Indirect statement

English reports what someone says or thinks with a clause beginning “that”: “he says that the enemy is coming”. Classical Latin does not use a word for “that” here. Instead it puts the subject of the reported statement in the accusative and turns its verb into an infinitive.

Ubi nē tum quidem eōs prōdīre intellēxit, circiter merīdiem exercitum in castra redūxit.
Literally: “When he realized them not to be coming out even then…” Naturally: “When he saw that even then they were not coming out, he led his army back into camp about midday.” (Caesar)

Grammarians call this indirect statement (part of ōrātiō oblīqua, “slanting speech”): the words or thoughts are reported, not quoted. The plain statement would be “they are not coming out”; Latin reports it as eōs prōdīre, English as “that they were not coming out”.

Indirect statement follows verbs and phrases of four kinds:

• Saying and telling: dīcō, nūntiō, respondeō, scrībō, prōmittō, polliceor, cōnfirmō, negō. Note negō, “say that … not”: negābat illa sē esse culpae proximam “she denied that she was anywhere near the crime” (Phaedrus).
• Thinking and believing: putō, crēdō, arbitror, exīstimō, iūdicō, spērō.
• Knowing and learning: sciō, nesciō, intellegō, cognōscō, comperiō, audiō.
• Perceiving: videō, sentiō, animadvertō.

Impersonal and passive expressions work the same way: cōnstat “it is agreed”, nūntiātum est “it was reported”, fāma est “the story goes”, and ferunt or trāditum est “they say”, “it is handed down”.

Horātiōs Cūriātiōsque fuisse satis cōnstat, nec fermē rēs antīqua alia est nōbilior.
“It is generally agreed that they were the Horatii and Curiatii, and hardly any event of antiquity is more famous.” (Livy)

Plūra quom scrībere vellem, nūntiātum est vim mihi parārī.
“Though I wanted to write more, word has come that violence is being prepared against me.” (Sallust)

• A verb of saying, thinking, knowing or perceiving, often at the very end of the sentence.
• An infinitive that is not simply completing a verb like possum or volō.
• An accusative that is doing the action of that infinitive, or being described by it. It is the subject of the reported statement, not the object of the main verb.

Then read the accusative and infinitive together as a clause: “that X does / is …”. Watch out for sentences with two accusatives, where one is the subject and the other the object of the infinitive:

Nōlīte exīstumāre maiōrēs nostrōs armīs rem pūblicam ex parvā magnam fēcisse.
“Do not think that our ancestors made the state great from small beginnings by arms.” (Sallust)

The subject is maiōrēs nostrōs, the people doing the making; rem pūblicam is the object of fēcisse. When in doubt, sense decides, and the subject usually comes first.

The tense of the infinitive is relative: it tells you when the reported action happens compared with the main verb, not compared with now.

• Present infinitive (esse, venīre, parārī): same time as the main verb.
• Perfect infinitive (fuisse, vēnisse, missum esse): earlier than the main verb.
• Future infinitive (ventūrum esse; futūrum esse or fore): later than the main verb.

English, by contrast, shifts its tenses back when the main verb is past. Keep the Latin infinitive’s time relation and let English do the shifting:

• After a present main verb: “he says that they are / were (or have been) / will be …”
• After a past main verb: “he said that they were / had been / would be …”

Sciō plērōsque ita scrīpsisse, Themistoclem Xerxe regnante in Asiam trānsīsse.
“I know that most writers have written that Themistocles crossed into Asia while Xerxes was king.” Perfect infinitive after a present verb: “have written”. (Nepos)

Sed eōs paulō ante frequēns senātus iūdicāverat contrā rem pūblicam fēcisse.
“But a full senate had a little before judged that they had acted against the Republic.” Perfect infinitive after a past verb: “had acted”. (Sallust)

satis sciēbat negātūrum Albānum;
“He knew well that the Alban would refuse.” Future infinitive after a past verb: “would refuse”. (Livy)

The present infinitive after a past verb therefore comes out as an English past: quod omnem prōvinciam cōnsentīre intellegēbat “because he realized that the whole province was of one mind” (Caesar). The rare future passive infinitive is made with the supine and īrī: spoliātum īrī “would be stripped” (Caesar).

