Latin Translation

That I will, although it will take a LONG time because I don't have much time for reading AND I am a slow reader. XD

By the way, does The Metamorphoses get any mention in Latin classes?

That's understandable! Just take it slow and enjoy it

Oh yeah, it certainly does! It gets read in advanced classes (poetry translation is notoriously worse than prose), and gets mentioned along with other works.

Just came across this tumblr and thought I'd share it with you all.

It's a collection of popular English memes translated into Latin and given a Roman flair. I am so happy right now.

What's the dog and the Farnsworth one?

The dog is "Hello, yes, this is dog."

Farnsworth's is "I don't want to live on this planet anymore."

Wow, I didn't know Latin had a word for a planet.

By the way, among the languages that are currently used, which would be closest to Latin? Italian?

Yeah, I suppose it would literally be "world"...but they certainly knew that the Earth is round. The word for "circle" is "orbis", and the word for "world/planet" is "orbis terrarum" - literally "circle of lands."

Hmm...that's a good question! You can split that up into two different questions for a more clear answer: what languages are closest to Latin in terms of vocabulary, and which languages are closest in terms of grammar.

For the first, that's easily Italian: I know of a joke that Italian is basically "Latin words in the ablative case". But the second...I've heard that, grammatically, Romanian is the closest to Latin.

French, Spanish, Sardinian, and Portuguese all have aspects of Latin as well.

edited 21st Jul '12 9:35:22 AM by Iulla

I see.

Double post.

I just found this song. Is the Latin grammatically correct?

Well...

GRAMMAR AHOY

At about 0:45, "quoniqm" is a typo - it should be "quoniam". Actually...that whole section gave me trouble, up until the new verse, anyway. The number on "accipient" was off, for example - that's plural when it should be singular.

At around 1:05, the "O quam sancta" verse...each word should end in "-um". I won't bore you with the details, but "lilium" is a neuter word, and "-um" is the neuter ending for this case; "-a" would be the feminine. "Castitas" should be "castitatis".

...I guess I did go into detail. Sorry :( (unless that's what you wanted...in which case I can go into MORE detail.)

I might have chosen a different words in a couple of areas as well, but that's not as bad.

edited 25th Jul '12 6:38:10 PM by Iulla

Do go into more details if you would like, although I'm not sure how much I can understand.

And I just finished The Aeneid.

It is without a doubt a literary masterpiece, filled with brilliant expressions that I personally believe surpass those found in The Iliad and The Odyssey.

There are many parts, though, that makes me think that Virgil was not finished with the poem. The ending felt very missing and I disliked Aeneas' rather conspicuous personality change. I guess it makes sense.

That said, it was a great experience.

Still, I think I should have gotten other translation. I don't know if it's just Fitzgerald, but the verses feel somewhat unnatural. Is it just the Latin grammar?

Awesome, that's great to hear!

Virgil actually wanted the Aeneid to be burnt upon his death. It wasn't entirely finished, I don't think, and for whatever reason he didn't want it read. Fortunately for us (unfortunately for him), Augustus ordered the copy saved. I'm pretty sure it was distributed posthumously, and that few had read it while Virgil was alive.

It might be that particular translator that gave it an unnatural feel. I've read a couple different versions, and they all had different styles and feelings.

It most likely is the Latin grammar. Roman poetry relies heavily on ambiguity, which often makes it difficult to translate, especially if you want to keep it in anything that resembles a poetic structure. A lot of older translations (i.e. 19th to early 20th century stuff) also intentionally go for the most melodramatic and high-falutin' language they can, which makes for some rather awkward-sounding choices to modern ears.

If you're looking for another translation for a comparative reading (or just for whatever reason), I'd recommend the one by David West, which is the current version published by Penguin Classics (so it shouldn't be too hard to find in a decent bookstore). It's a prose translation, but West still tries to capture the feel of the original while also trying to keep the language close to contemporary English.

Seems like activity's picking back up…y'all still want to get this off the ground, Deo volente?

Prose translation of poems...hmm...I am not sure, but okay, I will give it a try. It will be a while, though, since I'm reading other books as well.

Say, has any of you guys read The Metamorphoses? Which translations would you guys recommend? The one I have and currently reading is Allen Mandelbaum.

Certe!

Unfortunately I've only read the first bit of the introduction, in the original Latin. Ovid's not exactly a favorite of mine; he has a bad habit of just inventing words when he doesn't want to say something conventional, which makes him absolutely maddening to translate.

Question on potential adjectival titles (e.g., Musculus): How do we handle when these are feminine or neuter? Should we use a default masculine title (or feminine or neuter if the default is obviously feminine or a machine or something) and have redirects for the other genders?

That's the way the English pages do it, if the trope is the same regardless of the gender of the character, for instance Manipulative Bitch is a feminine redirect to Manipulative Bastard. There are others, where the trope is actually different depending on which gender it is (Action Girl doesn't redirect to Action Hero, because sometimes putting a female in the position of an action hero carries different baggage than putting a guy there.) But Action Heroine does redirect to Action Hero.

Confused yet?

edited 27th Jan '13 4:54:56 PM by Madrugada

Awesome, thank you.

Another question—spelling conventions. How do we want to handle i/j and u/v? I'd personally cast my vote for sticking with i only (unless maybe we were handling the title of a work), but I'm ambivalent on u/v.

(Aw, did I miss a brief period of activity?)

I agree that we should use i instead of j, but I like having both v and u. But I'm probably just saying that because that's how I learned it.

Works for me.

Say, what would be the most concise translation of "Anytime, Anywhere, Anything."?

What would be the most succinct translation of "I have nothing more to say to you." In Latin? What would also be the most detached but condemning way to put it?

I might have got this wrong (I only started learning Latin a few months ago) so someone might want to doublecheck or correct me, but a couple of ways I can think of are:

• "noli me loqui!" (or "nolite me loqui" if you're addressing more than one person) - "Don't talk to me!" (in the sense of giving a command)
• "te loqui non volo" - "I don't want to talk to you."
• "tacebo" - "I will not say anything."

edited 13th Aug '14 3:17:11 PM by Bisected8