Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2022 August 25

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August 25

Praematura morte jam erepto

I found a Latin vita of Otto Heuer in his doctoral dissertation at Google books and typed it out at Talk:Otto Heuer#Latin vita. Google translate did a good job, but I am confused by the phrase "patre Friderico Guilelmo , praematura morte jam erepto". Similar text say "praematura morte mihi jam erepto", already taken from me by his premature death, is that a good translation here? TSventon (talk) 09:55, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

I think it means, "My jam got moldy in the fridge, and exploded way before its sell-by date". Well, it could be that, couldn't it? Mathglot (talk) 11:08, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

Mathglot, that is consistent with the well-known phrase, "Caesar adsum jam forte, Pompey aderat". TSventon (talk) 11:46, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

But not consistent with the schoolboy joke: Caesar adsum jam forte / Pompey aderat / Caesar sic in omnibus / Pompey sic inat. :-) Alansplodge (talk) 14:07, 25 August 2022 (UTC)]]

D'oh! I think we're both using the same gag. Apologies. Alansplodge (talk) 14:22, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

Yes, it's a good translation, except that there is no mihi ("from me"). Erepto - past participle of eripio ("take away") in the ablative to agree with patre Friderico Guilelmo. Praematura morte "by premature death" (ablative again). Jam "already". ColinFine (talk) 14:36, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

ColinFine thank you for the grammatical detail, I will change Google translate's "already saved by premature death" to "already taken away by his premature death". TSventon (talk) 14:48, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

It occurs to me: "Already" might not be the best translation of jam. It can mean "now". See wikt:iam#Usage notes ColinFine (talk) 15:25, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

There is something very unusual about the following piece of Latin doggerel. See if you can work out what it is:

In girum imus nocte et consumimur igni.

The first Latin limerick was written by St Thomas Aquinas. The advent of Protestantism widened the scope:

There was a young man who said, "Damn!

It is borne upon me that I am

But a being that moves

In predestinate grooves -

I'm not even a bus, I'm a tram.

"In girum imus nocte et consumimur igni". I recognise this from a book I read way back in the 1980s. It means something like this "we go into the circle of the night and are consumed by fire". The funny thing is that it's a palindrome. JIP | Talk 19:07, 26 August 2022 (UTC)

Nocte is absolutely an ablative absolute: "at night" or "by night".  --Lambiam 11:31, 27 August 2022 (UTC)

All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy

did "play" and "boy" rhyme in 1659? Do they still rhyme in any English dialect? (The proverb seems a bit off to my ears, you'd expect a rhyme, but then I'm not a native speaker) -- 2A01:C23:5D31:EA00:1088:F292:E5C6:9EF9 (talk) 18:07, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

I would think not - it's not a limerick. Consult the section above in a few minutes. 2A00:23C3:F780:EC01:FCD1:AB60:49DA:FDD7 (talk) 18:14, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

If it has any poetic intent at all, it reads a bit like blank verse, which is to say it has a bit of a rhythm to it, but it doesn't rhyme. --Jayron32 18:19, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

A teacher of mine 60 years ago stated that they did rhyme, in whatever linguistic group the saying originated. Not sure how he knew though. HiLo48 (talk) 18:31, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

The Oxford English Dictionary traces "boy" back to Middle High German buobe, and "play" back to Old English plega. 2A00:23C3:F780:EC01:FCD1:AB60:49DA:FDD7 (talk) 18:38, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

I don't know how to pronounce either of those. Do you? HiLo48 (talk) 18:43, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

Mm, etymology is rather beside the point here. But there is some comfort in the knowledge that I am not the first to think that the saying could have rhymed once, or should. --2A01:C23:5D31:EA00:1088:F292:E5C6:9EF9 (talk) 18:40, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

Work and Jack also end in the same sound. Anyway, judging from Wiktionary, it seems as if the proverb didn't rhyme in Middle English, either. 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 20:22, 25 August 2022 (UTC)

Note that Shakespeare rhymed "boy" with "toy", half a century earlier. [1] I couldn't find any 17th century poetry which rhymes "oy" with "ay" (you might expect "joy" with "day" for instance, but apparently not). Alansplodge (talk) 11:32, 26 August 2022 (UTC)

Wiktionary does not give buobe as an ancestor, merely High German Bube (which does descend from Middle High German buobe) as a (possible) cognate, both deriving from Proto-Germanic bō-, the German word by reduplication, which also produced English babe.  --Lambiam 11:26, 27 August 2022 (UTC)

Who says it has to rhyme? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 13:18, 26 August 2022 (UTC)

No one at all has suggested that it has to. The discussion is whether or not it did many centuries ago, as apparently has been claimed. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.208.90.29 (talk) 20:03, 26 August 2022 (UTC)

See also Assonance... AnonMoos (talk) 22:24, 26 August 2022 (UTC)