Passive Periphrastics

Passive periphrastics (aka gerundives of obligation) are gerunds used with est/sunt to express necessity.

The skeleton is essentially passive by using a passive participle + the correct form of est:

	ludi omni modo ornandi sunt, "the games must be (are to be) embellished in every what".
	hoc carmen tibi scribendum est, "this poem must be written by you".

The person on whom the obligation rests goes in the dative rather than an ablative of agent with "ab" because the action is still in the future and only the obligation is expressed. Often, these can be translated as active sentences to sound better in English

	templum nobis aedificandum est, "the temple must be built by us", "we must build the temple"
	multae recitationes mhi audiendae erant, "many recitations had to be listened to by me" (past tense, thus the imperfect of sum), "I had to listen to many recitations.
	ad palatium vobis festinandum erit, "There will have to be a hurrying to the palace by you" (future perfect tense), "You will have to hurry to the palace". Festino is intransitive and so works similar to an impersonal passive verb.

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Last Updated March 18, 2003

Questions, comments and corrections should be sent to Brian K. Harvey, Kent State University