Delphi Complete Works of Varro

by Marcus Terentius Varro

32. Likewise there are four categories of inflections which have tenses without persons: in the interrogative, as foditurne ’is digging going on? seriturne ’is sowing going on?’ and fodieturne ‘will digging be done?’, sereturne ‘will sowing be done?’; of the category for the answer the same forms are used, but without the last syllable ne; the category for the wish, as vivatur ‘may there be living,’ ametur ‘may there be loving,’ viveretur ‘would there were living,’ amaretur ‘would there were loving.’ Whether the inflections for the impersonal command exist, is somewhat doubtful; there is also doubt about the scheme of the forms, which is given as paretur ‘let there be preparation,’ pugnetur ‘let there be righting,’ or parator, pugnator.

  33. There are added to these categories those which proceed from the four sets of pairs consisting of the divisions: from that of the incomplete and the completed, as emo ‘I buy’ and edo ‘I eat,’ emi ‘I have bought’ and edi ‘I have eaten’; from that of the act done once and the act done more often, as scribo ‘I write’ and lego ‘I read,’ scriptito ‘I am busy with writing,’ and lectito ‘I read and reread’; from that of active and passive, as uro ‘I burn’ and ungo ‘I anoint,’ uror ‘I am burned’ and ungor ‘I am anointed’; from that of singular and plural, as laudo ‘I praise’ and culpo ‘I blame,’ laudamus ‘we praise’ and culpamus ‘we blame.’ With regard to the words of this class whose categories I have described, the matter of how full an equipment of forms each has, and what sort of forms it makes, will be set forth with more attention to detail in the books which are to be on the paradigms of verbs.

  34. The words of the third subdivision, which are inflected with tenses and cases and are by many therefore called participials, are of this kind...

  here three leaves are lacking in the model copy 35.... When we meet a new word, we ask about its case-forms, as to how we shall inflect them; and yet if some poet has made up some word and has himself formed from it some case-form in an incorrect way, we blame him rather than follow his example. Therefore Ratio or Relation, of which I am speaking, is present in both: in the words which are imposed upon things, and in those which are formed by inflection; and then also there is that third kind of Relation, which combines the characteristics of the two.

  36. Among these, each and every relation, when compared with another, is either like or unlike; and often the words are different but the relation is the same, and sometimes the relation is different but the words are the same. The same relation which is in amor ‘love’ and dative amori is in dolor ‘pain’ and dative dolori, but not in dolor and accusative dolorem. The same relation which is in amor and genitive amoris is in plural amores and genitive amorum; and yet, because the subject-matter in it is not compared as it should be, this relation cannot of itself effect Regularities, on account of the differences in the forms of the spoken word, because a singular word has been associated with a plural. So, when it is by a proportionate likeness that the word has the same relation, then and not until then does this relation achieve what is demanded by Analogia or Regularity; of which I shall speak next.

  37. There follows the third topic: What is Ratio or Relation that is pro portione ‘by proportionate likeness’? This is in Greek called ‘according to logos’; and from analogue the term Analogia or Regularity is derived. If there are two things of the same class which belong to some relation though in some respect unlike each other, and if alongside these two things two other things which have the same relation are placed, then because the two sets of words belong to the same logos each one is said separately to be an analogue and the comparison of the four constitutes an Analogia.

  38. For it is as in a matter of twins: when we say that the one Menaechmus is like the other Menaechmus, we are speaking of one only; but when we say that a likeness is present in them, we are speaking of both. So, when we say that a copper as has the same relation to a half-as as a silver libella has to a half-libella, then we are showing what an analogue is; when we say that both in copper and in silver there is the same relation, then we are speaking of Analogia ‘Regular Relation.’

