Learn and teach Latin here

A motto for this forum could be:

Contra principia negantem non est disputandem.

He he, Greatnan. I know those too, and you did have a bad time of it. But happily for me, it wasn't all I learnt. We did lots of nature study, art and drama, and, high spots of the week, an afternoon of history and a quiz on Fridays where we had to research and ask the opposing team a question. Excellent training for pub quizzes I agree.

I wish I had received a primary education like yours, Anno. At my useless Catholic elementary school in the 1940s, all we learned was the catechism, much of the New Testament, hymns and prayers in Latin (without translation), arithmetic up to long division (no fractions or decimals). The only geography, history or science I knew was learned at home by voracious reading - luckily, my parents were both avid readers.
Once I had learnt all the school was prepared to teach me I spent my last year marking the sum books of other pupils. But at least I still know the Cardinal Virtues, the Seven Deadly Sins, the Fruits of The Holy Ghost, and the sacraments. Very useful in trivial pursuits.

I suggested learning some Latin to a fellow student at Queensland University who was having trouble with English grammar. She did start Latin, but gave it up 'cos it was too hard! In the end I made up a sentence for her, using all the different parts of speech, and labelled each one with its grammatical name and position in the sentence, eg 'dog' noun, subject, 'bone', noun, direct object, 'black', adjective etc etc. She told me later it had helped enormously.

We learnt almost all the English grammar we needed to know in primary school, though we continued to practise it in secondary and it was tested in the Higher exam. So we understood the terminology of grammar - tenses and so on - by the time we started on Latin and French. My DS2 took up Spanish again at university, having given it up after GCSE. He just didn't know the terminology and I sent him a module I'd written for my mature students. Latin would have done him a power of good!

Semper inops quicumque cupit
Whoever desires is always poor.

Deedaa I never understood English grammar until I did Latin - then I not only understood it, I was grateful it was so simple in comparison!

Looking back though, I think it was also a case of good and bad teachers. My English teacher was a judgmental impatient bitch. My Latin teacher was one of those gifted teachers who just know how to impart knowledge.

I gave up Latin after I was off school for a month with measles, I missed all the lessons when they were learning all the tenses and I never did get them sorted out properly. But even with the little I did I can remember finding it quite thrilling to read Caesar's Punic Wars in his own words instead of a translation.
As a scientist my daughter finds Latin very useful as an international scientific language, and since she wasn't taught much English grammar at school she relies quite heavily on her knowledge of Latin grammar.

Oops sorry! Gm Wrong spelling and I think I've got the wrong thread

Ad nauseum

The Corsican language is said (by Corsicans) to be the closest language to Latin and Latin itself used to be spoken there. The last Latin speaker died within living memory - just.

Greatnan Apparently Napier and "I have Sind" is apocryphal - but it should be true.

Napier was supposed to have sent one word home to Britain during the Indian campaign - 'peccavi' - meaning 'I have sinned'. He had taken the town of Sind. He thought only senior officers would be educated enough to interpret the message so it would be secure.

Having learnt Latin and French certainly helped when I went to work in French speaking countries.

My French master said 'Latin is a dead language that won't lie down' to which the Latin master riposted 'French is just Latin with the endings chewed off!"

Isn't there a radio station in Finland that broadcasts the news in Latin?

Latin seemed so straightforward because it had rules. If you know how one verb behaves, you know how all the others in the same conjugation behave. I like things that work to a pattern.

That Horace should be compulsory for all students.

I loved Latin (good teacher) but blame it for my over complex sentences - Hannibal, having crossed the Alps & all that.

Greatnan, I bet it has been more useful to you than you give it credit. Although we didn't do German at school our understanding of Latin helped us help our son in Germany when he was struggling to learn it. It helped me too when I started to learn.

And actually, the words are wise.

There was a large and ancient aspidistra in my Fourth Form classroom and I had been assigned the task of dusting its leaves and watering it when it needed moisture. Which I hated. So I devised a cunning plan; if it died my task would be no more. Boiling water was obtainable from the almonary and was not hard to pour a good mugful over the plant. Actually when I left, Sister Agnes Mary told me that all the staff were glad to see the back of it and had a lot of sympathy. But the proprieties had to be maintained, hence the Latin punishment.

Or even , mightily. [titter]

Agree WHEN, it would be mightly helpful !

I was allowed to give Latin up after a couple of years when it became clear that I was no good at it:

22%: this is a true reflection of E's ability in Latin.

That is what the Latin teacher wrote in my report. Did not reflect that maybe he was not a very good teacher and his only strategy if you did not understand was to shout at you and call you very stupid! He left his wife and young family and ran off with a 6th former he was giving extra curricula Greek lessons to!

However I still know all the common Latin phrases and roots of words etc. Don't need an exam to know those bits!

Ok whose aspidistra were you watering? Was it a love hate relationship?

I hesitate to bring in alter ego in case it infringes GNHQ guidelines
but where would English be without Latin?
per capita
ad hoc
dies irae
agnus dei
vivat regina
even
sic transit gloria mundi
I feel young people whose education has not included these basics are missing out on the richness of language and shades of meaning.