Unit Six - Reading

[Cyborg]

I'd love if someone could help me with the first adapted Cicero text presented in this book, at Unit Six. Here's my best translation (it's terrible), but I haven't gotten the meaning yet.

i desire, senators, i am pious, i desire i am not seen in so many dangers in this town, but now i condemn myself for laziness and worthlessness.
a camp is in italy against the roman people, located in the mountains of etruria, the number of enemies always grow;
however you all see the commander of the camp and leader of the enemies within the city walls and even in number of (the) senators, and you all ought to understand that those men think (are thinking) about danger and great bad things to our city.

If possible, I'd like to see the translation you've done to this text.

gratias uobis ago.

[amans]

Hi Cyborg,

I know this oration. I do not have, however, the M&F. If you could post the Latin original therein, I'd gladly help you make sense of it

[Cyborg]

Hi Cyborg,

I know this oration. I do not have, however, the M&F. If you could post the Latin original therein, I'd gladly help you make sense of it

Well, thank you, amans.
Here it goes:

optō, patrēs cōnscrīptī, mē esse pium, optō in tantīs urbī perīculīs mē nōn sine cūrā uidērī, sed nunc mē inertiae nēquitiaeque dāmnō.
castra sunt in italiā contrā populum rōmānum in etrūriae montibus conlocāta, crēscit sempre inimīcōrum numerus;
castrōrum autem imperātōrem ducemque inimīcōrum intrā moenia atque adeō in patrum cōnscrīptōrum numerō uidētis,
et intellegere dēbētis illōs dē perīculō et magnīs malīs urbī nostrae cōgitāre.

[amans]

salue o Cyborg

I think your translation is fine Really, I don't see many problems in it. I'll set forth a few comments, but first my own go at it:

I want to be just, senators. I want to be seen not without concern for all these dangers to the city, but now I condemn myself beacause of inactivity and negligence. A camp has been set up against the Roman people in the mountains of Etruria, the number of enemies still grows. Yet you see the commander of the camp and the leader of the enemies within the city walls and even amidst the numbers of the conscript fathers, and you ought to understand that those men pursue danger and great evils to our city.

Now my comments:

- me esse pium and me uideri are ACIs. You must either use infinitives as I have done or introduce your subordinate clauses by a "that": I desire that I be just, e.g. (I find, btw, the pius of M&F a little strange: I am not sure if this word is used by Cicero at all)

- sunt conlocata: in your interpretation the particple loosely refers to castra, which is a possibility; I understand this as a passive perfect: has been set up

- perhaps a "yet" translates the autem a little better, - and the "all" of the debetis in your translation does not have an equivalent in the Latin original, but one could certainly imagine Cicero saying that, pointing at the senators

That's it! As you can see, I can't find fault with it - just a few minor ideas. Now, what is this speech about? Well, to be brief: Cicero has revealed Catiline's coup d'état and he explains the situation as it is to the senators. He didn't expect Catiline to be there (which is why the oration has a very in medias res opening: quousque tandem abutere...). Catiline is plotting against the state and yet he dares walk about freely and even show up in the senate!

What are your own thoughts about this piece and its translation?


salutem tibi

[Cyborg]

salue, amans!

thanks for your translation, it helped me in some ways, but i still am per aspera in some passages.

ok, i now understand the first part. cicero desires to be just, he wants to tell the truth. he wants to be seen as a man that worries over his city... but if the concerns are "for all these danger to he city", then why "in tantís urbí perículís"? that "in" confused me.

i've never seen the esse part of a periphrastic so separated from its supine, that's why i thought it had to be "a camp... located" and never thought about the periphrastic "has been set up", mainly because the text notes say i should translate "conloco" as "locate", but of course it can also mean "settle, station, lay out" and thus "set up". am i to encounter a great number of greatly separated periphrastics in my readings of Latin authors?

and what exactly is he trying to say in the last line? is he implying the senators already know there is an enemy among them? does he imply they are all able to see the enemies inside the town, and yet are doing nothing against these enemies?
to read "in the number of senators" meaning "among the senators" seems perhaps weird to me.

uale!

[amans]

Oh, ok, I understand But remember that prepositions can be translated in a variety of ways. This is the oratio in Catilinam, for instance: the oration against Catiline. In other situations you may need to translate in differently. I didn't really think of it, but I just checked in Lewis & Short:

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/pt ... 3D%2311979

If you go to II, A (scroll somewhat down) you find "Anxiety, solitude, concern [...]", and under this heading they mention cura with in: nulla in posterum cura for instance

I cannot tell for sure if separated periphrastic constructions are rare or not; perhaps your translation is just as good; you could say: "there is a camp in Italy" . . . The Lewis & Short dictionary mentions "set up" as one possible translation of conloco. An advantage to that interpretation, I think, is that the adverbial phrase, contra populum Romanum, fits the verb nicely. It would be interesting to know if separating periphrastics this way is normal, though

The last line . . . the fact is that Catiline is sitting right there in the senate among the senators. The enemy is up there in the camp in Etruria but it is also right here among us, Cicero says. Catiline attends senate meetings and plots against the state at the same time. Check out this picture:

http://www.cnrs.ubc.ca/newsletter2004/p ... ablitz.htm

The picture is not contemporary, but it illustrates Catiline's position fairly well, I think.

uale!

[Cyborg]

Thank you very much for your help, amans.
cura ut ualeas!

[amans]

You're welcome

[DaveKovacs]

I have been working my way through M&F and just now came up against this reading. Is it just me or is this passage much more difficult than anything else presented previously in the book? I had no trouble with any of the exercises in Unit Six, but these few (liberally adapted) sentences from Cicero were a real pain!

Is it just me or is there any concurrence on the matter?

[phil96]

Is it just me or is this passage much more difficult than anything else presented previously in the book?

Hi Dave,
I'm just another student working my way through M&F a few chapters further on, so take what I say with a grain of salt; others with more exposure to Latin literature than me will comment, no doubt. But I agree with you. It's the first passage of real (well, nearly real), polished, polemic prose in Latin in the book (Cicero, In Catilinam I.2.4-5, "liberally adapted"). And it uses the devices, twists and emphases of polemic, so it's harder than the contrived sentences. That said, there are plenty of resources/translations on the internet to help when we get stuck, and I've always found the people here at Textkit to be very willing to help with specific questions.

I hate to say it, but Latin poetry is even harder. The first four lines of Vergil's Aeneid, in a later chapter, had me resorting to a translation to even begin working out which words went with what.

Phil