  39. As sodalis ‘fellow’ and sodalitas ‘fellowship,’ civis ‘citizen’ and civitas ‘citizenship’ are not the same, but both come from the same origin and are connected, so analogue and Analogia are not the same, but are likewise congenitally connected. Therefore, if you take away men, you have taken away the sodales; if you take away the sodales, you have taken away the sodalitas: just so, if you take away the logos or Relation, you have taken away the analogue, and if you have taken this away, you have taken away the Analogia.

  40. Since these are of such close kinship to each other, you must listen with keen understanding rather than wait to be told, that is, when I have said something about either, it will be also of general application to both; you should not wait for me to repeat it in writing in a later part of my work, but you should rather continue to follow up the line of thought.

  41. These phenomena are produced in unlike things, as in numbers, if you compare two with one and so also twenty with ten; for twenty has to ten the same relation which two has to one. It is found also in like things; in coins, for example, one denarius is to one victoriate as a second denarius is to a second victoriate. So likewise in all other things those are said to be in a status of comparative likeness, wherein there is a fourfold nature of such a kind as among children the daughter is to the mother as the son is to the father, and in matters of time the midnight is to the night as the midday is to the day.

  42. The poets make a great use of this kind of relationship in their similes, and the geometricians use it with greatest keenness; in reference to speech, Aristarchus and the grammarians of his school use it with more care than others do, as when acc. amorem and dat. amori, acc. dolorem and dat. dolori are said to be like by comparative likeness, although they see that amorem is unlike amori because it is in another case, and likewise dolorem is unlike dolori; but they say that the four are like, because they come from like words.

  43. Sometimes it has two crossed relationships, in such a way that one is vertical and the other crosswise. What I mean will become clearer by this: Suppose that some numerals are so set down that in the first line there are 1 2 4 in the second line there are 10 20 40 in the third line there are 100 200 400

  In this scheme of numerals there will be two examples of what I have called logos, which make different systems of Regularity: one is the twofold which is in the crosswise lines, because two is to four as one is to two; the other is the tenfold relation in the vertical lines, because ten is to one hundred as one is to ten.

  44. Likewise the inflections of words may go in two directions, because from the nominative case they are inflected into the oblique cases, and from the nominative to the nominative, so that they make a similar scheme; which is in line 1: masc. nom. albus, dat. albo, gen. albi; in line 2: fem. nom. alba, dat. albae, gen. albae; in line 3: neut. nom. album, dat. albo, gen. albi. Therefore by the crosswise inflections there are made from these words systems of Regularity like Albius and Atrius, Albio and Atrio, which to be sure is only a small part of that binary scheme; and by the vertical inflections are made Albius and Atrius, Albia and Atria, which is a part of the tenfold scheme of Regularities of which I have spoken above.

  45. Of that which is called Regularity, there are two kinds. One is disjoined, thus: as one is to two, so ten is to twenty. The other is conjoined, thus: as one is to two, so two is to four. Because in it two is said twice, both when we compare it with one, and then when we compare it with four, 46. this kind also is said to be fourfold by nature. So the cithers, though with seven strings, are none the less said to have two sets of four strings, because just as the sound of the first string stands in a certain relation to that of the fourth, so the fourth stands in the same relation to the seventh; the middle string is the first of the one set and the last of the other. The doctors who watch the seven days when a man is ill, note the symptoms of the illness with greater care on the fourth day, for th
e reason that the relation which the first day had to the fourth, foretells that the day which will be fourth from it, that is, seventh from the first, will bear the same relation to the fourth.

  47. The Regularities are disjoined and fourfold in the cases of nouns, such as rex ‘king,’ dative regi, and lex ‘law,’ dative legi; they are conjoined and threefold in the three tenses of verbs, such as legebam ‘I was reading,’ present lego, future legam, because the relation which legebam has to lego, this same relation lego has to legam. In this, almost all men make a mistake, because they cite these verbs wrongly in the three tenses, when they wish to express them in a proportion.

