Here's where the third declension gets complicated. In the last two chapters, it's been simple: drop the -is ending from the genitive to get the stem, add our third declension endings, and remember that the neuter accusative matches the nominative and takes -a in the plural. Simple enough. But now we've got a whole new class of third declension nouns that work a bit differently: the I-stems.
First of all, I'm not really sure why they're called I-stems, because the stem doesn't really end in -i-! My textbook says, “These nouns normally show the -i- of the stem only in the genitive plural…” To my mind, if it only shows up in one form out of ten, it's not part of the stem; it's part of the ending, or an extra part in between, like the tense-signs we've learned for verbs. But “I-stems” are what all the books call them, so we will too.
So how do we tell I-stems from other third declension nouns? There are four different types of I-stems:
1. Masculine and feminine nouns ending in -is or -ēs in the nominative singular, with the same number of syllables in the nominative and genitive. (Note that that's a long -ē- in -ēs, not a short one. So mīles, mīlitis, which we learned two lessons ago, does not match this rule.) For example:
2. Masculine and feminine nouns ending in -rs or -ns in the nominative singular:
3. Masculine and feminine nouns with a single syllable in the nominative, and a genitive stem that ends in two consonants:
4. Neuter nouns ending in -al or -e in the nominative singular.
All I-stems fall into one of those four categories, three for masculine and feminine nouns and one for neuter nouns. If a third declension noun (one that ends in -is in the genitive singular) doesn't match one of these rules, it's not an I-stem, and is declined according to the rules we learned in lessons 14 and 15.
Now that we know how to recognize them, how do we decline them? The answer is: almost exactly the same as non-I-stems. For masculine and feminine nouns, the only difference is in the genitive plural; the -i- of the “stem” shows up before the -um ending. So if we compare miles (not an I-stem) to hostis (an I-stem), we see that everything else is the same:
| Singular | ||
|---|---|---|
| Nom. | mīles | hostis |
| Gen. | mīlitis | hostis |
| Dat. | mīlitī | hostī |
| Acc. | mīlitem | hostem |
| Abl. | mīlite | hoste |
| Plural | ||
| Nom. | mīlitēs | hostēs |
| Gen. | mīlitum | hostium |
| Dat. | mīlitibus | hostibus |
| Acc. | mīlitēs | hostēs |
| Abl. | mīlitibus | hostibus |
Things differ more in the neuter forms. In the neuter, the -i- shows up in the genitive plural, but also before the -a ending of the nominative and accusative plural, and it becomes long and replaces the -e ending of the ablative singular. Let's compare corpus (not an I-stem) and animal (an I-stem) to show the differences:
| Singular | ||
|---|---|---|
| Nom. | corpus | animal |
| Gen. | corporis | animālis |
| Dat. | corporī | animālī |
| Acc. | corpus | animal |
| Abl. | corpore | animālī |
| Plural | ||
| Nom. | corpora | animālia |
| Gen. | corporum | animālium |
| Dat. | corporibus | animālibus |
| Acc. | corpora | animālia |
| Abl. | corporibus | animālibus |
The neuter I-stems have more quirks than the masculine and feminine ones, but it's still a minority of the forms. Luckily, there are very few neuter I-stem nouns. The two we learn in this lesson may be the only two we see for a long time.
When Romans wanted to sound like a President giving a speech, they said, “cīvēs mei,” which translated literally means, “my citizens,” but to them meant, “my fellow citizens.”
Fīnēs (the plural of fīnis) means “territory” in the geographical sense because multiple boundaries define a particular area. Where we would say “in the territory of the Romans,” they would say, “in the boundaries of the Romans”: in finibus Romanorum.
Earlier we learned inimicus, which means a personal enemy. Now we've learned hostis, which means an enemy of the state or a military foe. Note that Latin speakers never used “enemy” in the singular to refer to a hostile army, the way we often do in English:
“Sea” is one of the few words that still has a sort of gender in English, where it is often referred to as “she,” yet it was a neuter noun (mare) in Latin. Go figure. “Ship” (navis), on the other hand, is feminine in both languages.
Find an English word that may be derived from each word in the vocabulary. Also, give the number of the rule above (1-4) that makes that word an I-stem.
Now we've covered the third declension. Next lesson, back to verbs. We've covered three declensions now, but only one conjugation, so it's time to start on the second.
| Singular | Plural | |
|---|---|---|
| Nom. | mare latum | maria lata |
| Gen. | maris lati | marium latorum |
| Dat. | mari lato | maribus latis |
| Acc. | mare latum | maria lata |
| Abl. | mari lato | maribus latis |
| mons albus | montes albi |
| montis albi | montium alborum |
| monti albo | montibus albis |
| montem album | montes albos |
| monte albo | montibus albis |
| navis nova | naves novae |
| navis novae | navium novarum |
| navi novae | navibus novis |
| navem novam | naves novas |
| nave nova | navibus novis |
(By the way, notice how adjectives help narrow down the case? “Navis” could be nominative or genitive, and “novae” could be genitive or dative singular or nominative plural, but “navis novae” together can only be genitive singular. When translating, that kind of context can help us put the pieces together.)