The perfect passive and future active infinitives are compounds of a participle and esse (missum esse, ventūrum esse), and esse is very often dropped. The participle agrees with the accusative subject, so it is still easy to recognize.

Crēditis āvectōs hostīs?
“Do you believe the enemy has sailed away?” (āvectōs for āvectōs esse; Vergil)

Hoc neque ipse trānsīre habēbat in animō neque hostēs trānsitūrōs exīstimābat.
“He did not intend to cross it himself, and he did not think the enemy would cross.” (trānsitūrōs for trānsitūrōs esse; Caesar)

When you meet a participle in -ūrus or a perfect participle in the accusative after a verb of saying or thinking, supply esse and read it as an infinitive. Fore is a one-word alternative to futūrum esse.

Inside an indirect statement the reflexive sē (and the possessive suus) normally refers to the subject of the introducing verb, the person who is speaking or thinking. Translate it as “he”, “she” or “they”, and “his”, “her”, “their”.

praeterita sē Dīviciācō frātrī condōnāre dīcit.
“He says that he forgives the past for the sake of his brother Diviciacus.” Caesar is speaking, and sē is Caesar. (Caesar)

Intellegēbat enim patrem suum hunc labōrem prōposuisse eō ipsō cōnsiliō, ut Iāsōn morerētur.
“For she understood that her father had set this labor for the very purpose that Jason should die.” Suum refers to Medea, who understands. (Ritchie)

A non-reflexive pronoun points to someone else: in quī vīderant eum resurrēxisse “who had seen that he had risen” (Vulgate), eum is Jesus, not the witnesses. A pronoun subject can also be left out altogether when it is obvious: audiērunt fēcisse hoc signum “they had heard that he had done this sign” (Vulgate).

Find the introducing verb, then translate the accusative and infinitive as a “that” clause, with the accusative as its subject and the infinitive as a finite verb in the right English tense:

• “that …”: Iāsonem solvisse cognōvērunt “they learned that Jason had sailed” (Ritchie)
• “that” left out, as English often does: tē crēdō surripuisse quod pulchrē negās “I believe you stole what you so nicely deny” (Phaedrus)
• “they say”, “it is said” for ferunt, trāditum est, fāma est (but dīcitur usually makes the person its subject, with a nominative: dīcitur fūgisse “he is said to have fled”): ossa ferunt lapidis trāxisse figūram “her bones, they say, took on the shape of stone” (Ovid)
• “he said” added in long reported speeches, where Latin keeps going in the infinitive without repeating the verb (see below).

The Latin of the Vulgate often uses a clause with quia or quod instead, much as English does: Domine, videō quia prophēta es tū “Sir, I see that you are a prophet” (Vulgate). Classical prose almost always prefers the accusative and infinitive.

• Translating the accusative as the object of the main verb. In At etiam sunt quī dīcant, Quirītēs, ā mē ēiectum esse Catilīnam (Cicero), the people do not “say Catiline”: Catilīnam is the subject of ēiectum esse. “There are some, citizens, who say that Catiline was driven out by me.”
• Forgetting to shift the tense. After a past main verb, a present infinitive becomes “was”, a perfect “had …” and a future “would …”. Iāsonem solvisse cognōvērunt is “they learned that Jason had sailed”, not “has sailed”.
• Missing the introducing verb. It often comes last (eōs prōdīre intellēxit), and in long reported speeches, especially in Caesar and Livy, one verb at the start governs sentence after sentence of accusatives and infinitives. Vercingetorix’s speech begins vēnisse tempus victōriae dēmōnstrat, “he pointed out that the time for victory had come”, and the next sentence simply goes on: Fugere in prōvinciam Rōmānōs Galliāque excēdere, “the Romans, he said, were fleeing into the Province and leaving Gaul” (Caesar). When you find a main-clause infinitive with an accusative subject and no verb in sight, look back for the last verb of saying.
• Treating every infinitive as indirect statement. A complementary infinitive (trānsīre habēbat in animō, “he intended to cross”) or an infinitive after iubeō or oportet is a different construction. Ask whether the sentence reports a fact or a thought that could be true or false.