- To correct the voice error, a student should check the verb ending of 'dicuntur' against the principal parts of 'dico.' Which of the following correctly applies this process and arrives at the accurate translation?
Answer: The principal parts of 'dico' (dico, dicere, dixi, dictum) confirm it is a regular third-conjugation verb; 'dicuntur' ends in '-untur,' which is the third person plural present passive ending, so the correct translation is 'The words are said by the poet,' not 'The poet says the words.'
When you encounter a Latin verb ending in -untur, your first instinct should be to check voice — this ending is a classic passive marker that students frequently misread as active. The question tests whether you can use a verb's principal parts alongside its personal endings to identify voice correctly.
For dicuntur, start with the principal parts: dico, dicere, dixi, dictum. These confirm dico is a standard third-conjugation verb — nothing irregular or deponent about it. Now examine the ending: -untur is the third person plural present passive indicative ending for third-conjugation verbs. The subject of a passive verb receives the action, and the original doer appears in the ablative with a/ab — exactly what you see with a poeta (ablative of agent). The correct translation is therefore "The words are said by the poet," making A correct.
B is wrong because dico is not deponent in any form. Deponent verbs have passive endings but active meaning throughout their entire paradigm, not selectively in the plural. You cannot apply a "deponent rule" to a non-deponent verb.
C is wrong because -untur is never a future active ending. The third person plural future active of a third-conjugation verb ends in -ent (e.g., dicent). Confusing tense endings with voice endings is a separate error entirely.
D is wrong because dico has no irregular active paradigm that mimics passive endings. There is no Latin verb where -untur functions as an active form.
Study tip: Memorize the passive personal endings (-r, -ris, -tur, -mur, -mini, -ntur) as a checklist. When you spot -tur or -ntur, immediately flag the sentence as passive before translating.
- The translation contains a voice error. To correct it, the student must identify what is wrong and choose the accurate translation. Which of the following correctly identifies both the error and the corrected translation?
Answer: The verb 'laudantur' is passive voice, third person plural, and the phrase 'a duce' signals the ablative of agent; the student incorrectly treated the passive verb as active, so the correct translation is 'The soldiers are praised by the leader,' reversing the subject-object relationship.
When you encounter a Latin sentence with a verb ending in -ntur, your first instinct should be to check voice. Latin has two voices — active (subject acts) and passive (subject receives action) — and the endings are completely different. Confusing them reverses the entire meaning of a sentence.
Here, laudantur comes from laudare and carries the passive third-person plural ending -ntur, meaning "they are praised." The subject milites (nominative plural) receives the action rather than performing it. The phrase a duce uses a + ablative to indicate the ablative of agent — the person by whom the action is performed. So the sentence correctly reads: "The soldiers are praised by the leader." This is exactly what B identifies: the student mistakenly read a passive verb as active, flipping the logical roles of soldiers and leader.
A is wrong because it correctly calls the verb passive in one breath, then contradicts itself by insisting the voice identification "remains active" — a self-defeating claim. A duce is never a direct object marker; accusative case handles that role.
C is wrong because laudantur is not deponent. Deponent verbs have passive forms but active meanings, and they must be memorized as a specific category. Laudare is a standard first-conjugation verb — fully active in form when active, fully passive here.
D is wrong because milites is nominative, not accusative, so it cannot function as a direct object. Latin word order does not determine subject or object — case endings do.
Your study tip: memorize the passive personal endings (-r, -ris, -tur, -mur, -mini, -ntur) and always pair them with a/ab + ablative to spot agent constructions instantly.
- To correct this voice error, the student needs to check the ending of 'defenditur' against the active paradigm of 'defendo.' Which of the following correctly completes this analysis and fixes the translation?
Answer: The active third person singular present of 'defendo' is 'defendit'; the added '-ur' converts this to the passive form 'defenditur,' marking passive voice. With 'a civibus' as the ablative of agent, the corrected translation is 'The city is defended by the citizens,' not the active reading the student produced.
When you encounter a Latin sentence and need to determine voice, your first move should be to compare the verb form in front of you against the active paradigm you already know. This question tests exactly that skill — identifying passive voice by isolating the passive marker.
