Nocte iube me dormire

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pmda
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Nocte iube me dormire

Post by pmda »

This sentence in Orberg's LLPSI has me a bit stumped.

Quintus says:

Nocte iube me dormire.

Now I think he means something like 'At night I must sleep'. But 'Iube' is Imperative (active) so is 'iube' like 'necesse' in necesse est (and is the 'necesse' in 'necesse est' an imperative?)? - I never thought about it.

Strictly speaking it seems to make no sense. 'Iube' is an order. Yet he's referring to himself.

Nooj
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Re: Nocte iube me dormire

Post by Nooj »

pmda wrote:This sentence in Orberg's LLPSI has me a bit stumped.

Quintus says:

Nocte iube me dormire.

Now I think he means something like 'At night I must sleep'. But 'Iube' is Imperative (active) so is 'iube' like 'necesse' in necesse est (and is the 'necesse' in 'necesse est' an imperative?)? - I never thought about it.

Strictly speaking it seems to make no sense. 'Iube' is an order. Yet he's referring to himself.
Quintus is telling someone else to order him to sleep.
Dolor poetas creat.

pmda
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Re: Nocte iube me dormire

Post by pmda »

Thanks. I suppose it's an idiomatic thing.... 'When it's night, tell me to sleep' like is a soliloquy, right?

adrianus
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Re: Nocte iube me dormire

Post by adrianus »

Salve pmda

Where (what chapter and section) is the sentence in Orberg?
Ubi (in quo capitulo et quâ sectione) est ea sententia apud Orberg(ensem)?
Last edited by adrianus on Sat Jul 31, 2010 12:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.
I'm writing in Latin hoping for correction, and not because I'm confident in how I express myself. Latinè scribo ut ab omnibus corrigar, non quod confidenter me exprimam.

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furrykef
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Re: Nocte iube me dormire

Post by furrykef »

Chapter 13, line 141. Fuller context:

Aemilia: "Sed hoc satis est. Iam necesse est tē dormīre."
[...]
Quīntus: "Sed diēs est. Sōl lūcet. Nocte iubē mē dormīre, cum sōl in caelō nōn est!"

Quintus's issue here is clearly that, in his view, Aemilia told him to sleep at the wrong time. So Quintus is simply telling her to do it at a more appropriate time. I don't think idiom or anything like that even enters the picture...
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