[A sample of the book available at Amazon.com]
Ablative Phrasebook: Mastering Latin’s Most Interesting Case
Claude Pavur
© 2014 Claude Pavur: this ebook
which includes original material,
revisions of parts of
Allen and Greenough’s New Latin Grammar (1903), and some material adapted from the author’s webpages
at the Latin Teaching Materials website.
Partial Contents [sample] Prefatory Note for Teachers and Students ...... 4 Part I: Understanding Cases, Declensions, and Ablative Forms ...... 6 The Ideas of Case and Declension ...... 6 Finding the Base to Which the Endings Are Added...... 7 The Ablative Case ...... 9 Ablative Forms ...... 10 Synopsis of All Ablative Singular Forms...... 10 Synopsis of All Ablative Plural Forms ...... 10 Summary of Ablative Case-Endings (Singular / Plural) ...... 10 The Ablative Absolute ...... 12 Famous Latin Ablative Absolutes ...... 13 Part II : AG Ablative Examples with Translations ...... 15 Overview: Ablative Usage from the AG Latin Grammar ...... 15 I. Ablative Proper (from) (Separative) ...... 17 I. 1. Of Separation, Privation, and Want (§ 400) ...... 17 I. 2. Of Source and Material (participles of origin etc.) (§ 403) ...... 20 Part III: Examples of Ablative Usage in Caesar’s De Bello Gallico III ...... 23
Prefatory Note for Teachers and Students
There is no way around the ablative case if you want to understand Latin. It is practically everywhere. Mastering the ablative early will give you a decisive advantage and make Latin a far more enjoyable experience. Of course, to understand the ablative case is necessarily to understand the idea of case and declension as well. This book offers you a very focused and practical way to accomplish this, especially by gathering over 600 translated examples of ablative phrases. As you use this book, you will pick up much more understanding of the Latin language than you now suspect.
In brief, for those who are unfamiliar with the terminology: The ablative “case” (that is, form) of a word expresses a variety of meanings. For example, haec nox means “this night” (as a subject of a sentence); in the ablative case, this phrase takes the form hâc nocte, and it can mean “on this night.” The ablative typically follows certain prepositions, as in the phrase magna cum laude (“with great merit”) or as in ex post facto (“on the basis of what was done later”). The most common ablative that we use in English now is probably the one found at the start of memos: re means “in the matter of” (the ablative of res, matter). Another one-word ablative expression has become quite standard in itineraries: via (viâ, by way of). Not long ago, the ablative designation A.D. (anno Domini, in the year of the Lord) was generally used to indicate dates of the Common Era. And in sixteenth-century Europe, a reformation was forged with the help of the ablative phrase sôlâ fide (by faith alone). Since there is no single way to translate ablatives, you have to get a feeling for the way the ablative case is used in context and make a judgment about its likely meaning.
***
We learn languages best by attending to, remembering, and appropriately imitating examples of communication. This example-book includes two bilingual treasuries of ablative phrases that can supply any introductory or more advanced courses with material for supplementary and diagnostic exercises. As with all phrasebooks, mastery of these smaller units of communication best precedes more ambitious attempts in reading or in prose-composition.
Part I first explains the ideas of case and declension and then it presents the ablative case-forms across all the declensions. It is far easier to master such forms by “dividing and conquering” this way: take up the ablative as a separate object of study until you feel quite comfortable with it. Since there are only five major case-forms, mastering this one will move you well along toward expertise on Latin nouns.
The first treasury of examples (Part II) extracts more than 400 items from Allen and Greenough’s Latin grammar (hereafter, AG) to help you consider ablative usage without a great deal of explanatory material. It is not that the grammatical explanations are not valuable. In fact they are often important and necessary for clarification. But they can frequently distract you from the supremely important practice of comprehension, or even divert you to a level of abstraction that exercises an area of the understanding rather different from that by which linguistic fluency is achieved. For those who wish to consult the AG explanatory material from which the examples come, the reference-numbers are kept in the text here. But the most important thing will be studying the instances that best develop a feeling for ablative usage. The second treasury of examples (Part III) provides some examples of ablative usage from the third book of Caesar’s Gallic Wars (De Bello Gallico). It is only by seeing many examples and repeatedly getting the meanings that you will begin to experience confidence and fluency in Latin.
