Difference between in and ad

[scrabulista]

I forgot to answer one of your questions: before a consonant, most of the time e and a are used instead of ex and ab.

According to Lewis and Short:
ex or ē (ex always before vowels, and elsewh. more freq. than e; e. g. in Cic. Rep. e occurs 19 times, but ex 61 times, before consonants—but no rule can be given for the usage; cf., e. g., ex and e together: qui ex corporum vinculis tamquam e carcere evolaverunt, Cic. Rep. 6, 14. But certain expressions have almost constantly the same form, as ex parte, ex sententia, ex senatus consulto, ex lege, ex tempore, etc.; but e regione, e re nata, e vestigio, e medio, and e republica used adverbially;

While the rule for a/ab is this:
The second form of this preposition, changed from ap, was ab, which has become the principal form and the one most generally used through all periods—and indeed the only oue used before all vowels and h; here and there also before some consonants, particularly l, n, r, and s; rarely before c, j, d, t; and almost never before the labials p, b, f, v, or before m,

aps was used only before the letters c, q, t, and was very soon changed into abs

I would assume, then that a would be used all other times.

 

[Dido]

Could I ask you, Dido, what's your native tongue? It could help a lot in the future in easy explanations.

Dutch indeed . What difference does it make? My English is good enough to understand examples in English (I went to university)

Even though i wrote gooses instead of geese

Really I was taught prepositions were NEVER used with proper names of towns... Always eo Romam, Roma proficiscor, etc... Well maybe there are exceptions.

Me too. Same goes for domus: domum venit.

By the way, this is a great forum, I learn so much And I like the geekiness

 

[Pacifica]

Yes this is a great Latin-geek forum indeed, with many "big brains" hanging around, lol.

 

[Godmy]

Dido: Whatever your knowledge of English is, the most "native" feeling will stay with your Dutch And that's why it is good to cleverly use it for more complex grammar of a foreign language, which doesn't seem natural to you from the first glance.

<- And I'm glad you're satisfied with the forum

 

[Imber Ranae]

Surely you can use them if the verb is not strictly the verb of the motion which uses them frequently or to convey a different kind of message: here "ad Tusculum" would mean that your destination (for example a little village or a port) is not "in Tusculo" but "apud Tusculum/ad Tusculum".

And "in Tusculum" is either (theoretically) a kind of emphasis (not found much in practice) or the verb used is not very much frequent with the allative kind of accusative.

Edit: Also. Pacis puella, the use is necessary if you say e.g. "in urbem Romam" here the bare accusative is banned... Titus Livius says frequently ad urbem Romam but he's usually talking about the hostile armies nearing to the city, he's never really hinting that the armies are on their way inside (nobody would ever thought that possible when they had their own armies outside defending the city/civitas.. etc etc etc)

ad and a/ab are also used when mere distance or direction is involved, but no actual movement, e.g. ipse iter ad Mutinam dirigerem "I myself directed the march to Modena" / arripit...notum iter ad Thebas "she took up the well-known journey to Thebes" / Zama quinque dierum iter ab Carthagine abest "Zama is a five days' journey distant from Carthage".

Generally, I'd say that Romae = in urbe, Romam = in urbem, and Romā = ex urbe, but that apud Romam = apud urbem, ad Romam = ad urbem, and ab Romā = ab urbe.

 

[Godmy]

<<- good remark about that direction, haven't thought of that.
(But basically this is the same as the phenomenom=preposition with two cases/2 kinds of "to", I observe in my own language...)

 

[Dominus Solanum]

Been having trouble with this exact pair of words, let me see if I'm grasping this correctly:

In the sentence "converte hanc sententiam ex Latin in Anglicum" one would use "in" instead of "ad" because we're going from Latin into English and not in a physical, directional sense?

If you used "ad" instead of "in" would it really screw up the sentence? I get the feeling that a Latin speaker would easily understand if you swapped out one for the other but it would not be perfectly correct and that the difference is incredibly minute either way.

 

[Pacifica]

I think you got it on the whole. It should definitely be in Latinum for the reason you say. In implies the idea of "actually entering" - either properly speaking (in Britanniam pervenire...) or figuratively (in Latinum vertere, in Honorem deorum...), and ad just an idea of direction, of "going towards". But it's true that there are some expressions where they seem to be used a bit interchangeably, there is ad honorem and in honorem, maybe these two have a slightly difference in intensity, but I couldn't tell to what extent it was really felt in actual use.

 

[Dominus Solanum]

Thanks, I think it's just the English 'in' that's screwing with my perceptions. It would probably easier to grasp if 'in' wasn't such a common word. A sentence like "licetne mihi in
latrinam ire?" goes against every grammatical urge I have.

