Matura Latin and Classical Culture key terms

A Latin participial phrase in the ablative case, made of a noun or pronoun plus a participle, that stands apart from the main clause and expresses circumstance such as time, cause, or condition.

The Latin subjunctive mood, used in subordinate clauses expressing purpose, result, indirect questions, and conditions, and in main clauses for wishes, commands, and potential statements.

A subordinate clause introduced by cum with a verb in the imperfect or pluperfect subjunctive, describing the circumstances surrounding a past action; usually translated with 'when' or 'since'.

One of the five Latin patterns of noun and adjective endings that mark case and number; the first covers mostly feminine nouns, the second mostly masculine and neuter, the third includes nouns of all genders.

One of the four regular Latin verb patterns distinguished by the theme vowel of the infinitive; the third conjugation has a short -ere ending and includes mixed verbs like capere.

A grammatical case of Latin nouns and adjectives; the six cases are nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, vocative, and ablative, each signalling a syntactic role such as subject, possessor, or means.

The Latin case covering separation, means, agent with a preposition, manner, and comparison; its many functions make it the most varied case in the language.

A Latin verb with passive form but active meaning, such as loquī ('to speak') or sequī ('to follow'); the perfect participle of such verbs is usually active in sense.

A verbal adjective formed from a verb stem, agreeing with a noun in case, number, and gender while also governing the verb's own objects; Latin has present, perfect, and future active participles plus a perfect passive one.

The study of how Latin words combine into clauses and sentences, including agreement, government of cases, word order, and the use of subordinate conjunctions and moods.

A verb form marked for person and number, which can serve as the predicate of a clause; it contrasts with infinitives, participles, and supines, which have no personal ending.

A pronoun such as quī, quae, quod that introduces a relative clause and agrees with its antecedent in gender and number but takes its case from its own function in the clause.

To render a Latin text into Polish; a faithful translation keeps the syntax and tense structure of the original while producing natural Polish word order and idiom.

A word or phrase built by translating the parts of a foreign expression into native morphemes, such as Polish 'językoznawstwo' modelled on a foreign compound; common in Latin-derived terminology.

Reported speech in Latin, in which statements, questions, and commands are expressed in the accusative with infinitive or in the subjunctive; the speaker's original words are not quoted directly.

A summary of a Latin text's structure and content, identifying the main sections, speaker, addressee, and argument before closer reading and interpretation.

A short illustrative anecdote or historical instance, often drawn from Roman history, used by orators and moralists to support an argument or teach conduct.

The art of persuasive public speaking, a central school subject in Rome; its three genres are judicial, deliberative, and epideictic, and its parts include invention, arrangement, style, memory, and delivery.

A deliberate deviation from ordinary expression, such as anaphora, chiasmus, or asyndeton, used to give emphasis, rhythm, or emotional force to a passage.

The rhythmic pattern of a Latin verse line, defined by the arrangement of long and short syllables; the dactylic hexameter and elegiac couplet are the most common in school texts.

A Latin poem or song; the term covers lyric verse, epic, and ritual chant, and it is the standard word for an individual poem in a collection such as Horace's Odes.

A long narrative poem in elevated style, centred on heroic deeds and often on a founding myth; Virgil's Aeneid is the Latin model, shaped by Homeric precedent.

A serious dramatic form in verse, developed in fifth-century Athens, in which a protagonist suffers a reversal through fate, error, or divine opposition; Seneca adapted the genre in Latin.

A comic dramatic form, developed by Aristophanes and Menander and adapted in Rome by Plautus and Terence, typically showing ordinary people resolving domestic or social conflicts.

A term from Aristotle's Poetics for the purging or clarification of pity and fear that tragedy is said to produce in the audience through emotional engagement with the action.

The Roman state conceived as a public matter; in political history the term denotes the republican system with its consuls, senate, and assemblies, as opposed to rule by one man.

One of two annually elected chief magistrates of the Roman republic who commanded armies and presided over the senate; the office gave its name to the year.

The Roman advisory council of former magistrates, which controlled finance and foreign policy and became the dominant political body of the republic and an enduring symbol of authority.

The formal power of command held by Roman senior magistrates, including military authority and the right to enforce obedience; it was limited by collegiality and annual tenure within the city.

An official elected by the plebeians to protect them against patrician magistrates; the tribune could veto proceedings and was sacrosanct, and the office later became a base for popular politics.

The long period of relative stability and internal peace across the Mediterranean world under the Roman empire, especially from Augustus to the second century, which favoured trade and urban life.

The mountain in northern Greece believed to be the home of the twelve principal gods; 'Olympian' therefore describes the major deities of the Greek pantheon.

The collective body of gods worshipped by a people; the term also names the Roman temple rebuilt under Hadrian, whose dome and oculus became a model for later architecture.

The Roman practice of identifying foreign gods with their own, such as equating the Greek Zeus with Jupiter or the Celtic gods with Roman deities, which eased cultural and religious integration.

The chief Roman god of sky, thunder, and oaths, equivalent to Greek Zeus; as Jupiter Optimus Maximus he was honoured in the temple on the Capitoline hill.

A Roman virtue of dutiful respect toward gods, homeland, and family, especially parents; Virgil makes it the defining quality of Aeneas and a core Roman ideal.

The 'custom of the ancestors', an unwritten code of traditional Roman values and practices that served as a moral and political standard throughout the republic.

The Trojan hero who escapes the fall of Troy and, after long wanderings, founds the line that leads to Rome; he is the protagonist of Virgil's Aeneid and a model of pietas.

The Renaissance movement that made the recovered Greek and Latin classics central to education and culture, stressing eloquence, philological study, and the imitation of ancient models.

The ongoing reuse of classical themes, forms, and ideas in later European culture, from medieval allegory through Renaissance imitation to modern theatre, film, and political thought.

The Greek poet to whom the Iliad and Odyssey are attributed; his epics set the model for heroic narrative and were central to Greek education and later Roman literary imitation.

The fourth-century BCE Greek philosopher whose Poetics analysed tragedy, plot, and catharsis; his logical and ethical works shaped medieval and Renaissance European thought.

The title taken by Octavian in 27 BCE when he became the first Roman emperor; his reign began the principate and a long period of internal peace and cultural patronage.