This book supports a phrase-based approach to Latin pedagogy. Phrases are basic in the learning of any language: we cannot get very far if we stress the learning lists of single words. We need to see items again and again in manageable contexts and develop an ability to interpret the language appropriately in “chunks.” You can know the English words “hold” and “up,” but you need to familiarize yourself with how these can be combined to produce different meanings:
hold up (= delay) traffic hold up (= rob) a bank hold up (= raise) your hand hold up (= endure) under pressure hold up (= support) the ceiling.
Hold up! (= “Wait!”)
Note: (1) Not all the examples included here involve ablative-forms exclusively: sometimes AG mentions or contrasts other uses, which it seems helpful to keep in this presentation. (2) As in most Latin texts, the long vowels are not usually marked. (3) This book does not present all the ablative uses with prepositions: for these, see Latin Prepositions: A Handbook for Teachers and Students
(2013).
Claude Pavur
Saint Louis
January 5, 2014
Part I: Understanding Cases, Declensions, and Ablative Forms
The Ideas of Case and Declension
A case or case-form is a form of a noun, pronoun, or adjective that reveals how that word may be used in a sentence. “He” and
“she” are in a different case from “him” and “her.” English uses the first pair as subjects in sentences, and the second as objects.
Doing the reverse makes a statement ungrammatical: it would be wrong to say “Him likes she” if you mean “He likes her.” In
English, the possessive case changes “he” and “she” to “his” and “her.”
So if you are asked about the case of a word, you are often being asked about something that involves a form of that word. But what may confuse you is that “case” can often refer to the more general idea behind the particular form. The “subjective case” is a category: the idea of “the set of forms that can be used as subjects.” In this sense, case can refer to this grammatical idea. So you can say, “The word he is in the subjective case; the word him is in the objective case.” (That is, they belongs to these grammatical categories of subject-forms and object-forms.) The question “What case is the word him?” means “Into what case-category do we put the form him?” Answer: the objective case. We needed these categories to be able to talk about changes in words as they are used differently in sentences. People do not need to understand such categories to be able to understand or speak the language.
Language-learners usually learn to speak merely by imitating the usages familiar to them from what they always hear.
Latin calls the subjective case the nominative case and the objective case the accusative case. The possessive case (“his” and
“her”) parallels the genitive case in Latin. Latin also has a case named after the recipient of an act of giving: the dative case. It has yet another case called the ablative, which will be explained below.
English does not have case endings for most nouns, except for those using possessive apostrophes (“Sam’s goal” / “the students’ hopes” / “the children’s playroom”), but practically all nouns in Latin have endings for these five cases (and sometimes for a locative case as well, one that indicates location or “place where”: Romae = “at Rome”).
Languages typically change the form of a word to indicate number as well: that is, whether it is singular or plural. But number is not case. The singular objective case for he is him; the plural objective case is them. The singular objective case for she is her; the plural objective case is also them.
The Latin case-endings across all the cases and numbers fall into a few predictable “sets” of endings called declensions. There are five major declensions in Latin and also one that is used for certain pronouns and adjectives like hic (“this”) and ille (“that”). These declensions are essentially “categories” or “boxes” in which we find words that use the same endings for all the words in a given case, so for a practical shorthand understanding you can say that “declension” means “a box of endings” or a “template” according to which the various forms of the word can be predicted or recognized. Or you can talk about the declension of a word to mean the particular box from which that word will take its endings: tempus (time) is a “third-declension noun”: it follows the pattern of all similar third-declension nouns (like corpus [body] or genus [kind] or nomen [name] or lumen [light]), and it takes its endings from the common stock that all similar third-declension nouns share in that box. Thus, all the genitive singulars for these words take the same ending, the –is genitive singular ending for the third declension: temporis = of the time / corporis = of the body / generis = of the kind / nominis = of the name / luminis = of the light.
