Conditions in Latin

[@duckymomo7935]

Hence why Romance languages invented a whole conditional tense lol

[@gabrielgboucher6546]

French has conditionnal *

[@gabrielgboucher6546]

And subjonctif

[@thomasbraga8397]

@@Thelaretus O futuro do pretérito é basicamente o condicional

[@BerMaster5000]

@@thomasbraga8397 Em Portugal, a Granática chama-lhe "Condicional".

[@tammcd]

Considering that many native English speakers no longer have any idea how to use the subjunctive correctly, I have to hand it to the underlying logic of Latin.

[@Mompellion]

The subjunctive mood in English, at least insofar as it is morphologically marked, is going away in common usage. Using the "correct" subjunctive mood on verbs is usually reserved for a higher register of speech/writing, and it often not taught in schools. The real *meaning* the subjunctive mood provides, namely the ability to discuss events that are not real or certain, is still a feature of English and every other language, but the way we mark it in English is different now than it used to be. The idea that Latin, or any other language, is more "logical" than English because it overtly marks different tenses/moods as suffixes, isn't actually grounded in reality. Notice how English is able to translate any subjunctive Latin phrase, just with auxiliary verbs and past tense morphology instead of dedicated suffixes.

[@pablomunoz3119]

@@Mompellion More clarity, less words = better, ergo, morphologically marked subjunctive > paraphrastic subjunctive.

[@hansbrackhaus8017]

I'm praising the teacher because he taught me well, not the other way around :P

[@williamlangfeldt5026]

If my teacher taught me well I wouldn’t be here...

[@sayarbanerjee1962]

I really wish you made such videos of Attic Greek as well. I had to study that on my own. If I had your videos I would have secured a perfect score in my Intermediate Attic test. I still did reasonably well (87.5%). If only I had a teacher like you ...

[@EpicSelenium34]

Excellent summary! I have a question about the "Past Simple Fact" section of the matrix. In the protasis, you use the verb laudāvī, which is perfect tense. But the way that you use it suggests a habitual action (i.e., I used to praise my teacher). So why doesn't the imperfect laudābam make more sense here? I've always found the imperfect vs. perfect nuance difficult to grasp, so I would greatly appreciate some insight on this.

[@Novumvir]

Imperfect holds true in the present, perfect does not. Hence the name: perfect = completed

[@douglasforaste3078]

Good explanation of translation of the FLV

[@zhennyaslootskin6821]

Dear Ben did you ever make a video on Mixed Conditions? I seem not to be able to find it

[@gjohnson1212]

I missed my professors class where he explained conditional clauses so thank you so much as usual

[@John-qd5of]

I originally got Latin conditionals from Professor Frederick Wheelock, through his famous Latin textbook. But I need to refresh my knowledge.

[@douglasforaste3078]

PROtasis is pronounced with the accENT on the first sylLABle

[@RedOctober_]

wait why aren't there aspects? shouldn't there be 12 cases instead of 6?

[@lucasw158]

These videos are so helpful, especially when translating Caesar who does a lot of this wackyness. Thank you!

[@isaacshultz8128]

I miss latin

[@arielschant9841]

Incredibly well taught! Short and clear. Thank you very much! From an Italian point of view, i can definitely see just how much Latin the Italian language is hahaha

[@TheWarTurkey]

What about combining tenses? Like "If I bought a plane ticket yesterday, then I would fly to Rome tomorrow?"

[@latintutorial]

Yeah, they are called mixed conditions and there are many pages in the grammar books about them! The conditions presented here are just the basic ones.

[@bdunc7244]

My teacher says that future more vivid is future perfect and future perfect,(where does this come from)

[@latintutorial]

Sure. You can have a future perfect in the if clause (the protasis), but the then clause (the apodosis) is in the future, and this counts as a future more vivid. But future - future is the standard one.

[@happygirlmichelle]

Thank you for all the excellent Latin videos! Could you please do a video on an if-then statement where the first verb is in the subjunctive and the second verb is in the imperative? Maybe that doesn't qualify as a conditional statement? I am reading Luke 17:3 and was wanting to understand the grammar of that passage better. In English: If your brother sins against you, reprove him: and if he repents, forgive him. In Latin: Si peccaverit in te frater tuus, increpa illum: et si poenitentiam egerit, dimitte illi. Thank you for any light you can shed on this!

[@Sathrandur]

I could be wrong, but _peccaverit_ in this case may be the future perfect as opposed to the perfect subjunctive. In which case it would be rendered "if you brother shall have sinned against you, reprove him". The two forms are identical which doesn't make things perfectly clear. Hopefully you have got your answer by now; but, if not, you definitely deserve to have one after all this time.

[@florencecyprus4238]

Thank you!

[@ClearOutSamskaras]

Subjunctive

[@curtpiazza1688]

Great lesson!

[@cem3620]

10 numara video olmuş eline sağlık

[@ezekielrast7807]

For the future less vivid, why not go with "If I were to..." rather than "If I should...?" (for the English translation) If there is anybody out there who hears 'should' used this way in conversational English I would be interested to hear it, maybe it's just because I'm from the US but it seems archaic to me (no shade)

[@latintutorial]

Yes, my point in the video at the end.

[@pablomunoz3119]

Should was originally the preterite of shall, shall was the common auxiliary verb to express pure futurity, will was used when one wished to convey some sort emotional investment in the action (I want this to happen) thus if I were to say "tomorrow I shall go to the store" it just means that is will happen, I have no particular desire to go, if, to the contrary, I said "I will go to the store", I could be making a promise or, in some way, shape, or form, my volition was involved. The situation was reflected in the preterite, "I should go" didn't mean "I ought to go" it just meant what now "I would go" means: "pure" subjunctive. I would go, on the contrary, meant something like "It would be my wish to go if...". You see, a very elegant system, that I as non-native much prefer to the "modern" version. I don't think one ought to shy away from superior things just because they may seem old-fashioned. The situation was reversed for the 3rd person: I shall, we shall, you will, he/she/it will, they will for pure futurity; I will, we will, you shall, he/she/it shall, etc. The reasoning was that, while I can indeed know my own will, my own volition; I cannot possibly know another person's will and thus, unless I want to be impolite, I cannot say to you: you shall do that (the etymology of shall comes from Old English sceal, meaning "owe to", meaning if I say you shall it carries the etymological baggage of you owe to, must, do that). Again, it seems to me that the old system allowed for a much succinct expression of finer shades of meaning.