  48. For since some verbs denote incomplete action, like lego ‘I read’ and legis ‘thou readest,’ and others denote completed action, like legi ‘I have read’ and legisti ‘thou hast read,’ and since in the conjoined form they ought to be connected with others of their own kind and by this principle lego is rightly related to legebam — lego is not rightly related to legi, because legi denotes something completed; so that they are wrong in finding fault with tutudi ‘I have pounded’ and pupugi ‘I have pricked,’ tundo and pungo, tundam and pungam, as well as necatus sum ‘I have been killed’ and verberatus sum ‘I have been beaten,’ necor and verberor, necabor and verberabor, because the tenses of incomplete action are like one another, and those of completed action are like one another. Thus we should say tundebam tundo tundam, and tutuderam tutudi tutudero, and in the same way amabar amor amabor, and amatus eram, amatus sum, amatus ero. Therefore those who speak against the Regularities are unfair in finding fault on the ground that whereas Regularity is fourfold by nature certain words are cited in a different way, in three tense-forms merely.

  49. This seems sometimes to have fewer parts, as I have said; similarly it seems, at other times, to have more parts, as when it is thus: as one and two are to three, so two and four are to six. Yet this form is included in the fourfold type, because sets of two are compared with sets of one. In speech also, this will sometimes be found, thus: As nominative Diomedes is compared with genitive Diomedi and Diomedis, so from nominative Hercules are said the genitive forms Herculi and Herculis.

  50. And as these move away from one starting-point and nominative into two oblique case-forms, so on the other hand from two starting-points of the nominative many words unite in a single oblique case-form. For as from the nominatives Baebiei (masc.) and Baebiae (fem.) comes the dative Baebieis, so from the nominatives Caelii and Caeliae comes Caeliis. From two like words forms are developed in unlike fashion, as happens in nemus ‘grove’ and holus ‘vegetable,’ plural nemora and holera. Others from unlike words are developed in like fashion, as in the articles the accusatives hunc and istunc come from hic ‘this’ and iste ‘that.’

  51. Regularity has its foundations either in the will of men or in the nature of the words, or in both. By will I mean the imposition of the word-names: by nature I mean the inflection of the words, through which passage is made without special instruction. He who starts from the imposition, will say that if dolus ‘guile’ and malus ‘bad’ are alike in the nominative, there will be found in an oblique case dolo and malo. He who starts from the nature of the words, will say that if Marco and Quinto are alike in the oblique cases, there will be nominatives Marcus and Quintus. He who proceeds from both, will say that if there is a likeness, then as the change is in servus ‘slave’ and vocative serve, so also there will be cervus ‘stag’ and vocative cerve. It is a common feature of all, that the four word-forms have their inflectional changes in a proportional relation.

  52. The first kind starts from the likeness in the nominatives, the second from a likeness which is in oblique cases, the third from a likeness which is in the changes from case to case. In the first kind we set out from the imposed name to the nature, in the second we go in the other direction, in the third we go in both directions. Therefore in fact this third can be divided into two parts and called the third and the fourth, because in it the argument can actually go both forward and backward.

  53. He who makes the imposed forms the starting-point for the Regularity, will have to develop the oblique forms from these; he who makes the nature the starting-point, will have to work in the other direction; he who starts from both, will have to make the rest of the inflections from the changes of the same kind. The imposition is in our power, but we are under the control of the nature of the words: for each one imposes the name as he wishes, but he inflects it as its nature requires.

  54. But since a noun is imposed in two ways, either on a singular thing or on a plural — singular like cicer ‘chickpea,’ plural like scalae ‘stairs’ — and there is no doubt that the line of the inflections wherein things which are singular only will be declined, proceeds from some case of the singular, as cicer ciceri ciceris; and likewise that in the line of inflections which is in the plural only, it is proper to begin from some case of the plural, as scalae scalis scalas: another point must be examined, since their connected nature is twofold and two lines of inflections are made, like Mars and Martes, namely from what place the relation of Regularity ought to start, whether from the singular to the plural or vice versa.

