How to independently learn Latin. The video course by Ivan Poloneichik "Quick entry to Latin or how to learn Latin quickly and on your own" includes such sections

LATIN LANGUAGE CASE SYSTEM
Nouns of the first declination
VERB "BE"

In Latin, as in Russian, nouns differ in numbers and cases. These cases are as follows:

Nominatīvus - Nominative
Genetīvus - Genitive
Datīvus - Dative
Accusatīvus - Accusative
Ablatīvus - Suspended
Vocatīvus - Vocal

The first four cases of the Latin language generally correspond to the first four cases of the Latin language. The last two deserve special mention. The destructive case (Ablatīvus) corresponds to the Russian instrumental case, the Russian prepositional case, and, in addition, it is the opposite of the dative case. If dative answers the questions to whom? what?, then the suspension case - to questions from whom? from what? where?
The vocal case (Vocatīvus) does not answer any question. This case form is taken by nouns in the position of circulation. Vocatīvus is translated into modern Russian by the nominative case. In the Old Russian language, the forms "God", "prince", "friend", "father", "elder", etc. corresponded to it.
All Latin nouns are distributed between five declensions. A declination is a group of nouns that have the same set of endings. The first declension includes nouns ending in the nominative singular in -а. Almost all of them belong to the female gender, and only a few exceptions, the list of which will be given below, are male.
Let's consider this declension using the example of the noun ancilla - "slave, maidservant."

Singularis - Singular Pluralis - Plural

N. ancīlla - maid ancīllae - maids
G. ancīllae - maidservants ancīllārum - maids
D. ancīllae - to the handmaid ancillis - to the handmaids
Ac. ancillam - handmaid ancillas - handmaidens
Ab. ancillā - maidservant ancillis - maidservants
V. ancīlla is a servant! ancīllae - maids!

Present conjugation of the verb "to be"

In Latin, unlike Russian, it is impossible to construct a sentence without a verb. If in Russian we can say “Peter is the judge”, then in Latin we can say only Petrus est judex, that is, “Peter is the judge”. The verb "to be" is conjugated in the present tense as follows.

esse - to be

sum - I am sumus - we are
es - you are estis - you are
est - he, she, it is sunt - they are

Exercise I
Decline the following nouns:

Vita - "life", terra - "earth", aqua - "water", familia - "family", schola - "school", victoria - "victory", insŭla - "island", via - "road", bestia - "Beast, animal", silva - "forest", injuria - "offense, injustice."

Exercise II
Translate the sentences into Russian. Transcribe them in Russian letters.

1) Terra est sphaera. 2) Jurisprudentia est schola vitae. 3) Illae puellae sunt amīcae. 4) Illae puellae sunt discipŭlae scholae nostrae. 5) In silvis patriae nostrae sunt bestiae. 6) Vita bestiārum non longa est. 7) Sumus incŏlae insǔlae. 8) Incŏlae insulārum quoque estis.

amīca (f) - girlfriend
bestia (f) - animal, beast
discipŭla (f) - student
illae (f) - these
in - in
incŏla (m, f) - resident, resident
insŭla (f) - island
jurisprudentia (f) - jurisprudence
longa - long, long nostra - our
patria (f) - homeland
puella (f) - girl
quoque - also, also
schola (f) - school
sphaera (f) - ball, sphere
silva (f) - forest
terra (f) - earth
vita (f) - life

Exercise III
From exercises I and II, write out the words:
a) borrowed by the Russian language without changing the meaning;
b) borrowed by the Russian language with a change in meaning;
c) borrowed by the foreign language you are studying without changing the meaning;
d) borrowed by the foreign language you are studying with a change in meaning.

Many people consider Latin to be a "dead" language, as it is rarely spoken outside of specialized courses or certain religious services. However, Latin is not a truly "dead" language. She has influenced languages ​​such as French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, English and many more. In addition, knowledge of Latin is essential in many literary studies. By learning how to learn Latin, you will be able to better understand many modern languages, gain the status of an experienced connoisseur of foreign classical literature and become part of a tradition that has existed for thousands of years.

