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AP Latin

AP Latin

Read Pliny and Vergil closely, translate them literally, and argue from the Latin, built for the new project-based exam.

Category
World languages
Units
6 units
Exam
Exam May 14, 2027 (in 229 days)
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What the course covers

A complete AP Latin course on the framework that took effect in 2025-26. Six units move from Teacher's Choice prose into Pliny the Younger's Letters (the eruption of Vesuvius, ghost stories, letters to the emperor Trajan and to his wife Calpurnia), then into poetry and Vergil's Aeneid from the opening storm to the death of Turnus, and finish with the Course Project on four newly released passages. You train the three skill categories the exam scores: reading and translating Latin literally, describing style, meter, and Roman context, and building short arguments that cite the Latin. Practice matches the real exam: glossed four-choice sight and syllabus sets, the Short Answer with scansion, the 15-segment Translation, the Short Essay, and the two Project Passage Short Essays.

6 units

  1. Unit 1

    Teacher's Choice: Latin Prose

    Free
    Rebuild the reading engine on about 1,200 words of nonsyllabus prose: noun cases, verb forms, pronouns, the ablative, the subjunctive, and participles, plus the core vocabulary list. Every reading pairs literal translation with summary, and the last one starts the habit the essays reward: citing the Latin that supports an interpretation. Suggested texts are accessible Classical and later prose from the CED's Teacher's Choice list. About 16 class periods in the CED pacing.
    4 topics
    1. 1.1Teacher's Choice Prose I: Nouns, Cases, and Prepositions
    2. 1.2Teacher's Choice Prose II: Verb Forms, Tense, and Voice
    3. 1.3Teacher's Choice Prose III: Genitive, Dative, and Pronouns
    4. 1.4Teacher's Choice Prose IV: Ablatives, Subjunctives, Participles, and First Evidence

  2. Unit 2

    Pliny's Letters: Eruption of Mt. Vesuvius

    The first syllabus author. Pliny the Younger's two letters to the historian Tacitus about the eruption of 79 CE: Letter 6.16 on his uncle Pliny the Elder, admiral at Misenum, who sails toward the disaster and dies near Stabiae, and Letter 6.20 on Pliny's own night and flight with his mother. Students read long continuous prose literally, meet the epistolary genre and Pliny's careful self-presentation, and begin building their own interpretations with style and context as evidence. A final Teacher's Choice letter extends the genre. About 20 class periods in the CED pacing.
    5 topics
    1. 2.1Letter 6.16.1-12: Eruption of Mt. Vesuvius and Pliny the Elder, part 1
    2. 2.2Letter 6.16.13-22: Eruption of Mt. Vesuvius and Pliny the Elder, part 2
    3. 2.3Letter 6.20.1-10: Eruption of Mt. Vesuvius and Pliny the Younger, part 1
    4. 2.4Letter 6.20.11-20: Eruption of Mt. Vesuvius and Pliny the Younger, part 2
    5. 2.5Teacher's Choice Prose V: Another Roman Letter

  3. Unit 3

    Pliny's Letters: Ghosts, Trajan, Calpurnia, and Teacher's Choice Prose

    Pliny beyond the volcano. Letter 7.27 asks whether ghosts are real through three stories, including the haunted house in Athens. Letters from Book 10 show Pliny writing to Trajan, first to request citizenship for the doctor who treated him and later, as governor of Bithynia-Pontus, about aqueducts: a window on patronage and imperial power. Letters 6.4 and 6.7 to his wife Calpurnia show marriage and affection in a highly crafted form. Students add inference, stronger literal precision, and interpretation with style and context. About 18 class periods in the CED pacing.
    6 topics
    1. 3.1Letter 7.27.1-8: Ghosts and Apparitions, part 1
    2. 3.2Letter 7.27.9-16: Ghosts and Apparitions, part 2
    3. 3.3Teacher's Choice Prose VI: Style in Prose
    4. 3.4Letters 10.37 and 10.90: Letters to Emperor Trajan, Aqueducts
    5. 3.5Letters 10.5, 10.6, and 10.7: Letters to Emperor Trajan, Citizenship for Pliny's Doctor
    6. 3.6Letters 6.4 and 6.7: Letters to Calpurnia

