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Post by Deleted on Jul 11, 2011 3:37:39 GMT -5
This guy is awesome. xDD I mean, he's fairly open-minded, all things considered. Though I marvel at this Indian tribe of 8 year olds probably more than I do at the rest of the "monsters". *chuckles* Keep up the good work, Pac. I would help, but like you, I'm schooled only in Classical Latin, and I have since forgotten much of what I learned. D;
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Post by Nimras on Jul 14, 2011 23:42:47 GMT -5
What a cool project! I'm starting Latin after I finish with my degrees this summer (school addict? Me? :  and I'd love to be able to do something like this... One side note though, for those who are expressing surprise at how open minded the author was -- the Romans and Greeks were very cosmopolitan (as well as classically trained medieval philosophers), and were far less racist than say... pre 1950's America. Sexist, yes, but they were remarkably willing to consider a man, a man, a man, and only citizenship proving one man over another (and citizenship any man could buy). |
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Post by Pacmanite on Jul 18, 2011 10:14:44 GMT -5
Thanks Sarn! Yeah, the 8-year old tribe sounds really bizarre. I guess it'd be impossible to be a grandmother in that society if a person took 5 years to reach sexual maturity and then lived only a further 3 years before dying. Everything would be in such a rush... and you'd spend 62.5% of your life as a kid.  (Although, I guess in some high density slums around the world where there isn't good sanitation, that proportion would be pretty close to the reality of life expectancy... sadly.) Yay Nimras, it's great that you'll be starting Latin soon. I wouldn't call it a beautiful-sounding language like Italian, but there's something elegant about those intricate grammar rules, that firm literary rigidity. <3 The way Latin gets taught usually stresses the logic of how everything in the sentence is supposed to work, so that when you come to translation, it's like deciphering a puzzle. Oh yeah and there are soooo many Latin words for "to kill" and "die". xD And it's a good point you raised there, Nimmy. The Greeks, the Romans, classically-educated medieval scholars, 19th century antiquarians and modern scholars have all had biases, but these were not always the same prejudices from age to age (or from author to author). At any rate, there had been foreign-born emperors who even led the Roman empire and were still well spoken of in the centuries afterward, like Trajan. Anyway, I need to speed up my translating thing because I suddenly realised it's the last week of the winter holidays for me! They went lightning-fast, and I didn't even go away anywhere. (But I have been playing a lot of pokemon. Darn those extremely entertaining games. Oh yeah, and I played viola in a couple of concerts too, which is draining.) But anyhow, lets read some more Ratramnus! (He's valorous! He's fab'lous! Heeee's... Ratramnus!) ------------------------------------------------------ De Gigantibus vere qui inter haec portenta numerantur, homines fuisse de hominibus natos nemo fere qui dubitet, quandoquidem divinarum auctoritate litterarum, hoc astrui non ignoremus.
“Indeed, in regards to the Giants who are counted among these monsters, almost no one doubts that these people were born from humans, and since [these creatures] are supported with the authority of divine scripture, we should not omit them. Remember Goliath from the Bible? He was nine feet tall. And I’m pretty sure there were a handful of other Giants in scripture too, which would be what Ratramnus is alluding to.
Before I smoothed it over, the final phrase was literally “let us not neglect to add these.” I had been really confused by the word “astrui” (I thought it had to mean “star” or something) until I saw a little note in my dictionary and realised it was just a variant spelling of “adstrui” (=to be added), which made a lot more sense. Quibus Cenocephali dum connumerantur, hoc etiam et de istis sentiendum esse putatur, maxime si illa constiterint quae de sancto Christophoro leguntur, ut quae fama de eis vulgaris dispergit.
“While the Cynocephali are numbered together with these monsters, they are even thought to be sentient, certainly if the things which are read concerning Saint Christopher were established, seeing that this well-known rumour about them spread. Literally, “ hoc etiam et de istis sentiendum esse putatur = regarding them, it is even thought that they are for thinking,” but because gerunds come out awkward in English I rendered it “they are even thought to be sentient”. The sentence has too many parts to it that it’s confusing me, and it’s hard to tell which one is the main clause, so let me try to work out how it all fits: - Quibus Cenocephali dum connumerantur, [“While the Cynocephali are numbered together with these monsters,”] = a DUM/TEMPORAL clause (meaning “while...”)
- hoc etiam et de istis sentiendum esse putatur, [“they are even thought to be sentient,” ]= either the MAIN clause or a continuation of that TEMPORAL clause (probably the main, because there would be no main clause otherwise, but that “et” [=and] keeps making me think it’s more of the “while...” clause)
- maxime si illa constiterint quae de sancto Christophoro leguntur, [“certainly if the things which are read concerning Saint Christopher were established”] = the IF part of a CONDITIONAL clause (also called the protasis; the apodosis or main part would then have to be hoc...putatur above)
- ut quae fama de eis vulgaris dispergit.[“seeing that this well-known rumour about them spread.”] = CAUSAL clause because “ut...” is explaining why the Cynocephali are said to be sentient.
Ehhh it’s like picking apart the tentacles of a dead and slimy octopus, this sentence. But I think that helped. Nec tamen ista dicentes vel sentientes, consequitur ut quidquid de homine procreatur, hominem quoque esse humanaeque rationis ingenio praeditum.
“But although we may say or think as much, it does not follow that whatever is produced from a human being is also human and has been granted with the genius of human reason. I translated the participles “dicentes” and “sentientes” with a concessive sense of “although”. Verbi gratia, cum legitur vitulus ex muliere procreatus, aut serpens editus de femina. Proinde tamen neque vitulum, neque serpentum illum, humanam animam vel rationalem habuisse consenserim.
