Plures discipuli hodie adsunt quam heri.

Plures is the comparative form used for more when talking about a number of people or things.

So in plures discipuli, it means more students.

A useful contrast is:

• multi discipuli = many students
• plures discipuli = more students

So the sentence is making a comparison, not just saying that there are many students.

Latin usually uses plures for more with countable nouns like students, books, or soldiers.

• plures discipuli = more students

By contrast, magis is usually used with adjectives, adverbs, or ideas like more bravely, more quickly, more useful.

So a learner can think:

• countable things -> plures
• qualities or actions -> often magis

Here plures is nominative plural masculine.

Why?

Because it goes with discipuli, and discipuli is the subject of the sentence. Since plures describes that subject, it must match it in:

• case: nominative
• number: plural
• gender: masculine

So:

• plures discipuli = more students as the subject of the sentence

Discipuli is the subject of adsunt.

The students are the ones who are present, so Latin puts discipuli in the nominative case.

It is plural because the sentence is talking about more than one student.

Adsunt means are present, are here, or are in attendance.

It comes from the verb adsum, adesse, which is built from:

• ad- = to, near, at
• sum = I am

So adsunt literally suggests they are here/near, and in normal English it is often translated as they are present.

Latin often uses adsum when it wants to say that someone is present or in attendance, not just that they exist.

So:

• sunt = they are
• adsunt = they are present / they are here

In this sentence, the idea is not simply that the students exist today. It means that more students are present today than yesterday.

Quam means than here.

It introduces the second part of the comparison:

• plures ... quam heri = more ... than yesterday

This is a very common Latin pattern:

• comparative word + quam
• for example, maior quam = bigger than
• plures quam = more than

Because Latin often leaves out a repeated word when it is easy to understand.

In full, the idea is:

• Plures discipuli hodie adsunt quam heri adsunt

But that sounds repetitive, so Latin leaves out the second adsunt.

This is called ellipsis. English does the same thing:

• More students are present today than yesterday

We do not usually repeat are present either.

Both hodie and heri are adverbs.

• hodie = today
• heri = yesterday

They are not nouns in a case form here. They are simple time adverbs telling when something happens.

They are also indeclinable, which means they do not change form.

Latin word order is much freer than English word order.

This sentence starts with plures discipuli because that is the main point being emphasized: more students.

Then comes hodie to place the action in time, and adsunt gives the verb.

So the order feels natural and clear, but Latin could rearrange it in other ways, for example:

• Hodie plures discipuli adsunt quam heri

That would still mean the same basic thing.

Latin word order often changes emphasis more than basic meaning.

Not in this sentence.

It is true that plures can sometimes mean several or quite a few, depending on context. But here the presence of quam heri clearly makes it comparative.

So here plures must mean more:

• plures discipuli ... quam heri = more students ... than yesterday

The quam makes the comparison unmistakable.

Yes, but indirectly through the whole idea of attendance.

The sentence does not mean that today is more than yesterday. It means:

• the number of students present today is greater than
• the number of students present yesterday

So hodie and heri are time words, and the comparison really applies to the whole situation.

Sometimes Latin can omit a noun if the context is obvious, but here discipuli is stated clearly.

Without it, plures adsunt quam heri could still mean more are present than yesterday, but then English would need to supply something like people or students from context.

Including discipuli makes the sentence precise: it is specifically about students.