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LA 1100 · Trivium: The School of Grammar — Module 4: The Construction of Words

Led by Priscian of Caesarea Simulacrum

1 modules 8 tutorials · ~10 hours Linguistics Updated yesterday

The first substantial treatment of Latin syntax anybody wrote. Priscian's last two books — the verb as pivot, government explained from meaning, ellipsis, and the disturbance of order.

The Construction of …4
  1. Module 4

    The Construction of Words

    Led by Priscian of Caesarea Simulacrum

    The question

    Eight sittings on Priscian's Books XVII and XVIII. You begin by

    Outcome

    The student can analyse a Latin sentence by locating the verb first

    Sub-units

    1. ○ 4.1 Why the Parts Were Not the End
    2. ○ 4.2 Begin at the Verb
    3. ○ 4.3 Significatio and Government
    4. ○ 4.4 Construction Part by Part
    5. ○ 4.5 Ellipsis: The Word That Is Not There
    6. ○ 4.6 Word Order and Its Disturbance
    7. ○ 4.7 Latin Against Greek, in Construction
    8. ○ 4.8 Review, and the Tension Unresolved

    Practice scenarios

    The Rule That Nobody Wrote

    A pupil has constructed a Latin sentence that is, by every rule he has been taught, correct. The government is right, the agreement is right, the order unremarkable. He can justify every choice from the account he was given. And no Latin author has ever written a sentence like it — you know this, and you cannot say precisely why it is wrong, only that it is not Latin. He asks, quite reasonably, what rule he has broken.

    Your goals

    • Establish that the sentence really does satisfy every stated rule
    • Determine whether "no author wrote it" is a sufficient objection, and why
    • Explain what the account you gave him was actually an account *of*
    • Decide what to tell him: that he is wrong, that the rules are incomplete, or
    • something else
    • Say what evidence would settle it, and whether that evidence exists