Typically all the words in a particular declension take only the endings in that particular box. There are a few “mixed” declension words (like domus, house), or words that might be used in more than a single declension (like vesper, evening). But the rule is that words only draw their endings from a single declensional box or template. A second-declension noun cannot dip into the third declension or vice-versa.
Grammars usually designate the major declension as first, second, third, fourth, and fifth. The sixth one does not have a standard designation. It could easily be called the “sixth declension,” except that it does not have nouns, but only certain pronouns and adjectives (hic, ille, ipse, unus, neuter, totus, and so on). Or it might be known as “the ius-genitive declension” after the typical ius- ending in the genitive singular. For the ablative case, this sixth declension usually parallels the first and second ones in its endings; it will not occupy us here.
Remember that declensions are a matter only of nouns, pronouns, and most adjectives that modify nouns or pronouns or stand for them. There are very few ending-changes for nouns compared with verbs, typically ten: the five singulars and the five plurals that correspond to the five major cases (nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, and ablatives).
Finding the Base to Which the Endings Are Added
The cases, that is, the various case-forms of the word, are usually built on an unchanging base, typically found by removing the genitive singular ending. Most Latin texts give the noun and its genitive singular ending to indicate its declension, and they often add the gender (m for masculine, f for feminine, and n for neuter). For example, the word for “wave” is given as
unda, -ae (f).
This means the nominative singular (that is, its subject form, or how it looks when it is the subject of a sentence) is unda; its genitive singular (possessive) form is undae; and it is feminine (f) in gender.
Remember: The genitive singular ending indicates the declension.
-ae in the genitive singular = first declension (familia, -ae, household)
-î in the genitive singular = second declension (numerus, -î, number)
-is in the genitive singular = third declension (mater, matris, mother)
-ûs in the genitive singular = fourth declension (sensus, -ûs, feeling)
-î (following an e) in the genitive singular = fifth declension (dies, diêî, day)
Remove the genitive ending to see the bases onto which you can put the other endings needed for the other cases.
Finding the Bases for the First Declension : remove the –ae.
* rosa, rosae (rose) : base is ros-
* puella, puellae (girl) : base is puell-
* regina, reginae (queen) : base is regin-
Finding the Bases for the Second Declension : remove the –î.
* numerus, numeri (number) : base is numer-
* puer, pueri (boy) : base is puer-
* vir, viri (man) : base is vir-
* liber, libri (book) : base is libr-
* lîber, lîberi (free man) : base is lîber-
Finding the Bases for the Third Declension: remove the –is.
* rex, regis (king) : base is reg-
* civitas, civitatis (state, city, city-state, citizenship) : base is civitat-
* tempus, temporis (time) : base is tempor-
Finding the Bases for the Fourth Declension: remove the –ûs.
* exercitus, exercitûs (army) : base is exercit-
* manus, manûs (hand) : base is man-
Finding the Bases for the Fifth Declension: remove the –î.
* dies, diêî (good faith) : base is diê-
* res, reî (matter, event, issue, thing) : base is re-
Note: “First declension” does not mean “feminine gender” but rather “a set of declensional endings (-a for nominative singular / -ae for genitive singular / -ae for dative singular, and so forth).” However it also the model for the feminine forms of the -us / -a / -um adjectives like bonus or novus, so that students can easily begin to believe that the first declension must imply the feminine gender.