Steps

Part 1

Learn latin verbs. In Russian, a verb is usually an action, but in Latin, a verb can describe an action, a state of something, or any change in a person, place or thing. Latin verbs consist of a word stem and a corresponding ending (the part of a word that makes it functional) and express the use of one of four categories:

• face (first: I / we, second: you / you, third: he / she / it)
• time (past, present, future)
• voice (active or passive)
• mood (indicative, conditional, imperative)

1. Learn latin nouns. Nouns are a little more complicated than verbs, but they also do not cause any particular difficulties. Noun endings indicate number (singular and plural), gender (masculine / feminine / neuter), and case (nominative / genitive / dative / accusative / instrumental / vocative).

   Understand Latin adjectives. In Latin, adjectives change in the same way as nouns, usually in accordance with either the first and second declensions (for example, magnus, magna and magnum are all forms of the adjective "great") or, at times, with the third declension (for example, acer, acris and acre are all forms of the adjective "sharp"). Latin adjectives are divided into three degrees of comparison:

   Learn Latin dialects. Just like adjectives, adverbs have comparative and superlatives. Adverbs are formed by appropriate changes in the ending: "-ius" for the comparative form, "-e" for the excellent one. Adverbs formed from adjectives of the first and second declensions have the ending "-e", and from the third - "ter."

   Use latin conjunctions. Just like in Russian, unions in Latin combine words, phrases, subordinate clauses and other sentences (for example, "and", "but" or "if"). Conjunctions have a fairly specific focus, and therefore should not be difficult to learn or use. There are three main types of alliances:

   • connecting (connect words / phrases / sentences with the same position) - et, -que, atque
   • delimiting (express opposition or choice) - aut, vel, -ve
   • adversaries (express contrast) - at, autem, sed, tamen

2. Buy a Latin dictionary. Having a dictionary with Latin words and many of their similar-root similarities will greatly help you in replenishing your vocabulary. In general, any good Latin vocabulary will do. If you are not sure which dictionaries are the best for learning languages, read reviews on the Internet or ask for advice from those who have already studied this language.

   Make and use word cards. This is an excellent way to top up vocabulary in any language. Get started with a stack of blank cards. Then write a word or phrase in Latin on one side, and his / her translation into your language into back side... Now you can test yourself. Keep a stack of words or expressions that are difficult for you so that you can revisit and remember them later.

   Use mnemonics. Mnemonics is a learning technique that helps you remember something difficult by associating it with another word, sentence, or image. Acronyms (forming a word by folding the first letters of each word in a phrase) and rhyme are two of the most common types of mnemonics. There are many mnemonic methods for learning Latin, which you can find on the internet or in books. You can also invent your own to help you learn.

   Take time to study. Finding a balance between work and free time can be tricky, and cutting off another chunk of your day for training seems impossible. However, it will definitely be a solvable task if you allocate time correctly, keeping your regular schedule and setting aside a little bit of study each day.

   Determine your ideal learning environment. Some people find it easier to concentrate at night, while others prefer to study first thing in the morning. Some are comfortable studying in their own room, others go to the library to be less distracted. If you are learning Latin, you may need certain conditions for calm and thoughtful study. So, you need to figure out how you will best practice.

Part 4

1. We memorize the forms of the word. Many language learners do not bother memorizing each word formation table, but in Latin it is necessary to fully understand and use the language. The easiest way to memorize shaping is to make a tablet for each word being studied. Then keep writing out each form until you learn it. Unfortunately, there is no more simple method remember something other than repeating the material over and over again until it stays in memory.

   • Start with the moods of the nouns and keep writing out each of them until you can instantly reproduce them. Then go to adjectives, after - to regular verbs in the indicative mood with an active and passive voice, as well as in a conditional form. If you do this, eventually you will memorize every form of the word, and with constant practice you will never forget it.

• If you are having difficulty learning Latin, consider hiring a tutor. You can find a tutor in your area through advertisements in your local newspaper or on the internet.
• One of better ways learn Latin quickly and efficiently - sign up for a course.
• Regardless of the way you choose to learn Latin, it is very important to practice your skills every day to solidify them.

