humanum

Humanum is the neuter singular form of the Latin adjective humanus, meaning “human” or “humane” when used to modify neuter nouns. In Latin, adjectives agree with the nouns they describe in gender, number, and case, so humanum occurs with neuter nouns such as genus (race), opus (work), or corpus (body). The primary sense is descriptive and can refer to humanity or humane qualities, depending on context.

Most common usages are in phrases that denote humanity as a collective. The standard formulation is genus humanum, often translated as “the human race” or “humankind.” Other possible expressions include opus humanum, meaning “a work of man” or “the human work,” and more broadly phrases where neuter nouns are paired with the neuter adjective to signal human-related attributes in a general sense.

Usage notes emphasize the distinction between gendered forms of the same base adjective. Humanum is not interchangeable with humāna or humānus, which agree with feminine or masculine nouns, respectively (for example, res humana, homo humanus). The neuter form is reserved for neuter nouns and for abstract or collective notions tied to humanity.

In modern literature and scholarship, humanum mainly appears in Latin phrases within historical, philosophical, or religious contexts, or in titles that preserve classical phrasing. As a Latin adjective, it illustrates how inflected forms encode semantic nuance: neuter forms often signal abstract, collective, or general notions of humanity, while other gendered forms describe individual or gendered subjects.