Writing a Synopsis in Latin A synopsis is

Writing a Synopsis in Latin

A synopsis is a summary. In Latin class, when we write a synopsis of a particular verb, we are taking one form from each tense and putting it into a list. This one form will be identified by person and number (i. e. third person singular, or s/he…). In this way, you are demonstrating that you can conjugate the chosen verb in every tense without having to write out all the charts.

For example, if I asked you to conjugate the verb ago agere egi actus, drive, in all the tenses we know, you would write: present tense ago I drive agimus we drive agis you drive agitis you (all) drive agit he, she, it drives agunt they drive

and then: imperfect tense agebam I was driving agebamus we were driving agebas you were driving agebatis you (all) were driving agebat he, she, it was driving agebant they were driving

and then: future tense agam I will drive agemus we will drive ages you will drive agetis you (all) will drive aget he, she, it will drive agent they will drive

and finally: perfect tense egi I drove egimus we drove egisti you drove egistis you (all) drove egit he, she, it drove egerunt they drove

That would take a great deal of time. Instead, we can practice all of the verb forms by just choosing one from each chart.

What would that look like? If we wrote our synopsis of ago agere egi actus, drive, in the first person plural (we…) it would look like this: tense Latin English present imperfect agimus agebamus we drive we were driving future perfect agemus egimus we will drive we drove

Now it’s your turn. What would a synopsis of ago agere egi actus, drive, look like in the third person plural? tense Latin English present imperfect agunt agebant they drive they were driving future perfect agent egerunt they will drive they drove

After reviewing the tenses presented here, you must take the multiple choice quiz on X 2. This quiz will ask you to translate several verb forms into English. See you tomorrow!