num

Num opens a direct question and tells you the expected answer in advance: no. "Num rex venit?" is not a neutral enquiry but "the king hasn't come, surely?", with the speaker's scepticism built in. Its opposite number is nonne, which expects yes, and the enclitic -ne, which expects nothing and is the plain question marker.

In indirect questions the colouring drops away entirely and num means simply "whether", interchangeable with -ne: "quaesivit num venisset", he asked whether he had come. Translating a direct num as a flat "did he...?" throws away the whole point of choosing it, which is the sneer. The verb in an indirect question is always subjunctive, and the tense follows the sequence rules.