Bello Gallico
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Bello Gallico
All:
Here's a general question regarding word order in prepositional phrases -
In a passage from the Invasion of Britain, Caesar writes:
"de superioris temporis consilio se excusant."
Now, I gather that the passage ultimately says something along the lines of, "They excuse themselves regarding (their) policy in a previous time."
But why is it that 'consilio' finds itself so far away from the 'ad' preposition that governs it? -- it seems like I've been taught to expect constructions along the lines of, "de consilio superioris temporis se excusant."
Is this common?
Gratias ago,
-FV
Here's a general question regarding word order in prepositional phrases -
In a passage from the Invasion of Britain, Caesar writes:
"de superioris temporis consilio se excusant."
Now, I gather that the passage ultimately says something along the lines of, "They excuse themselves regarding (their) policy in a previous time."
But why is it that 'consilio' finds itself so far away from the 'ad' preposition that governs it? -- it seems like I've been taught to expect constructions along the lines of, "de consilio superioris temporis se excusant."
Is this common?
Gratias ago,
-FV
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Yes, as the Latin passages become harder, the word order will become funkier and funkier, and not just in prepositional phrases. Sigh.
Also, your translation seems a bit out to me. I can't exactly say why, as I don't know the complete context, but maybe you're translating some of the words with the wrong connotation?
Also, your translation seems a bit out to me. I can't exactly say why, as I don't know the complete context, but maybe you're translating some of the words with the wrong connotation?
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The genitive, when it precedes its noun, sometimes fits between a preposition and noun. Of course, when the genitive is modified by adjectives this can place the prepositional object quite far away, so you should usually not encounter any prepositions separated from their objects by more than 2-3 words, except perhaps in poetry or the rare prose. It is comparable to the English "from the plan of a previous time" or "from a previous time's plan", which in the latter has the prepositional object separated by three words.
vae te MyIlium!
vae te MyIlium!
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Caesar's prepositions
Hi,
I'm new here. My level is sort of crazy intermediate. Thanks for a stimulating problem. It took me a moment or two to realize/remember that 'superioris temporis' were both GENITIVE SINGULAR (and not ablative plural!), but after that everything fell into place.
In this case, Latin seems to function very much like English. 'Superioris temporis consilium' is 'AN EARLIER TIME'S policy'. 'Consilium superioris temporis' would be 'the policy OF AN EARLIER TIME.
In English we could say a) 'ABOUT an earlier time's policy' or b) 'ABOUT the policy of an earlier time' but NOT c) 'of an earlier time ABOUT a policy'!
Caesar wrote a) ' DE superioris temporis consilio'. He could have written b) 'DE consilio superioris temporis'. But c) 'superioris temporis DE consilio' could only mean he'd been hitting the wine jar.
As for why he chose the first option, I read the other day that the genitive PRECEDES the noun three times out of four in Latin.
Cheers,
Int
I'm new here. My level is sort of crazy intermediate. Thanks for a stimulating problem. It took me a moment or two to realize/remember that 'superioris temporis' were both GENITIVE SINGULAR (and not ablative plural!), but after that everything fell into place.
In this case, Latin seems to function very much like English. 'Superioris temporis consilium' is 'AN EARLIER TIME'S policy'. 'Consilium superioris temporis' would be 'the policy OF AN EARLIER TIME.
In English we could say a) 'ABOUT an earlier time's policy' or b) 'ABOUT the policy of an earlier time' but NOT c) 'of an earlier time ABOUT a policy'!
Caesar wrote a) ' DE superioris temporis consilio'. He could have written b) 'DE consilio superioris temporis'. But c) 'superioris temporis DE consilio' could only mean he'd been hitting the wine jar.
As for why he chose the first option, I read the other day that the genitive PRECEDES the noun three times out of four in Latin.
Cheers,
Int
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My Ilium
My Ilium:
Although I certainly don't discount the possibility that I've taken this quote out of context - my translation seemed to fit the surrounding context. Given that my grasp of Latin is tenuous at best, I offer the original text and my translation for scrutiny.
The entire passage reads:
"Caesar in his locis moratur: et naves parat:
(Caesar tarries in this place, and prepares the boats:)
Legati ex magna parte Morinorum ad eum veniunt:
(Lieut.'s from a large part of the Morini come to him:)
de superioris temporis consilio se excusant:
(They excuse themselves regarding their policy of an earlier time:)
olim enim bellum populo Romano fecerant.
