Allen and Greenough's New Latin Grammar for Schools and Colleges
J. B. Greenough, G. L. Kittredge, A. A. Howard, Benj. L. D'Ooge, Ed.

1. “haec ōrnāmenta sunt mea ” (Val. 4.4) , these are my jewels. [ mea is neuter plural, though the speaker is a woman.]
meī sunt ōrdinēs, mea dīscrīptiō; (Cat. M. 59), mine are the rows, mine the arrangement. [ mea is feminine, though the speaker is Cyrus.]
2. multa in nostrō collēgiō praeclāra (id. 64), [there are] many fine things in our college. [ nostrō is neuter singular, though men are referred to.]
3. “Germānī suās cōpiās castrīs ēdūxērunt ” (B. G. 1.51) , the Germans led their troops out of the camp.

[*] a. To express possession and similar ideas the possessive pronouns are regularly used, not the genitive of the personal or reflexive pronouns (§ 343. a):—

1. domus mea, my house. [Not domus meī .]
2. pater noster, our father. [Not pater nostrī .]
3. patrimōnium tuum, your inheritance. [Not tuī .]

[*] Note 1.--Exceptions are rare in classic Latin, common in later writers. For the use of a possessive pronoun instead of an Objective Genitive, see § 348. a.

[*] Note 2.--The Interrogative Possessive cûius , -a, -um, occurs in poetry and early Latin: as,— “cûium pecus” (Ecl. 3.1) , whose flock? The genitive cûius is generally used instead.

[*] b. The possessives have often the acquired meaning of peculiar to, favorable or propitious towards, the person or thing spoken of:—

1. “[petere] ut suā clēmentiā ac mānsuētūdine ūtātur ” (B. G. 2.14) , they asked (they said) that he would show his [wonted] clemency and humanity.
2. “īgnōrantī quem portum petat nūllus suus ventus est ” (Sen. Ep. 71.3) , to him who knows not what port he is bound to, no wind is fair (his own).
tempore tuō pūgnāstī; (Liv. 38.45.10), did you fight at a fit time?

[*] Note.--This use is merely a natural development of the meaning of the possessive, and the pronoun may often be rendered literally.

[*] c. The possessives are regularly omitted (like other pronouns) when they are plainly implied in the context:—

1. socium fraudāvit, he cheated his partner. [ socium suum would be distinctive, his partner (and not another's); suum socium , emphatic, his own partner.]

[*] d. Possessive pronouns and adjectives implying possession are often used substantively to denote some special class or relation:—

1. nostrī, our countrymen, or men of our party.
2. “ suōs continēbat ” (B. G. 1.15) , he held his men in check.
3. “flamma extrēma meōrum ” (Aen. 2.431) , last flames of my countrymen.
4. Sullānī, the veterans of Sulla's army; Pompêiānī, the partisans of Pompey.

[*] Note.--There is no reason to suppose an ellipsis here. The adjective becomes a noun like other adjectives (see § 288).

[*] e. A possessive pronoun or an adjective implying possession may take an appositive in the genitive case agreeing in gender, number, and case with an implied noun or pronoun:—

1. meā sōlīus causā; (Ter. Heaut. 129), for my sake only.
in nostrō omnium flētū; (Mil. 92), amid the tears of us all.
ex Anniānā Milōnis domō; (Att. 4.3.3), out of Annius Milo's house. [Equivalent to ex Annī Milōnis domō .]
2. nostra omnium patria, the country of us all.
3. suum ipsīus rēgnum, his own kingdom.

For the special reflexive use of the possessive suus , see §§ 299, 300.