Instructions

You need to start learning Latin by learning the alphabet. The Latin alphabet has 25 letters. Six letters (a, e, i, o, u, y) convey 12 vowel sounds of the Latin language. There are also 4 diphthongs in Latin. You need to know that Latin has long and short vowels. Brevity and longitude are indicated using superscript characters: ā - "a" is long, ă - "a" is short. The stress in Latin words is never put on the last syllable. In two-syllable words, the stress is on the initial syllable. In trisyllabic and polysyllabic words, stress is placed on the second syllable from the end, if this second syllable is long. The stress is placed on the third syllable from the end if the second syllable is short. For example, in the word transformatio, the stress is on "a".

Further, in Latin 4. In the first conjugation, the stem ends in a long (ā). For example, "ornāre" in which "ornā" is the stem and "re" is the suffix. The suffix can also be "ere". The second conjugation includes verbs whose stem ends in a long "e" (ē), for example, "habēre". The third conjugation includes verbs whose stem ends in a consonant, “u” is short and “i” is short (ŭ and ĭ), for example, “tangere” (stem is “tang”). The fourth conjugation includes verbs with a long “i” (ī), for example, “audīre”, where “audī” is the stem and “re” is the suffix.

Latin verbs have the following grammatical categories: time (six tenses: present, future first, future second, imperfect, perfect, plusamperfect), mood (indicative, subjunctive and imperative), voice (real and), number (singular and plural), person (1, 2 and 3rd person). Of course, you need to study each section gradually. However, you should start somewhere, for example, to start with four correct conjugations. Let us consider how the verbs I-IV of the conjugation in the present tense of the indicative mood of the active voice change.

Verb I conjugation of ornāre: orno, ornas, ornat, ornāmus, ornatis, ornānt. Verb II conjugation of tacēre: taceo, taces, tacet, tacēmus, tacētis, tacent. Verb III conjugation tangere: tango, tangĭs, tangĭt, tangĭmus, tangĭtis, tangŭnt. Verb IV conjugation of audīre: audio, audis, audit, audīmus, audītis, audiuŭt.

Let's talk a little in Latin. They have a gender category (masculine, feminine, neuter), numbers (singular, plural). There are 6 cases in Latin: Nominativus (), Genetivus (), Dativus (dative case), Accusativus ( accusative), Ablativus (susceptible), Vocativus (vocative). Latin nouns have 5 declensions. The first includes nouns with stems in ā and ă. To the second - on ŏ and ĕ. To the third - into a consonant and ĭ. To IV - by ŭ. By the fifth - on ē.

Languages. The new collection includes free sites for those who are going to master Latin and Ancient Greek through ancient literature, news releases, video podcasts and communities on social networks.

Latin

For those who have decided to learn Latin from scratch, I recommend this series of short lessons in English. Each episode lasts three to four minutes, and during this time it is possible to memorize several phrases and grammar rules at a calm pace. There is nothing superfluous about rendering this podcast: just simple slides illustrating the teacher's words. Now on YouTube, 160 lessons of this course are already uploaded in open access, but for additional materials you can also go to the home page of its creators.

Students foreign language it is often advised to read newspapers in that language or listen to the radio. The Finnish broadcaster YLE has also given the opportunity to those who have decided to master Latin. Once a week, a short summary of world news is published on this site. Since 1989, the authors of the program have been developing a new Latin vocabulary to cover current events - in some issues, we still left the ancient Romans far behind. You can read and listen to this newsletter - however, in the latter case, the Latin takes on a slight Finnish accent.

If you want to learn Latin and spend a lot of time on Vkontakte, be sure to subscribe to this group. First, there are several proven tutorials, tutorials and dictionaries for free download. Secondly, community members post a lot of pictures - for those who better remember new words with illustrations attached to them. And thirdly, here sometimes you come across not only Latin demotivators (it's better to go after them here), but also real masterpieces - for example, Latin comic "Asterix and Obelix"... And, finally, in a special thread here you can even discuss tattoos.

Perhaps, someone, like Onegin, learns Latin only in order to "put vale at the end of the letter", while someone strives to read ancient literature in the original. This site contains many works of the classics of Ancient Rome - from the historian Tacitus and the scientist-encyclopedist Varro to the architect Vitruvius. All texts are posted here with a translation into English - although there is no way to see the translation of each specific word separately, but you can see the translation of an entire paragraph.