The Ablative Case
This book studies one particular case-form, the ablative, in its singular and plural varieties. It can be called the “by-with-from” case, or the “adverbial case,” or the “prepositional case,” but these names do not accurately capture all of its uses. You will learn those by studying examples such as those given in this book. If you want to call for or represent the ablative case, for simplicity’s sake you can verbally abbreviate the ablative by using the simple word by (meaning “by means of” or “through the agency of”): viâ = by way of / gladiô = by the sword / pane = by bread / solâ fidê = by faith alone. (But remember that with persons the preposition a or ab is usually included to indicate the agent, the one by whom something is done: a rege = by the king / a reginâ = by the queen.)
Ablative Forms
The important thing now is to isolate and focus on the ablative case forms so that you will recognize them when they occur.
In the singular, the ablative is usually a long open vowel (-â / -ô / -î / -û / -ê ) and sometimes a short -e. (Some “i-stem” neuter nouns and the typical third declension adjectives end in -î for the ablative singular.)
Synopsis of All Ablative Singular Forms
First Declension Ablative Singulars : rosâ (“by the rose”) / puellâ (“by the girl”) / reginâ (“by the queen”)
Second Declension Ablative Singulars: numerô / puerô / virô / librô / lîberô
Third Declension Ablative Singulars: rege / civitate / tempore
[Some Third Declension neuter nouns take -î (like exemplarî, example); so do typical third declension adjectives (like omnî, every);
Fourth Declension Ablative Singulars: exercitû / manû
Fifth Declension Ablative Singulars: diê / rê
In the plural, the ablative endings are just like the dative plural endings: -îs (Declensions 1 and 2) or -bus (Declensions 3, 4, 5). So by knowing these, you also know the dative case plural endings as well. Context will usually tell you whether the word is a dative or an ablative.
Synopsis of All Ablative Plural Forms
First Declension Ablative Plurals: rosîs / puellîs / reginîs
Second Declension Ablative Plurals: numerîs / puerîs / virîs / librîs / lîberîs
Third Declension Ablative Plurals: regibus / civitatibus / temporibus
Fourth Declension Ablative Plurals: exercitibus / manibus
Fifth Declension Ablative Plurals: fidêbus / rêbus
Summary of Ablative Case-Endings (Singular / Plural)
First Declension: -â / -îs
Second Declension: -ô / -îs
Third Declension: -e or -î / -ibus
Fourth Declension: -û / -ibus
Fifth Declension: -ê / -(e)bus
Now we turn from the forms (the “morphology”) to examples of usage of the ablative. Note that some examples from the grammar show different ways of expressing an idea that sometimes uses an ablative, so that not every example given here employs an ablative case. See the original grammar for the full explanation of any given example.
The Ablative Absolute
A word needs to be said about a very common use of the ablative in Latin, in phrases known as ablative absolutes.
The Latin word absolutus means detached, set off, or loosened. Ablative absolutes are Latin phrases based on a word in the ablative case and in a way “detached” or “set off” or “loosened from” the rest of the sentence. This means that these words do not grammatically interrelate very closely with the other words of the sentence. They have a certain independence.
Ablative absolutes usually consist of a noun and an adjective. The adjective is often a form coming from a verb, that is a participle,
(in the present tense like running, finishing, seeing or in the past like done, finished, seen). The noun is usually not mentioned at all in the sentence’s main clause.
The ablative absolute is a grammatical structure easily learned by examples. English does not have the ablative case, but it does have a structure called the “nominative absolute” that is similar to the ablative absolute. Here are some examples of phrases that are used “absolutely” in English. The underlined phrases parallel the Latin ablative absolute construction.
1. Weather permitting, we will have the picnic there.
2. God willing (Latin: Deo volente) their freedom will be preserved.
3. All things considered, you are not a bad Latinist.
4. You owe me ten dollars, tax included.
5. Dishes done, she prepared to leave for her engagement that night.
6. They broke through the swinging doors of the saloon, guns a-blazing.
7. He stood there, arms akimbo.
8. Time permitting, we will have a contest at the end of class.
9. They had an all-out fight, no holds barred.
10. Tears running down her cheeks, she finally admitted she could never stop studying Latin.
11. The replacement will be sent next week, no cost to you.
12. Your money will be refunded, no questions asked.
The following sentence does not include an absolute phrase:
* Run ragged by the heavy schedule, they dropped out.
