Salvete!
I recently started working through the second volume of LL. In Cap. XXXVI , on page 17 I stumbled upon this sentence: “Non solum … refecit, sed plurimas domos e lateribus factis destruxit …”. I read it to mean, that he destroyed most houses made of planks. Shouldn’t it be “domos e lateribus factas” or am I missing something here?
Thanks in advance!
Yes, it seems like a typo. It might be worth looking up the original Livy: http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/
It could be a variety of reasons. The author wasn’t factis to go with lateribus, not domos. Latin often times does this weird thing with words, which doesn’t correspond in English. Think of the phrase “ab urbe condita”, literally “from the city having been made”. In English, this means “from the (insert modifier here) city”. You technically ought to be able to switch out condita for another adjective like “magnus” and get the same meaning “from the large city”. But this is wrong, since it’s not from the city, it’s from the founding of the city. It has to do with it being a verbal adjective. Transferred epithet is the wrong term, though I cannot remember for the life of me what it’s called. Perhaps one of the grammar intensives here can pinpoint where in Bennet’s or A&G’s it is to be found. But no, it’s not a mistake, and I see this kind of thing all the time in real Latin.
I initially read right over this myself, assuming that the author simply meant “hand-made bricks.” The phrase “hand-made bricks” appears often in Akkadian and Sumerian as well, implying the opposite of “cut stone.” However, I have to agree with Lucus…here it does look like a typo…“homes made of bricks” making much more sense considering the flow of the entire passage.
I would agree with you, Chris, but though it may be somewhat common, it’s still seems rather early on in LL-II for Orberg to be throwing screwballs. 
Chris
I don’t really follow what your saying at all. “Ab urbe condita” means “from the city [having been] founded” — the “having been” part is understood in Latin. The Latin goes right to English with no particular strangeness at all.
I looked up the passage and found it was Ørberg’s original, not from Livy. He made a typo. End of story. There are numerous typos in the MMIII version of Pars II that I have. I never got around to emailing him the corrections. There are a couple is Pars I as well — mostly macron related.
Not quite. “From the city having been founded” implies that the x comes from the city, not from the foundation.
It’s no mistake. Or it could be, for cdm’s reason, but it doesn’t have to be. Let me look for some examples. I remember them more clearly in Vergil.
Carissimi,
I feel some confusion has been wrought here, and would like to volunteer some clearing up of this:
saevae memorem Iunonis ob iram
where, based on the individual meaning of the words, the joining of ‘memor’ and ‘Iuno’ might make more sense, although this is not the case, grammatically speaking
From the above, it can be gathered that the phrase from Orberg is definitely not a case of the second phenomenon, although maybe a case of hypallage - although I think most instances of hypallage occur with transferred adjectives, not participles (which is, grammatically speaking, a lot more disruptive, especially for prose). I agree with Lucus that Orberg plainly made a typo, as ‘factas’ would fit (as mentioned above) a lot better in the flow of the sentence.
Care Luce, if it’s not inconvenient, would you provide a list of typos you have found in the texts?
Read what little pig number three and the big bad wolf say about houses made of bricks here.
De domis e lateribus factis secundum porcellum tertium et magnum malum lupum, legite in hoc loco: www.magisterwebb.com/qas/porcelli.pdf
Not so: “the city founded” is a singular event, not an event which began some time ago and continues forward.
Think aorist, not imperfect.
I never listed the typos, and a rare few only have I actually marked. Scanning through my Pars II, I can’t find any marks. But know there are some. If you doubt it, bring it forward to Textkit.
Thanks for all the replies! Very interesting. (Oh and it is of course ‘bricks’, not ‘planks’. I completely missed that.)
You’re still missing the point. Ab urbe insert adjective here refers to local distance, not temporal distance. It’s from the city. Switch out condita for magna and you’ll see what I mean.
And thanks to Iulianus for the information. Another case, this time from memory, is from Catullus, with the gemina/lumina/nocte problem. If I recall, gemina has to go with nocte, yet it clearly ought to go with lumina.
And I disagree that the author meant “factas” here based on syntactic concerns. While you sometimes see a prepositional phrase separating a noun from its modifier, if I recall correctly, it’s far rarer than my alternative, and is usually done either for metrical reasons (I recall it abundantly in Vergil, not very much so in Cicero) or for emphatic purposes (which is what it is when I normally see it in Cicero).
Sorry for uncareful references. I worked all day yesterday, and all day today, with today having overstayed the session with the kid I’m tutoring in Latin since he really needed help. I think that’s excuse enough, nonne?
Ah, then you have missed the point you yourself are illustrating: ab urbe condita DOES indicate temporal distance. No wonder you find it so strange! My Cassell’s Latin-English Dictionary circa 1960 clearly states:
“a, ab, abs prep. with abl. (1) of motion or measurement in space, from, away from. (2) of time from, after…”
Good now?
P.S. The switch-out-for-any-adjective thing is non sensical, since condita is a past participle, while magnus is only and adjective.
Lucus and Chris, you are arguing past each other. My take on this is that Chris knows and argues that “ab urbe conditâ” indicates temporal distance and “ab urbe” (or “ab urbe magnâ”) indicates spatial distance. He just tackles your point, Lucus, about the English: “From the city having being founded”, which should strictly be “From the city’s having being founded” --not that you would often use that phrase in English, but it does extend from “from the city’s founding” and “from the city’s being founded”. (You wouldn’t say “from the city founding”, would you? Actually, were you to say it so, you would be insinuating that “city” was being used adjectivally, – which would be alright, if a bit strained.) Chris I understand to say, then, that the Latin phrase isn’t exactly an extension of the English sense, which should be “From the city’s having being founded”. Is that right, Chris? But Lucus may say that “From the city having being founded” is perfectly understandable in English (without insisting on genitive 's, whatever the sticklers may say) and, then, does convey the temporal sense, in the exact same way that the Latin phrase does. And that is fair enough (provided you don’t walk past a grammarian in a dark alleyway). What do you say? [Since this is more about English, I won’t attempt to wobble about with this in Latin. Relief.]
Thank you, adrianus, but “from the city” indicates a local (is that the right terminology? oblitus sum) sense and not a temporal sense. The city isn’t doing anything, it’s static. Lucus himself agreed with me (though unwittingly, I imagine) when he said that condita is different because it’s a participle. The same applies to factis. It doesn’t agree directly because it’s a participle, and I said as much: “It has to do with it being a verbal adjective.”
Chris, buddy, I know what you’re saying, I do understand you, but you’re not right about this. URS CONDITA is an event. AB means “from (in a temporal sense)”: AB + [event] = “from [event].” AB URBE CONDITA = “from the city [having been] founded.” The artificial constructs you are trying to add to the phrase are not applicable. If they were applicable, then the Romans would not have formed such a construction in the first place.
Let’s take another example. Instead of ANNO DOMINI we might say A CHRISTO NATO. Does this somehow imply physical displacement from the physical man Christ (who only just happened to be born — any adjective will do, right?)? Certainly not. It means “from Christ having been born.”
What about A CAESARE MORTO? CAESAR MORTUS is an event. A CAESARE MORTO means “from Caesar having died.” MM anno a Caesare morto = in the two thousandth year from Caesar having died, or rather, in the two thousandth year from Caesar’s death.