[1600.] For the imperfect indicative of certain verbs relating to action not performed at the present time, see [1497]; for the conative use, see [2302].
[1601.] In letters, the imperfect may denote action at the time of writing, the writer transferring himself to the time of the reader: as,
haec tibi dictābam post fānum putre Vacūnae, H. E. 1, 10, 49, I dictate this for thee behind Vacuna’s crumbling shrine. nihil habēbam quod scrīberem, Att. 9, 10, 1, I have nothing to write. Similarly in the delivery of messages: as, scrībae ōrābant, H. S. 2, 6, 36, the clerks request. The present, however, is very often used where the imperfect would be applicable. Compare 1616.
[1602.] The Latin perfect indicative represents two English tenses: thus, the preterite, I wrote, and the perfect, I have written, are both expressed by the perfect scrīpsī. In the first sense, this perfect is called the Historical Perfect; in the second sense, it is called the Perfect Definite.
[1603.] The historical perfect simply expresses action as having occurred at an indefinite past time, without implying anything as to the duration of the action: as,
scrīpsī, I wrote. vēnī, vīdī, vīcī, Caesar in Suet. Iul. 37, came, saw, overcame. apud Helvētiōs longē nōbilissimus fuit Orgetorīx, 1, 2, 1, among the Helvetians, the man of highest birth by all odds was Orgetorix. Diodōrus prope triennium domō caruit, V. 4, 41, for nearly three years Diodorus had to keep away from home. in Graeciā mūsicī flōruērunt, discēbantque id omnēs, TD. 1, 4, in Greece musicians stood high, and everybody studied the art ([1596]).
[1604.] It may be mentioned here, that in subordinate sentences the historical perfect is sometimes loosely used from the writer’s point of view, instead of the more exact pluperfect demanded by the context: as, aliquantum spatiī ex eō locō, ubī̆ pugnātum est, aufūgerat, L. 1, 25, 8, he had run off some distance from the spot where the fighting had occurred. See [1925].