Latin course for the Virtual School of Languages

Lesson 36: The flood

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Text
(The story of the Flood is not unique to the Bible, many cultures
tell a similar story. The Romans say that Jupiter (Iove) decided to
eradicated humanity because of its wickedness and unbelief:)
Tum Iovi, quod hominibus impiis irascebatur, placuit omne genus
mortalium ingenti imbre perdere. Et brevi tempore ingens imber
ex omni caelo missus est, mare facta est.
Omnia flumina vires suas per vias et agros effundebant. Ingenti vi
delebantur omnis arbor, omnis homo, omne animal.
Turres altae sub mari latebant: Brevi terra non iam videbatur.
Hic homo frustra tumulum ascendebat: Vim vehementem undarum
non evadit. Ibi alii in arboribus sedentes ab animalibus marium
necati sunt.
Sic mortales impii morti sunt. Fere omnes perierunt, nisi duo, qui
Iovis iram evadere potuerant: Deucalion, vir pius ac innocens, et
Pyrrha, eius fida ac pia uxor.
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Reading vocabulary you needn't learn:
irascebatur: he was angered 
imber, imbris: rain
effundere: to pour out, shed
tumulus: heap of earth
ascendere: to ascend, climb
sedentes: sitting; (here:) who are sitting


Vocabulary

Practise the vocabulary of this lesson by matching it.	

Grammar
It's time to deal with a small variation of the Consonantic Declension, the
I-Declension. The I-Declension was called this way because some of its
forms maintain an i where the Consonantic Declension would put an e.
The words of the I-Declension became increasingly regular, that is closer
to the Consonantic Declension, which is reflected by some people saying
that there is a long-I-Declension (which keeps more cases irregular) and 
a short-I-Declension (which is almost exactly like the Consonantic
Declension), but it really just depends on the age of the text you're reading
whether you'll see words like "mare"(sea) adhere to the I-Declension or
the Consonantic one. The differences are in fact minor, so I'm just 
mentioning this so that you can recognise a noun declined according to the
I-Declension when you see one. Here's a table comparing "victor" 
(Consonantic Declension), "turris" (feminine I-Declension) and "mare" (neuter
I-Declension):

I highlighted the differences to the Consonantic Declension in the feminine
I-Declension and I highlighted the usual differences for neuter words in the
third column. Neuter words are actually regular in their differences to the
"normal" I-Declension: as with all neuter words, the Nominative and 
Accusative forms are the same and the plural Nominative (and therefore
also Accusative) ends in -a, -ia in this case.
In the unlikely event that you notice the same noun using the I-Declension 
-i for Ablative singular but the Consonatic Declension -em for Accusative 
singular, don't worry. That just means that it was in the process of 
becoming a regular Consonantic noun at the time the text was written.
What is way more important than tracking this difference is that you can
recognise the case of a noun (or adjective, for that matter). 

Speaking about adjectives, there are some adjectives that use the
I-Declension. They can have either have 3 different endings for the 
Nominative, like the A-/O-Declension adjectives you know, or
2, or just one. 
Examples:
1) with just one ending: e. g.  innocens. Just like with Consonantic nouns,
    I have to list the Genitive form so that you can decline adjectives
    with just one ending.
2) with two endings: e. g. omnis, omne. These words are easy to handle:
    the masculine and feminine form is the first one (in this case "omnis")
    and the neuter form is the second one (in this case "omne"). Besides,
    the Genitive form is exactly the same as the masculine / feminine 
    Nominative and all following forms are regular.
3) with three endings: e. g. celer, celeris, celere (quick). These are very easy
    to handle, too: masculine, feminine and neuter forms are given in order
    and the Genitive form is exactly the same as the feminine Nominative and
    all following forms are regular. 

You'll be able to practise nouns and adjectives of the I-Declension in the
following lessons, too.


Exercise
Determine the case, number (singular or plural) and root words of the following 
adjective + noun combinations. Example: "omni caelo" is either Dative or 
Ablative singular, root words are "omne caelum".
hominibus impiis, viri mortales, virium vehementium, animalia periculosa, tempus
breve, amicum innocentem, turrium altarum. 

Information on Great Flood myths
Information on Jupiter, the god
Information on Deucalion
Information on Pyrrha


Exercise answers:
hominibus impiis = Dative or Ablative plural of "homo impius"
viri mortales = Nominative plural of "vir mortalis"
virium vehementium = Genitive plural of "vis vehemens"
animalia periculosa = Nominative or Accusative plural of "animal periculosum"
tempus breve = Nominative or Accusative singular of "tempus breve"
amicum innocentem = Accusative singular of "amicus innocens"
turrium altarum = Genitive plural of "turris alta"