Start with what you know: the active third person singular present of defendo is defendit. Now look at defenditur — the only difference is the suffix -ur attached after defendit. That -ur is the telltale passive marker in Latin's present tense, converting an active form directly into a passive one. Since urbs (city) is nominative, it functions as the subject receiving the action, and a civibus is an ablative of agent construction (preposition a/ab + ablative = "by the citizens"). Putting it together, the correct translation is "The city is defended by the citizens" — making D the right answer.
Choice A is wrong because defendo is not a deponent verb. Deponent verbs have passive forms but active meanings; defendo is a perfectly standard active verb, so passive endings carry passive meaning. Choice B invents a rule that doesn't exist — -ur never signals the subjunctive mood. The subjunctive uses entirely different personal endings (-et, -at, -atur, etc.), not a simple -ur suffix. Choice C is wrong because -itur is not a present active ending for any conjugation class; it is unmistakably the third person singular present passive ending across all conjugations.
Your study tip: memorize the passive personal endings (-r, -ris, -tur, -mur, -mini, -ntur) as a set so you can immediately spot the passive — especially that -ur attached to familiar active forms.
- Which of the following best explains the voice error in the student's translation and provides the corrected version?
Answer: The student confused the roles of 'puella' and 'magistra' because both are first-declension nouns, but 'docetur' is third person singular present passive indicative, so the correct translation is 'The girl is taught by the teacher,' with 'a magistra' functioning as the ablative of agent.
When you encounter a Latin sentence with a passive verb and an a/ab + ablative construction, your first job is to identify voice correctly — that is, whether the subject is performing or receiving the action.
In Puella a magistra docetur, the verb docetur is third person singular present passive indicative of doceo. The passive voice means the subject (puella, nominative singular) is receiving the action. The phrase a magistra uses a + ablative to express the ablative of agent — the person performing the action. Putting it together: "The girl is taught by the teacher." Answer A captures this precisely and correctly identifies both the verb form and the grammatical role of a magistra.
Answer B is tempting because deponent verbs are a real phenomenon — verbs that look passive but carry active meaning (e.g., loquitur = "he speaks"). However, doceo is not a deponent verb; it forms a genuine passive, so docetur truly means "is taught," not "teaches." Don't apply the deponent exception without confirming the verb belongs to that category.
Answer C incorrectly labels docetur as active voice — it is not. The -tur ending is a hallmark of the passive, never active.
Answer D misapplies the ablative of means, which is used for things, not persons. When a person is the agent of a passive verb, Latin uses a/ab + ablative of agent, not ablative of means.
Study tip: Always check whether a verb is genuinely deponent before overriding a passive translation — and remember that a/ab + a person = ablative of agent, not means.
- The student has made a voice error. Which answer correctly identifies the grammatical signal of the error in 'paratur' and produces the corrected translation?
Answer: The verb 'paratur' ends in '-atur,' the third person singular present passive ending of a first-conjugation verb; 'a matre' is the ablative of agent and 'cena' is the nominative subject receiving the action, so the correct translation is 'The dinner is prepared by the mother.'
When you see a Latin verb ending and a question about voice, your first move should be to examine the personal ending carefully — it tells you whether the verb is active or passive.
In Latin, the third person singular present passive ending for all conjugations is -tur (with the thematic vowel producing -atur for first-conjugation verbs like paro, parare). So paratur signals a present passive verb, meaning the subject is receiving the action, not performing it. The nominative noun cena (dinner) is the subject being acted upon, and a matre — ablative of agent, signaled by a/ab + ablative — tells us by whom. Putting it together, the correct translation is "The dinner is prepared by the mother" — which is answer C.
The student's error was misreading paratur as an active verb, then forcing a matre into the role of subject — a classic voice confusion.
A is wrong because paro is not a deponent verb. Deponents have passive forms but active meanings; paro is a standard first-conjugation verb with no deponent status.
B is wrong because -atur is not an "active ending for verbs taking an indirect object." That ending category simply doesn't exist in Latin grammar. This distractor invents a fake rule.
D is wrong because paratur is present tense, not perfect passive. The perfect passive third singular would be parata est, a compound form requiring a form of esse.
As a study strategy: always identify **nominative subject + verb ending + any a/ab phrase** together — those three elements lock in voice instantly.
- The student's translation contains a voice error. Which of the following correctly identifies the grammatical evidence for the error and supplies the corrected translation?
