imperfect use

hi,
in translating the sentence :

Our ancestors believed that the sun was a god.

from english to latin, my first attempt was to use the perfect active indicative for 'believed' crediderunt, and also the perfect active indicative of 'to be' for 'was', 'fuit' :

Maiores nostrum crediderunt sol deus fuit.

but in the solution I have :

Maiores nostri credebant solem esse deum.

they used the imperfect for 'believed' which is supposed to mean 'were believing' and the infinitive of 'to be' for 'was', 'esse'. I can understand the accusative of deus->deum and thus solem instead of sol but can you explain the choice of verb tenses?

BadButBit

It's imperfect because such verbs of feeling, emotion, thinking, judging etc, which were going on for quite some continuous time are incomplete actions (as opposed to something only ONCE done or thought of, which would be in the perfect tense), in my opinion. I don't think I fully understand what I am saying here, but I think it's similar in the Romance languages. States of mind, weather conditions, incomplete past actions are rendered in the imperfectum. Comments on this? I bet Chamæleo could shed some light on this topic.

thanks for the reply. you're making sense though I've never seen any such rule in the Wheelocks textbook which I'm studying.
could you explain the use of 'esse' -> 'to be' in the infinitive as opposed to 'fuit' perfect 'was'?

BadButBit

It's called the AcI (accusativus cum infinitivo), used in an indirect statement, where the subject takes the accusative case and its verb the infinitive. This construction is extremely common in Latin.

E.g. Scio te hodie venire. (I know that you are coming today)
Fatetur ecclesiam magnam esse. (He admits that the church is big)
Dicimus has gentes perituras esse. (We say that these people will perish)
Caesar dixit copias suas pontem fecisse eumque transivisse. (Caesar said that his forces had built a bridge and crossed it)

credo id claraturum esse.

also known as the 'Future Active Infinitive', I just discovered, which uses the future active participle along with the word 'esse', and in these cases the

mattheus dixit:

AcI (accusativus cum infinitivo), used in an indirect statement, where the subject takes the accusative case and its verb the infinitive.

Click to expand...

gratias ago,
BadButBit

The imperfect is commonly used when the sense is ‘used to believe’ or suchlike. This is the case here. The perfect is typically for single events.

Continue through your textbook, and all the finer nuances will be revealed.

lente sed certus

gratias ago
BadButBit

Festina lente!

Someone more advanced may correct me if I am wrong on this, but I believe the imperfect in Latin to be equivalent to the imperfect in Spanish. If this is wrong, let me know. But if this is correct, then I suggest going to this site- http://www.studyspanish.com/lessons/pretimp1.htm

This has great explanations for the use of the imperfect in Spanish, which can be applied to Latin. You will see on the left of the page, there are different sections with further explanations. And if anyone out there wants to delve into Spanish, I highly recommend this site.