(for, formerly they had made war on the Roman people.)
Hoc Caesari esse opportunam videbatur:
(This appeared to Caesar to be opportune:)
nam neque post tergum hostem relinquere volebat,
(For he wished neither to leave the enemy behind (their) back,)
neque facultatem belli gerendi propter anni tempus habebat."
(Nor did he have the opportunity for waging war because of the season.)
I actually had a fair amount of trouble arriving at a sensical translation for the next line as well:
"His magnum numerum obsidum imperat, et eos in fidem recipit."
The best I can come up with is:
"To them, he ordered a great number hostage, and received them in faith"
or instead of 'received them in faith' maybe, 'received their submission.'
Man. I don't know.
-FV
Although I certainly don't discount the possibility that I've taken this quote out of context - my translation seemed to fit the surrounding context. Given that my grasp of Latin is tenuous at best, I offer the original text and my translation for scrutiny.
The entire passage reads:
"Caesar in his locis moratur: et naves parat:
(Caesar tarries in this place, and prepares the boats:)
Legati ex magna parte Morinorum ad eum veniunt:
(Lieut.'s from a large part of the Morini come to him:)
de superioris temporis consilio se excusant:
(They excuse themselves regarding their policy of an earlier time:)
olim enim bellum populo Romano fecerant.
(for, formerly they had made war on the Roman people.)
Hoc Caesari esse opportunam videbatur:
(This appeared to Caesar to be opportune:)
nam neque post tergum hostem relinquere volebat,
(For he wished neither to leave the enemy behind (their) back,)
neque facultatem belli gerendi propter anni tempus habebat."
(Nor did he have the opportunity for waging war because of the season.)
I actually had a fair amount of trouble arriving at a sensical translation for the next line as well:
"His magnum numerum obsidum imperat, et eos in fidem recipit."
The best I can come up with is:
"To them, he ordered a great number hostage, and received them in faith"
or instead of 'received them in faith' maybe, 'received their submission.'
Man. I don't know.
-FV
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Where From?
My text comes from a graded reader by Welch and Duffield called, "Invasion of Britain."
Supposedly the first 11 chapters (Roughly Book IV Ch. XX through XXIV of Bello Gallico) are graded - after which, the text is supposedly a verbatim of Bello Gallico book IV.
But yes, my passage is from Book IV, Ch. XXII of the original work. Keen eye Tim.
-FV
Supposedly the first 11 chapters (Roughly Book IV Ch. XX through XXIV of Bello Gallico) are graded - after which, the text is supposedly a verbatim of Bello Gallico book IV.
But yes, my passage is from Book IV, Ch. XXII of the original work. Keen eye Tim.
-FV
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I checked up in various sources and came up with the following notes for what they are worth.
Translated from my Latin Swedish dictionary:
imperare alicui (dative) alquid = demand sth of s.o./ demand sth from s.o.
aliquem i fidem recipere = take someone under one’s protection; pardon (when an enemy capitulates)
Cheers,
Int
C. is about to cross the English channel from what is today Calais. He’s in potentially hostile territory but luckily for him the Gallic warlords in the area don’t want trouble so most of them send ENVOYS/ AMBASSADORS (not lieutenants) to do a deal with the Romans.Legati ex magna parte Morinorum ad eum veniunt:
(Lieut.'s from a large part of the Morini come to him:)
I found this alternative: they apologize for their conduct the previous season.de superioris temporis consilio se excusant:
(They excuse themselves regarding their policy of an earlier time:)
he did not wish to leave an enemy behind HIM/ in the rearnam neque post tergum hostem relinquere volebat,
(For he wished neither to leave the enemy behind (their) back,)
He ordered a large number of hostages from them and took them (the Morini) under his protection"His magnum numerum obsidum imperat, et eos in fidem recipit."
(“To them, he ordered a great number hostage, and received them in faith"
or instead of 'received them in faith' maybe, 'received their submission.')
Translated from my Latin Swedish dictionary:
imperare alicui (dative) alquid = demand sth of s.o./ demand sth from s.o.
aliquem i fidem recipere = take someone under one’s protection; pardon (when an enemy capitulates)
Cheers,
Int
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I don't quite see the connection here between "ad" and "consilio". I really think that the modifed version given obscures the basic structure of the passage.But why is it that 'consilio' finds itself so far away from the 'ad'
preposition that governs it?
