New Latin Grammar

Name: New Latin Grammar
Author: Charles E. Bennett

by Charles E. Bennett

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Subjects

Latin language -- Grammar

In: Language Education·Language & Communication·Teaching & Education

Public-domain ebook sourced from Project Gutenberg #15665.

About this book

Charles E. Bennett’s New Latin Grammar is a revised school‑text that builds on his earlier 1895 edition, with the most recent updates dated 1918. The author explains that the work has been trimmed to a compact 250‑page format while preserving the essential facts of Latin syntax, morphology, and prosody. A new introductory essay traces the development of Latin within the Indo‑European family, and an index at the back lists the sources of the illustrative examples. The prefaces detail modest alterations, such as revised rules for syllable division, long‑marking of certain perfect subjunctive endings, and the abandonment of an obsolete theory of vowel length, yet the overall structure remains faithful to the original, offering a systematic progression from sounds and alphabet through declensions, conjugations, particles, word formation, and detailed syntax.

The book reflects the scholarly tone of early‑20th‑century American pedagogy, with a clear, didactic style that assumes a reader already motivated to master Latin. Its dense yet orderly layout, extensive tables of forms, and concise explanations will appeal to secondary‑school teachers, college students, and self‑directed learners who prefer a thorough, reference‑ready manual over a more narrative or anecdotal approach.

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The object of this book is to present the essential facts of Latin grammar in a direct and simple manner, and within the smallest compass consistent with scholarly standards. While intended primarily for the secondary school, it has not neglected the needs of the college student, and aims to furnish such grammatical information as is ordinarily required in undergraduate courses.

The experience of foreign educators in recent years has tended to restrict the size of school-grammars of Latin, and has demanded an incorporation of the main principles of the language in compact manuals of 250 pages. Within the past decade, several grammars of this scope have appeared abroad which have amply met the most exacting demands.

The publication in this country of a grammar of similar plan and scope seems fully justified at the present time, as all recent editions of classic texts summarize in introductions the special idioms of grammar and style peculiar to individual authors. This makes it feasible to dispense with the enumeration of many minutiae of usage which would otherwise demand consideration in a student's grammar.

In the chapter on Prosody, I have designedly omitted all special treatment of the lyric metres of Horace and Catullus, as well as of the measures of the comic poets. Our standard editions of these authors all give such thorough consideration to versification that repetition in a separate place seems superfluous.