help with Aeneid 3 translation:

Latin Learning Latin
1

at 111: hinc mater cultrix Cybeli…etc.

whats going on with cultrix? my dictionary has it as “female inhabitant”. The notes dont explain it and D. West seems to ignore it.

at 90: vis ea fatus eram: tremere omnia visa repente,

“scarcely i had said this (what’s fatus??): suddenly everthing having been seen (what form is visa and what’s it doing??) began to shake”

at 93: summissi petimus terram…

having sent ourselves down to the ground?? whats petimus doing??

at 99/100: mixtoque ingens exorta tumulu laetitia

a huge happiness and tumult was risen among them (mixto)?? what is mixto and how does it mean among them??

at 100: et cuncti quae sint ea moenia quaerunt

and all men asked what walls these were. that ok?? is it an indirect question?

ty guys

2

at 111: hinc mater cultrix Cybeli…etc.

whats going on with cultrix? my dictionary has it as “female inhabitant”. The notes dont explain it and D. West seems to ignore it.

My dictionary also has it as nurse. Colo, the verb from which this noun is derived, can mean “to cultivate, to live in, to honour, to worship”. So I suppose cultrix can be a noun attached to any of those meanings.

at 90: vis ea fatus eram: tremere omnia visa repente,

“scarcely i had said this (what’s fatus??): suddenly everthing having been seen (what form is visa and what’s it doing??) began to shake”

I assume for vis you mean vix.

fatus is a part of the deponent verb for (to say).

I dare say that tremere could be a historic infinitive. This is an infinitive used for dramatic effect, or used to denote “an unfolding scene, a state of feeling, or the beginning and unfolding of a state of action” (Woodcock, A New Latin Syntax)

Poets sometimes use perfect stem+ere (the first e is long) as a form of perfect stem + erunt, but the meter excludes that here.

No idea about visa. Definitely a perfect passive participle (meaning seen) though. Omnia visa would certainly mean all things seen.

at 93: summissi petimus terram…

having sent ourselves down to the ground?? whats petimus doing??

Summissi = grovelling (?)

peto can mean “to make for”

at 99/100: mixtoque ingens exorta tumulu laetitia

a huge happiness and tumult was risen among them (mixto)?? what is mixto and how does it mean among them??

ingens laetitia exorta (est) = a great joy arose

mixtoque tumulu mixto is part of misceo, miscere. The whole phrase is in the ablative of attendant circumstances (I think)

at 100: et cuncti quae sint ea moenia quaerunt

and all men asked what walls these were. that ok?? is it an indirect question?

Yeah. Quaero is in the present tense, but Virgil is probably using it for poetic effect.

3

thanks turpissimus, theres 1 more thing:

line 116: nec longo distant cursu,…

neither the journey is long or something like that - what’s “distant” from tho and what is it doing?

4

nec longo distant cursu

disto is a verb meaning to be distant, to be separated by. You can tell this by the -ant ending on the word which denotes, as you must surely know from your first or second lesson in Latin, a first declension verb in the third person plural. So distant = they are distant/separated by.

longo cursu.

This is clearly the ablative form of the phrase longus cursus. It means here probably long journey. But it is in the ablative.

Now, I was always confused with expressions of distance and which case they went along with. So -

(a)distance travelled, used with verbs of motion takes the ACCUSATIVE.

(b)distance between or from, is expressed with either the ACCUSATIVE or ABLATIVE.

(c) distance how high/deep/broad/tall, is expressed by the ACCUSATIVE with the appropriate adjective.

longo cursu clearly only goes along with meaning (b). It means in this context by a long journey.

So “nec longo distant cursu” is “and they are not separated by a long journey”.[/quote]

5

“cultrix Cybeli” simply means that she was a worhsipper of Cybele- there’s a line in Aeneid I where Vergil talks about people cultivating Juno, i.e., cultivating the worship of Juno.

“All things seemed to shake…” the “sunt” is ellipsed- as it often is- and the infinitive is just complementary to the passive form of “visa (sunt).”

6

need some more hlp chaps. here’s the latin of our next chunk:

121
Fama volat pulsum regnis cessisse paternis
Idomenea ducem, desertaque litora Cretae
hoste vacare domos, sedesque adstare relictas.
Linquimus Ortygiae portus, pelagoque volamus,
125
bacchatamque iugis Naxon viridemque Donysam,
Olearon, niveamque Paron, sparsasque per aequor
Cycladas, et crebris legimus freta consita terris.
Nauticus exoritur vario certamine clamor;
hortantur socii: “Cretam proavosque petamus!”
130
Prosequitur surgens a puppi ventus euntis
et tandem antiquis Curetum adlabimur oris.
Ergo avidus muros optatae molior urbis,
Pergameamque voco, et laetam cognomine gentem
hortor amare focos arcemque attollere tectis.
135
Iamque fere sicco subductae litore puppes;
conubiis arvisque novis operata iuventus;
iura domosque dabam: subito cum tabida membris
corrupto caeli tractu miserandaque venit
arboribusque satisque lues et letifer annus.
140
Linquebant dulcis animas, aut aegra trahebant
corpora; tum sterilis exurere Sirius agros;
arebant herbae, et victum seges aegra negabat.
Rursus ad oraclum Ortygiae Phoebumque remenso
hortatur pater ire mari, veniamque precari:
145
quam fessis finem rebus ferat; unde laborum
temptare auxilium iubeat; quo vertere cursus.

what’s going on in the first bit?? the rumour flew…???

128 is confusing too - what case is nauticus, nom? “The shouts of the sailors arose in various contests” ok??

line 130: The wind rising from the stern was pursuing (speeding) euntis?? what’s euntis doing?

133: are we to understand laetam as a verb?? “the people were happy with the name”??

137-139 confuses my brain: suddenly the expanse of the sky (tractu caeli) was corrupted (corrupto) when a pestilent thing came upon our limbs (cum tabida membris…venit) and requiring pity (miserandaque) and on the trees and the crops a plague and a deadly season?? that ok??

143/6: “my father encouraged me to go sailing back again our course to the oracle at Ortygia and to Apollo and to pray for his pardon, how he will bring and end to our tired things (sufferings), where he orders us to look for (temptare??) help with our labours, what course we were to turn to.” what do u think of that??