Monday, July 16, 2012

On Latin Translation

I took 2 years of Classical Latin in High School and 3 years of it in University with a mind to teach it. I graduated university with my degree only to see the subject removed from the private school curriculum and deemed a worthless subject and more emphasis put upon modern languages of Spanish and Italian. Seems they forgot that both those languages have their roots in Latin and that Latin has touched so many other branches in the language tree that to know it is to find greater understanding of many languages... and is also why I am able to gain a general understanding of more languages that I have been formally training it.

On that mildly ranting note, I came across Latin in the Order of Scathach Lesson 1 14th draft that was improperly translated.

Ego-Video Liber Deorum is translated as "Gods: a Spotters Guide"

It is actually bad syntax as in Latin the verb comes last with no pronouns and the conjugation of a verb pre-defines the pronoun and to state a pronoun is redundant.

Ego = "I"
Video = verb "to see" conjugated in present tense as "I see/observe/understand"
Liber = an adjective declined in the nominative case to denote that is the subject of the verb. The adjective means "free". As a noun also declined in the nominative case means "book".
Deorum = "god" declined in the genitive case denoting possession "of god"

If I translate the phrase directly, it ends up as this, I would have to make a broad assumption that Liber is actually a noun and the object not the subject of the verb.

Ego-video liber deorum = I (myself) see the book of God.

Proper Classical Latin for "Gods: a Spotters Guide" would be (if I assume that the guide is a book and not a person): Di (or) Dei: Liber Videndi (translated as = Gods: a Book of sighting or seeing).

Thus ends my Latin Lesson. This was fun to dive back into Latin for a brief moment.

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