  4. Unit 4

    Teacher's Choice Poetry and Vergil's Aeneid, Books 1 and 2

    The turn to poetry. Three Teacher's Choice readings train students to follow artful word order by agreement and to hear meter. Then the Aeneid begins: the proem and Juno's anger, the storm and Aeneas's first speech, Dido at her temple, and Laocoön and the Trojan Horse. Students learn the epic genre, Vergil and Augustus, the core myths, dactylic hexameter and elision, and the word-order figures poetry makes possible. About 22 class periods in the CED pacing.
    6 topics
    1. 4.1Teacher's Choice Poetry I: Reading Latin in Meter
    2. 4.2Teacher's Choice Poetry II: Clauses and Moods in Verse
    3. 4.3Teacher's Choice Poetry III: First Interpretations of Poetry
    4. 4.4Aeneid Book 1, Lines 1-33: The Epic Begins
    5. 4.5Aeneid Book 1, Lines 88-107 and 496-508: The Storm, Queen Dido
    6. 4.6Aeneid Book 2, Lines 40-56 and 201-249: Laocoön and the Trojan Horse

  5. Unit 5

    Vergil's Aeneid, Books 4, 6, 7, 11, and 12

    The Aeneid to its end: Dido's love and Rumor's flight, the quarrel in which Aeneas leaves Carthage, Dido's silent shade and Anchises's prophecy of Rome and Augustus in the underworld, King Latinus and Turnus arming for war, the story of Camilla, the reconciliation of Jupiter and Juno, and Aeneas killing Turnus. Students finish the core vocabulary, the remaining devices and genre features, and write full interpretations that weigh pietas, fate, and heroism. About 26 class periods in the CED pacing.
    7 topics
    1. 5.1Aeneid Book 4, Lines 74-89 and 165-197: Dido Feels the Effect of Cupid, Rumor Reaches Jupiter
    2. 5.2Aeneid Book 4, Lines 305-361: Aeneas Leaves Dido
    3. 5.3Aeneid Book 6, Lines 450-476, 788-800, and 847-853: The Shade of Dido, Meeting Anchises
    4. 5.4Aeneid Book 7, Lines 45-58, 783-792, and 803-817: King Latinus, Turnus Prepares for War
    5. 5.5Aeneid Book 11, Lines 532-594: The Story of Camilla
    6. 5.6Aeneid Book 12, Lines 791-796, 803-812, and 818-828: The Fate of the Trojans Is Decided
    7. 5.7Aeneid Book 12, Lines 919-952: The Final Battle of Aeneas and Turnus

  6. Unit 6

    Course Project and Teacher's Choice Poetry

    The Course Project: four nonsyllabus passages (two prose, two poetry, about 100-150 words each, from varied authors and periods) released each summer, studied for at least 12 class periods, and tested on Questions 4 and 5 of the exam plus two in-class checkpoints. Students summarize and interpret passages they have prepared, then finish with two Teacher's Choice poetry readings for final review of grammar, meter, and sight reading. About 18 class periods in the CED pacing.
    5 topics
    1. 6.P1Course Project: Reading and Summarizing the Project Passages
    2. 6.P2Course Project: Interpreting a Prose Project Passage
    3. 6.P3Course Project: Interpreting a Poetry Project Passage
    4. 6.1Teacher's Choice Poetry IV: Meter, Elision, and Word Order
    5. 6.2Teacher's Choice Poetry V: Gods, Omens, and Roman Values

The exam, part by part

7 parts, 3 h in all.

  • Section I: Multiple Choice

    Questions
    52
    Time
    1 h 5 min
    Weight
    50%
    Format details

    Four choices (A-D) per question, English stems, glosses for every word outside the Full Required Latin Vocabulary List. Composition: 20 discrete sight questions (stimulus of 20 words or fewer; roughly even across sight Pliny, sight Vergil, other prose, other poetry), 18%; four short sets of 3 questions each (sight prose 20-30 words, sight poetry 3-4 lines, syllabus Pliny, syllabus Vergil), 3% each; two long sets of 10 questions each (syllabus Pliny 75-90 words, syllabus Vergil 10-12 lines), 10% each. About 80-85% of items assess reading and comprehension (Skill Category 1) and 15-20% style and context (Skill Category 2); analysis (Category 3) is not tested in multiple choice.

  • Section II, Question 1: Short Answer

    Questions
    1
    Time
    15 min
    Weight
    10%
    Format details

    Task types: Short Answer

    Suggested 15 minutes. Section II lasts 1 hour 55 minutes in total and students pace themselves across the five questions. Passage from the required Vergil (about 5-10 lines) or Pliny (about 50-75 words) readings.

  • Section II, Question 2: Translation

    Questions
    1
    Time
    15 min
    Weight
    10%
    Format details

    Task types: Translation

    Suggested 15 minutes. About 35 words of required Vergil or 40 words of required Pliny, scored in 15 segments.

  • Section II, Question 3: Short Essay

    Questions
    1
    Time
    25 min
    Weight
    10%
    Format details

    Task types: Short Essay

    Suggested 25 minutes. About 35-55 words of required Vergil or 40-60 words of required Pliny. Questions 1, 2, and 3 never all come from the same author: an exam mixes Vergil and Pliny across them.