The given phrase is:
Caesar in his locis moratur, et naves parat legati ex magna parte Morinorum ad eum veniunt, de superioris temporis consilio se excusant...
Perseus has it as:
Dum in his locis Caesar navium parandarum causa moratur, ex magna parte Morinorum ad eum legati venerunt, qui se de superioris temporis consilio excusarent...
Focusing on the Perseus version, the sentence structure clarifies the subject of the "qui..." phrase. The sentence phrases flow quite naturally from one to the other. The first word, "Dum" introduces a clause of explaination for the second, which is the main action of the entence; "While <Caesar was delayed doing some action>...". To me, this is a classic example of Caesar's style of writing; he keeps the reader's attention on himself by speaking in the third person, passive voice, emphasizing his actions first and how other events happen around him. So the reader is predisposed for the subsequent phrase,
"...ex magna parte Morinorum ad eum legati venerunt..."
Here the word order seems fairly indicative. If I were to compose such a sentence myself, it would come out quite differently:
legati ex magna parte Morinorum ad eum venerunt.
Part of the reason is that I'm constructing a stand alone sentence out of a dependent phrase. I haven't properly learned about the partive genitive yet, but I gather the construction from § 346 of A+G. My point, however, is that the emphasis is completely altered by the sentence extraction. Instead of highlighting that it was the majority of the enemy who sent ambassadors to Caesar, which emphasizes Caesar's stature, it becomes a fairly mudane report of the arrival of ambassadors.
Still it begs the question, "What did they say?" And this is where I think the modified version gets muddled because it drops the qualifier "qui" that introduces the dependant phrase and connects its subject to that of the preceding phrase: legati.
So, I find the modified version,
...legati ex magna parte Morinorum ad eum veniunt, de superioris temporis consilio se excusant...
obscures the connection between the dependent phrase and its subject. The sentence seems so fractured to me that it feels like it would be better if the comma here were a period. Then I think "se" whould resume its proper place:
...legati ex magna parte Morinorum ad eum veniunt.
se de superioris temporis consilio excusant.
FWIW
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Caesar
A correction: I misread the map. Caesar set out from the Boulogne area on his first trip to England. His major effort the following year (54BC) started out from the Calais area. I know this doesn't affect the problem under discussion but sorry anyway.
Int
Int
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Comma
Tim:The sentence seems so fractured to me that it feels like it would be better if the comma here were a period. Then I think "se" whould resume its proper place:
Although I completely agree that the phrasing here is somewhat stilted, I believe there was a certain logic to it on the part of Welch and Duffield. Just to be precise - the actual punctuation used is a colon, which seems to imply the cause-effect nature of what is going on in the passage, while still allowing the individual passages to function as 'complete sentences.'
I think they get a little bit crazy with the colon though. Reading over their graded passage, almost every sentence becomes dependent upon the previous. The final logic looks something like this:
Caesar stopped: prepared the boats: ambassadors came to him: they apologized: because the weiners feared the fell glory of his wrath.
It's not pretty to look at - but it still connects all of the necessary elements without coordinating using the multiple dependent clauses of the original text. I must say though, I'm relatively unindoctrinated in Caesar's writing style. My own experience heretofore is limited to Wheelock's -- so I have no idea how prevalent the colon is in the larger corpus of Latin literature.
I'm still at the point where I like to have my hand held in these matters. Multiple dependents mixed with participles and gerunds frighten the hell out of me. As it's a graded reader, I sort of appreciate the fact that they do this kind of stuff early on.
-FV
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Punctuation is largely,* I think, editorial. Caesar would have written (actually probably dictated) to produce a text written entirely in capitals, without punctuation, and without space between words.
DUMINHISLOCISCAESARNAVIUMPARANDUMCAUSAMORATUREXMAGNA
PARTEMORINORUMADEUMLEGATIVENERUNTQUISEDESUPERIORIS
TEMPORISCONSILIOEXCUSARENT...
The text would then have been read (out loud: non-vocal reading does not come until later).
Punctuation is therefore fair game for editors. I suspect but do not know that practices have probably varied with general practice with regard to punctuation.
* The earliest punctuation I believe is mid-point dots (interpuncts) used to separate words in inscriptions.
DUMINHISLOCISCAESARNAVIUMPARANDUMCAUSAMORATUREXMAGNA
PARTEMORINORUMADEUMLEGATIVENERUNTQUISEDESUPERIORIS
TEMPORISCONSILIOEXCUSARENT...
