Two cum-clauses in a Livian battle narrative
A candidate in a 45-minute unseen prose paper translates a 27-word passage: 'Hostes, ubi primum signa nostra conspexere, cum flumen transirent, impetu facto in ripam nostros, qui pauci aderant, dissipaverunt; quos cum fugientes vidisset dux, ipse cum equitibus supervenit.' She renders the first clause as 'since they were crossing the river' and the second as 'when he had seen them fleeing'. She also takes 'quos' in the second clause to refer to 'flumen'. Her teacher marks the first 'cum' wrong, the second right, and asks for a written justification before awarding the translation mark. The candidate insists that 'cum' with an imperfect subjunctive is always causal, and that 'quos' must refer to the nearest preceding noun. The passage is printed without glosses, and she has 10 minutes to defend her choices in a viva.
1. Assess the two 'cum' clauses. What mood and tense does each use, and which English rendering does the context support? Why is the candidate's rule ('cum + imperfect subjunctive is always causal') unreliable?
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The first clause, 'cum flumen transirent', is cum + imperfect subjunctive. In past narrative this is the circumstantial cum, which can be temporal ('when/while') or causal ('since'); context decides. The enemies see the standards, then attack while crossing: the crossing is the circumstance of the attack, not its cause. 'While they were crossing' is therefore the natural rendering. 'Since they were crossing' would need a context such as the river exposing them. The second clause, 'quos cum fugientes vidisset', is cum + pluperfect subjunctive, normally temporal ('when he had seen them fleeing'); the pluperfect marks prior action. The candidate's rule is false: mood alone does not fix sense. 'Cum' with the subjunctive is a subordinating conjunction whose nuance depends on the main clause and real-world logic. The examiner is right to mark the first wrong and the second right, but the justification should be contextual, not a blanket rule.
2. Resolve the reference of 'quos' and translate the second half of the sentence. What settles the reference?
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'Quos' is accusative plural, object of 'vidisset'. The nearest antecedent is 'nostros' (our men), not 'flumen' (neuter singular, which could not be referred to by masculine plural 'quos'). So 'quos cum fugientes vidisset dux' = 'when the commander had seen them fleeing'. The principle is agreement: 'quos' is masculine plural, so it cannot pick up 'flumen'. Sense also supports 'our men': the commander sees his own men running and intervenes with cavalry. Translation: 'when the commander had seen them fleeing, he himself came up with the cavalry.' The candidate's claim that 'quos' refers to the river ignores gender and number.
3. Propose a defensible construal of 'impetu facto in ripam' and show how it changes the English.
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'Impetu facto' is an ablative absolute, 'having made an attack'. The phrase 'in ripam' is ambiguous: it can be accusative of motion ('onto the bank') or complement of 'impetum facere in aliquem/rem' ('make an attack on'). Latin idiom supports 'impetum facere in' + accusative = 'attack'. So 'impetu facto in ripam' = 'having made an assault on the bank'. That makes the bank the target, and 'nostros dissipaverunt' follows: they scattered our men. If 'in ripam' were motion, we should expect a verb of motion, not 'impetum facere'; the English would be 'they made an attack and rushed onto the bank', which adds a verb not in the Latin. The idiomatic construal is therefore 'they attacked the bank and scattered our men'.