Peto: To Seek

Petō means “seek,” “request,” “make for,” “attack,” or “stand for.” Its principal parts are petō, petere, petīvī, petītum. Although the present is third conjugation, the perfect and supine use the characteristic extensions petīv- and petīt-; v-less perfect forms such as petiī also occur.

The direct object and its complements guide the meaning: one seeks peace, requests help from someone, heads for Rome, attacks an enemy with a weapon, or seeks a public office. The shared idea is directed effort toward a target, not five unrelated dictionary entries.

Active Indicative and Subjunctive

The perfect also has v-less forms such as petiī, petiit, petiērunt; petieram, petierim. Further contraction produces forms such as petī, petīt, petīstī, and petīsse. All are Classical, but the tables display the full petīv- series because it exposes the stem most clearly. Thus a visible petiit or petīsse is not a new verb.

Passive Voice

Perfect-system passives use petītus, -a, -um plus sum: perfect petītus est, pluperfect petīta erat, future perfect petītī erunt; perfect subjunctive petītus sit, pluperfect subjunctive petīta esset. The participle agrees with the subject in gender and number.

Personal passive forms are grammatically possible but less frequent with some lexical senses. A destination itself is not normally conceived as a passive patient; authors more readily use the active “make for a place.”

Commands and Non-Finite Forms

Present active imperatives are pete, petite. The future imperative has petitō for the second- or third-person singular, petitōte for the second-person plural, and petuntō for the third-person plural; these forms belong especially to laws, instructions, and precepts rather than ordinary conversation. Passive imperatives, rarely needed with this verb, are present petere, petiminī and future petitor (second- or third-person singular), petuntor (third-person plural).

In the perfect passive infinitive, petītus esse changes for the infinitive's understood subject: eam petītam esse, “that she was sought.” By contrast, rare future passive petītum īrī contains the invariant accusative supine petītum, whatever the subject's gender or number.

Asking: Thing and Source

The thing requested is accusative; the person from whom it is requested commonly appears with ā/ab + ablative: pecūniam ab amīcō petit. An action requested can be expressed by petō ut + subjunctive.

In normal Classical prose, do not imitate English “ask someone something” with two accusatives. Latin organizes the source with ab and the request as object or clause. A bare accusative for the person requested is found in early and later Latin, but it is not the Classical default taught here. This is the key contrast with quaerō ab aliquō, where the object is information sought in a question.

The social force ranges from humble request to formal demand. Adverbs and context supply politeness; the verb itself does not encode English “ask” versus “demand” as two fixed senses.

Aspect and Goal Attainment

The present and imperfect emphasize striving toward a goal; the perfect reports that the seeking or request occurred, not necessarily that the goal was obtained. Auxilium petīvit means “he sought/requested help,” but a following clause may say it was refused.

Likewise, cōnsulātum petīvit means that someone stood as a candidate, not that he became consul. English learners should not import a success implication from completed perfect aspect.

When the object is a hostile target, imperfect petēbat can present repeated blows or attempts; perfect petīvit presents a bounded attack. With a destination, the imperfect can show movement in progress and the perfect a completed choice of route, but arrival is better stated with perveniō or adveniō.

Formal and Figurative Goals

Abstract goals remain accusative: glōriam, honōrem, veniam, salūtem petere. The verb can therefore express ambition, pardon, or safety without changing its government.

Seeking, Attacking, and Heading Toward

The core idea is directed striving. That supports several senses:

Town names use the accusative of direction without ad; ordinary destinations can use ad + accusative. See the accusative of direction.

Compounds

Common compounds preserve the basic conjugation: appetō, appetere, appetīvī, appetītum “strive after, approach”; expetō “seek eagerly, demand”; repetō, repetere, repetīvī, repetītum “seek again, demand back, repeat”; competō “come together, agree, be suitable.” Meanings are lexical, not simple arithmetic with prefixes.

Parsing Diagnostic

Identify present pet-, full perfect petīv-, v-less peti-, contracted petī-, or supine petīt-. Then inspect object and complements: office suggests candidacy, a person with a weapon attack, a place direction, and ab + person a request.

Common Mistakes

Inventing a regular perfect

Giving the requested person an accusative

Treating ad plus a town as identical to the bare accusative

Translating every object as something requested

Key Takeaways

• Memorize petō, petere, petīvī, petītum and recognize both v-less and contracted perfect forms.
• The requested thing is accusative; the source is normally ā/ab
  • ablative.
• Directed seeking extends to candidacy, attack, and movement toward a destination.
• The verb has full active, passive, and non-finite systems.
• Objects and directional syntax must choose the translation before English does.