 

[Pacifica]

Well, maybe when it's in + abl. you can think about it as the English "in", and when it's in + acc. as the English "into". There's a somewhat similar difference between these two pairs, even if, of course, you won't always actually translate in + acc as "into" if you have to provide a translation in good English for whatever reason, and vice-versa, but you get what I mean. It's just similar.

 

[Deleted member 13757]

Thanks, I think it's just the English 'in' that's screwing with my perceptions. It would probably easier to grasp if 'in' wasn't such a common word. A sentence like "licetne mihi in
latrinam ire?" goes against every grammatical urge I have.

Ad pipem aut cacam faciendum?

 

[Dominus Solanum]

Well, maybe when it's in + abl. you can think about it as the English "in", and when it's in + acc. as the English "into". There's a somewhat similar difference between these two pairs, even if, of course, you won't always actually translate in + acc as "into" if you have to provide a translation in good English for whatever reason, and vice-versa, but you get what I mean. It's just similar.

Ah yeah, that's a bit better to keep in mind at least in general terms. Thanks for the advice!

Ad pipem aut cacam faciendum?

Mon Dieu, why would you want to know?

 

[Godmy]

Just adding:
- ad honorem alicuius aliquid facere - to do something in addition to somebody's honour
- in honorem alicuius aliquid facere - to do something so the somebody's honour connected to this action starts to exist in effect (=in somebody's honour, mostly)

ad cannot incite the object/noun to exist, whereas in can

(*To do something in addition to somebody's honour can mean for example that want to augment it, not to create a new instance)

You could argue with gerundives/gerunds: Ad navigandum paratus est.
-> Litteraly "he is(est) prepared(paratus) to(ad) sail(navigandum - acc.; nom. is navigare as we know)" ( <- that's how English infinitive of purpose has appeared).
It is used like this because these actions always exist in speaker's mind and somebody else in the same time is operating with the actions already. "paratus" expresses that you are making yourself compatible with something (which therefore must exist)

(In slavic language this construction works only with verbal susbtantives <- which behave fully as substantives, either analogically created from the verb or having the same root: je(est, or older "jest" ) připraven(paratus) k(ad) plavbě(navigationem -> "navigationi" for us, a dative) )

(Now off-topic: )

So just theoretically if somebody used this non existing construction (I will cross it out) : In navigandum paratus est <- now if I imagine this being done in Czech with our counterpart of in+acc (which is "do+gen."): Je připraven do plavby what are my feelings:
1) it sounds as a nonsense
2) it is too invasive
3) it seems that a verb of motion has been omitted: (paratus est in navigandum ire) / je připraven do plavby jít (<- here both Latin and Czech use the supines instead of this)
4) there is no reason to "cause the navigatio/plavba to exist", it already exists in his mind, he's not preparing himself so the navigatio/plavba starts to exist, but because it exists in his head already and he's just making himself a compatible part with the action


Edit: In Czech we use "ad honorem" because we say something different than Romans. We think that the honor already exists and we only add something to it. Romans on the other hand were creating "a new instance" of the honour connected to that particular action even if there were some "honours" already existing.
(check my last edit Pacis puella - but it's not that interesting)

 

[Pacifica]

Thank you Godmy! I absolutely wasn't aware that the difference between ad honorem and in honorem was the one you say, but it perfectly makes sense!

 

[Godmy]

I'm glad if it does

Now just few other things from my language:

- We use in this construction either pro+acc (which can be compared either to the dative of purpose /dativus finalis / double dative or sometimes Latin pro + abl.): děláme to pro jeho slávu = ei honori id facimus (=in eius honorem) / pro eius honore (<= I wouldn't use this one in latin preferably)
- And when we use "ad" then usually we feel that we omit (or we don't omit) something as "maiorem" - k jeho větší sláve (litt.: "to his bigger glory") = ad maiorem eius gloriam <- here the "in" wouldn't be even possible because "maior" predicts that we will augment/magnify something which already exists

 

[Acsacal]

Ad pipem aut cacam faciendum?

After a sentence including ire, I'd say minctum vel cacatum?
(Vel instead of aut to encompass a possible dual-function mission)

 

[Deleted member 13757]

a possible dual-function mission)

I guess that's possible...

 

[Dominus Solanum]

I guess that's possible...

QCM = quatens caput meum

Sidenote, is there a standardized list of internet abbreviations translated to Latin somewhere?

 

[Godmy]

QCM = quatens caput meum

Sidenote, is there a standardized list of internet abbreviations translated to Latin somewhere?

Only those the single communities make for themselves and use them frequently

 

[Pacifica]

I've only invented one... RM= ridendo morior...