Serva flores in mensa ordinat.

Because serva is in the nominative singular, which is the case normally used for the subject.

Here, serva means slave girl or maidservant.
So serva is the one doing the action of ordinat.

A learner might notice that serva looks like a very simple -a noun. That is typical of many first-declension feminine nouns in the nominative singular.

Because flores is in the accusative plural, which is the case commonly used for the direct object.

The direct object is the thing being acted on. In this sentence, the flowers are what the slave girl is arranging.

So:

• serva = subject
• flores = direct object

The form flores comes from flos, floris and is a third-declension noun.

The ending -at tells you that ordinat is:

• third person
• singular
• present tense
• active voice

So it means he arranges, she arranges, or it arranges, depending on context.

Since the subject is serva, a feminine noun, the natural English meaning is she arranges.

Latin word order is much more flexible than English word order because the case endings show what each word is doing.

A very common Latin pattern is:

• subject ... object ... verb

So putting ordinat at the end is perfectly normal.

English depends more on word order, but Latin depends more on endings.

Because in takes different cases depending on meaning:

• in + ablative = location, meaning in/on
• in + accusative = motion into, meaning into

So:

• in mensa = on the table / in the table area, showing location
• in mensam = onto the table or into the table, showing motion toward it

Here the flowers are being arranged at that location, not moved into it, so mensa is in the ablative.

In this sentence, it is usually understood as on the table.

Latin in with the ablative can cover a range that English splits up into words like:

• in
• on
• sometimes even something close to among or at

So the exact English preposition often depends on the noun and the context. With mensa (table), English naturally says on the table.

Latin has no articles like English the or a/an.

That means a Latin noun like serva can mean:

• a slave girl
• the slave girl

and flores can mean:

• flowers
• the flowers

The exact sense comes from context. In beginner sentences, English translations often add the because it sounds more natural.

Often, yes. Because the endings show the grammatical roles, Latin can change word order without completely changing the basic meaning.

For example, these could still mean essentially the same thing:

• Serva flores in mensa ordinat.
• Flores serva in mensa ordinat.
• In mensa serva flores ordinat.
• Ordinat serva flores in mensa.

However, the emphasis may shift. Latin writers often move words around to highlight something important or to create a certain style.

It is ablative singular.

You can tell because after in with a meaning of location, Latin uses the ablative.
The noun mensa, mensae is a first-declension noun, and its ablative singular form is mensa.

So:

• dictionary form: mensa, mensae
• form used here: mensa
• case: ablative singular

Yes. Without macrons, serva can look ambiguous to a learner.

It can be:

• serva = slave girl or maidservant as a noun
• servā! = save! as an imperative of servare, if macrons are shown

In this sentence, it is clearly the noun, because it fits as the subject with ordinat.

This is one reason context matters a lot in Latin.

A learner often wants to know what forms to look up in a dictionary. They are:

• serva → serva, servae = slave girl, maidservant
• flores → flos, floris = flower
• in → preposition meaning in/on with ablative, into with accusative
• mensa → mensa, mensae = table
• ordinat → ordino, ordinare, ordinavi, ordinatum = arrange, put in order

Knowing the dictionary form helps you recognize how the sentence form was built.