Fides amicitiam servat.

Fides is a noun. It is a third-declension feminine noun meaning faith, trust, or reliability, depending on context.

The ending -es here is the nominative singular ending, which is the form used for the subject of the sentence. So in this sentence, fides is the thing doing the action.

Basic parsing:

• fides = nominative singular
• gender: feminine
• declension: third

The ending -am shows that amicitiam is accusative singular. In Latin, the accusative case is often used for the direct object, the person or thing receiving the action of the verb.

So:

• fides = subject
• amicitiam = direct object

This is a very common pattern in Latin:

• subject in the nominative
• direct object in the accusative

Amicitia is a first-declension feminine noun, and its accusative singular form is amicitiam.

In Latin, you usually know this from the word endings, not mainly from word order.

Here:

• fides has the nominative singular ending, so it is the subject
• amicitiam has the accusative singular ending, so it is the direct object

An English speaker may expect the first noun to be the subject because English relies heavily on word order. Latin does not depend on word order as much, because the endings already tell you each word’s job.

Servat is a verb in the:

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

It comes from servo, servare, meaning to preserve, to protect, to keep, or to maintain.

The -t ending tells you the subject is he/she/it. Since the subject here is fides, the verb is translated as preserves, keeps, or maintains.

Because Latin often does not use an expressed subject pronoun when the verb ending already makes the subject clear.

In English, we usually need a subject pronoun:

• it preserves

In Latin, the ending -t in servat already means he/she/it. Since the noun fides is present, there is no need to add a pronoun.

This is normal in Latin:

• servat = he/she/it preserves
• fides servat = faith preserves

Latin word order is more flexible than English word order because the endings show grammatical function.

This sentence uses a very common and straightforward order:

• subject + object + verb

But Latin could also say:

• Amicitiam fides servat
• Servat fides amicitiam

All of these can mean the same basic thing, because:

• fides is still nominative
• amicitiam is still accusative
• servat is still the verb

Different word orders can change emphasis, but not necessarily the core meaning.

Yes. Fides is a rich Latin word. Depending on context, it can mean things like:

• faith
• trust
• trustworthiness
• loyalty
• good faith
• reliability

So although the sentence’s meaning may already be given to the learner, it is useful to know that fides is broader than a single English word. In many Latin texts, choosing the best English translation depends on the situation.

No. English speakers sometimes confuse servat with an English-looking word such as serve, but servat comes from servo, which means:

• preserve
• save
• keep
• maintain
• protect

So servat does not usually mean serves. The similarity is misleading.

A common classroom pronunciation would be something like:

FI-days ah-mee-KEE-tee-ahm SER-waht

If using a more classical reconstruction, you might hear:

FI-dehs ah-mee-KEE-tee-am SEHR-wat

A few helpful points:

• fi- in fides sounds like English fee or fi depending on teaching tradition
• c in amicitiam is always hard, like k
• v in restored classical pronunciation is often pronounced like w
• stress usually falls on the second-to-last syllable if it is heavy; otherwise on the third-to-last. In amicitiam, the stress is on -ti-

They belong to different declensions:

• fides, fidei = third declension
• amicitia, amicitiae = first declension

That is useful to notice because beginners often expect nouns in the same sentence to look similar. But Latin has several declension patterns, and different nouns can appear together with different kinds of endings.

Here the forms are:

• fides = nominative singular
• amicitiam = accusative singular

Not in this exact form.

If the sentence meant Friendship preserves faith, then:

• friendship would need to be the subject, so amicitia would be nominative
• faith would need to be the object, so fidem would be accusative

That sentence would be:

Amicitia fidem servat.

So the endings are what determine the roles, not the English order you might imagine.

The dictionary forms are:

• fides, fidei — a noun meaning faith / trust / loyalty
• amicitia, amicitiae — a noun meaning friendship
• servo, servare, servavi, servatum — a verb meaning preserve / protect / keep

For a learner, it is helpful to connect the sentence forms back to these dictionary entries:

• fides comes directly from the nominative singular dictionary form
• amicitiam comes from amicitia
• servat comes from servo

Yes. It is a fully complete Latin sentence.

It has everything needed:

• a subject: fides
• a direct object: amicitiam
• a finite verb: servat

Latin often expresses ideas very compactly. A short sentence like this can still be grammatically complete and perfectly natural.