Henle II

[mom2-3 boys]

Henle II Lessons 1-3 quiz. (and it is from Ex. 9 #7 in Henle II)
B Translate:
The Roman cohort was not large.

Cohors Romana magna non erat.

Cohors is M.
Why is Roman and large F in gender?
As a country it is F; a person M.
What rule or "How did they say it" are we overlooking?

TIA

[Bonnie]

Cohors, cohortis, cohort, is feminine. It is a collective noun referring to a Roman military unit. Have a look at #50 in the Henle Grammar. Cohors follows the SOX rule. The adjectives Roman and large must agree with the subject cohors; they must be nominative, singular, feminine. Roman is an adjective directly modifying the noun subject, and large is a predicate adjective. Does that help?

Bonnie

[Bonnie]

You could also take a look at Henle Grammar #474 and 477, which explain that predicate adjectives and attributive adjectives agree with their nouns in case, number, gender. Also, Romana, Roman, is the adjective Romanus, Romana, Romanum -- not the city Roma, which as you correctly said is feminine. A cohors is not a person; it is a feminine collective noun. The Henle Grammar explains all the rules of gender in #46-51.

Bonnie

[mom2-3 boys]

Thank you. The grammar rule helps.
I said cohors cohortis is M - it actually wasn't listed as that in dictionary. We went off the definition that it was a unit of 600 men of a legion. But legion is F, and the SOX rule helps.

If a gender isn't listed in the back how do we know - Rules such as SOX? natural gender?
I see the foot note on pg. 9 in Henle grammar - I think will help sort this out.
Just getting use to a new text vs. the form series.

Thank you.

[Bonnie]

Yes, the Henle Grammar is an excellent, essential help. Always consult the Grammar book when a Grammar item is referenced in the textbook. And that is a great connection that you noted -- legio is also a feminine collective noun that follows the SOX rule. Natural gender does not apply to collective nouns ljke cohors and legio. Memorize the ERROR, SOX, LANCET rules. Also look at footnote #3 on p. 305 of the textbook: Nouns that do NOT follow the rules will have the gender marked in the vocabulary. Always memorize these exceptions. But nouns that do follow the rules will not have their gender noted in the vocabulary.

Bonnie

[Bonnie]

Just an extra note: You see in the Lesson 1 vocabulary that the 3rd declension noun consul, consulis, consul, has the gender marked. That is because, although it ends in the letter l, as in LANCET, it is not neuter but is masculine, as the natural gender rule is applied first. You probably noted in Exercise 1 that mons, pons, and collis do not follow SOX but are masculine. And there are several in that exercise that follow natural gender.

Bonnie

[Jon Christianson]

Apologies for the delay; I've been sick at home! It looks Like Bonnie has answered this handily already; nevertheless, a recap:

Cohors, cohortis is a feminine noun. In Henle, it's a little confusing that the word is provided without telling the gender. That's because Henle uses a number of "rules" or patterns to help students predict the gender of many third declension nouns. The SOX rule, for example, suggests that most third declension nouns whose nominative singular forms end with S, O, or X are feminine. Cohors fits this description. (You can find these "rules" on p. 9 of the Henle Latin Grammar.)

There are numerous exceptions to these "rules" - dux, for example, is masculine - but one can often tell because the noun describes something with natural gender. Dux means leader, which in Roman (i.e. military) terms is almost always a man. Natural gender (almost) always wins in such cases! Anytime neither the ending "rules" or natural gender can correctly indicate a third declension noun's gender, it should provide the gender.

As for Romana and magna, both are adjectives. It doesn't matter whether the noun Roma is feminine or not, the adjective Romanus must agree with whatever it describes in gender, case, and number; same with magnus. So, if the cohort is a Roman cohort, or a great cohort, both Roman and great modify cohort and must agree with it as feminine nominative singular.

- Jon