Citations:quis

For citation of the feminine forms quae and quam, shared with quī, see Citations:quae.

Latin citations of quis and quem

Feminine singular interrogative quis and quem

• 239 BCE – 169 BCE, Ennius, tragoediae 386, (cited by Nonius 198, 3):

  et quis illaec est quae lugubri succincta est stola?

  and who is this woman who is girded in mourning garments?

• c. 220 BCE – c. 166 BCE, Caecilius Statius, Plocium , (cited by Aulus Gellius, Noctes Atticae 2.23; "nostrarum" occurs in place of "vestrarum" in inferior manuscripts):

  “quis vestrarum fuit integra aetatula,
  quae hoc idem a viro
  impetrarit suo, quod ego anus modo
  effeci, paelice ut meum privarem virum?”

  "Who among you was there in the flower of youth,
  who obtained from her own man, that same thing
  that I, an old woman, just
  accomplished: to deprive my man of his mistress?"

• c. 220 BCE – c. 130 BCE, Pacuvius, Tragedies 257:

  Quis tu es mulier quae me insueto nuncupasti nomine?

  • 1936 translation by E. H. Warmington

    What woman are you, who have called me thus by an unwonted name?

  This line is transmitted by Varro De Lingua Latina 6.60.7 (who attributes it to a play "Medus" and cites it in a discussion of the verb nuncupo) and by the 4th or 5th century grammarian Nonius (197, 28) (who cites it as evidence that old writers used 'quis' in the feminine as well as in the masculine—evidently something that seemed worthy of comment by Nonius's time).

• c. 205 BCE – 184 BCE, Plautus, Miles Gloriosus 361:

  Respice dum ad laevam: quis illaec est mulier?

  Look to the left: who is that woman?

• c. 205 BCE – 184 BCE, Plautus, Miles Gloriosus 807:

  Pal. Hoc facito, miles domum ubi advenerit, / memineris ne Philocomasium nomines. Pl. Quem nominem? / Pal. Diceam.

  • 1924 translation by Paul Nixon

    Pal. Mind this—when the soldier comes home, remember not to call Philocomasium by her own name. Pl. What am I to call her? Pal. Dicea.

• c. 203 BCE, Plautus, Cistellaria 745:

  H. Quid istuc negoti est? aut quis es? P. Ego sum illius mater, / quae haec gestitavit.

  • 1912 translation by Henry Thomas Riley

    H. What matter is this, or who are you? P. I am the mother of her who had these things with her, when exposed.

• c. 200 BCE, Plautus, Stichus 237:

  Quis haec est quae advorsum it mihi? / Epignomi ancilla haec quidem est Crocotium.

  • 1912 translation by Henry Thomas Riley

    Who's this that's coming towards me? Why, surely this is Crocotium, the maid-servant of Epignomus.

• c. 197 BCE, Plautus, Persa 200:

  sed quis haec est quae med advorsum incedit?

  but who is this that walks towards me?

• c. 190 BCE, Plautus, Epidicus 533:

  Quis illaec est mulier, timido pectore peregre adveniens / quae ipsa se miseratur?

  • 1912 translation by Henry Thomas Riley

    Who is this woman coming from a distance with a breast filled with alarms, and who thus bewails her lot?

• c. 190 BCE, Plautus, Epidicus 620:

  sed quis haec est muliercula et ille gravastellus qui venit?

  • 1912 translation by Henry Thomas Riley

    But who's this young woman, this greyish old fellow, too, that's coming along?

• c. 186 BCE, Plautus, Aulularia 136:

  ubi ea est? quis ea est nam optuma?

  • 1912 translation by Henry Thomas Riley

    Where is she? Who, pray, is this best of women?

• c. 186 BCE, Plautus, Aulularia 170:

  Dic mihi, quaeso, quis ea est, quam vis ducere uxorem?

  • 1912 translation by Henry Thomas Riley

    Tell me, pray, who is she whom you would like to take for a wife?