Regina ipsa convivas salutat.

Because regina is in the nominative singular, which is the case normally used for the subject.

• regina = nominative singular, queen
• The subject is the person doing the action
• Here, the action is salutat = greets
• So regina is the one doing the greeting

A native English speaker may be tempted to rely mostly on word order, but in Latin, case endings are very important.

Ipsa adds emphasis. It means herself in the sense of the queen herself or the queen in person.

So the sentence is not just saying that the queen greets the guests, but that the queen herself does so.

Grammatically, ipsa agrees with regina:

• regina = feminine singular nominative
• ipsa = feminine singular nominative

That agreement shows that ipsa refers to regina.

Not exactly. Here ipsa is an intensive use, not a reflexive object.

In English, herself can do two different jobs:

1. Intensive: The queen herself greeted the guests.
2. Reflexive: The queen greeted herself.

In this Latin sentence, ipsa is the first kind: intensive. It emphasizes the subject.

If Latin wanted to say the queen greeted herself, it would use a reflexive pronoun in the object position, not just ipsa by itself in agreement with regina.

Because convivas is accusative plural.

The accusative case is commonly used for the direct object, the person or thing receiving the action of the verb.

Here:

• salutat = greets
• Who is being greeted? convivas

So convivas is the direct object, and its ending shows that.

The dictionary form is conviva.

This is a first-declension noun, so its accusative plural is convivas.

A learner may find this surprising because many first-declension nouns are feminine, but conviva is often masculine or can refer to a guest more generally depending on context.

So:

• dictionary form: conviva
• accusative plural: convivas

Because the subject is singular: regina = the queen.

The verb must agree with its subject in number:

• singular subject → singular verb
• plural subject → plural verb

So:

• regina = singular
• salutat = he/she/it greets, third person singular

If the subject were plural, the verb would be plural too.

We know because of the case ending and the verb ending.

• regina is nominative singular, which marks the subject
• convivas is accusative plural, which marks the direct object
• salutat is third person singular, matching regina, not convivas

So even if an English speaker expects the word after the verb to be the object simply because of position, in Latin the stronger clue is the grammar of the endings.

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

For example, these could mean essentially the same thing:

• Regina ipsa convivas salutat.
• Ipsa regina convivas salutat.
• Convivas regina ipsa salutat.
• Salutat regina ipsa convivas.

However, changing the order often changes the emphasis or style.

The given order puts regina ipsa up front, which strongly highlights the queen herself.

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

So regina can mean:

• queen
• the queen
• sometimes even a queen

And convivas can mean:

• guests
• the guests

The exact sense usually comes from context.

Because it agrees with regina, which is feminine.

Latin adjectives and adjective-like words must agree with the nouns they describe in:

• gender
• number
• case

Since regina is feminine singular nominative, the emphatic word must also be feminine singular nominative:

• ipsa

If the noun were masculine, you would expect ipse instead.

Salutat is:

• present tense
• active voice
• indicative mood
• third person singular

It comes from the verb saluto, salutare, meaning to greet.

So salutat means he/she greets or is greeting, depending on context.

Since the subject is regina, here it means the queen greets.

Yes. This is a very common point of confusion for English speakers.

A noun ending in -a is often feminine in Latin, but not always. Conviva is one of the nouns that can be masculine despite the first-declension ending.

So convivas can absolutely mean male guests, or a mixed group, depending on context.

This is a good reminder that:

• ending often helps
• but gender must sometimes be learned from vocabulary and usage

It could be. Regina convivas salutat is a perfectly normal sentence.

Adding ipsa gives extra force:

• Regina convivas salutat = The queen greets the guests
• Regina ipsa convivas salutat = The queen herself greets the guests

So ipsa is not required for the grammar of the sentence, but it changes the emphasis.