Disclaimer: Nether I wish to discuss anything about the gore in the series nor I want to start a religious dispute
Recently I listened to the opening of the anime Elfen Lied, Lilium. I realised that the lyrics where Latin. They are taken from the Psalms (36[37]:30), James (1:12) and Ave mundi spes Maria. Eventually, I decided to translate it into Greek since there are very few songs in ancient Greek and fewer have been sung.
About the first two verses, I used the texts of the Ecumenical Patriarchate versions. As for the last, I tried to make a translation on my own with the help of Perseus Digital Library. Because of that -and my little knowledge of Latin- I would like you to make any suggestions whether I have to correct any phrases or not.
I don’t know the anime and I don’t alchemy, but that is a troped Kyrie. The Kyrie was introduced into the Roman Mass in late antiquity, as it was not part of the original Greek Mass of Rome. Then the tropes were added by monks during the middle ages and removed by the Council of Trent, since (although perfectly orthodox, small o) they were not biblical and that caused embarrassment before the protestants.
Hi Michael, and welcome to Textkit. A couple of points on o quam sancta etc.
(1) As I expect you’re aware, it’s in meter, which is essential to the hymn, but your Greek destroys that. If you want to translate Latin to Greek, it might make more sense to choose prose passages. A good choice would be the Emperor Augustus’ autobiographical “Res Gestae” (“Things Done”) and see how your translation compares with the official one that was circulated throughout the Greek-speaking parts of the Roman Empire, linked by bedwere. That would improve both your Latin and your ancient Greek. (Even more instructive, and even more fun, would be to try back-translating the Greek into Augustus’ original Latin!)
And (2), your πῶς should be ὡς, exclamatory. πῶς is interrogative, so it reads as if you’re contesting Mary’s holiness etc.: “How come the virgin is believed to be sancta …?” (And benigma should of course be benigna.)
He he, thanks!
Actually, I’m very familiar with the modern Greek pronunciation of ancient Greek which doesn’t make distinctions between long and short vowels and all diphthongs are digraph vowels. Also, when Latin is being teached in Greece, we never take into account the long vowels as well.
I’m off correcting this one!
(That’s how I found it in the wiki, so maybe it’s their fault )
Yes, it was me. Actually, there was a need for me. I do not want something so discouraging as something that destoys poems to get in my way of loving ancient languages. Because all my life I love creating things and not destroying them. These being said, I do not want to see failures that remind me of my imperfect past.
Probably, you’ll find silly these words coming out of the mind of highschool boy, but that’s the truth!
Have a good day mwh! The next time you’ll see any compositions of mine, I wish they’re worthy of your judgement.
Michael, Don’t be so hard on yourself. Let’s face it, any translation destroys the original, and good ones are creative. And very few translations of metered poetry replicate the meter, and those that do are mostly terrible. So it’s not as if you were doing something bad!
Besides, your translation was very creditable. I don’t know any sixteen-year-olds who could do anything half that good. So please don’t be deterred. We must all accept that most of what we do will be imperfect. Accept it and move forward. Per ardua ad astra.
Thank you mwh for your kind words! I do try not to be hard on me, however, (un)fortunately, I’m a perfectionist. By nature I dislike being imperfect. And many times I feel envious when I believe that I’m the only imperfect among perfects.
Anyway, I’ll keep your words in my mind. But it would be a huge help if you could provide me with any strategies in order to begin to read the poets. I really love the idea of reading Homer.
)