Quote:
Originally Posted by HareBrain  The only Latin I know comes from Monty Python's Life of Brian, but isn't the male ending "us"? (As confusion over the gender of a certain bear has shown.) So focus/foci, locus/loci, pokeintheus/pokeinthei.
If stadium/stadia, why not forum/fora? |
I ought to decline to comment, but as with English (and other languages') verbs, endings are often reused. This is easiest to see with adjectives, which have to have versions for all three genders as well as the six cases**:
.......M.......F.......N
Singular
Nom. bonus ..bona ...bonum
Acc. bonum ..bonam ..bonum Gen. boni ...bonae ..boni
Dat. bono ...bonae ..bono
Abl. bono ...bona ...bono Voc. bone ...bona ...bonum Plural
Nom. boni ...bonae ..bona Acc. bonos ..bonas ..bona
Gen. bonorum bonarum bonorum
Dat. bonis ..bonis ..bonis
Abl. bonis ..bonis ..bonis
Voc. boni ...bonae ..bona (I hope no-one will suggest that Boneman has a feminine plural accusative. 
) ** - Nominative (subject), Accusative (direct object), Genitive (possessive), Dative (indirect object), Ablative (used with objects that in English are preceded by: with, to, for, in, on...), Vocative (used to address someone - or something - in speech). Someone else can deal with the Locative.