Expert: Maria - 7/30/2010

Question
can you translate: 'A man is defined by his actions'

Answer
Hello,

If you want a literal translation of “A man is defined by his actions", here it is: “Suis vir definitur actis“.

Anyway the best translation is the active phrase “Acta virum probant” as well as “Acta virum faciunt” meaning “Actions define a man”.

Best regards,
Maria
___________________________________________________________
Note that :

-A man= VIR (nominative, 2nd.declension)

-is defined = DEFINITUR (present passive of DEFINIO)

-by his = SUIS (ablative of the possessive SUUS  agreed with ACTIS)

-actions = ACTIS (ablative plural of the neuter noun ACTUM, 2nd.declension)
__________________________________________________________

-Actions = ACTA (nominative plural of the neuter noun ACTUM, 2nd.declension)

-define= PROBANT (from PROBO)  or FACIUNT (from FACIO)

-a man = VIRUM (direct object, accusative case of VIR, 2nd.declension)

As you can see, Latin word order can be different from English as Latin is an inflected language where syntactical relationships are indicated by the endings of each term, not by the order of the words.