Avia omnibus pacem optat.

Avia is nominative singular. It is the subject of the sentence: the person who is doing the wishing.

The dictionary form is avia, meaning grandmother. Since it is a first-declension noun, the -a ending here fits the nominative singular form.

So in this sentence, avia = grandmother as the subject.

Because pacem is the accusative singular form of pax.

• pax = nominative singular, used for the subject
• pacem = accusative singular, used for the direct object

With optat (wishes), Latin puts the thing being wished for in the accusative. So:

• pax = peace as a subject
• pacem = peace as the thing wished for

Here, grandmother is wishing peace, so Latin uses pacem.

Omnibus is dative plural here.

It tells you to whom or for whom the wish is directed. With optare, Latin often uses:

• the accusative for the thing wished
• the dative for the person or people receiving the wish

So:

• pacem = the thing wished
• omnibus = to all / for all

That is why omnibus is dative here.

Formally, yes: omnibus can be either dative plural or ablative plural.

But in this sentence it is understood as dative, because the sense is wishes peace to all.

An ablative meaning would not fit the sentence naturally. So even though the form itself is ambiguous, the syntax and meaning make dative the right choice here.

It comes from omnis, meaning all or every.

Here omnibus is the dative plural form. It is being used without a noun stated explicitly, so it means something like:

• to all
• to everyone
• for all people

This is very common in Latin: an adjective can stand on its own when the noun is understood.

Optat is the third-person singular present active indicative of optare, meaning to wish.

The ending -t tells you the subject is:

• he
• she
• it

Since the subject here is avia (grandmother), we understand it as she wishes.

So the verb ending itself already contains the idea of she; Latin does not need a separate subject pronoun.

Latin does not have articles like English the and a/an.

So avia can mean:

• grandmother
• a grandmother
• the grandmother

The exact choice in English depends on context.

The same is true for pacem: Latin does not separately mark peace, the peace, or sometimes even a peace the way English does.

Latin word order is much more flexible than English word order because the endings show each word’s role.

In English, word order is crucial:

• Grandmother wishes peace to all

In Latin, the endings already tell you:

• avia = subject
• pacem = direct object
• omnibus = indirect object
• optat = verb

So Latin can arrange the words more freely. Putting the verb at the end, as in Avia omnibus pacem optat, is very natural Latin style.

Not necessarily. It is capitalized here because it is the first word of the sentence.

As a common noun, avia normally means grandmother, not a proper name. If it appeared in the middle of a sentence, it would usually be lowercase.

So the capital letter here does not by itself mean Avia is someone’s personal name.

Here it means all people or everyone.

Grammatically, omnibus by itself could be fairly general, but the sentence strongly suggests people as the recipients of the wish. You normally wish peace to people, not to things.

So an English speaker should understand it as to everyone or for everyone.