  55. For not even if nature does proceed from one to two, should the conclusion be drawn that in teaching the later thing cannot be the clearer, for the purpose of beginning from it, to show what the prior thing is. Therefore even those who deal with the nature of the universe and are on this account called physici ‘natural philosophers,’ proceed from nature as a whole and show by backward reasoning from the later things, what the beginnings of the world were. Though speech consists of letters, it is nevertheless from speech that the grammarians start in order to show the nature of the letters.

  56. Therefore in the explanation, since one ought rather to set out from that which is clearer than from that which is prior, and rather from the un-corrupted than from a corrupt original, from the nature of things rather than from the fancy of men, and since these three factors which are more to be followed are less present in the singulars than in the plurals, one can more easily commence from the plural than from the singular, because in the latter as starting-points there is less of a basis for relationship in the forming of words. That the singular forms of words can be more easily interpreted from plural forms than plural forms from the singular, is shown by these words: plural trabes ‘beams,’ singular trabs; plural duces ‘leaders,’ singular dux.

  57. For we see that from the plural nominatives trabes and duces the letter E of the last syllable has been eliminated and thereby in the singular have been made the nominatives trabs and dux. But on the other hand, if we start from the singulars we do not so easily see how they have become trabs, from B and S, and dux, from C and S.

  58. If the nominative plural is by any chance a corrupted form, which rarely occurs, we shall correct this before we make it our starting-point; it is proper to take from the oblique cases, either singular or plural, some forms which are not ambiguous, from which can be seen the make-up which the other forms ought to have.

  59. For sometimes the one is seen from the other and at other times the other is seen from the one, as Chrysippus writes, as the father’s qualities may be seen from the son, and the son’s from the father, and in arches the right-hand side stands on account of the left-hand side, no less than the left on account of the right. Therefore the oblique forms can sometimes be regained from the nominatives, and sometimes the nominatives from the oblique forms; sometimes the plural from the singular forms, and sometimes the singular forms from the plural.

  60. The principle that we should most of all follow, is that in this the foundation be nature, because in nature there is the easier relationship in inflections. For it is easy to note that error can more easily make its way into those impositions which are mostly made in the nominative singular, because men, being unskilled and scattered, set names on things just as their fancy has impelled them; but nature is of itself for the most part uncorrupted, unless somebody pe
rverts it by ignorant use.

  61. Therefore, if one has founded the principle of Regularity on the natural cases rather than on the imposed case-forms, not many awkwardnesses will be his to face in usage; human fancifulness will be corrected by nature, and not nature by fancy, because those who have wished to follow imposition will in reality act in the opposite way.

  62. But if one should prefer to start from the singular, he ought to start from the sixth case, which is a case peculiar to Latin; for by the differences in the letters of this case-form he will be more easily able to discern the variation in the remaining cases, because the ablative forms end either in A, like terra ‘earth,’ or in E, like lance ‘platter,’ or in I, like clavi ‘key,’ or in O, like caelo ‘sky,’ or in U, like versu ‘verse.’ Therefore, for the explaining of the declensions, there is this way, which may proceed from either of two starting-points.

  63. But where there is Regularity, there are three factors, one which is in the things, a second which is in the spoken words, a third which is in both; the first two are simple, the third is twofold. In view of this, attention must be given to the relation which they have to one another.

  64. First, of the differences which exist in the things, there are some which have no bearing on speech, others which are connected with it. Those which are not connected with it are like those which the artificers observe in making buildings and statues and other things, of which some are called harmonic, and others are called by other names; but no one of these becomes an element in speaking.

  65. The differences which pertain to speech, consist of those things which are expressed by the words in a proportionate way, and yet do not have a likeness of the spoken words also to help in forming the inflections: such as nominative Iupiter and Marspiter, dative Iovi and Marti. For these are like one another in the gender of the nouns, and in the number, and in the cases; because both are nouns, and are masculine, and singular, and nominative and dative in case.