Cum clauses

Latin has two different words that look exactly alike. The preposition cum takes the ablative and means “with”: cum fīliīs “with his sons”. The conjunction cum introduces a whole clause, with its own subject and verb, and means “when”, “since” or “although”. Older texts and editions sometimes spell the conjunction quom or quum; Sallust almost always writes quom.

Ritchie puts both in one clause:

et cum rēgem ipsum cum fīliīs interfēcisset, Iolēn eius fīliam captīvam sēcum redūxit.
“and when he had killed the king himself along with his sons, he brought back with him Iole, his daughter, as a captive.” The first cum is the conjunction (“when”), the second the preposition (“with”). (Ritchie)

To tell them apart, look at what follows:

• Preposition: a noun or pronoun in the ablative comes straight after it, and the phrase ends there. With personal pronouns it is joined on behind: mēcum, tēcum, sēcum, nōbīscum.
• Conjunction: somewhere after it, usually at the end of the clause, there is a finite verb that belongs to the cum, most often a subjunctive. The clause is often set off by commas, and cum is often the second or third word, after the word it puts first for emphasis: Hoc cum animadverterent hominēs fugitīvī.

An ablative right after cum does not settle the question. In Lūcius Petrosidius aquilifer, cum magnā multitūdine hostium premerētur (Caesar) the verb premerētur shows that cum is the conjunction, and magnā multitūdine is simply the ablative of the thing doing the pressing: “when he was hard pressed by a great crowd of the enemy”.

Most cum clauses in narrative have their verb in the subjunctive. The subjunctive does not change the meaning to something unreal; it marks the clause as a description of the situation in which, or because of which, the main action happened. There are three senses, and only the context tells you which one you have.

1. Circumstantial (“when”, “as”, “after”): it sets the scene for the main action. This is the commonest kind in historians and storytellers.

Herculēs autem cum haec vidēret, dē suīs fortūnīs dēspērāre coepit.
“But when Hercules saw this, he began to despair of his fortunes.” (Ritchie)

Ad fontem cervus, cum bibisset, restitit et in liquōre vīdit effigiem suam.
“A stag, after drinking at a spring, stood still and saw his own likeness in the water.” (Phaedrus)

2. Causal (“since”, “because”): the clause gives the reason for the main action. praesertim cum “especially since” and quippe cum “inasmuch as” make the causal sense certain.

Quae cum ita sint, Catilīna, perge quō coepistī: ēgredere aliquandō ex urbe;
“Since this is so, Catiline, go on where you have started: leave the city at last.” (Cicero)

Iāsōn igitur cum calceum āmissum nūllō modō recipere posset, ūnō pede nūdō in rēgiam pervēnit.
“So Jason, since he could in no way get back the lost shoe, arrived at the palace with one foot bare.” (Ritchie)

3. Concessive (“although”): the main action happens in spite of the fact in the cum clause. A tamen (“still, nevertheless”) in the main clause is the surest signal, but it is often left out.

Quī cum esset senex mortuus, tamen propter excellentem artem ac venustātem vidēbātur omnīnō morī nōn dēbuisse.
“Though he died an old man, still, because of his outstanding art and grace, it seemed that he ought not to have died at all.” (Cicero)

Nam, cum id posset īnfitiārī, repente praeter opīniōnem omnium cōnfessus est.
“For though he could have denied it, he suddenly confessed, to everyone’s surprise.” No tamen here: the sense alone tells you. (Cicero)

The tense of the subjunctive follows the usual sequence of tenses and shows the time of the cum clause relative to the main verb.

• Imperfect subjunctive = at the same time: “when he was seeing / saw”, “while they were setting out”. Cumque proficīscerentur dē oriente, invēnērunt campum “And when they were setting out from the east, they found a plain” (Vulgate).
• Pluperfect subjunctive = earlier: “when / after he had …”. Peliās cum hoc audīvisset “When Pelias had heard this” (Ritchie). This is the tense to expect in a long chain of actions, and natural English often shortens it to “when Pelias heard this” or “after hearing this”.
• Present or perfect subjunctive when the main verb is present or future (primary sequence), most often in causal and concessive clauses: present for the same time, perfect for earlier. Quōmodo hic litterās scit, cum nōn didicerit? “How does this man know letters, although he has never studied?” (Vulgate)

Do not let the pluperfect subjunctive lure you into “would have”. In a cum clause vēnisset is simply “he had come”.

When the verb of a cum clause is indicative, the clause is about time: it dates the main action rather than explaining it. (Sallust, who likes old-fashioned usage, occasionally has the indicative in a concessive clause, Quom tabulās signa toreumata emunt “though they buy pictures, statues, embossed plate”, but in classical prose “since” and “although” call for the subjunctive.) There are four common patterns.

