Lingua Latina Per Se Illustrata: Familia Romana

Guide to Resources for Self-Study

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lingva·latína·per·sé·illv́stráta
is published by

Edizioni Accademia Vivarium Novum and Hackett Publishing Company

A (not very) Brief Guide to LLPSI

Last updated: 12.02.22

Contents:

I. The approach
II. Related guides and reviews
III. PDFs, CDs and Audio
IV. Further Online Resources

DO NOT TRANSLATE. DO NOT CONSCIOUSLY REPHRASE INTO ANOTHER LANGUAGE.

This is not a question of being good at languages – everyone can and is born to do it, which
is why the method is sometimes dubbed «natural». The artificial habit of transverbalisation may be a
hard one to break for those with previous exposure to the grammar-translation method, where you
translate the text into your native language using a vocabulary and drilled-in formulas in order to
understand the translation instead of the original. At the same time, this habit must be broken in
order to start gaining proficiency in the language.

Luckily, the text is designed to help you gradually build up your ability to read and think in
Latin. The first chapter of the book is comprehensible to anyone who speaks any European
language, and every subsequent chapter builds up on the previous one. You should be reading and
understanding the sentences as they are written, just as you are reading and understanding this
English text. When you read, pay attention and notice. Marginal notes are important.

If you don’t understand at the first try, re-read. If you’re stuck, move on, you will get it the
next time you see it. Try not to use external dictionaries with LLPSI, as looking up the answer just
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Guide to Resources for Self-Study

when your cognitive machinery is asking to be fed information to figure it out will instead put that
machinery to rest, prevent dopamine reinforcement and stop actual learning from taking place. This
is like making the dog not want to eat instead of giving it a bone. It will discourage you from doing
your best to figure things out and can also result in forming undesirable or even false connections
between English and Latin words.

Thinking of your native-language equivalents of individual tricky places in order to compare

and make sure you undertand their precise meaning isn’t a crime, and sometimes even advised.
However, if you find you are having to resort to translating large parts of the text to achieve
comprehension, you should go back and review prior chapters either through reading aloud or
listening to the MP3s or Youtube readings of the chapters, or read the supplements to them.

LLPSI series reading order.

Original series’ current editions from Hackett Publishing – the blue books.
Accademia Vivarium Novum additions – the green books (use sidebar navigation).

For experienced learners who have already spent considerable time studying Latin or other
languages, i.e. those who have have already finished an introductory sequence in the
grammar-translation method OR those who are not monolingual, are equipped with some
metalinguistic knowledge and are aware of how they learn and process language:

We asked a few people who were self-taught using LLPSI who fall into this category. This
summary incorporates their approaches to LLPSI:

1. Read the text aloud aiming for general comprehension, preferrably after listening to the
audio and attempting to understand the general gist without reading along. Then read the
chapter critically a second time, focussing on precise understanding of the new vocabulary
and grammar. For pronunciation guidance use Vox Latina and audio recordings – see below.
2. Periodically go back, review, and reread prior chapters, especially after chapter 11. This is
best done in batches (7-10, 11-14, 15-18 etc.).
3. Use audio of the text (Ørberg’s is fine too if you find Scorpio Martianus’ recordings difficult,
but in this case you want to know what not to imitate) to review and check for
comprehension. It’s also great for generic background listening, an equivalent of turning on
the news in a modern language. In case you want the actual news, look no further.
4. Do the Pensa immediately after reading or listening, especially in the later chapters – easiest
using the CD (torrent below) or online (Magistra). Do Pensum C first, pretend like the
other sections are also Pensum C.
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Guide to Resources for Self-Study

5. Use the Exercitia in the separate book to determine which grammar topics you need
reviewing, the end-of-the-book grammar index lets you find the relevant chapters and
exercises. The ability to self-assess comprehension and acquisition is a distinguishing
characteristic of this type of learner – none of them made extensive use of the separate
exercise book. You may be able to skip this altogether, or save it for a final review.
6. Read Colloquia Personarum between the book chapters for different and unfamiliar input –
or just for entertainment. ScorpioMartianus has brilliantly recorded them all.
7. Epic Mode: rewrite sections (or all!) of the text, especially when the grammatical concepts
used in them don’t come naturally.
8. Justin Slocum Bailey’s blog post on how he came to use LLSPI along with his explanation
what he did when he got stuck in FR are extremely helpful.

