Uses of the Ablative
Cracking the Case
What is the ablative case actually used for? Today we're going to go through some of the main uses of the ablative in Latin.
If you are not sure about any of the noun endings, you can download my free noun endings guide here. It's got all the endings for the first, second, and third declension nouns, and it's very useful to have to hand as you're doing exercises or translations.
What is the Ablative Case?
We often translate an ablative by using one of these words: by, with, from, or in. Keep that in mind when you're talking about the ablative. By, with, from, in.
If you see a word in the ablative case, you should be thinking this little phrase. Make it into a mantra to remember, and say it to yourself when you see ablatives.
This is helpful because for the most part, one of these words will be what you need to add to most nouns in the ablative case to get a good English translation.
Main Uses of the Ablative
The ablative does several things. It's used for circumstances, it's used for separation, and it's used for location. Each of these has various uses within them, so I'm going to go through each of these types, and use examples to explain what they mean.
Let’s get started.
1. Ablative of Circumstance
The ablative of circumstance breaks down into three uses.
ablative of accompaniment
ablative of means, which we also call the ablative of instrument, or the instrumental ablative
ablative of manner.
i) Accompaniment is for when you are with someone, it literally does what it says on the tin.
“The girl was walking with the boy”
puella cum puero ambulabat
puero is in the ablative, as he is the one accompanying the girl. This type of Circumstance is often found with the Latin word cum which means “with”, which can make spotting the ablative a lot easier.
ii) Means or instrument - this is used to talk about how someone does something, the means with which they have completed an action.
“The king was killed with poison”
rex veneno necatus est
veneno is ablative, “with poison”. It is the instrument with which an action has been completed.
iii) Circumstance can mean the emotions with which something is done, or the manner in which it is happening.
“We heard the news with fear”
nuntium terrore audivimus
terrore here is in the ablative case - “with fear” or “in fear”. I could also have used “with joy”, gaudio.
Ablatives of circumstance: Accompaniment; Means; Manner.
2. Ablative of Separation
Again this has three common uses:
place from which
ablative of agent
ablative of general separation
i) ablative of place from which. This is a location from which something's happening, usually where you're leaving from or sailing from.
“You are fleeing from the island”
ab insula fugitis
ab means “away from”, and insula means “the island”. Now, that is a first declension noun, so this is ablative. Place from which could be from the house, from the city, from the forum. Any place from which something is happening, or involves a movement away from.
ii) agent is also a part of separation. This is the person completing an action when you have a passive verb. With passive verbs, the grammatical nominative has something done to them by this person.
“The king was killed by his wife”
rex ab uxore necatus est
She's the agent in this, and so she is in the ablative, ab uxore is the ablative of agent. This is always found with a or ab (if the following word begins with a vowel).
iii) separation itself, which is where you physically separate two things.
“We saved you from the river”
te flumine servavimus
In this example, we have physically removed you from the river. flumine is the ablative of separation, “from the river”.
Separation uses of the ablative: Separation itself; Agent; Place From Which.
3. Ablative of Location
The last of the three main types of ablative are ablatives of location, and unsurprisingly these are to do with placing something in a place or time:
the place where something is happening,
the time when something happened,
and the time within which something happened.
i) Place Where is a physical location
The master sat in the garden”
dominus in horto sedit
horto is the ablative of place where. This requires the preposition in, which leads me to an important point: there's a very important difference between in + ablative and in + accusative in Latin.
in + ablative is the place where something is happening; a physical location, as in the example above.
in + accusative shows movement towards. So if you wanted to say “the master walked into the garden”, you would have to use in hortum.
ii) Time When is used to explain a specific moment when an event happens.
“They arrived at first light”
prima luce advenerunt
In this case, prima agrees with luce as they are both in the ablative: “at first light”.
iii) This is different from Time Within Which:
“I will leave within 10 days”
diebus decem discedam
diebus is the ablative, “within X number of days”.
You can often tell the difference between Time Within Which and Time When, because of the type of quantifier used. Time Within Which will always use normal numbers. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. “I will leave within four hours”. “I will leave within six days”.
However, Time When will be a specific period, so at the first hour, or by the seventh day. Time When uses ordinal numbers (where you have an order of things - first, second, third etc).
In my example above, decem, 10, is just a normal number, a cardinal number. It's not the 10th day, it's just within 10 days. diebus is days, and that's in the ablative. decem doesn't change because it's indeclinable, but it goes with days.
Ablatives of location: Place Where; Time When; Time Within Which
Other uses
There are a couple of other fairly common uses of the ablative.
i) Cause: this is a bit like the ablative of manner we talked about in Circumstance.
“to burn with desire” ardere cupidine.
“to weep for joy” lacrimare gaudio.
ii) Comparison:
“the boys are happier than the girls” pueri sunt laetior puellis
In previous comparative posts, I may have ignored this form of comparative, as more often you see pueri sunt laetiores quam puellae - using the word quam with another nominative (puellae). If I don't have quam, then I have to use the ablative case. It's an ablative of comparison. It means I can get rid of the word quam and just put the noun that's being compared in the ablative.
If you want to know more about comparatives, you can read my post on comparative adjectives here, and you can find all my previous posts here in the bambasbat archive.
The Ablative Case? Completed it mate.
So these are my three most important types of ablative.
Circumstance
Separation
Location
Each of those has different uses, but on the whole, it can be described using these four words: by, with, from, in. Cycle through those in your head when you see an ablative noun, and you'll probably get the right answer!
Make sure you've downloaded my free noun endings guide! It'll really help you out.
Let me know what you think of the ablative case! People always think the ablative is the most complicated of the noun cases, but I actually think once you get your head around all the uses, and those four words (by, with, from, in) it's really quite simple.
I hope this has been helpful. Thanks so much for joining me, and I'll see you next time on bambasbat!