Questions & Answers about Puer aviae respondit se non iam clamare, immo vero tacere coepisse, quia eius verba audire vellet.
Why is aviae in the dative case?
Why does Latin use se here instead of eum?
Because the sentence is reporting what the boy said, and Latin uses the accusative + infinitive construction for that. The subject of the reported statement goes into the accusative.
It is se, not eum, because the reported subject is the same person as the subject of respondit: the boy replied that he himself.... A non-reflexive eum would suggest some other male person.
Why are clamare and coepisse infinitives?
After verbs of saying, answering, thinking, and perceiving, Latin often uses an indirect statement with an accusative subject and an infinitive verb.
So where English says he replied that he was no longer shouting, Latin says, more literally, he replied himself no longer to be shouting:
- se = the subject of the reported statement
- clamare / coepisse = the verbs of the reported statement
Latin does not need a separate word for that here.
Why is it clamare but coepisse?
The difference is one of tense inside indirect statement:
- present infinitive (clamare) shows action happening at the same time as the main verb: he replied that he was not shouting
- perfect infinitive (coepisse) shows action earlier than the main verb: he replied that he had begun...
There is also a special point with coepi: it is a defective verb, and its perfect-system forms are the normal ones used for begin. So coepisse is exactly what you would expect here.
What exactly does tacere coepisse mean?
Literally it means to have begun to be silent. In smoother English, that is often to have fallen silent or to have started keeping quiet.
The verb tacere means to be silent / keep quiet; it does not itself mean to become silent. The idea of beginning comes from coepisse.
What does non iam mean here?
non iam means no longer. So se non iam clamare means that he was no longer shouting.
You may also see iam non in Latin. In many contexts the difference is slight, and both can mean no longer.
What is the force of immo vero?
It strongly corrects and replaces the previous idea. A natural sense here is no, rather, indeed rather, or on the contrary.
So the boy is not just denying the charge of shouting. He is saying something stronger: I am not shouting anymore; in fact, I have begun to be quiet.
Why is it quia eius verba audire vellet with the subjunctive, not quia eius verba audire volebat?
Because the quia clause is giving the boy's own reason, as part of what he said, rather than an objective reason stated directly by the narrator.
Latin often uses:
- indicative after quia for a straightforward factual reason
- subjunctive when the reason is presented from someone's point of view or as part of reported speech/thought
So vellet means, in effect, because he wanted to hear her words, as the boy explained it.
The tense is imperfect subjunctive because the main verb respondit is past, and the wanting is simultaneous with that past moment.
Why is it eius verba and not sua verba?
Because suus/sua/suum refers back to the subject of its own clause. In quia eius verba audire vellet, the subject of vellet is the boy. So sua verba would mean his own words.
But the meaning here is her words, referring to the grandmother. Therefore Latin uses eius, the non-reflexive form.
What might the direct speech have looked like before it was turned into indirect speech?
Something like this:
Non iam clamo, immo vero tacere coepi, quia verba tua audire volo.
Then, after respondit, Latin changes it into indirect speech:
- clamo → clamare
- coepi → coepisse
- volo → vellet
- verba tua → eius verba
- the subject I becomes se
That is a good way to see how the whole sentence is built.
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