Download The Use of the Participle in Latin The Circumstantial Participle The

The Use of the Participle in Latin
The Circumstantial Participle
The participle is a verbal adjective. In English, the participle is routinely employed as an
attributive adjective that describes or specifies something about the noun it modifies:
the sleeping man
the running girl
the smoking gun
the cocked pistol
Latin, too, has participles that are employed in this fashion; generally speaking, however,
these are forms that have become so frequent that their origin is ignored or has largely
been forgotten, to the point that they are treated like any other adjective or, often (in the
case of present participles), as a noun: e.g., sapiens, prudens (< providens), adulescens,
iratus.
In Latin, however, regular participles are rarely employed in an attributive sense; instead,
they have a predicative force, actively stating something about the noun they modify. As
a result, they function as the equivalent of a subordinate clause, and are often best
translated in this way, both for the sake of clarity and because good English style admits
the use of participles to a much more limited degree than does the Latin. When employed
in such a fashion, the participle is referred to as a circumstantial participle, since it
describes the circumstances that attend or inform the action indicated by the main verb of
the sentence. Thus the sentence:
vir dormiens nihil videt.
is best translated, not as “the/a sleeping man sees nothing” (attributive use), but in one of
the following senses:
The/A man, while he is sleeping, sees nothing.
[temporal]
The/A man, although he is sleeping, sees nothing.
[concessive]
The/A man, because he is sleeping, sees nothing.
[causal]
The/A man, who is sleeping, sees nothing.
[relative]
The/A man, if he is sleeping, sees nothing.
[conditional]
The first three uses are the most common in Latin, and coincide with the standard options
when translating a cum-clause.
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As in the case of cum-clauses, the decision how best to translate these participial clauses
will rest in part on the particular clues offered by the context, and in part on your
subjective sense of what makes the best sense: you will often find that there are
reasonable arguments to be made for more than one translation. And, of course, the
Roman reader was offered no such interpretation: he or she merely heard a participle. In
this regard, it is clear that Roman authors relied on their auditor/reader to do a great deal
more work than is felt to be appropriate in the case of the modern English reader. But it is
equally clear that authors such as Cicero have worked out the logic of their compositions
quite carefully, and are relying on their audience to follow their train of thought. As a
translator, your job is in part to make such decisions for your reader and pass them along
via your translation.
Tense of the Participle
Like the infinitive, the participle does not have an absolute tense: it derives its tense in
relation to that of the main verb of the sentence (or, in the case of more complex
sentences, the verb governing the statement of which it forms a part).
A present participle indicates that the action indicated by the participle is to be
conceived as occurring simultaneously with the action indicated by the main verb.
A perfect participle indicates that the action indicated by the participle is to be
conceived as having occurred at some time prior to that of the action indicated by
the main verb.
A future participle indicates that the action indicated by the participle is to be
conceived as being destined/intended/planned to occur at some time subsequent to
that of the action indicated by the main verb.
Thus:
minans mihi, abiit.
He departed while in the midst of threatening me.
[i.e., he was shouting threats as he went out the door]
minans mihi, abibit.
He will depart while in the midst of threatening me.
minatus mihi, abiit.
After/Although/Since he had threatened me, he departed.
[i.e, the threatening occurred, and then, when it was completed, the man who
had voiced the threats left]
minatus mihi, abibit.
After he has threatened me, he will depart.
minaturus mihi, abiit.
He departed with the intention of threatening me.
[i.e., the threatening had yet to occur when he left, but was intended to occur]
minaturus mihi, abit.
He is departing with the intention of threatening me.
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The principal occasions on which the above set of practices will routinely be violated
involve the perfect participles of deponent verbs. Deponent verbs have a present active
form of the participle that the Romans can employ (e.g., sequens, minans). In many
instances, however, they will instead opt to use the perfect participle as though it were a
present (especially with verbs indicating states of mind, or the like): e.g., servos
repudiabat, veritus ne videretur causam civium cum servis fugitivis communicavisse (“he
kept rejecting [the services of] slaves, fearing that he might seem to have shared the cause
of citizens with runaway slaves” — reading 5Eii).
Translation Hint
When the circumstantial participle appears in the nominative case, as in the above
examples, it presents little challenge to the English speaker and can often be translated
quite literally (although such a strategy should generally be avoided: see above). When
the participle is not in the nominative, it tends to offer somewhat more of a challenge:
militem mihi minantem necavi.
I killed the soldier while he was in the midst
of threatening me.
servos conatos fugere necabimus.
We will kill the slaves who have attempted to
escape.
You want to be particularly careful to avoid what in English is known as a dangling
participle, illustrated by the following mistranslation of the second sentence above:
“Having attempted to escape, we will kill the slaves.”
That is, English speakers, lacking the clarity offered by the Latin inflectional system,
need to ensure that the participle will be taken with the correct noun. The danger is
illustrated most vividly by sentences such as the following:
“Having peed on a bush, I took my dog home.”
The Ablative Absolute
The ablative absolute offers a particular instance of a circumstantial participle. It is
employed when the subject of the participle (the noun modified by the participle) does
not appear in the main sentence (hence the descriptor “absolute” — i.e., unconnected).
This construction simply appends a circumstantial participial clause to the main sentence
by employing the ablative of accompaniment/attendant circumstances, without cum:
Caesare necato, omnes Brutum oderunt.
After Caesar had been killed, everyone
despised Brutus.
[lit. “With Caesar having been killed, …”]
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The only difference between such a sentence and the ones studied above is that “Caesar”
does not appear in the main clause, and so has to be appended using the ablative of
accompaniment.
The ablative absolute is often employed with statements that should involve the present
participle of the verb sum: since the present participle of sum is not employed in classical
Latin, it is simply omitted:
Verre praetore, …
“With Verres (being) praetor, …”
— i.e., while Verres was praetor; during Verres’ praetorship
Metello et Afranio consulibus, …
“When Metellus and Afranius were
consuls; during the consulship of
Metellus and Afranius …”