The text would then have been read (out loud: non-vocal reading does not come until later).
Punctuation is therefore fair game for editors. I suspect but do not know that practices have probably varied with general practice with regard to punctuation.
* The earliest punctuation I believe is mid-point dots (interpuncts) used to separate words in inscriptions.
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Don't mind me. It just struck me that the problem presented didn't seem to exist except in that version. If the reader presents the text in a particular manner for the purpose of elaboration of a construct then that's a good thing.
I knew about capitals but I didn't know about lack of spaces. Don't the inscriptions in the forum have them? Or are they all post Republic? The capitals I could deal with but not the lack of spaces. I've always assumed the inscriptions and money marks are all abbreviated due to a shortage of space. But I thought that writing would have them.
I knew about capitals but I didn't know about lack of spaces. Don't the inscriptions in the forum have them? Or are they all post Republic? The capitals I could deal with but not the lack of spaces. I've always assumed the inscriptions and money marks are all abbreviated due to a shortage of space. But I thought that writing would have them.
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See for yourself (mind the Latin cursive, may have to reload that to get it to work). Sometimes they had the courtesy to put dots between the words, but usually not.
flebile nescio quid queritur lyra, flebile lingua murmurat exanimis, respondent flebile ripae
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Interesting website you posted Benissimus.
A good friend of mine collectes illuminated manuscripts, and I always found myself having a hard time distinguishing the individual letters in each word. Woud you, or anyone, happen to have a website or know of a book that teachers how to distinguise that type of stylized writing? 'twould be much appreciated.
A good friend of mine collectes illuminated manuscripts, and I always found myself having a hard time distinguishing the individual letters in each word. Woud you, or anyone, happen to have a website or know of a book that teachers how to distinguise that type of stylized writing? 'twould be much appreciated.
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RamenSama wrote:Interesting website you posted Benissimus.
A good friend of mine collectes illuminated manuscripts, and I always found myself having a hard time distinguishing the individual letters in each word. Woud you, or anyone, happen to have a website or know of a book that teachers how to distinguise that type of stylized writing? 'twould be much appreciated.
Try these. I should organize my links, I know there is another good one, but I can't find it.
http://medievalwriting.50megs.com/
http://www.bibliographics.com/PALAEOG-lite/HECTOR.htm
Ingrid
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Exercises.
Dear God. These exercises are impossible. Has anyone tried the 'Diploma of Charlemagne A.D.781'?Try these. I should organize my links, I know there is another good one, but I can't find it.
http://medievalwriting.50megs.com/
http://www.bibliographics.com/PALAEOG-lite/HECTOR.htm
P.S. Is it bad that I'm rather proud that my simple post has spawned such copious and diffuse response? Hubris I believe it's called? Regardless: thanks all, for making me feel welcome. ειλικρινα.
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Re: Exercises.
Welcome you? Isn't it obvious we were trying to scare you off? Just kidding Anyways, that is exactly why I avoid medieval Latin.FerrariusVerborum wrote:Dear God. These exercises are impossible. Has anyone tried the 'Diploma of Charlemagne A.D.781'?Try these. I should organize my links, I know there is another good one, but I can't find it.
http://medievalwriting.50megs.com/
http://www.bibliographics.com/PALAEOG-lite/HECTOR.htm
P.S. Is it bad that I'm rather proud that my simple post has spawned such copious and diffuse response? Hubris I believe it's called? Regardless: thanks all, for making me feel welcome. ειλικρινα.
flebile nescio quid queritur lyra, flebile lingua murmurat exanimis, respondent flebile ripae
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Double Re:
Ben...:
It's funny -- during lower division Latin, reading Medieval Latin (Esp. St. Jerome) was the greatest pleasure in the world after wading through Cicero. (For some reason my Prof. didn't give me passages from the Vulgate until after going through several of Wheelock's Loci Immutati... go figure) But these enscriptions make me want to end myself in a manner akin to Hemingway: frustrated, gun to my face, late at night, utterly alone; in the rain. Cripes.
-FV
It's funny -- during lower division Latin, reading Medieval Latin (Esp. St. Jerome) was the greatest pleasure in the world after wading through Cicero. (For some reason my Prof. didn't give me passages from the Vulgate until after going through several of Wheelock's Loci Immutati... go figure) But these enscriptions make me want to end myself in a manner akin to Hemingway: frustrated, gun to my face, late at night, utterly alone; in the rain. Cripes.
-FV
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