Latin 4: The Little Pigs

When I was a boy, my father would lovingly tell me the story of the three little pigs. Now that I am a father, I am able to rehearse the same poem to my children. Kids love that story for some reason. :-)

If you're not familiar, then it goes like this.

This little piggy went to the market. This little piggy stayed home. This little piggy had roast beef. This little piggy had none. And this little piggy went: wee, wee, wee, all the way home.

From the book Latin By The Natural Method 1, in Lectio Secunda, we get a Latin version of this:

Hic parvus porcus venit in forum.
Hic parvus porcus remansit domi.
Hic parvus porcus habuit carnes bovinas assas.
Hic parvus porcus non habuit.
Hic parvus porcus exclamavit: Oui! Oui! Oui!
Porci dixerunt: Oink! Oink!

Genius. Using this method, you can simply read Latin. Of course, if we just used this, there still much we don't know about Latin declensions and case and so on. But this simple example helps us build a little more vocabulary.

The part that I find funny is the "carnes bovinas assas," which would be roast beef. When I hear this, my mind immediately goes to the local Mexican food restaurant, which serves a carne assada burrito. So this also brings visuals to mind as well!

One thing I want to point out; see that last line?

Porci dixerunt: Oink! Oink!

Notice that the first lines use the word "porcus," but this line uses "porci." Why do you suppose that is? Well, the beginning of the poem is discussing a single pig at a time. But the last line is saying that the pigs, plural, had said "oink! oink!" So the noun ending changes, and the the verb ending changes. If it was a single pig, then the pig would "dixit", but it's multiple, being "dixerunt."

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