For less-experienced learners:

1. Pacing: take several days to do a chapter, not rushing it so that you have plenty of time to
review as needed. The beginning chapters will not take as long.
2. Use Latine Disco or the College Companion – but only after reading the chapter itself! – to
clarify and solidify your understanding of the new concepts you should be mastering in each
chapter.
3. Read the text aloud, one lesson at a time. See the pronunciation resources below.
4. After reading a lesson, review by asking yourself questions about the text or attempting to
summarize what you’ve read in your own words out loud – in Latin. In later, more difficult
chapters, it will be helpful to write a Latin summary of each lesson. Do these activities while
trying to incorporate as much new vocabulary as possible. If you struggle to review the
lessons with yourself, see Josiah Meadows’s Youtube videos below.
5. If you’re struggling with the grammar, do the Exercitia on the first read-through. Especially
in the latter chapters, doing them lesson by lesson might be preferrable – this PDF will help.
Questions from Exercitia – always start with those. If you find them boring or distracting,
don’t force yourself and don’t prioritise them over reading – but doing just the questions is
still a good idea.
6. Once you’ve read the chapter lesson by lesson (and done the Exercitia), go back and review
the entire chapter either by reading aloud or by listening to the audio. You may find
listening to the audio to be more enjoyable than reading again.
7. Do the Pensa immediately after reviewing the entire chapter, since they aren’t divided into
lessons. Do Pensum C first – it the closest to genuine output practice you will get at first.
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Guide to Resources for Self-Study

For the other ones, pretend they’re the same by reading the whole thing out loud and trying
to fill in the blanks orally in real-time. The longer you think, the less useful the blank-filling
exercise becomes. Teacher’s materials with an answer key are provided below. The most
efficient way to do the Pensa is to use the CD (found in the torrent below), but there’s also
an online option.
8. If you find you are repeatedly referring to the text in order to complete the Pensa, reread the
entire text again or listen to the audio to review.
9. Periodically review previous chapters in batches – old concepts and vocabulary will decay
over time, and the book itself isn’t all that good at refreshing them. This is especially advised
if you start struggling with new material.
10. If you find you’re still struggling, or just looking for different and unfamiliar graded texts
besides Colloquia Personarum to solidify your current vocab and grammar, the expanded
edition of Fabellae Latinae has no lack of those while being keyed to the first book’s
chapters.

Related guides and reviews

◈ A video & text introduction to the series and its method by scholaeinterretiales.
◈ Guía para el estudio autodidacta por G. Jerez y C.M. Aguirre.
◈ LLPSI series recommendation video by Luke A. Ranieri (ScorpioMartianus).
◈ How to read and speak Latin fluently video by Joseph Conlon (deka glossai).
◈ Teaching Latin to humans by Justin Slocum Bailey, very briefly but lucidly explaining
language (non-)acquisition.
◈ Latin as She is Spoke: How Classicists Tricked Themselves, and the Real Issue with Mary
Beard's Latin by Alex Z. Foreman.
◈ Ars longa, vita brevis: Active Latin in the Classroom & video talk by Melinda Letts.
◈ How to Speak Latin: A Beginner's Guide to Living Latin by fluentin3months.
◈ Second and Foreign Language Teaching Methods provides a detailed overview.

PDFs, CDs and Audio

MEGA folder
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Guide to Resources for Self-Study

With PDFs, DJVUs and MP3s of most of the series.

The almost complete collection in DJVU format, along with the FR MP3s
Requires a DJVU-capable reader.

PDFs and DJVUs on LibGen

Includes most but not all of the series, as well as the audio.

UNAEL Latin resources folder

Has about half of the LLPSI-series PDFs.

LLPSI CDs Torrent

Contains the CDs of both books with Pensa and their respective Exercitia. Massively simplifies
doing exercises as you can enter your answers and have them immediately checked as well as see the
correct one. Requires a torrent client and CD image mounting software unless you have Windows
8/10 where the latter is built-in. Update it to work properly.

Subsidia by Academia Vivarium Novum

A whole lot of new audiovisual materials of various usefulness to supplement each chapter.

Individual books
LLPSI Pars I: Familia Romana, mirror
The main book of Pars I of the Lingua Latina per se illustrata series contains thirty-five chapters and
describes the life of a Roman family in the 2nd century A.D. It culminates in readings from classical
poets and Donatus's Ars Grammatica, the standard Latin school text for a millennium. Each chapter
is divided into two or three lessons (Lectiones) of a few pages each followed by a grammar section
(Grammatica Latina) and three exercises (Pensa). This book alone contains ~1600 unique vocabulary
items.

