Magister poetae iuveni consilium dat.

the teacher

Breakdown of Magister poetae iuveni consilium dat.

• dare: to give
• consilium: the advice
• poeta: the poet

Questions & Answers about Magister poetae iuveni consilium dat.

How do I know magister is the one doing the action?

Because magister is in the nominative singular, which is the case normally used for the subject of the sentence.

In this sentence:

• magister = subject
• consilium = direct object, the thing being given
• poetae iuveni = indirect object, the person receiving it

So the endings tell you the grammatical roles, not just the word order.

Why is there no word for to before poetae iuveni?

Latin often does not need a separate word like to for an indirect object. It uses the dative case instead.

So poetae iuveni means to the young poet because both words are in the dative singular.

Why are there two words, poetae and iuveni, for the person receiving the advice?

They go together. Iuveni is describing poetae and agrees with it in case, number, and gender.

So together they mean something like to the young poet.

A learner can treat iuveni here as being used adjectivally, even though its basic form is also very commonly a noun.

If poetae and iuveni go together, why don’t they have the same ending?