word order for Classical Latin - i.e. normally all the other words in the sentence come before an action verb [linking verbs usually go between the subject (nominative case) and object (accusative case) as in English].
In answer to your second question, Latin word order is pretty flexible, so I don't think it's incorrect, per se; however it is more common (and consequently probably preferable) to put the action verb at the end of the sentence.
I'm not familiar with vulgar Latin, but these differences just go to show how much a language can change:)
- 1579
Can somebody explain to me why "we love" (without object) is an incorrect translation, or/and what would be the correct latin translation of "we love"?
- 2087
Because "vos" refers to "you" (plural), not "we." Since the verb conjugation indicates that the subject is "we," "vos" must be the object: "We love you."
"We love" would be simply "Amamus," or, with the subject included (for emphasis), "Nos amamus."
