Re: "ex before consonant > e" non-rule( was: Sensible passives (was: confession: roots))

From: "Yoon Ha Lee" <yl112@...>
> Our Latin teacher told us that if we used ex before a vowel and e before
> a consonant we probably wouldn't go too wrong but that wasn't quite it.
> <shrug>  OTOH this is a one-semester intensive Latin course.
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/resolveform?lookup=ex&lang=la
has a bit about it.

My book (_Teach yourself Latin_, Gavin Betts) says "ex always before a vowel,
sometimes before a consonant".  Which I suppose is close..

> But as a quasirelated point of curiosity, who came up with "deabus" as
> the dat/abl plural of "dea" (?) (goddess)?  It shows up in 6th ed.
> Wheelock but not in 3rd ed. Wheelock.  Did someone make it up by analogy
> with something else so we students wouldn't get confused about our deities?
"<Filia> _daughter_ and <dea> _goddess_ have irregular dative and ablative
plurals: <filia:bus, dea:bus>. This is to avoid confusion with the corresponding
forms of <filius> _son_ and <deus> _god_."

Also http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/resolveform?lookup=dea&lang=la
mentions 'deabus'...

    *Muke!