Politicos and Latin Mottos

Back to Scotland we go for a bit of bad Latin from Parliamentarian and Beatles fan Alistair Darling:

On BBC Radio 4's Today programme, Mr Darling reeled off Loretto School's motto - "Spartan nactus est, hanc exorna" - and said: "It was usually translated at school as 'you've attained Sparta, now live up to it'.

"But I was at school in the 1960s. When I was in my second year, I was listening to the motto in one ear and Sergeant Pepper in the other. The two didn't quite fit."

I don't like the idea of blaming the Fab Four for basic errors in Latin accidence. ('Spartan' can't be a Latin form, and est is third person where we need second.) The form should be 'Spartam nactus es; hanc orna.' (The compound exorna appears in some variations).

In this form it goes back to Erasmus whose advice to a prince (any prince) was that 'you have obtained Sparta; make it splendid.'

This was borrowed from Plutarch's Σπάρταν ἔλαχες, ταύτην κόσμει, which appears twice and is quoted as a proverb. The sense of it is that one should do his best to improve his lot, whatever state it may be. Adorning Sparta sounds to me like a daunting task. It's not bad advice for a politician.

It seems that school mottos are all the rage in the UK today. After Tony Blair stepped down his replacement, Gordon Brown, used the English translation of his school's motto 'I will try my utmost' (usque conabor). The BBC has more on that and other Latin mottos.

Mummy Dearest?

Egypt says mummy is Queen Hatshepsut

By KATARINA KRATOVAC, Associated Press Writer Wed Jun 27, 8:52 PM ET

CAIRO, Egypt - A tooth found in a relic box led archaeologists to identify a long-overlooked mummy as that of Egypt's most powerful female pharoah — possibly the most significant find since King Tutankhamun's tomb was uncovered in 1922, experts said Wednesday.

The mummy was identified as Queen Hatshepsut, who ruled for 20 years in the 15th century B.C., dressing like a man and wearing a fake beard. A monumental builder, she wielded more power than two other famous ancient Egyptian women, Cleopatra and Nefertiti, who unlike her never took the title of pharaoh.

But when she died, all traces of her mysteriously disappeared, including her mummy.

In 1903, a mummy was found lying on the ground next to the sarcophagus holding the mummy of the queen's wet nurse in a tomb in the Valley of Kings burial ground in Luxor. For decades, that mummy was left unidentified and remained in the tomb because it was thought to be insignificant.

Read the rest.

A complete translation of Livy

I know I'm not the only one to hunt through Google Books to find useful editions and out of print classics.

But one thing I've had great difficulty locating is a complete text of Livy. Out of print editions on the used book market are few and expensive, and plain e-texts are unattractive. I'm not averse to printing PDFs (2-up, double-sided) and keeping them on the shelf in three ring binders.

So if you're like me and you're looking for Livy, then look no farther:

1. Books 1 to 8
   
2. Books 9 to 26
   
3. Books 27 to 36
   
4. Book 37 to the end
   

QOTD

I can't remember if I've posted this here before, but don't feel like checking and came across it again today. It comes from Kathleen Jamieson's article 'Jerome, Augustine and the Stesichoran Palinode' (Rhetorica 5 [1987] 353-67). On the verbal war between Rufinus and Jerome, she writes:

Reading the apologiae of Rufinus and Jerome leaves one with the sense of having helplessly witnessed the bludgeoning of a child. (p. 359)

Review: Letters of A.E. Housman

Frank Kermode in the London Review of Books reviews Archie Burnett's expensive new edition of Housman's letters. It's worth reading for many reason, including entertaining bits like this:

He declined all academic and national honours because to accept them would be to admit comparability with other classical scholars who had received them, admiring the attitude of the 17th-century Greek scholar Thomas Gataker who refused a Cambridge doctorate because ‘like Cato the censor he would rather have people ask why he had no statue than why he had one.’ When he came across some self-critical words of T.E. Lawrence in Seven Pillars of Wisdom – ‘there was a craving to be famous; and a horror of being known to like being known’ – he wrote in the margin: ‘This is me.’ So in the course of his life he turned down everything from the OM to the poet laureateship, not to speak of many honorary doctorates. And he refused all invitations to give lectures except for the ones that he conceived to be part of his job.

That's my guy. I'll leave it to you to find the bit about Wittgenstein and the bathroom.

Well, he's not quite Lesbia, but ...

A 57 year old Scotsman spent ten long years watching the man of his dreams from afar before getting up the nerve to confess his feelings in a letter, complete with a classical reference:

Aberdeen Sheriff Court heard the letter Leverett gave Mr Davidson contained references to the Roman poet Catullus and referred to Mr Davidson as the "loveliest guy" and the "cuddliest teddy bear".

It claimed the victim had shown Leverett "affection over many years" and said there was "a beautiful poem about a young man" who wanted 300,000 kisses.

He must mean Catullus 5, which by my calculation adds up precisely to ... 'many thousands.' And not only that, they're to be confounded so that not even the lovers know how many there were. But perhaps Mr. Leverett is just a very talented reader of verse. We should ask for further insights into poetic mysteries.

Before we go, the relevant (ubiquitous) poem for our readers:

Vivamus mea Lesbia, atque amemus,
rumoresque senum severiorum
omnes unius aestimemus assis!
soles occidere et redire possunt:
nobis cum semel occidit brevis lux,
nox est perpetua una dormienda.
da mi basia mille, deinde centum,
dein mille altera, dein secunda centum,
deinde usque altera mille, deinde centum.
dein, cum milia multa fecerimus,
conturbabimus illa, ne sciamus,
aut ne quis malus inuidere possit,
cum tantum sciat esse basiorum.

Lively Up Your Latin (with earthquakes)

That title doesn't make much sense, but then again I just woke up and am about the celebrate the one week anniversary of the school year's end. What better way to celebrate, however, then to write about some new information that might supplement well the dreadful (and dreadfully trendy) Cambridge Latin Course?

Here's something to add to the CLC's exceedingly dull treatment of Boudicca (even if it is questionable that the Romans wouldn't have known an earthquake when they felt one):

Up until now, a series of bizarre events that allegedly took place at the time have been played down as exaggeration and allegory rather than taken at face value.

But British classicist Raphael Isserlin has re-examined the ancient texts and concluded that they are not simply classical literary devices, but descriptions of a serious earthquake that hit the heart of the religious and political capital of Roman Britain - Colchester.

BBC History magazine, which has published Mr Isserlin's findings, explains that the texts recall how the “statue of the goddess Victory in Colchester partly rotated and toppled over, how strange sounds were heard and how the sea turned blood red”.

Along with Dr Roger Musson, the British Geological Survey's most senior seismologist, Mr Isserlin believes these three events are likely to occur during a strong earthquake.

“The noise, a deep, dull sound could conceivably have been described as a strange moan or prolonged groan - often accompanies earthquakes,” Dr Musson told BBC History.

“The seawater change could result from seismic waves causing cliff collapses or destabilising sloping mud deposits which can muddy the water and transform the colouring of the sea.

. . . . .

The full version of 'Boudica's Earthquake' in the July issue of BBC History Magazine, is on sale June 27, priced £3.60.

I'm thinking of having the kids perform a big musical number with the Britons singing "Boudic-CAN!" and the Romans "Boudic-CAN'T!" back and forth, building to a crescendo when the suddenly the earthquake hits and the Britons have the confidence to go at their oppressors West Side Story style. That will get the kids interested. ("When you're a Brit you're a Brit all the way ...".) Or maybe I'll just have some coffee now.