I am confused about what case oportet takes. In the sentence 'It is proper for me to ___", would 'me' take the dative because of 'for' or the accusative because 'me' is the object of oportet? Different websites seem to conflict about this. Also, what would the Latin be for "It is necessary that I ___"- is it the same thing?
Use of oportet
- Thread starter Alcibiades
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Oportet takes an acc.-inf. clause, so it would be me in the accusative.
Me isn't the object of oportet, though — oportet takes no object — but the whole acc.-inf. clause (me + inf.) is the subject of oportet.
It can also be construed with the subjunctive (e.g. oportet hoc faciam, "It is necessary that I do this/for me to do this", "I must/should/need to do this").
Me isn't the object of oportet, though — oportet takes no object — but the whole acc.-inf. clause (me + inf.) is the subject of oportet.
It can also be construed with the subjunctive (e.g. oportet hoc faciam, "It is necessary that I do this/for me to do this", "I must/should/need to do this").
Interesting -- I'd never thought of it that way (I suppose that, by analogy with verbs like dixit, I'd automatically read the acc-inf clause as an object) but that makes perfect sense and reads far more smoothly than trying to make it into an object: "'That I do such-and-such' is fitting/necessary" (rather than "It behooves me to do such-and-such," which is how I'd been thinking of it before.)
In "sed neque longioribus quam oportet hyperbatis", Quintillian 9.4.144; "oportet" doesn't select an accusative, why not?
sed neque longioribus quam oportet hyperbatis compositioni serviamus
That's more or less implying sed neque longioribus quam nos oportet compositioni servire hyperbatis compositioni serviamus, or sed neque longioribus quam ea esse oportet hyperbatis compositioni serviamus, but such wordiness is unnecessary as the meaning is clear the way Quintilian put it. It's like in English when you say something like "they shouldn't be longer than necessary": that's implying "they shouldn't be longer than is necessary for them to be", but you don't need all those words to convey your meaning.
That's more or less implying sed neque longioribus quam nos oportet compositioni servire hyperbatis compositioni serviamus, or sed neque longioribus quam ea esse oportet hyperbatis compositioni serviamus, but such wordiness is unnecessary as the meaning is clear the way Quintilian put it. It's like in English when you say something like "they shouldn't be longer than necessary": that's implying "they shouldn't be longer than is necessary for them to be", but you don't need all those words to convey your meaning.
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I wonder if the subjunctive and the ut clause could imply that it is more akin to an object than a subject, even if that's probably an improper definition. Perhaps the fact that it is called an impersonal verb could also hint in that direction, unless I am getting it all wrong.
Maybe we can just say it is like a predicative form of some sort.
Iam ad finem septimana uergit et ut solet Matthaeus inebriatur...