Ancient greek

This channel is well suited for those who decided to master the ancient Greek language using materials in Russian. In the grammar course of the philologist Pyotr Makhlin on this moment 29 short lessons are presented - from explaining the ancient Greek alphabet to classifying verb forms. The only thing you will have to get used to while watching them is that the board does not always accurately fall into the sharpness of the camera lens, which, however, almost does not interfere with following the teacher's oral explanations. If you adapt to this option, don't miss the episode. interesting videos about history of European languages by the same author.

To keep up with the popularizers of the Latin language, the Spanish philologist Juan Coderch began publishing weekly news in ancient Greek. In a sense, he had to be a little simpler - he can directly borrow vocabulary for describing current events from modern Greek. But difficulties arose in something else: only recently the ancient Greek font began to be adequately displayed in Chrome, and the site creator finally managed to load news text as text, and not as pictures.

If you compare this public with similar language communities, the difference is immediately noticeable: there are many links to useful, serious resources - and no funny pictures. An attempt at a scientific reconstruction of the pronunciation of the ancient Greek language using the example of Aesop's fables or a calligraphy tutorial - you will find many similar materials here, not to mention textbooks and translated literature. By the way, if you still want to add funny pictures with ancient Greek signatures to your feed, go to

Why do we say "Latin", "Latin"? When it comes to ancient languages, first of all, Greek and Latin languages ​​appear in memory. It is quite obvious that the Greek language, in its various dialects, was spoken by the Greeks, and Latin was the language of the Romans. And then the question arises: why romans spoke in latin language?

Latin language(lingua Latina) is the language of the ancient inhabitants of Latium, a small region in central Italy bordering the lands of the Sabines, Etruria and Campania. The inhabitants of Latium were called Latins, their language was Latin (lingua Latina). It fell to Latius - according to traditional Roman legend - to accept Aeneas, who fled from Troy captured by the Greeks, and his distant descendant Romulus was destined to become the founder and first king of Rome (in 753 BC). And it was Rome, at first only the capital of Latium, thanks to its expansionist policy, first took possession of all of Italy, and then the basin Mediterranean Sea and became the capital of the whole Roman Empire. And although the power and political influence of the Romans spread far beyond Latium and their language became the language of the entire Roman Empire, it was still called Latin.

Lingust is very for a long time could not find quality materials for self-study Latin, to everyone's joy, heritage Soviet Union, in the form of a self-study guide for the Latin language of the Polish author Lidia Vinnichuk (), solved this problem. The site presents is free Not only course of 60 online lessons, but also the texts of Roman authors, such as Caesar, Cicero, Horace, Ovid, etc. To view the answers to the exercises and translations of Latin texts, move the mouse over the key: We sincerely advise the student to abandon dependent moods, maintain character and turn to the “Key” in the last the moment when in grammar exercises and translations everything has already been done, depending on their own knowledge and ingenuity.

Go to - ›lesson list‹ - (Press)

Is Latin a dead language?

Let us answer this with the words of Julian Tuwim: “What kind of a dead language is it if, without fading, it has survived thousands of years? ...” But how, in what form, did it “survive”? First of all, in texts, in works that have survived to our time and thanks to which we can observe the development and change of the Latin language over the centuries; in historical monuments and documents of the Middle Ages, in the creations of the Renaissance. And, in addition, it was preserved in the Romance languages, in the languages ​​of those peoples conquered by Rome who experienced its political and cultural influence. These are Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese, and other foreign languages.

Finally - and this should also be remembered - other languages ​​were also influenced by Latin, although this impact is manifested mainly in the fact that their vocabulary is largely saturated with Latin words. Scientists have calculated that of the 20,000 most common words in the English language, about 10,400 are of Latin origin, about 2,200 are of Greek origin, and only 5,400 are of Anglo-Saxon origin.

A lot of Latin words were included in the Russian language. And this is not only scientific terminology, which in most cases is international, but also the words of colloquial speech. They penetrated so deeply into our language that, using them since childhood, we no longer perceive them as words. foreign origin... Here are some examples related to the field of education: “school”, “institute”, “student”, “table”, “director”, “lecture”, “audience”, etc. Therefore, we advise you to accompany the learning of Latin vocabulary by searching for borrowed words in Russian language. You will discover how exciting the life of the word is.

You've probably found something interesting on this page. Recommend it to a friend! Better yet, place a link to this page on the Internet, VKontakte, blog, forum, etc. For example:
Learning Latin