1. Purely temporal (“at the time when”): often with tum or a word like eō tempore in the main clause. It is regular for present and future time, as in Phaedrus’ ubi vōs requīram cum diēs advēnerit? “where shall I look for you when the day comes?” (future perfect indicative), and in the past when the writer simply wants a date.

Cum Caesar in Galliam vēnit, alterīus factiōnis prīncipēs erant Aeduī, alterīus Sēquanī.
“When Caesar came into Gaul, the Aedui were the leaders of one faction, the Sequani of the other.” (Caesar)

2. Repeated action (“whenever”): the perfect indicative goes with a present main verb, the pluperfect with an imperfect one. The cum action is finished each time before the main action follows.

cumque ego porrēxī tibi bracchia, porrigis ultrō: cum rīsī, adrīdēs;
Narcissus to his reflection: “whenever I stretch out my arms to you, you stretch yours out in return; whenever I laugh, you smile back.” (Ovid)

cum propius erat necessāriō ventum, ab scientiā gubernātōrum atque artificiīs ad virtūtem montānōrum cōnfugiēbant.
“Whenever it came of necessity to closer quarters, they turned from the helmsmen’s skill and tricks to the courage of the mountaineers.” (Caesar)

From Livy onwards, and in later writers such as Pliny, a repeated action can also take the subjunctive, so “whenever” is sometimes the right English for a subjunctive clause too.

3. cum prīmum “as soon as”, with the perfect indicative: ipse, cum prīmum per annī tempus potuit, ad exercitum contendit “he himself hurried to the army as soon as the season allowed” (Caesar).

4. Inverse cum (“when suddenly …”): here the roles are swapped. The main clause, usually in the imperfect or pluperfect and often with iam, vix or nōndum, describes what was going on; the cum clause, in the perfect indicative or historic present and often with subitō or repente, tells the event that broke in. The main news is in the cum clause.

Mūrō quoque lapideō circumdare urbem parābat, cum Sabīnum bellum coeptīs intervēnit.
“He was also preparing to surround the city with a stone wall, when a war with the Sabines interrupted his undertaking.” (Livy)

Tālia vōciferāns gemitū tēctum omne replēbat, cum subitum dictūque oritur mīrābile mōnstrum.
“Crying out such words she was filling the whole house with lamentation, when a sudden portent arises, wonderful to tell.” (Vergil)

In English keep the Latin order and say “when (suddenly)”, or make two sentences: “He was preparing … Then a war broke out.” Do not turn it round into “When a war interrupted him, he was preparing”, which loses the surprise.

For a subjunctive cum clause, read the whole sentence first, then test the three meanings in order:

• when is the default and is rarely badly wrong. If the clause just sets the scene for what follows, keep it.
• since, if the main clause is what you would expect to follow from the cum clause: he could not get the shoe back, so he went in barefoot. Words like igitur, itaque, praesertim, quippe point this way.
• although, if the main clause goes against what you would expect: he was an old man, yet his death seemed untimely. Look for tamen, nihilō minus or a contrast such as caecus … modo videō “I was blind, now I see”.

Often two meanings fit, because a Roman did not have to choose. Herculēs autem cum haec vidēret can be “when Hercules saw this” or “seeing this”; “since he saw this” is also defensible. Pick the English that makes the logic of the sentence clearest, and remember that an English participle (“seeing this”, “having drunk”) is often the most natural rendering of all.

For an indicative clause, use when, whenever (if the main verb describes a habit or a repeated action) or as soon as for cum prīmum, and check whether the main clause is in the imperfect with iam or vix: that is inverse cum.

• Reading every cum as “with”. If there is a verb at the end of the phrase that must belong to it, it is the conjunction, even when an ablative follows, as in cum magnā multitūdine hostium premerētur.
• Missing a cum that comes second. Latin often puts an emphatic word, frequently a connecting relative, before the conjunction: Quae cum ita sint, Hoc cum animadverterent, Quī cum esset senex mortuus. Translate cum first: “Since these things are so”, “When they noticed this”.
• Ignoring tamen. A tamen in the main clause almost always makes the cum clause concessive. “When he died an old man, still …” does not make sense; “Although he died an old man, still …” does.
• Translating the subjunctive as “would” or “might”. cum vēnisset is “when he had come”, not “when he would have come”.
• Confusing cum … tum with a cum clause. cum … tum means “both … and” or “not only … but also”, with no clause at all: Cum valida tum temperāta et bellī et pācis artibus erat cīvitās “The state was both strong and well tempered by the arts of war and of peace” (Livy).
• Taking cumque for quīcumque. In the Vulgate Cumque at the start of a sentence is just cum + -que, “And when”.