Porta:Tirones

See also Categoria:Textus ad discendam linguam latinam This page is to help people learning Latin to find and use Vicfons. We have various texts that you may wish to use for every stage of your Latin learning.

Online dictionaries

It can help to install a Latin dictionary into your browser.

• Alpheios have a Firefox browser plug in that lets you click on any Latin or Greek word to get its definition and what case or part of the verb it may be, etc. This may help you read texts directly on Vicifons.

Readers and plays

Beginners' Latin

These texts are suitable for very early beginners. These texts were written for US students in the 1920s-30s.

• Carolus et Maria can be read with little or no Latin at the start. It covers present past indicative tenses.
• Cornelia Puella Americana also starts with very simple Latin.
• A New Latin Primer takes the same approach.

Other simple texts include:

• Ora Maritima, which starts with simple present sentences, and can be read reasonably early on
• Easy Latin Plays, should be within reach after a year at most
• Decem fābvlae pverīs pvellīsqve agendae, which also start quite simply, but go through towards intermediate

Later beginners

• Pro Patria; a continuation of Ora Maritima.
• Olim aims to be readable after 2-3 years of basic school Latin

Lower intermediate

• Dialogues of Roman Life
• A First Latin Reader, by Herbert Nutting; notes include links to Wiktionary. Graded, so later chapters are upper intermediate.
• Cothvrnvlvs, plays drawing on Roman authors
• Epitome historiæ sacræ, by Lhomond
• Easy Latin Stories, by George Bennett, there is also an English key

Intermediate

• Ad Alpēs; notes include links to Wiktionary. It aims at preparing for reading Caesar and other simpler Latin authors.
• Second Latin Reading Book

Upper intermediate

• Colloquia familiaria, by Erasmus. This needs a reasonably full grasp of grammar to enjoy, but is simpler than classical Latin authors, and aims at introducing useful expressions and facility with oral Latin.

Spoken latin colloquies

We also host transcriptions of Latin colloquies, aimed at helping people to speak Latin.

Beginner to early intermediate

• Colloquia scholastica Corderius' dialogues start with simple Latin and were a mainstay of post medieval Latin education

These colloquia written in Roman times, aim at building a working knowledge of Latin or Greek, through learning set phrases and common vocabulary, with often quite simple Latin. These can be read after completing a text like Familia Romana.

• Colloquium Leidense
• Colloquium Harleianum
• Colloquia Monacensia
• Colloquium Montepessulanum

More recently:

• Nos in schola latine loquimur - Ars latine loquendi; a French guide to using Latin in class, expects most grammar to have been learnt

Intermediate or upper intermediate level texts

Many of the medieval and Renaissance Colloquia need familiarity with the main aspects of Latin grammar. They generally aim at school vocabulary particularly, and other aspects of oral expression.

• Franciscus Cervantes de Salazar. Ad Exercitia Linguae Latinae Dialogi
• Sebastianus Castalio. Dialogorum sacrorum libri quattuor
• Laurentius Corvinus. Latinum Ydeoma.
• Scriptor:Ioannes Fontanus. Hortulus puerorum pergratus ac perutilis Latine discentibus.
• Scriptor:Nicolaus Beraldus. Dialogus quo rationes quaedam explicantur quibus dicendi ex tempore facultas parari possit.
• Scriptor:Jacobus Pontanus. Jacobi Pontani de Societate Jesu Progymnasmatum Latinitatis, sive Dialogorum Volumen primum, cum annotationibus. De Rebus Literariis..
• Scriptor:Petrus Popon. Colloquia de Scholis Herbipolensibus
• Scriptor:Ioannes Ludovicus Vives. Exercitatio Linguae Latinae
• Scriptor:Petrus Mosellanus. Paedologia.
• Scriptor:Martinus Duncanus. Praetextata Latine Loquendi Ratio
• Scaenica progymnasmata
• Dialogorum sacrorum libri quattuor
• Colloquium (Aelfricus)

Other open resources

Other resources, using public domain resources which you can freely reuse include:

• Project Gutenberg, including the texts by RB Appleton such as Fabulae, virginibus puerisque aut narrandae aut recitandae, and Arcadius Avellanus
• Wikiversity Latin course, Latin I, Latin II, Latin III, Latin IV,