vereri

Vereri is a Latin verb meaning to fear, to revere, or to show reverence toward someone or something. It can express ordinary fear as well as profound respect, including religious reverence. In use, vereri may take a direct object in the accusative (for example, mortem vereor, “I fear death”) or be followed by clauses introduced by ne or by ut, or by indirect statements to convey feared or revered outcomes.

Grammatically, vereri is a deponent verb, which means it forms its tenses with passive morphology but conveys active meaning. Its principal parts are vereor, verērī, veritus sum. In the present system the forms are vereor, vereris, veretur, veremur, veremini, verentur. The imperfect is verēbar, verēbāris, verēbātur, verēbāmur, verēbāminī, verēbantur; the future is verēbor, verēberis, verēbitur, verebimur, verebiminī, verēbuntur. The perfect uses the participle veritus with sum (veritus sum, veritus es, veritus est, veriti sumus, veriti estis, veriti sunt). The present active forms commonly described in grammars reflect the deponent conjugation pattern.

Usage notes emphasize the range of meaning. Vereri can express fear of something specific, as in mortem vereor, or it can introduce a fear clause with ne, as in vereor ne quid mali accidat. It also carries a sense of reverence or respect toward persons, things, or deities, depending on context. In classical Latin, distinctions between fear and respect are often determined by collocation and purpose, with reverent usage common in religious or ethical writing.