  • Section II, Question 4: Project Prose Passage Short Essay

    Questions
    1
    Time
    30 min
    Weight
    9%
    Format details

    Task types: Project Prose Passage Short Essay

    Suggested 30 minutes. One of the two prose Course Project passages (about 100-150 words), printed without its title, attribution, introduction, glossary, or commentary. Which passage appears is not announced.

  • Section II, Question 5: Project Poetry Passage Short Essay

    Questions
    1
    Time
    30 min
    Weight
    9%
    Format details

    Task types: Project Poetry Passage Short Essay

    Suggested 30 minutes. One of the two poetry Course Project passages (about 100-150 words), printed without its title, attribution, introduction, glossary, or commentary.

  • Course Project: In-Class Checkpoints

    Questions
    2
    Time
    Untimed
    Weight
    2%
    Format details

    Task types: Project Checkpoint 1: Summary Draft, Project Checkpoint 2: Interpretation Product

    Not part of exam day and not timed. Two tasks completed in class during the Course Project and scored by the teacher (2 + 3 = 5 points), entered in AP Digital Portfolio by May 31. Mock exams should skip this part; it is here so the weights are true to the real composite.

How the 1 to 5 score is set

Section I (52 multiple-choice questions, no penalty for guessing) is 50% of the composite. Section II is 48%: Short Answer 10%, Translation 10%, Short Essay 10%, and the two Project Passage Short Essays 9% each; AP Readers score them on the published point rubrics (8, 15, 8, 11, and 11 points). The final 2% comes from the two teacher-scored Course Project checkpoints (5 points). Together the project essays and checkpoints are 20% of the score. The weighted composite is converted to the 1-5 AP scale with criterion-referenced cut points that the College Board sets each year and does not publish in advance.

What you bring and get

No dictionary, grammar, or reference sheet is allowed. The exam is fully digital in the Bluebook app. Every Latin word outside the Full Required Latin Vocabulary List is glossed beneath the passage (proper names from the course's essential knowledge are not glossed when nominative), except on Questions 4 and 5, which print the project passage with no glosses at all. The app provides reference information listing the three accepted ways to indicate scansion. Scratch paper is allowed for planning, but only typed responses are scored.

Skills the exam scores

  • 1.AIdentify the meaning of Latin words and phrases

    Skill Category 1 (Read and Comprehend). Know the Full Required Latin Vocabulary List (VOC-1) and choose the meaning a word or phrase has in its specific context, including synonyms that fit the passage better than the listed definition (VOC-2).

  • 1.BDescribe how grammar shapes meaning in context

    Skill Category 1. Explain what nouns (GRAM-1: every case use from subject to locative and vocative), verbs and verbals (GRAM-2: tense, mood, voice, deponents, subjunctive clauses, conditions, infinitives, indirect statement, gerunds, gerundives, supines, participles), adjectives and pronouns (GRAM-3), and particles such as adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, and question words (GRAM-4) are doing in a specific sentence.

  • 1.CSummarize Latin texts in English

    Skill Category 1. State a passage's explicit meaning, such as its ideas, setting, and sequence of events (SUM-1), and its implied meaning drawn from figurative language and inference (SUM-2).

  • 1.DTranslate Latin texts into English

    Skill Category 1. Produce an idiomatic English translation (TRAN-1) and a literal translation that accounts for every Latin word with its exact case, number, tense, voice, and mood (TRAN-2).

  • 2.ADescribe features and functions of stylistic elements

    Skill Category 2 (Describe Style and Context). Identify repetition, alliteration, anaphora, and parallelism (STYL-1), chiasmus, synchysis, and enjambment (STYL-2), simile and metaphor (STYL-3), dactylic hexameter, feet, and elision (STYL-4), and features of the epistolary and epic genres (STYL-5), and describe the effect each creates.

  • 2.BDescribe historical and cultural contexts

    Skill Category 2. Explain references to influential people, works, and events such as Augustus, the civil wars, the Punic Wars, Pliny the Elder, Tacitus, Domitian, and Trajan (CTXT-1), to Roman social norms such as citizenship, slavery, patronage, the family, religion, omens, and pietas (CTXT-2), and to Greco-Roman myth and legend such as the gods, the Fates, the Judgment of Paris, the Trojan War, and Dido (CTXT-3).

  • 3.ADevelop an interpretation of a Latin text

    Skill Category 3 (Analyze). Form a defensible interpretation about a main idea or meaning (INT-1), an effect or purpose (INT-2), or a point of view or attitude of the author, speaker, or a character (INT-3).

  • 3.BExplain how evidence supports an interpretation

    Skill Category 3. Cite specific Latin from the passage (INT-4) and explain how it supports the interpretation (INT-5), and explain how contextual information (INT-6) and stylistic features (INT-7) support it too.