Here the phrase Run ragged modifies the word they. Adjectival phrases modifying a word in the sentence are not “absolute.”
Compare these two sentences:
(1) Fully loaded, the plane took off.
The word loaded describes the plane. The phrase is not absolute, but in Latin, it would have to link with the main clause because the adjective loaded would have to take the same gender, number, and case as the word plane.
(2) The cargo fully loaded, the plane took off.
Cargo loaded is “detached” and loaded modifies only a word within its own phrase. This phrase is therefore an absolute. It could have been expressed as a clause: “When the cargo had been fully loaded…”
Famous Latin Ablative Absolutes mutatis mutandis
* with the things that need to be changed (mutandis) having been changed (mutatis)
ceteris paribus
* with the other things being equal
his dictis
* these things having been said (after these things had been said)
vice versa
* with the alternation turned around to its opposite, reversely
lite pendente
* with the lawsuit pending
Cn. Pompeio et M. Crasso consulibus
* [or the names of any two consuls, to designate a particular year in Roman history]: in the year of the consulate of Gnaeus
Pompeius and Marcus Crassus (= “with Gnaeus Pompeius and Marcus Crassus being the consuls”) Here two nouns are enough to fashion an ablative absolute: the idea of “being” is understood : “these people (being) the consuls.”
Note: Ablative absolutes can be translated in different ways depending on the context. The reader has to interpret what meaning is likely intended and the translator has to pick what best fits English style. The phrase signo dato means “the signal having been given” but in context it might be better translated as “when the signal had been given” or “at the sound of the signal” or “after the signal was given.”
Part II : AG Ablative Examples with Translations
Overview: Ablative Usage from the AG Latin Grammar
[The symbol § indicates the AG sections; the last numbers in each line indicate the examples extracted below.]
I. Ablative Proper (from) (Separative)
I. 1. Of Separation, Privation, and Want (§ 400): 1-28
I. 2. Of Source and Material (participles of origin etc.) (§ 403): 29-57
I. 3. Of Cause (laboro, exsilio, etc.) (§ 404) : 58-80
I. 4. Of Agent (with ab after Passives) (§ 405): 81-95
I. 5. Of Comparison (than) (§ 406). 96-121
II. Instrumental Ablative (with)
II. 1. Of Means or Instrument (§ 408 ff.): 122-137
II. 2. Of Object of the Deponents utor etc. (§ 410): 138-146
II. 3. With opus and usus (§ 411): 147-155
II. 4. Of Accompaniment (with cum) (§ 413): 156-177
II. 5. Of Degree of Difference (§ 414): 178-189
II. 6. Of Quality (with Adjectives) (§ 415): 190-197
II. 7. Of Price and Exchange (§ 416): 198-215
II. 8. Of Specification (§ 418): 216-234
II. 9. Ablative Absolute (§ 419): 235-264
III. Locative Ablative (in, on, at) (§ 421ff.)
III. 1. Of Place where (commonly with in) (§ 421)
III. 2. Of Time and Circumstance (§ 423): 265-297
III. 3. Extent of Space (§ 425): 298-304
III.4. Relations of Place (§ 426): 305-434
I. Ablative Proper (from) (Separative)
I. 1. Of Separation, Privation, and Want (§ 400)
1. liberare metu
* to deliver from fear.
2. excultus doctrina
* trained in learning.
3. hoc ipso tempore
* at this very time.
4. caecus avaritia
* blind with avarice.
5. occisus gladio
* slain by the sword.
6. oculis se privavit (Cicero De Finibus 5.87)
* he deprived himself of eyes.
7. omni Gallia Romanis interdicit (Caesar Gallic Wars 1.46)
* he (Ariovistus) bars the Romans from the whole of Gaul.