Answer: The verb ending '-atur' is third person singular present passive indicative, replacing the active '-at'; combined with 'a servo' as ablative of agent, this means 'puer' is the nominative subject receiving the action, so the correct translation is 'The boy is loved by the slave.'
When you see a question about voice errors in Latin, your first move should be to isolate the verb ending and identify its person, number, tense, and voice — then check whether the surrounding nouns match that analysis.
Here, the verb is amatur. The ending -atur is the third person singular present passive indicative of amare. The passive transformation works like this: the active form amat ("he/she loves") drops -t and adds -tur, producing amat → amatur ("he/she is loved"). That single morphological shift flips the voice entirely. Now, because the verb is passive, the nominative noun puer (boy) becomes the subject receiving the action, not performing it. The prepositional phrase a servo uses the ablative of agent construction (a/ab + ablative), identifying the slave as the one performing the action. Putting it together: "The boy is loved by the slave" — which is exactly what answer B explains.
Answer A is wrong on multiple counts: -atur is third person, not first person, and puer and servo cannot be bundled together as dual agents — servo is ablative, not nominative. Answer C incorrectly claims amatur is imperfect; the imperfect passive would be amabatur. The present stem plus -tur always signals present tense. Answer D invents a false rule — deponent verbs have passive forms but active meanings as a lexical property of specific verbs; first-conjugation membership alone grants no such privilege, and amo is not deponent.
Your study tip: memorize the present passive personal endings (-or, -ris, -tur, -mur, -mini, -ntur) and always pair verb voice with case analysis — passive verbs demand you look for an ablative of agent, not a second accusative.
- After checking the principal parts of 'frango' and analyzing the ending of 'frangitur,' which of the following correctly identifies the nature of the voice error and offers the properly corrected translation?
Answer: The principal parts of 'frango' (frango, frangere, fregi, fractum) confirm a regular third-conjugation verb; 'frangitur' uses the passive ending '-itur' while the active third singular would be 'frangit,' and 'ab hostibus' is the ablative of agent, so the correct translation is 'The gate is broken by the enemies.'
When you encounter a Latin passive voice question, your first move should always be to check the principal parts of the verb, then analyze the ending, and finally examine any accompanying ablative phrases. This three-step process unlocks the entire sentence.
For frango, the principal parts are frango, frangere, fregi, fractum — a standard third-conjugation verb with no deponent or irregular voice behavior. Now look at the ending: the active third-person singular present is frangit, while frangitur uses the passive marker -itur. So frangitur is unambiguously passive. Next, ab hostibus uses the preposition ab with the ablative, which signals ablative of agent — always used with passive verbs to express the person(s) performing the action. Putting it together, the correct translation is "The gate is broken by the enemies" — answer C.
Choice A fails because frango is not semi-deponent. Semi-deponents only use passive forms in the perfect system, not throughout, and *frango*'s principal parts show nothing semi-deponent. Choice B invents a rule that doesn't exist: -itur is never an active ending for third-conjugation -io verbs or any others — it is always a passive marker. Choice D correctly identifies frangitur as passive but then misapplies the rule for ablative of means. Ablative of means is used for things (gladio, by a sword), not persons. Since hostes are persons, ab hostibus is ablative of agent, not means.
Study tip: Memorize this pairing — passive verb + ab/abs + ablative = ablative of agent (persons); passive verb + ablative alone (no preposition) = ablative of means (things).
- The student must correct this voice error by consulting the principal parts of 'ago' and analyzing the verb ending. Which answer both correctly identifies the form of 'agitur' and provides the accurate translation?
Answer: The principal parts of 'ago' (ago, agere, egi, actum) confirm a third-conjugation verb; 'agitur' ends in '-itur,' marking it as third person singular present passive, and 'a nautis' is the ablative of agent, so the correct translation is 'The ship is driven by the sailors.'
When you encounter a Latin verb ending in -tur, your first instinct should be to check for passive voice. Latin distinguishes active from passive through personal endings, and the present passive indicative has its own distinct set — including -tur for third person singular. Pairing this with the sentence's syntax will reveal who acts and who receives the action.
