# Latin Gender Agreement **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 7, 2009, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latin-gender-agreement/505666 "2009-08-07T17:41:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Angel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d26b3c/32.png) [@Johnny\_Angel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Angel)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2009, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latin-gender-agreement/505666/1 "2009-08-07T17:41:57Z")
I can’t seem to work out a way to look this up, but I keep running into an issue with what you’re supposed to do about gender agreement when multiple genders are involved. It occurred to me that perhaps somebody could just tell me. The rule given is that adjectives must agree with their subjects in number, case and gender: _Pueri laeti sunt._ Swell. But what if you have multiple subjects of different genders? _Puer et puella laet?? sunt._ Also, what’s the rule for a predicate nominative in mixed genders? Can you say: _Hic vir est clavis._ …even though _clavis_ is feminine? And then what gender do you assume in a further clause? _Hic vir est clavis, qu?? voravisti._ ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2009, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latin-gender-agreement/505666/2 "2009-08-07T20:06:15Z")
I’m afraid the Japanese has completely overwritten my Latin from high school, but I’ll try to remember to dig up my old textbooks when I get home to see if I can find anything. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2009, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latin-gender-agreement/505666/3 "2009-08-07T20:51:52Z")
> [@Johnny\_Angel](#): > > But what if you have multiple subjects of different genders? Mixed genders in a case like this, where they are essentially two halves of a whole, are treated as masculine: _Puer et puella laeti sunt._ (I find this helps if you think of them as “Class A” and “Class B,” since there’s nothing inherently masculine or feminine about them). See below. > [@Johnny\_Angel](#): > > Also, what’s the rule for a predicate nominative in mixed genders? From Hale & Buck’s Latin grammar: “Nouns agree in case… and, if possible, in gender and number… _Volsinii, oppudum Tuscorum_, ‘Volsinii, a city of the Etruscans,’ Plin. N.H. 2, 139. (Agreement in gender and number is impossible.)” This is an appositive, but there are less clear examples that show the same in the predicate nouns. They cite examples where a masc. noun takes _effector_ and a fem. noun takes _effectrix_, but where it’s not possible to change they don’t. Further: “An adjective, participle, or pronoun belonging or referring to two or more substantives of the same gender and number must agree with them in gender, and it may be either the number of the nearest, or plural, even if the nearest is singular. … of different gender or number, or both, may agree with the nearest of them; otherwise it must be in the masculine plural if one of the substantives denotes a man, in the feminine plural if one of them denotes a woman and none of them a man, or in the neuter plural if all of them denote things.” I’ve reformatted their capitalization and italics a bit but I haven’t changed their wording. ---
**Author:** ![Kizarvexius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/da6949/32.png) [@Kizarvexius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kizarvexius)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2009, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latin-gender-agreement/505666/4 "2009-08-07T21:02:21Z")
As far as mastery of Latin, any _auctoritas_ (street cred) I might once have possessed has long since withered away like an inbred bloodline. However, I happened upon the following. > [@](#): > > _Obs._ I. But when an Adjective is predicated of two or more animate Substantives, it is generally put (_α_) in the Plural, and (_β_) in agreement with the masculine subject rather than with the feminine, e.g., _Balbi pater et mater mortui_ (not _mortuae_) _sunt_. So _Balbi matrem et patrem mortuos_ (not _mortuas_) _esse constat_. > > _Obs._ II. If, on the other hand, the Substantives of which the Adjective is predicated are inanimate objects, the Adjective is generally put in the Neuter (as well as Plural), e.g., _virtus et vitium inter se contraria sunt_. I found this on GoogleBooks. [Source](http://books.google.com/books?id=u31fAAAAMAAJ&lpg=PA516&ots=4AmFXgCFSJ&dq=Latin%20subject%20adjective%20agreement%20gender%20syntax%20plural&pg=PA516#v=onepage&q=&f=false) (which I believe to be public domain).