8. ei aqua et igni interdicitur (Velleius Paterculus 2.45)
* he is debarred the use of fire and water. [The regular formula of banishment.]
9. voluptatibus carere (Cicero Cato Maior De Senectute 7)
* to lack enjoyments.
10. non egeo medicina (Cicero Laelius De Amicitia 10)
* I am in need of no medicine.
11. levamur superstitione, liberamur mortis metu (Cicero De Finibus 1.63),
* we are relieved from superstition, we are freed from fear of death.
12. soluti a cupiditatibus (Cicero De Lege Agraria 1.27)
* freed from desires.
13. multos ex his incommodis pecunia se liberasse (Cicero Verrine Orations 5.23)
* that many have freed themselves by money from these inconveniences.
14. conatu desistere (Caesar Gallic Wars 1.8)
* to desist from the attempt.
15. desine communibus locis (Cicero Academica 2.80)
* quit commonplaces.
16. abire magistratu
* to leave one’s office.
17. abstinere iniuria
* to refrain from wrong.
18. a proposito aberrare (Cicero De Finibus 5.83)
* to wander from the point.
19. de provincia decedere (Cicero Verrine Orations 2.48)
* to withdraw from one’s province.
20. ab iure abire (same, 2.114)
* to go outside of the law.
21a. ex civitate excessere (Caesar Gallic Wars 6.8)
* they departed from the state. [But compare
21b. finibus suis excesserant (same, 4.18)
* they had left their own territory.]
22. a magno demissum nomen Iulo; (Vergil Aeneid 1.288)
* a name descended (sent down) from great Iulus.
23. urbs nuda praesidio (Cicero Letters to Atticus 7.13)
* the city naked of defence.
24. immunis militia (Livy 1.43)
* free of military service.
25. plebs orba tribunis (De Legibus 3.9)
* the people deprived of tribunes.
26. a culpa vacuus (Sallust Catilina 14)
* free from blame.
27. liberi a deliciis (Cicero De Lege Agraria 1.27)
* free from luxuries.
28. Messana ab his rebus vacua atque nuda est (Cicero Verrine Orations 4.3)
* Messana is empty and bare of these things.
I. 2. Of Source and Material (participles of origin etc.) (§ 403)
29. Rhenus oritur ex Lepontiis (Caesar Gallic Wars 4.10)
* the Rhine rises in (from) the country of the Lepontii.
30. ab his sermo oritur (Cicero Laelius De Amicitia 5)
* the conversation is begun by (arises from) them.
31. cuius rationis vim atque utilitatem ex illo caelesti Epicuri volumine accepimus (Cicero Natura Deorum 1.43)
* of this reasoning we have learned the power and advantage from that divine book of Epicurus.
32. suavitatem odorum qui afflarentur e floribus (Cicero Cato Maior De Senectute 59)
* the sweetness of the odors which breathed from the flowers.
33. Rhenus oritur ex Lepontiis (Caesar Gallic Wars 4.10)
* the Rhine rises in (from) the country of the Lepontii.
34. ab his sermo oritur (Cicero Laelius De Amicitia 5)
* the conversation is begun by (arises from) them.
35. cuius rationis vim atque utilitatem ex illo caelesti Epicuri volumine accepimus (Cicero Natura Deorum 1.43)
* of this reasoning we have learned the power and advantage from that divine book of Epicurus.
36. suavitatem odorum qui afflarentur e floribus (Cicero Cato Maior De Senectute 59)
* the sweetness of the odors which breathed from the flowers.
37. erat totus ex fraude et mendacio factus (Cicero Pro Cluentio 72),
* he was entirely made up of fraud and falsehood.
38. valvas magnificentiores, ex auro atque ebore perfectiores (Cicero Verrine Orations 4.124),
* more splendid doors, more finely wrought of gold and ivory.
39. factum de cautibus antrum (Ovid Metamorphoses 1.575)
* a cave formed of rocks.
