translation hell

[deird1]

Was enjoying my Latin, and feeling very accomplished about how far I'd gotten.

Now, I'm up to basic Latin poetry, and am feeling rather like setting myself on fire.


Seriously, this stuff is horrifying.

Like this one, from Martial:

aethera contingit nova nostri principis aula;
clarius in toto sol videt orbe nihil.
haec, Auguste, tamen, quae vertice sidera pulsat,
par domus est caelo sed minor est domino.

You see, the Latin poets, being interested in fun languagey things; and being aware that their mother tongue could be put in a blender, reassembled at random, and still technically make sense; proceeded to do just that.

No, Latin word order is not like our word order. But yes, it usually actually has something that could, technically, be called "order". This, though?

Let's put the poem in English, and see what happens.

Heaven touches new our prince's palace;
more splendid in whole sun sees earth nothing.
This, Augustus, though, which the peak of the stars hits,
equal house is to sky but lesser is than master.

The main culprits being these ones:

Heaven touches new our prince's palace;
more splendid in whole sun sees earth nothing.
This, Augustus, though, which the peak of the stars hits,
equal house is to sky but lesser is than master.

Make those word-pairs actually sit together, rather than at opposite ends of the sentence, and it'd be fine. But no, that wouldn't be fancy and poetical, would it? Much better to drive Mez to despair by being untranslateable...


BRB. Ripping Latin books to shreds while sobbing.

Comments

[velvetwhip]

*pets you*

*refrains from throwing any Latin at you*


Gabrielle

[vass]

But isn't the metre beautiful?

*ducks thrown book*

Edited to add that I'd parse it like this:

Heaven touches our prince's new palace,
More splendid than the sun has seen on all earth
Though this house, Augustus, which the peak of the stars [i.e. the sun] hits
Is equal to heaven, it is still lesser than its master [i.e. Augustus].

I don't know Latin grammar, but that's what I'm getting from your word for word.

[deird1]

Almost. :) It's the palace touching heaven and hitting the stars, rather than the other way around...

[vass]

Oh Latin. :D:

Here, watch a nice bit of Monty Python to take the taste of cases out of your mouth.

[thirdblindmouse]

But isn't the metre beautiful?

But they cheated. If I words any in order could put, any attain could I metre!

[nimthiriel]

This comment is an example of why I love you so much :-)

[stormwreath]

It's decades since I studied Latin formally, but I remember the pain. I think it helps if you approach Roman poetry rather in the mindset of someone solving a cryptic crossword...