Chapter 15
Now it’s time to look at how the Romans dealt with numbers. In Latin, as in all languages, there are two types of numbers: Ordinal and Cardinal. The term ordinal comes from the Latin ordo ordinis which means to rank. These numbers do exactly what the term implies, it ranks data. An example of an ordinal number is “first” or “second”; “third” or “fourth”. These numbers are adjectives. And they use the endings of the first and second declension. An example of these are: primus a um, secundus a um, tertius a um.
The second group of numbers are called cardinal numbers. Cardinal comes from the Latin cardo cardinis which means to hinge or pivot. These are the pivotal numbers. An example of these numbers in English are: one, two, three etc. In Latin these numbers are primarily indeclinable. Only the numbers one, two, three and a thousand are declinable.
One
M F N
Nom usus una unum
Gen: unius unius unius
Dat: uni uni uni
Acc: unum unam unum
Abl: uno una uno
Two
M F N
Nom: duo duae duo
Gen: duorum duarum duorum
Dat: duobus duabus duobus
Acc: duos duas duos
Abl duobus duabus duobus
Three
M F N
Nom: tres tres tria
Gen: trium trium trium
Dat: tribus tribus tribus
Acc: tres tres tria
Abl: tribus tribus tribus
A thousand
M F N
Nom: mille mille milia
Gen: mille mille milium
Dat: mille mille milibus
Acc: mille mille milia
Abl: mille mille milibus
Genitive of the Whole
Since we are still dealing with numbers, let’s examine how the Romans dealt with concepts of the whole or part of a whole. E.G. (whole) None of my friends. (part of a whole) Part of my friends. The Romans would use the Genitive to express such an idea. E.G. Nemo amicorum meorum. Pars amicorum meorum.
This genitive is also know as a partitive genitive.
More on numbers:
When we use the Latin word mille (1000 or thousand) we will use a partitive genitive to express the number of people.
Five thousand men. Quinque milia virorum. Virorum is the partitive genitive. What we are literally saying is five thousand of the men.
With other cardinal numbers, we will use either “ex” or
“de” and the ablative case. This construction will be found with
either preposition.
E.G. five of them quinque ex eis (literally) five from them
One hundred of our men Centum ex viris nostris
Ablative of time
.
Whenever the Romans wanted to express time in Latin, they would simply take
the phrase which expressed the time, and put it in the ablative case. In English,
it will usually be expressed as a prepositional phrase.
At that time eo tempore
During the summer Aestate
In the winter hieme
In good years bonis annis
In a few hours paucis horis
Now let’s look at our workbook and see how we can apply this information.