Avus puellae imaginem reginae ostendit.

A quick parse looks like this:

• avus — nominative singular; the subject
• puellae — either genitive singular or dative singular here
• imaginem — accusative singular; the direct object
• reginae — either genitive singular or dative singular here
• ostendit — 3rd person singular verb: he/she shows or he/she showed, depending on context

So the basic frame is:

subject + someone/something related to a girl/queen + direct object + someone/something related to a queen/girl + verb

Because avus is in the nominative singular, which is the normal case for the subject of a Latin sentence.

Also, ostendit is 3rd person singular, so it matches a singular subject like avus.

So avus is the one doing the showing.

Because imaginem is in the accusative singular, and the accusative often marks the direct object in Latin.

With ostendit (shows/showed), the direct object is the thing being shown. So imaginem is the thing that is shown.

This is also a good reminder that the dictionary form is imago, but in the accusative singular it becomes imaginem.

Because both puella and regina are first-declension nouns, and in the first declension, -ae can represent more than one case.

For a singular noun, -ae can be:

• genitive singular — of the girl / of the queen
• dative singular — to/for the girl / to/for the queen

So the ending -ae is doing a lot of work, and you have to use context to decide which meaning is intended.

You do not know from the form alone.

That is one of the most important things to notice in this sentence: it is ambiguous in isolation.

• A dative would mean to/for the girl or to/for the queen
• A genitive would mean of the girl or of the queen

Since both puellae and reginae have the same form, the sentence could be interpreted in more than one way unless context tells you which meaning is intended.

So even if your textbook gives you one translation, the Latin form itself does not completely remove the ambiguity.

Yes.

Because both puellae and reginae can be either dative singular or genitive singular, the sentence can be read in different ways, such as:

• the grandfather shows the queen’s picture to the girl
• the grandfather shows the girl’s picture to the queen

Without more context, Latin readers would have to rely on situation, surrounding sentences, or authorial style.

This is a very common thing for beginners to run into: sometimes Latin is simply less explicit than English in a short sentence.

Sometimes a little, but not always enough.

Latin word order is much freer than English word order because the case endings carry so much of the grammatical information.

In this sentence:

Avus puellae imaginem reginae ostendit

the placement of imaginem between the two -ae words does not fully settle which noun goes with which.

You might feel a slight pull toward reading imaginem reginae as the queen’s picture, because those two words are next to each other. But Latin often separates related words, so that is only a clue, not a rule.

So the safest answer is:

• word order may suggest
• case endings determine
• context finally decides

Because Latin often uses the dative case instead of a separate word like to.

So where English says:

• to the girl
• to the queen

Latin can simply use:

• puellae
• reginae

if those words are functioning as datives.

English often uses prepositions; Latin often uses case endings.

Because Latin usually uses the genitive case instead of a separate word like of.

So English:

• of the girl
• of the queen

can be expressed in Latin just by the genitive form:

• puellae
• reginae

Again, this is why -ae is tricky here: the same form can mean either to/for or of.

It can mean either, depending on context.

The form ostendit can be:

• present tense — shows
• perfect tense — showed / has shown

Latin has a number of verb forms like this where the spelling is the same and context tells you which tense is meant.

In many beginner sentences, the intended meaning is often the present, but grammatically the form itself can be ambiguous.

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

So Latin simply says:

• avus
• puellae
• imaginem
• reginae

and English has to supply the, a, or sometimes no article at all based on context.

That is why one Latin sentence may be translated into English in more than one natural way.

In theory, the form -ae can also be nominative plural or vocative plural for first-declension nouns.

But in this sentence, that is not the most likely reading.

Why?

• avus is already the clear singular subject
• ostendit is singular
• the sentence structure strongly points to puellae and reginae being singular dative or singular genitive

So although puellae can sometimes mean girls, and reginae can sometimes mean queens, that is probably not what is happening here.

Because the dictionary form of the noun is imago, but the sentence needs the accusative singular, which is imaginem.

This noun belongs to the third declension, and third-declension nouns often change form more noticeably than first- or second-declension nouns.

So a learner should recognize:

• dictionary form: imago
• meaning: image, picture, likeness
• accusative singular: imaginem

That kind of change is completely normal in Latin.