LLPSI: Exercitia Latina

This workbook contains contains supplemental grammatical exercises for each of the 133 lessons in
Familia Romana. Further augmented by:

Questions from Exercitia Latina I

Extracted to a single PDF.

Exercitia I – Soluta
Solutions.

Magistra & Exercitia Latina

The best way to do Pensa and Exercitia online.
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Guide to Resources for Self-Study

Didascalica

The way worse way.

Lessons-to-Exercises Correspondence
For Exercitia Latina I & II.

LLPSI Suppementa: Colloquia Personarum

Dialogues corresponding to Ch. 1-24 of Familia Romana (LLPSI Pars I), to supplement the lessons.
Offers good entertainment value.

LLPSI: Fabellae Latinae ad cap. I-XXXV

A 2009 edition by Luigi Miraglia with double the content of Ørberg’s original. Lacks the marginal
explanations of the other books, but the stories are nice and graded to the chapters. Provides you
with tons of additional reading.

Latine Disco
Includes a guide to pronunciation (which is wrong), instructions, and information on key grammar
points to be noted in each chapter. For those who like their explanations concise, this should be
preferrable to the Companion below.

A Companion to Familia Romana

by Jeanne Neumann, formerly known as the College Companion (the book, not Jeanne), provides a
running outline/commentary on the Latin grammar covered in Familia Romana by expanding the
1-page explanations from Latine Disco over a good half a dozen pages, breaking them up by lesson
and topic, and furnishing them with examples from the text, more historical background notes, and a
La-En vocabulary. Includes the complete (but translated, duh) text of the Ørberg ancillaries
Grammatica Latina and the Latin-English Vocabulary. The book is designed especially for college
students who approach LLPSI at an accelerated pace.

LLSPI: Teacher’s Materials, mirror

Teacher's Materials contains the Pensa and answer keys for the Pensa in Familia Romana and Roma
Aeterna, and answer keys for Exercitia Latina I & II.

Grammatica Latina
GL contains much of the vocabulary necessary to discuss basic Latin syntax in Latin as well as
paradigms and forms corresponding to the material in Familia Romana.

MP3 Files of LLPSI

The author Hans Ørberg reads Familia Romana well enough, but not to be copied uncritically.

Familia Romana and Colloquia Personarum read by Scorpio Martianus

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Guide to Resources for Self-Study

Significantly more difficult to follow due to being significantly more accurate, but also due to the
overzealous elisions in the first half.

Vox Latina
All the basics and beyond concering the restored Classical pronunciation of Latin, quite accesible
without any deep knowledge of phonetics and the golden standard in the field.

How to Pronounce Latin by Scorpio Martianus

A YouTube playlist that teaches a very accurate Restored Classical pronunciation of Latin, if not for
the unrealistic Italianate vowel qualities.

The LLPSI series contains graded readers to complement the main course books – some for
concurrent reading with FR (Fabellae Latinae, Colloquia Personarum, Fabulae Syrae), others for
filling the notorious gap between it and Roma Aeterna (Epitome Historiae Sacrae, Sermones
Romani), yet others to be read together or after the second book, namely the slightly adapted texts
of In Catilinam, DBG, the Aeneid, Cena Trimalchionis, Amphitryo and Ars Amatoria, all
self-illustrated just like the main books.

LLPSI Progress Tracker

A useful document that you can print off and use to track your progress through LLPSI and its
various supplements.

Further Online Resources

◈ Thesaurus Anbrutalis – here you’ll find our eye-watering collection of online resources,
including many more designed for LLPSI.
◈ Restored pronunciation guide in Latin with thorough explanations, many examples, and
audio files (get your “open in new tab” ready, clicking works on like one page).
◈ English-language course outline part I, part II for Familia Romana, including grammar
commentary, reading commentary, and vocabulary handouts.
◈ Youtube channel with passable readings of all of FR and some of Roma Aeterna.
◈ Scott Meadows’s YouTube channel – Roberto Carfagni and Josiah Meadows demonstrate
how to teach and learn LLPSI as well as classical texts in Latin.
◈ Scholae per rete – a group lesson playlist featuring the same teacher.