Enjoy an exciting story while learning Latin.

An important, even crucial, part of learning Latin is to read a lot of level appropriate texts. For Latin learners and teachers, such texts can be hard to find. That is why we wrote Pugio Bruti – A Crime Story in Easy Latin.

We wrote the book with a one central goal: to be a great, enjoyable page-turning book all in Latin. It is written with less than 350 words but as true to classical Latin as possible, but without compromising the good story.

And now, to make things even better, we have created a course to go along with the book. With the course you will be able to follow along with video lessons, get help with an English-Latin glossary as well as a thorough commentary for the text. You will get even more story, more ”book” as we have written 10 new dialogues to go along with the original book. You will be able to put your knowledge to the test with quizzes and exercises, practice your listening and reading comprehension as well as get a deeper understanding of Augustan Rome with history lessons as well as original Latin from the Romans themselves.

And, if you are a teacher: we got your back! We have made sure to include extra teacher material that you can use in class.

What the course contains

The course consists of well over 100 lectures divided into 10 modules. These contain a wide variety of material:

• Study tips
  
• Commentaries for every chapter
• Video summaries in Latin
• Video lessons in Latin
• Full Latin-English Glossary
• Reading and listening comprehension exercises
• Image quizzes and crosswords
• History lessons
• Literary Latin texts with recordings
• Supplemental teacher materials
• Extra reading material: Dialogues
• And more!

Study tips

One of the first things you will find in the Pugio Bruti Online Course is a video about how to use the course. That video contains good tips on how to study using the book and the course. On top of that you will also find a document containing study tips that are not only applicable to the course and the book Pugio Bruti but universal for language learning.

Commentaries for every chapter

The course contains commentaries for every single chapter of the book. These explain, in English, the vocabulary, expressions and grammar of the book. This will help you learn more about how Latin works.

Video summaries in Latin

Every module begins with a video summary in Easy Latin where the chapters for that specific module are summarized for you in slow Latin. In the class curriculum below you can watch the video for the summary of module one.

Video lessons in Latin

For every chapter of the book there is a classroom video lesson in which Daniel teaches the chapter in Latin, asking questions on the text and story as well as explain grammar and expressions. Below you will find an excerpt from one of the video lessons, and in the class curriculum further down you can preview video lesson 1.2, i.e. the lesson for Chapter one of Pugio Bruti. You can change the speed of the playback from very slow to fast to fit your current ability.

Full Latin-English Glossary

We have created a glossary of all word forms occurring in Pugio Bruti. This list gives the English equivalent of each Latin word form in Pugio Bruti, if you need it while reading the book. So for instance, if you look up pugione, you will find ”with the dagger”. You can preview it in the curriculum further down.

Reading and listening comprehension exercises

Every module has many quizzes with multiple choice questions on the story and vocabulary. Before answering the questions, you are asked to either read a chapter from the book, or listen to an audiofile. The questions and answers are all in Latin, to give you as much practice as possible.

Image quizzes and crosswords

Sprinkled throughout the course you will find quizzes based on the illustrations in Pugio Bruti, you will also find a few word puzzles or crosswords to test your vocabulary.

History lessons

Every module contains a history lesson in English that treat different aspects on Roman history and culture that relate to Pugio Bruti, e.g. wine, Augustus, and beards.

Literary Latin

Every module has a bonus lesson for a taste of ”real” Rome. In this you will encounter Latin from the Roman authors themselves in the form of the original Latin text, recording of it, and an English translation.

Supplemental teacher material

The book Pugio Bruti has been adopted by teachers all over the world. We have therefore made sure to provide the Online Course with teaching materials that can be used in class, making preparations and teaching easier. This includes printable quizzes, images, crosswords, dialogues, classroom exercises suggestions as well as the entire commentary for the book in a handy PDF. Take a look at the end of the Class curriculum down below for further details.

Extra reading material: dialogues

We have written 10 dialogues for this course. The dialogues all take place within the story of Pugio Bruti and provides you with more story and above all: more Latin to read.

Check out the full Class curriculum further down below for more details and some previews.

Latin as Latin

This way you will encounter as much Latin, and in the most unexpected places, as possible so to help you internalize the language efficiently and make the language your friend.

Principles and purpose

This course is built on two central principles: On the one hand, on the importance of reading, listening and understanding Latin as Latin, while enjoying yourself, as mentioned above. On the other hand, on learning about the grammar of Latin.

The purpose of the course is first of all, to help you practice and internalise the Latin used in the book Pugio Bruti. Second to guide you systematically through the book, the language, the story and the cultural details within.

In your own time

The Pugio Bruti Online Course is a course that you can do in your own time. Once you’ve enrolled, there is no time limit so you can take as much or as little time as you need to finish it. You can also re-take the course as many times as you want

It is not bound to a place, a classroom or a specific time.

You can purchase the book used for this course, Pugio Bruti - A Crime Story in Easy Latin, here.