Does the Word “Tibi” Have Anything to Do With Your Tibia?

PictureNo. Your shinbone is named after an ancient Greek wind instrument, sort of like a flute.

Everybody got that? Maybe it’s just me, but I’m very distractible. So it’s good for me to get that out of the way. What does “tibi” mean? Basically, “to you.” Latin nouns and pronouns have various forms that determine their use in a sentence so that you don’t have to use a preposition. And you don’t have to worry about word order. You just have to learn all six types (called “cases”) of nouns and pronouns. Then you have to learn tense, voice and mood for each verb, and degrees of comparison for each adjective . . . and don’t get me started on the adverbs. It’s very complicated. How did the Romans have time to conquer the world when they had to learn all this grammar? Beats me.

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