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I need to know how to say the present, past and future tense of "imply" in Latin. I don't know much Latin, I just need the grammatically correct way to say: "Implied ______"

For example, for "Implied Power" Google says "Sequitur Imperium."

I don't trust computers.

I would prefer the classical Latin way of saying it, but it honestly doesn't matter. In fact I don't even need Latin, it's just a habit.

luchonacho
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1 Answers1

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The closest thing I could find to the verb [to] imply (at least in the way implied is used in this context) in my dictionary was adfirmō, -āre, -āvī, -ātum. In this case you'd want to use the passive perfect participle, adfirmātum plus the adverb nōn. As for the noun power, you have a number of options depending on what kind of power you're referring to:

  • potestās, f.
  • (strength) vīrēs, fpl.
  • (excessive) potentia, f.
  • (supreme) imperium nt.
  • (divine) nūmen, nt.
  • (legal) auctōritās, f.

The pairs for each participle-noun pair are as follows:

  • nōn adfirmāta potestās or potestās nōn adfirmāta
  • nōn adfirmātae vīrēs or vīrēs nōn adfirmātae
  • nōn adfirmāta potentia or potentia nōn adfirmāta
  • nōn adfirmātum imperium or imperium nōn adfirmātum
  • nōn adfirmātum nūmen or nūmen nōn adfirmātum
  • nōn adfirmāta auctōritās or auctōritās nōn adfirmāta

When all of these are translated literally, they come out to mean something along the lines of "[type of power] having not been stated" or "[type of power] not stated", which isn't perfect, but probably as close as you can get to the English idiom "implied power" with Latin.

Minor edit:

If the phrase “implied power” is being used to describe power of a strictly legal kind, then the word auctōritās alone would suffice, since from a pragmatic standpoint, this would would have already meant “implied [legal] power” to a Roman.

Ethan Bierlein
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