For agitur, consulting the principal parts — ago, agere, egi, actum — confirms a standard third-conjugation active verb (note: all four parts are normal active forms, so this is not deponent). The ending -itur is the third person singular present passive indicative marker. Navis (ship) is nominative singular, functioning as the subject receiving the action, and a nautis uses the preposition a/ab with the ablative — the classic construction for ablative of agent (by whom the action is done). Answer A correctly assembles all of this: principal parts confirm third conjugation, -itur signals present passive, and a nautis names the agent, yielding "The ship is driven by the sailors."
Answer B misidentifies -itur as a future active ending — it is not; -itur is present passive, not future active, which would use different forms entirely. Answer C falsely claims ago is deponent because egi is passive in form — egi is a standard active perfect, not a passive form; deponent verbs have passive-form principal parts throughout. Answer D invents a grammar rule that inanimate nouns cannot be nominative subjects — Latin syntax has no such restriction; case endings, not semantics, determine grammatical function.
Study tip: Memorize the present passive personal endings (-or, -ris, -tur, -mur, -mini, -ntur) alongside the active ones — recognizing -tur as passive instantly will save you from voice errors on every Latin exam.
- Which of the following correctly diagnoses the voice error in the student's translation and demonstrates the proper method for correcting it?
Answer: The form 'scribitur' is third person singular present passive indicative of 'scribo'; the student treated the passive verb as active, reversing subject and agent. The corrected translation is 'The letter is written by the friend,' making 'epistula' the nominative subject receiving the action.
When you encounter a Latin sentence with a passive verb form, your first job is to correctly identify the verb's voice, then locate the true subject (nominative case) and any agent phrase (ablative with ab). This question tests exactly that skill.
The verb scribitur is third person singular present passive indicative of scribo. The ending -itur is the signature present passive ending for third person singular. Because the verb is passive, the nominative noun — epistula (letter) — is the subject receiving the action, not performing it. The phrase ab amico (ablative with ab) identifies the agent, the one performing the action. The correct translation is therefore "The letter is written by the friend." The student's error was treating a passive verb as active, which flipped subject and agent entirely — a classic voice reversal mistake.
Choice A is wrong because scribitur is not an infinitive at all — it's a finite indicative verb. There is no indirect statement construction here, and inventing one fundamentally misreads the sentence's grammar. Choice B is wrong on a basic morphological point: the ending -itur marks present tense, not imperfect. The imperfect passive third singular would be scribebatur. Introducing a tense error where none exists only compounds the confusion. Choice C is wrong because scribitur is clearly passive (the -itur ending signals this), and ab amico is an agent phrase, not an ablative of separation — that construction typically appears without ab and with verbs of motion or emotion.
Your study tip: memorize the present passive personal endings (-or, -ris, -tur, -mur, -mini, -ntur). Recognizing -itur instantly as passive will prevent the subject/agent reversal trap every time.
- The student has made a voice error. After checking the verb's principal parts and endings, which analysis correctly diagnoses the error and repairs the translation?
Answer: The principal parts of 'capio' (capio, capere, cepi, captum) confirm a third-conjugation -io verb, not a deponent; the ending '-itur' marks 'capitur' as third person singular present passive, and 'ab hostibus' is the ablative of agent, so the corrected translation is 'The king is captured by the enemies.'
When you see a Latin verb ending in -tur, your first instinct should be to check for passive voice — and then confirm whether the verb is truly passive or deponent by consulting its principal parts.
Capio has the principal parts capio, capere, cepi, captum — a standard third-conjugation -io verb, fully regular and non-deponent. The ending -itur (third person singular present passive indicative) therefore carries genuine passive meaning: "is captured." Meanwhile, ab hostibus is a classic ablative of agent construction (ab + ablative = "by" someone performing the action). Putting it together: Rex ab hostibus capitur = "The king is captured by the enemies" — making B the correct diagnosis and repair.
A is wrong because it claims capitur is present active, which would require the ending -it, not -itur. The student in the passage made exactly this mistake, so A simply repeats the error rather than correcting it.
C is wrong because it misidentifies capio as a deponent verb. Deponent verbs have passive forms but active meanings; however, capio is not deponent — it has both active and passive forms with their expected meanings. Applying the deponent rule here is a category error.
D is wrong because Latin voice is determined by verb morphology, not context alone. The ending -itur unambiguously marks passive voice, and ab hostibus reinforces it. There is no ambiguity.
Study tip: Always check the principal parts before assigning voice. If the verb isn't deponent, -tur endings are passive — full stop.
