A March of Condemned Souls This story is an exceptional episode from the Ecclesiastical History, written by the 12th-century monk Orderic Vitalis from the abbey of Saint Evroult in Normandy. More known for his records of political events and local news of the medieval...
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Daniel Pettersson
How Catiline was defeated according to Sallust
Roman historian and politician, Gaius Sallustius Crispus, to many known as Sallust, wrote Bellum Catilinae or the War of Catiline around 42 B.C. as a chronicle of the conspiracy to overthrow the government by the aristocrat Lucius Sergius Catilina in 63 B.C. Bellum...
Halloween Special in Latin #7 – Frightful times at Froda
The Wonders of Fróðá In this year’s Halloween special in Latin, we will travel back in time to the Viking era and the summer when Christianity arrived in Iceland (i.e. around the year 1000). The story you are about to hear is based on the so-called Wonders...
The Day the Music Died: Alcibiades and the Tibiae
One of history's most ardent collectors of curious notes, interesting texts, and odd passages, Aulus Gellius (c. 125-180 A.D.), relates quite an amusing story in his Noctes Atticae about the famous general Alcibiades. Alcibiades (c. 450–404 B.C.) was Greek, Athenian...
Dry jokes in Latin from the 16th Century
Did people "back in the day" have a sense of humour? Or, are jokes something new to mankind? Of course people have laughed throughout history, telling each other jokes and stories meant for laughter! However, what you've laughed at and considered funny has widely...
The Supine in Latin Grammar: What it is and What its Function is
Among Latin’s many verb forms, the supine, causes students quite a lot of confusion. In this article, I will explain in detail what the supine is, its meaning and how and when it is used. In Latin there are two types of supine, Supine I and Supine II. The first,...
Halloween special in Latin #6 – The Ring
Last year we went to France in the mid 1600's for Halloween. This year we have turned to good old Swedish folktales to find our story. This year’s story has no date, no place, no names – which is quite common for tales of this kind: stories that have been told, and...
Rare and Ancient Latin words
Latin is an old language, a very old language. Today we might think of it as one language, frozen in time. However, even the Romans had "old words", words no longer in popular use. Some authors took pleasure in using these, while others frowned upon this. Julius...
How to start speaking Latin: the first daily exercise
Do you want to learn to read Latin well—without looking for the verb or checking the dictionary every other sentence? It is possible to read Latin well and understand it without translating, although you will need commentaries for some literature. Like most people who...