2.14 The Future — Epoché
What you will be able to do Build the future of all four conjugations, using the right one of two patterns. Say which conjugations use -bō and which use -am , and why it matters. Recognise the place where a third-conjugation future looks like a present subjunctive. Read the future of sum and possum . Read sentences like Iam satis est! [35] — Enough already! — without looking anything up. Prerequisites : 2.13 — the imperfect. The future is the last tense of the first phase and the only place in the present system where the four conjugations split into two camps. The first and second build it one way, the third and fourth another, and if you build it with the wrong pattern you will produce a form that already means something else. This is the single most practical reason to know which conjugation a verb belongs to — the reason lessons 2.7, 2.11 and 2.12 kept insisting on the infinitive. The table First and second conjugations: -bō, -bis, -bit, -bimus, -bitis, -bunt . Person First Second 1st singular amābō I shall love monēbō 2nd singular amābis monēbis 3rd singular amābit monēbit 1st plural amābimus monēbimus 2nd plural amābitis monēbitis 3rd plural amābunt monēbunt Third and fourth conjugations: -am, -ēs, -et, -ēmus, -ētis, -ent . Person Third Fourth 1st singular regam I shall rule audiam 2nd singular regēs audiēs 3rd singular reget audiet 1st plural regēmus audiēmus 2nd plural regētis audiētis 3rd plural regent audient And sum : erō, eris, erit, erimus, eritis, erunt . possum : poterō, poteris, poterit, poterimus, poteritis, poterunt . How to read the table Why two patterns. These are two different formations of different age. The -bō future is built from an old verb meaning "be" or "become" welded onto the stem — the same element you can still see in erō . The -am/-ē- future of the third and fourth is an old subjunctive pressed into service as a future, which is exactly why it looks like one. Neither is more regular than the other; they simply divide the conjugations in half. The trap. Take the second person singular of a third-conjugation verb. The future is regēs . Now build the present subjunctive of the same verb, which you will meet in the second phase: it is regās . And the present indicative is regis . Three forms one vowel apart, in a text that prints no macrons: Form What it is Meaning regis present indicative you rule regēs future indicative you will rule regās present subjunctive you may rule, you would rule And in the first conjugation the collision goes the other way. amābis is unambiguously future, but the present subjunctive is amēs — which looks exactly like the future of a second -conjugation verb would if you built it wrongly. The whole knot comes undone the moment you know which conjugation the verb is in, and stays knotted if you do not. The first person singular is -bō or -am . Note that the -bō future keeps the -ō of the present, while the -am future uses the -m of everything else. That is a small consistency worth having: the -bō pattern behaves like a present because it was built out of one. What the Latin future does not do. English uses "will" for futurity and also for willingness, requests and promises — will you pass the salt , I will do it . Latin does none of that with the future tense; it uses volō for willingness and the imperative or subjunctive for requests. So a Latin future is a plain statement about later time, nothing more. Conversely Latin uses the future where English is content with a present: after sī "if" and cum "when", Latin says what English would put in the present. Sī veniēs, gaudēbō is "if you come, I shall be glad" — future in both halves, where English keeps the first half present. That last point is worth holding on to, because it is the kind of difference that makes a translation read wrongly in a way no single word explains. Latin is being precise about time in a place where English has stopped bothering. Seen in real Latin The corpus is thin in futures, as it was thin in imperfects, and for the same reason: short exchanges are mostly present and perfect. The eight below are what it has, and the eighth is the one worth studying. Latin English The verb Bonus magister erit. [1] He will be a good teacher. erit — future of sum ; two nominatives Nemo domi erit. [2] There'll be no one in the house. future again; domī is a locative Satis erat. [3] There was enough. the imperfect, for contrast — one letter apart Quis domi erat? [4] Who was at home? imperfect again; domī is a locative Vita bona erat. [5] Life was good. imperfect; compare the second sentence Quis tecum erat? [6] Who was with you? tēcum — the joined preposition of lesson 2.12 Domi erat. [7] He was at home. two words, and both carry grammar English needs four for Cum eo erat. [8] He was with him. cum + ablative eō — separate, because it is not a personal pronoun Put the second, third and the present together and you have the whole tense system of sum in miniature: erit will be, erat was, and from lesson 2.8 est is. One letter apart in the middle, and that letter is the tense. If you can read those three at sight you can read the tense of the commonest verb in Latin, which is most of the battle. The seventh and eighth show a small point of interest. domī "at home" is a locative , a seventh case that survives in Latin only in a handful of words — place names, domus , rūs the countryside, humus the ground. It is not in the six-case table of lesson 2.5 because it barely exists, but it is common in exactly those few words, so it is worth recognising. And cum eō is written as two words where mēcum was one, because the joining only happens with personal pronouns. New words Word (dictionary form) Meaning Note erō la I shall be Part of speech verb, future of sum How it differs from English erō, eris, erit, erimus, eritis, erunt — learn it as a set poterō la I shall be able Part of speech verb, future of possum How it differs from English pot- + erō , as in the imperfect satis la enough,