Medicus pulmonem spectat.

Because medicus is in the nominative case, which is the case normally used for the subject of the sentence.

In this sentence:

• medicus = the doctor, as subject
• pulmonem = the lung, as direct object

Latin often shows grammatical roles by word endings, not mainly by word order.

Because pulmonem is the accusative singular form, used for the direct object.

The basic dictionary form is pulmo, meaning lung. But when the lung is the thing being looked at or examined, Latin puts it into the accusative:

• pulmo = lung, as subject
• pulmonem = lung, as direct object

So Medicus pulmonem spectat means the doctor is looking at/examining the lung.

The ending -at tells you that the verb is:

• present tense
• third person singular
• active
• indicative

So spectat means he/she/it looks at, is looking at, or in context examines.

Since the subject is medicus, we understand it as the doctor looks at/examines.

Because classical Latin does not have articles like English the and a/an.

So medicus can mean:

• a doctor
• the doctor

And pulmonem can mean:

• a lung
• the lung

You figure out which is best from the context.

It is important for emphasis and style, but not as much for basic grammar as it is in English.

Because the endings already show the roles of the words, Latin can change the order more freely. For example, these would still mean basically the same thing:

• Medicus pulmonem spectat
• Pulmonem medicus spectat
• Spectat medicus pulmonem

The most neutral order here is fine as given, but Latin does not depend on word order the way English does.

Literally, spectat comes from spectare, meaning to look at, watch, observe, or inspect.

In a medical sentence like this, English might naturally translate it as examines, because that is what a doctor does to a lung. So both ideas are connected:

• basic meaning: looks at / observes
• contextual meaning: examines

They are usually given as:

• medicus, -i = doctor, physician
• pulmo, pulmonis = lung
• specto, spectare = look at, observe, examine

For beginners, this is useful because it shows how the word changes:

• medicus belongs to the second declension
• pulmo belongs to the third declension
• spectare belongs to the first conjugation

Because Latin declensions are not determined by the nominative form alone. You also need the genitive singular.

The dictionary entry is pulmo, pulmonis. The genitive pulmonis shows that it is a third-declension noun.

That is why its accusative singular is pulmonem.

It is nominative singular.

That tells you:

• it is the subject
• it is one doctor, not more than one

If it were plural, you would expect medici.

It is accusative singular.

That tells you:

• it is the direct object
• it is one lung

So the sentence is about a doctor examining one lung.

No. The endings prevent that reading.

• medicus is nominative, so it is the subject
• pulmonem is accusative, so it is the object

If Latin wanted to say The lung examines the doctor, it would need different forms, such as Pulmo medicum spectat.

In a common classroom-style classical pronunciation, you could say:

• medicus = MEH-di-koos
• pulmonem = pool-MOH-nem
• spectat = SPEK-taht

So the whole sentence sounds roughly like:

MEH-di-koos pool-MOH-nem SPEK-taht

Usually yes. Medicus means doctor or physician.

Depending on context, it can mean someone practicing medicine in general, not necessarily a modern specialist. In a simple learning sentence like this, doctor is the natural meaning.

Because Latin verb endings already include the subject information.

The form spectat already means:

• he looks at
• she looks at
• it looks at

So Latin often does not need a separate subject pronoun unless it wants extra emphasis.

Here, medicus gives the subject explicitly anyway.

Yes. The Latin present tense often covers both:

• simple present: looks at
• progressive present: is looking at

So depending on context, either can work in English.

The biggest point is that Latin uses endings to show function:

• -us in medicus here marks the nominative singular subject
• -em in pulmonem marks the accusative singular object
• -at in spectat marks third-person singular present

So even in a very short sentence, the endings tell you who is doing what to whom.