Cum magistra ad villam venisset, puella celeriter chartas plicavit et de mensa sustulit.

Venisset is the pluperfect subjunctive of venio. It appears here because the sentence has a cum clause of circumstance:

• Cum magistra ad villam venisset = when / after the teacher had come to the house

In this kind of clause, Latin very often uses the subjunctive, not the indicative.

The pluperfect shows that this action happened before the actions in the main clause:

• first: the teacher came
• then: the girl folded the papers and took them from the table

So venisset is not just had come in time, but also the normal verb form for this kind of cum clause in narrative Latin.

Here cum means something like when, after, or once.

It introduces the background action that had already happened before the main action. In narrative Latin, cum + subjunctive often gives the circumstances in which the main event happened.

So:

• Cum magistra ad villam venisset
  = When / after the teacher had arrived at the house

This is different from cum meaning with. Here it is a conjunction, not a preposition.

Magistra is the subject of venisset, so it is nominative.

In the clause:

• Cum magistra ad villam venisset

the teacher is the one doing the action of coming. That is why Latin uses the nominative:

• magistra = the teacher as subject

Likewise, in the main clause:

• puella is nominative because she is the subject of plicavit and sustulit

So the sentence has two subjects:

• magistra for venisset
• puella for plicavit and sustulit

The preposition ad takes the accusative case when it means to or toward.

So:

• ad villam = to the house / villa

Here villam is accusative singular of villa.

This is a very common pattern in Latin:

• ad urbem = to the city
• ad scholam = to school
• ad mensam = to the table

So ad villa would be incorrect, because ad requires an accusative object.

Because de takes the ablative case.

Here:

• de mensa = from the table

The noun mensa is ablative singular.

Many Latin prepositions regularly govern a particular case. For example:

• ad
  • accusative
• de
  • ablative
• cum
  • ablative when it means with

So in this sentence:

• ad villam = motion to something
• de mensa = movement from/off something

They are in the perfect tense because they describe completed actions in the past:

• plicavit = folded
• sustulit = took up / removed

In Latin narrative, the perfect often gives the main events of the story. Here the sequence is:

1. magistra ... venisset = the teacher had come
2. puella ... plicavit = the girl folded
3. et ... sustulit = and took away

So the pluperfect subjunctive in the cum clause gives earlier background, while the perfect indicative gives the main completed actions.

Sustulit is the perfect tense of tollo, tollere, sustuli, sublatum, meaning lift up, take away, remove.

It looks different because this verb is irregular:

• present: tollo
• infinitive: tollere
• perfect: sustuli
• perfect 3rd singular: sustulit

So sustulit means he/she took up, removed, or carried off.

This is a very common thing in Latin: a verb’s perfect stem may look quite different from its present stem.

Yes. The object of sustulit is understood to be chartas.

The sentence says:

• puella celeriter chartas plicavit et de mensa sustulit

Literally, Latin has not repeated the object after et, but English would usually say:

• The girl quickly folded the papers and took them from the table.

Latin often omits a repeated object when it is easy to understand from context. So:

• chartas is the direct object of plicavit
• and it is also understood with sustulit

Chartas is accusative plural because it is the direct object of the verbs.

The girl is doing something to the papers:

• she folded the papers
• she took the papers from the table

So Latin uses the accusative:

• nominative singular: charta = a sheet / paper
• accusative plural: chartas = papers

A native English speaker often has to get used to the idea that Latin marks the job of a noun with endings, not mainly with word order.

Celeriter is an adverb meaning quickly. It modifies plicavit.

Latin word order is more flexible than English word order because the endings show the grammar. So Latin can place celeriter in a position that feels natural for emphasis or rhythm:

• puella celeriter chartas plicavit

This means the same basic thing as:

• puella chartas celeriter plicavit

Both would be understandable. The chosen order simply gives a natural flow, with celeriter coming before the object and verb.

The word order matters less in Latin than in English, because case endings show each noun’s role.

For example:

• magistra is still the subject of venisset
• puella is still the subject of plicavit and sustulit
• chartas is still the object
• villam is still governed by ad
• mensa is still governed by de

So Latin could rearrange parts of the sentence without changing the core meaning.

However, the actual order still helps with:

• emphasis
• style
• clarity
• rhythm

The sentence as written is a normal, natural narrative order: background clause first, then the main actions.

Latin often puts a cum clause first to give the background before stating the main action.

So the structure is:

• background: Cum magistra ad villam venisset
• main event: puella celeriter chartas plicavit et de mensa sustulit

This is very similar to English style:

• When the teacher had arrived at the house, the girl quickly folded the papers and took them from the table.

Putting the clause first helps the reader understand the situation before the main actions happen.

Yes, in context that is often a very natural translation.

Because venisset is pluperfect, the idea is that the teacher’s arrival happened before the girl’s actions. So English may prefer:

• After the teacher had come to the house...
• When the teacher had come to the house...
• Once the teacher had come to the house...

The exact English wording depends on style. Latin cum itself is broad enough to allow several natural English translations here.