40. templum de marmore ponam (Vergil Georgics 3.13)
* I’ll build a temple of marble.
41. Iove natus et Maia (Cicero Natura Deorum 3.56)
* son of Jupiter and Maia.
42. edite regibus (Horace Odes 1.1.1)
* descendant of kings (edite is in the vocative: “you who are sprung from…”).
43. quo sanguine cretus (Vergil Aeneid 2.74)
* born of what blood.
44. genitae Pandione (Ovid Metamorphoses 6.666)
* daughters of Pandion.
45. ex me hic natus non est sed ex fratre meo; (Terence Adelphi 40),
* this is not my son, but my brother’s (not born from me, etc.).
46. cum ex utraque [uxore] filius natus esset (Cicero De Oratore 1.183)
* each wife having had a son (when a son had been born of each wife).
47. Belus et omnes a Belo (Vergil Aeneid 1.730)
* Belus and all his descendants.
48. desideravit C. Fleginatem Placentia, A. Granium Puteolis (Caesar Civil Wars 3.71),
* he lost Caius Fleginas of Placentia, Aulus Granius of Puteoli.
49. Q. Verrem Romilia (Cicero Verrine Orations 1.23)
* Quintus Verres of the Romilian tribe.
50. domus amoenitas non aedificio sed silva constabat (Nepos Atticus 13),
* the charm of the house consisted not in the buildings but in the woods.
51. ex animo constamus et corpore (Cicero De Finibus 4.19)
* we consist of soul and body.
52. vita corpore et spiritu continetur (Cicero Pro Marcello 28)
* life consists of body and spirit
53. quid hoc homine faciatis (Cicero Verrine Orations 2.1.42),
* what are you going to do with this man?
54. quid Tulliola mea fiet (Cicero Letters to Family and Friends 14.4.3)
* what will become of my dear Tullia ?
55. quid te futurum est (Cicero Verrine Orations 2.155)
* what will become of you?
56. non pauca pocula ex auro (Cicero Verrine Orations 4.62),
* not a few cups of gold.
57. scopulis pendentibus antrum (Vergil Aeneid 1.166)
* a cave of hanging rocks.
Part III: Examples of Ablative Usage in Caesar’s De Bello Gallico III
1. uti in his locis legionem hiemandi causa conlocaret
*
to station the legion in these places for the purpose of wintering
2. secundis aliquot proeliis factis castellisque compluribus eorum expugnatis
*
after successfully conducting some battles and capturing quite a few of their strongholds
3. missis ad eum undique legatis obsidibusque datis et pace facta
*
after a delegation had been sent to him from all the regions, hostages given, and a peace agreement made
4. qui vicus positus in valle non magna adiecta planitie
*
and this village set in a valley with not a very large plain adjoining it
5. altissimis montibus undique continetur
*
it is surrounded on all sides by very high mountains
6. Eum locum vallo fossaque munivit
*
he fortified that spot with a rampart and ditch
7. omnes noctu discessisse
*
that all had left at night
8. detractis cohortibus duabus
*
after two cohorts had been detached
9. compluribus singillatim, qui commeatus petendi causa missi erant, absentibus
*
several particular individuals who had been sent to look for provisions being absent,
10. Accedebat quod suos ab se liberos abstractos obsidum nomine dolebant,
*
It also happened that they were in grief over the fact that their children had been removed from them as designated hostages
(“under the name of hostages”)
11. non solum itinerum causa sed etiam perpetuae possessionis
*
not only for the sake of passage (“journeys”) but also to hold it as a lasting possession
12. His nuntiis acceptis
*
When this news had come in
13. deditione facta obsidibusque acceptis
*
after the surrender had been made and hostages received
14. consilio celeriter convocato
*
swiftly convening a council
15. iam omnia fere superiora loca multitudine armatorum completa conspicerentur
*
already almost all the elevated places were seen to have been packed with a crowd of armed men
[End of the sample of the book available at Amazon.com.]