Morphology
Imperfect Tense
- The term TENSE refers to the time that's verb is taking place.
- We already know the present tense, which has the endings: -o, -s, -t, -mus, -tis, -nt.
- Now we are going to learn the imperfect tense. The imperfect endings are: -bam, -bas, -bat, -bamus, -batis, -bant
- You can translate an imperfect verb four different ways: I was doing something, I used to do something, I began to do something, or I kept doing something.
- An imperfect describes an action that was started, but may have or may have
- Let's take a look at the imperfect paradigms for ambulāre.
Ambulāre
Ambulabam Ambulabas Ambulabat Ambulabamus Ambulabatis Ambulabant |
To Walk
I was walking You were walking He/she/it was walking We were walking You (pl) were walking They were walking |
Third declension i-stem
- There is a subset of third declension nouns. We call them i-stem nouns.
- The only difference between i-stem third declension nouns and regular ones is that i-stems have a slightly different genitive plural ending. They end in -ium instead of -um.
- Here are some examples of 3rd declension i-stem nouns: urbs (gen. pl. urbium), nox (gen. pl. noctium)
Nominative
Genitive Accusative Ablative Nominative Genitive Accusative Ablative |
Nox
Noctis Noctem Nocte Noctēs Noctium Noctēs Noctibus |