Found in Antiquity

salvēte omnēs, ego sum Magistra Hurt! I'm a high school Latin teacher who makes Youtube videos including the Minecraftium series in which I teach Latin through the world of minecraft. I also run a blog called Found in Antiquity, where I post about Latin, Greek, and all things ancient world.

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Deponent verbs: the extremely common and useful verbs that Latin textbooks don't want you to acquire early, as they are usually withheld until late in the course. I explain them here in this video through CI and simple storytelling!

https://t.co/GKjaEdBipv

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multae vaccae sunt in terrā! In Minecraftium ep 3, Christopherus shows me how to get lots of cows, but a creeper sneaks into my field... I hope it doesn't explode our precious cows...

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Friendly Latin stories from 1934: A Roman Matron and her daughter. I talk to some tiny students in this video, and do a little picture-talk with the illustration.

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A complete guide to Classical Latin pronunciation: the sounds of Golden Age Latin

I have now made a Classical Latin pronunciation series on Youtube! Check out the first three parts here: These videos are suitable for complete beginners and advanced students alike. I speak 100% i…

It’s no wonder that reconstructed Latin is so often pronounced with an English or German accent when our textbooks are all written with advice like “c as in cat” (making you do an aspirated c) or “o as in pot” (a sound which varies according to English accents). Mapping Latin sounds onto English sounds inevitably causes students and teachers to reuse their not-quite-the-same native sounds instead of hearing and learning Latin sounds. I made this pronunciation video series to fill that gap and provide a way of demonstrating Latin pronunciation while staying 100% in the target language.

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Grammar Analysis scores don’t correlate with unseen translation ability

Some of the types of assessments Latin teachers have been traditionally setting are quite weird, the kind of things that aren’t normally done in any other languages. Consequently, it is hard …

Does Grammar Analysis matter, if our main goal is being able to actually understand stuff written in Latin? Does putting labels on the ablative have any bearing to translating? Not much at all, it appears (at least in my small sample of student test scores).

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I used to seriously question the Comprehensible Input method for learning ancient languages, but now I strongly recommend it as fully authentic and the best method for gaining reading fluency and b…

I’ve changed my mind - the comprehensible input stuff is actually incredibly powerful for learning language, even dead languages like Latin, Ancient Greek, and Biblical Hebrew. The one thing I can’t even make myself enjoy is the poster-child of CI in Latin, Orberg’s Lingua Latina Per Se Illustrata. I compare the pedagogy of this textbook to the pedagogy of Aleph with Beth’s video series of Biblical Hebrew, and explain how well-crafted video resources may have a far greater impact on language acquisition than print textbooks. 

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When ‘comprehensible input’ is not enough

I’ve been on Latin reddit discussions for years and one single educational theory comes up again and again as if it were the only way to learn a language: Krashen and his comprehensible input…

In this post, I discuss some of the problems in teaching Latin via comprehensible input, specifically in getting students to even notice the accusative case if too many predictable SOV sentence patterns are used. For example, in the introductory chapter for the accusative in Orberg’s Lingua Latina, students can guess correctly 88% of the time that the subject is the first word in the sentence, and in the remaining 12% the context doesn’t make it obvious that they have made a mistake in comprehension. I propose ways we can write sentences that solve this problem.

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Getting better at teaching scansion

Previously, I had taught the scansion of dactylic hexameter by giving a lecture of the whole system then getting students to have a crack at it with a copy of Latin text – and with no macrons print…

The rhythm of poetry arises from the natural long and short sounds of the language, but the way it is often taught is in the reverse: learn these rules and use puzzle-logic to figure out where the macrons are. In this post I explore what it is like to teach Latin scansion by starting with a text with all macrons printed. 

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Speed-running putting on a toga

What can you do stuck at home inside? See how fast you can get yourself dressed for the Senate of course. I started this challenge when someone said, “You need slaves or helpers to get yourse…

How fast can you put a toga on? Quite fast, it turns out. I feel like I take longer to put on layers of pants and shirts to be honest, but maybe that’s just me being lazy.

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Picture yourself planning for a Year 8 class in the final period of the day. It’s the second last week of term and everyone has finished their exams and have mentally started their holidays a…

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‘Palatina Medea’ or ‘Medea Palatina’? A preference for adjective-noun word order in Latin

We’ve been told that adjectives in Latin ‘tend to’ or ‘prefer to’ follow the nouns they describe. But on the contrary, the statistical evidence shows that Caesar and C…

Latin adjectives come before the word they describe more often than they come after! It was all liiies!

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A look at past and present views, and an analysis of -que words in Aeneid book 1.

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'Right now, Ottink is focused on the article for the word res, which roughly translates to "thing." ...

Ottink did not volunteer for this word.

"No one volunteers for res," she says, a little ruefully.’

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Shoes, you had one job

A heavily armored Roman centurion falls over with a crash when his hobnailed boots (which have great grip in mud and dirt) skid wildly on hard pavement in front of the Temple of Jerusalem. He does not get up alive.

Josephus, War of the Jews, VI.1.8

But there was one Julian, a centurion, that came from Bithynia... This man... leaped out, and of himself alone put the Jews to flight, when they were already conquerors; and made them retire as far as the corner of the inner court of the temple. From him the multitude fled away in crowds: as supposing that neither his strength, nor his violent attacks could be those of a mere man. Accordingly he rushed through the midst of the Jews, as they were dispersed all abroad, and killed those that he caught. Nor indeed was there any sight that appeared more wonderful in the eyes of Cæsar, or more terrible to others, than this. However, he was himself pursued by fate; which it was not possible, that he, who was but a mortal man, should escape. For as he had shoes all full of thick and sharp nails; as had every one of the other soldiers; so when he ran on the pavement of the temple, he slipped, and fell down upon his back with a very great noise which was made by his armour. This made those that were running away to turn back. Whereupon those Romans that were in the tower of Antonia set up a great shout, as they were in fear for the man. But the Jews got about him in crowds, and struck at him with their spears, and with their swords, on all sides. Now he received a great many of the strokes of these iron weapons upon his shield, and often attempted to get up again: but was thrown down by those that struck at him. Yet did he, as he lay along, stab many of them with his sword. Nor was he soon killed; as being covered with his helmet, and his breast-plate, in all those parts of his body where he might be mortally wounded: he also pulled his neck close to his body, till all his other limbs were shattered, and no body durst come to defend him; and then he yielded to his fate.

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νιηιλ ηυιυς λιβρι συπερεστ.

When Perseus accidentally renders a Latin editorial note in Greek letters but you can still totally make out what's going on.

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Twelve tenses: When English outdoes Ancient Greek in precision

I have sometimes heard people say, "Ancient Greek is the most precise language in the world." This usually comes from people who have not studied Greek for themselves and haven't really seen its qu...

Latin has six tenses and Ancient Greek has seven, but how many tenses do you think English has? In this post, I consider how languages might be more or less precise than each other in different ways, and compare the number of tenses available in English, Greek and Latin.

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(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8E9xXJBU5U)

It’s not that common to find Latin taught at a Primary School level. Yesterday I taught Latin numbers to a class of grade 3-6 students and we all sang this counting song, Decem Urnae. They couldn’t stop giggling when we got to the number six.

For more thoughts on how well these little kids are doing in Latin, check out my latest blog post (http://foundinantiquity.com/2015/05/01/a-latin-counting-song-and-thoughts-on-primary-latin/)