The word "conjugation" comes from the Latin coniugātiō, a calque of the Greek συζυγία (syzygia), literally "yoking together (horses into a team)".
The ancient Romans themselves, beginning with Varro (1st century BC), originally divided their verbs into three conjugations (coniugationes verbis accidunt tres: prima, secunda, tertia "there are three different conjugations for verbs: the first, second, and third" (Donatus), 4th century AD), according to whether the ending of the 2nd person singular had an a, an e or an i in it.
[4] In modern times grammarians[5] generally recognise four conjugations according to the ending of the active infinitive: namely -āre, -ēre, -ere, or -īre, for example: (1) amō, amāre "to love", (2) videō, vidēre "to see", (3) regō, regere "to rule" and capiō, capere "to capture", (4) audiō, audīre "to hear".
Examples in the different conjugations are: (1) moror, morārī "to delay", (2) polliceor, pollicērī "to promise", (3) sequor, sequī "to follow" and regredior, regredī "to go back", (4) mentior, mentīrī "to lie (tell a lie)".
These are: The first conjugation is characterized by the vowel ā and can be recognized by the -āre ending of the present active infinitive form.
The infectum tenses conjugate as follows (see also their meaning): * The 2nd person singular passive amāberis, amābāris, amēris, amārēris can be shortened to amābere, amābāre, amēre, amārēre.
-re was the regular form in early Latin and (except in the present indicative) in Cicero; -ris was preferred later.
[6] In early Latin (Plautus), the 3rd singular endings -at and -et were pronounced -āt and -ēt with a long vowel.
The a is also short in the supine statum and its derivatives, but the other parts of stō "I stand" are regular.
Deponent verbs in this conjugation all follow the pattern below, which is the passive of the first type above:[7] The three perfectum tenses of the 1st conjugation go as in the following table: In poetry (and also sometimes in prose, e.g. Livy), the 3rd person plural of the perfect indicative is often amāvēre instead of amāvērunt.
[10] The -v- of the perfect active tenses sometimes drops out, especially in the pluperfect subjunctive: amāssem for amāvissem.
Other forms: The second conjugation is characterized by the vowel ē, and can be recognized by the -eō ending of the first person present indicative and the -ēre ending of the present active infinitive form: The passive videor also often means "I seem".
Other forms: The principal parts usually adhere to one of the following patterns: In verbs with perfect in -vī, syncopated (i.e. abbreviated) forms are common, such as dēlēram, dēlēssem, dēlēstī for dēlēveram, dēlēvissem, dēlēvistī.
They mostly go like the passive of terreō, but fateor and confiteor have a perfect participle with ss:[12] The following are semi-deponent, that is, they are deponent only in the three perfect tenses:[13] The third conjugation has a variable short stem vowel, which may be e, i, or u in different environments.
", have the ending -e.[6] There is no regular rule for constructing the perfect stem of third-conjugation verbs, but the following patterns are used: Although dō, dare, dedī, datum "to give" is 1st conjugation, its compounds are 3rd conjugation and have internal reduplication: Likewise the compounds of sistō have internal reduplication.
Other forms: Some examples are: Deponent verbs in this group include: The fourth conjugation is characterized by the vowel ī and can be recognized by the -īre ending of the present active infinitive.
In the perfect tenses, shortened forms without -v- are common, for example, audīstī, audiērunt, audierat, audīsset for audīvistī, audīvērunt, audīverat, audīvisset.
Cicero, however, prefers the full forms audīvī, audīvit to audiī, audiit.
It is conjugated as follows:[17] In early Latin (e.g. Plautus), siem, siēs, siet can be found for the present subjunctive sim, sīs, sit.
The principal parts of these verbs are as follows: The perfect tenses conjugate in the regular way.
For the difference in meaning between eram and fuī, see Latin tenses#Difference between eram and fuī The verb volō and its derivatives nōlō and mālō (short for magis volō) resemble a 3rd conjugation verb, but the present subjunctive ending in -im is different: The spellings volt and voltis were used up until the time of Cicero for vult and vultis.
The verb ferō, ferre, tulī, lātum "to bring, to bear, to carry" is 3rd conjugation, but irregular in that the vowel following the root fer- is sometimes omitted.
The perfect tense tulī and supine stem lātum are also irregularly formed.
The compound verb comedō, comedere/comēsse, comēdī, comēsum "to eat up, consume" is similar.
The Romans themselves often used an alternate expression, fore ut followed by a subjunctive clause.
The gerund is a noun, meaning "the act of doing (the verb)", and forms a suppletive paradigm to the infinitive, which cannot be declined.
Some examples coming from all conjugations are: Deponent verbs use active conjugations for tenses that do not exist in the passive: the gerund, the supine, the present and future participles and the future infinitive.
A few examples are: The future active participle is normally formed by removing the –um from the supine, and adding a –ūrus.