8
The next word is humanus, -a, -um, meaning “human(e), kind, refined, cultivated.” It’s a
first/second-declension adjective, employing the same base as the noun homo, hominis. Thus, it
means literally “pertaining to humankind.”
The next word is another adjective, immortalis, -e, meaning “not subject to death, immortal.” It’s
third declension so it must be i-stem. It’s a combination of the prefix in- (here, in its assimilated
form im-) meaning “not,” and the base mort- meaning “death,” a base we’ve already encountered
in the noun mors, mortis.
The next word is a verb: ait, aiunt, meaning “he says, they say (assert).” Its conjugation is
unclear, perhaps third-io. There’s not enough of it attested to make a clear determination. And
that’s because this is a “defective” verb, meaning it doesn’t have all its parts. Roman authors use
it almost invariably in the third person, although the 1
st
-singular aio and 2
nd
-singular ais are
attested in a few works, not many. It also occurs in the present tense mainly, though here and
there it shows up in the imperfect, aiebat. Be aware that this is a “verb of the head” and often
introduces indirect statement: “He says that …”
The next word is another verb: credo, credere, credidi, creditum, meaning “believe, trust.” It’s
third-conjugation. The odd-looking perfect base credid- is a product of reduplication like do,
dare, dedi, datum, of which credo is probably a compound of some sort. What the affix cre-
represents is unclear, though some scholars suggest it’s related to the same base that gives us
cardi- “heart.” In that case cre-do originally meant “put one’s heart (into something),” that is,
“have confidence in it.” Note that because of its meaning credo expects an indirect object,
literally “to give trust or be trusting to someone.” It also expects indirect statement, “to believe
that…”
Another verb follows: nego (1), meaning “deny, say (that) … not.” Indirect statement also
follows nego often which is used by Roman authors to negate the indirect statement, producing
the sense “I said that something did not happen,” which is only a hair’s difference from
“denying” it but renders much more idiomatic English. In other words, where we like to say “He
says that she did not come,” the Romans preferred “He denies (negat) her to have come.”
The next word, yet another verb that takes indirect statement, is nuntio (1), meaning “announce,
report, relate.” That so many verbs in the vocabulary for this chapter take indirect statement can
hardly come as a shock.
So here’s another one: puto (1), meaning “reckon, suppose, judge, think, imagine.” Do you
“think that” this verb takes indirect statement? Etymologically, it’s a fascinating verb. Originally,
it comes from a base that means “to prune,” as in “prune or trim a bush.” As Latin developed, its
tidy-up-the-garden sense led to another connotation, “clean up one’s financial accounts.” That
later evolved into “think.” So, it’s fundamentally a metaphor based on farming, something the
early Romans did a lot of and thus affected their “thinking” and vocabulary, as can be seen from
other Latin words which are based on agricultural terminology, for instance, pecunia (“money”),
cf. English “impecunious” ─ what do you think that means? Good! “Having no (im-) money
(pecuni-)” ─ pecunia comes from a base that means “cattle” (pecus in Latin); also, rivalis, giving
us the word “rival,” which meant originally “pertaining to a river bank (rivus),” its adversarial