Num Questions

 When my son was of an age to study Latin, I noticed something that had escaped me in my younger days: Among the words with which one can begin a question are "num", when the expected answer is "No", and "nonne" when the expected answer is "Yes". A friend of about my age said the other week that the point had eluded him, too.

It is not unreasonable that I should have learned this later in life. What I had in my son's school years, and of course not in my own, was a spouse who exercised--to my good and the public's--some authority over my wardrobe. The question, "Is that what you're wearing?"--to the party, to work, to visit with friends--was very familiar. The answer she expected was not exactly "No", it was more  "Well, I thought so, but what's wrong with it?" Still, "Is that what you're wearing?" is definitely a "num" question.