dico

dico is one of only a handful of verbs in this core hundred, and it is third conjugation: dico, dicere, dixi, dictum. It takes a DATIVE for the person addressed (dic mihi) and an accusative for what is said. For reported speech it takes the accusative and infinitive that carries most Latin indirect statement: dixit se venire, "he said he was coming". Its singular imperative is irregular and loses the ending altogether, giving a bare dic.

One thing on this page needs flagging, because the frequency list quietly folds it in. inquit, "he says" or "he said", is counted here on frequency grounds but it is not part of dico at all. It belongs to inquam, a defective verb that survives in only a few forms (inquam, inquis, inquit, inquiunt), and its job is narrow and specific: it inserts the speaker into DIRECT quoted speech, sitting inside the quotation the way English drops "he said" into the middle of a sentence. Where a Roman writer reports what somebody said, the verb is dico; where he quotes them word for word, it is usually inquit.