Active Versus Passive
So far almost all the verb forms we have seen have been in the active voice; that is, they have indicated action done by the subject. It is also possible for a verb to be passive; that is, to indicate action done to the subject (we have seen this with the perfect participles in chapters 6.2, 23.3, and 24). Compare the following:
Active: He loves. He will love. He loved. He has loved.
Passive: He is loved. He will be loved. He was loved. He has been loved.
In all these pairs of sentences the same person is the subject of the same verb in the same tense, but because one element of the pair is active and the other is passive, the meaning is very different.
Verb Endings for the Passive
In Latin regular verbs form their passives by conjugating like deponent verbs; deponent verbs do not have any passives at all. Another way of thinking about this situation is that the endings you have already learned for the deponent verbs are the passive endings, and that deponent verbs are verbs that take passive endings in the active and that therefore cannot have a passive. So the passive system of the tenses we have so far seen is as shown in the tables on the following pages:
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