“For instance, it is read that a calf [or foal] was born from a lady, or that a serpent emerged from a woman. But consequently, I would agree that neither the calf nor the serpent had a human or rational mind. “vitulus” could either mean a calf or a foal (or a seal at that), but since I’ve never heard of this tale of a woman pregnant with a calf or foal I don’t know which specific beast it should be (or if there even is a regular pattern to the folktale). I have heard of the stories of a woman giving birth to a snake though. So I guess Ratramnus is saying, “well, apparently animals can come out of human wombs but the simple fact of their origin doesn’t guarantee them human sentience.”
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Post by Pacmanite on Jul 19, 2011 21:42:52 GMT -5
Monstruosus quoque partus ille tempore regis Alexandri de munere profusus, cujus superior pars hominem proterebat, inferior vero bestiarum formas diversarum viventiumque protulerit.
“Also, a monster was born in the time of King Alexander’s reign whose upper part crushed a man, and his lower half in fact brought forth the appearance of various living beasts. I’m very puzzled over what “proterebat” (=crush??) is really meant to mean in this sentence. My dictionary tells me it means trample on or crush, but I feel like the sentence should really say “his top part looked human, his bottom part looked beastly”. Maybe the word is means something different in Medieval Latin, but neither my normal dictionary nor my online dictionary can confirm that for me, and I haven’t been able to find a different version of the Latin text to check if it was even some kind of typo. So, with nothing better to be sure of, I’m sticking with these guns, for now.
I was tempted to translate “diversarum” (=different, various) as “disparate”, because there’s that sense from the word of how the jumble of creatures is a conflicting and unnatural sight. But “various” sounded less awkward. Nec tamen bestias illas, licet humano semine procreatas, rationalem habuisse animam, nisi rationis expers, unquam puto praebebit assensum.
“But although these beasts were born of human origin, I wouldn’t ever think that they had a rational mind, unless I’m lacking reason – this is evident through observation. Qua de re nec hos de quibus res agitur, propterea quia duxerant originem ex hominibus, eos continuo rationali pollere mente crediderim, si non vel ea quae scripsistis, vel quae leguntur et feruntur de iis talia, quomodo sentirem, moverent.
“On this subject, this notion is not of our concern: because they originated from humans, I would have believed that they necessarily had the power of rational thought, if weren’t for what you wrote and what is read and spoken of about such things. That changed how I thought. The first clause was very tricky. “res agitur” is a phrase that means, “the matter is at stake”; the “nec” makes it negative, i.e. “the matter is not at stake”, but what is the matter? “de quibus”, “about which things”, is not very descriptive, but it leads into the next clause, so the next statement is the thing which isn’t being argued. “res agitur” is also found in a famous line from Horace, which is commonly translated, “It is your concern when your neighbour’s wall is on fire.” And that helped me phrase “the matter is not at stake” in a more natural way like “it’s not of our concern”.
The last part after “if” was a bit too longwinded a sentence for my liking when I stuck to the Latin phrasing – “if either these things you wrote or such things which are written and spoken about didn’t change how I thought”. So I broke it up a bit. Nunc autem tanta tamque fortia videntur esse quae super his dicuntur, ut his vel fidem non adhibere, vel contradicere velle, pervicacia potius videatur esse quam prudentia.
“But now, those things which are said about these [creatures] seem to be so copious and so compelling that to either not give credence to them or wishing to oppose them would seem like stubbornness rather than discretion. “tanta” (=so much) I interpreted as making the evidence “copious”, and I translated “fortia” (adj.=strong, sturdy) with the sense of having strong evidence, i.e. “compelling”. Otherwise, this sentence is relatively straightforward, with a result clause.
------------------------------------------------ Do you get the sense that sometimes Ratramnus isn't exactly happy with all he hears about these monsters? He seems to only grudgingly accept the "facts" for the sake of the abundance of the accounts. But I don't know how rare it is for a philosophery kind of person to give up their theory of how they think the world ought to work in order to accept what has apparently been observed. |
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Post by Pacmanite on Jul 23, 2011 9:23:40 GMT -5
My rough draft has reached the end! And my more polished version is very nearly finished, only about five sentences to go. =D =D Which is good because my uni will be starting up again soon. -------------------------------------- Accedit ad haec, quod scripta vestra testantur, domesticorum omne genus animalium, quae nostris in regionibus habentur, apud illos haberi. Hoc vero fieri posse, si bestialem et non rationalem animam haberent, nequaquam video.
“In addition, your letter shows that all the kinds of domestic animals which are owned in our districts are kept among those [Cynocephali]. Truly, if they had a beastly and irrational mind, I see no way that they could do this. “Hoc fieri posse... nequaquam video” = (lit.) “I see this by no means able to happen” ==> “I see no way that they could do this.”
For some reason, I get chills when I try to imagine the Cynocephali owning dogs as pets. I don’t entirely know why... Siquidem homini animalia terrae fuisse divinitus subjecta, Geneseos lectione cognoscimus.
“If in fact the animals of the earth have been subordinated under people by divine will, we should know this from reading Genesis. Not much to say except I think “cognoscimus” is a Jussive subjunctive, “we must know/we ought to understand...” Ut vero bestiae alterius a se generis animantia, et maxime domestici generis, curent, et eis diligentiam adhibeant, suisque cogant imperiis subjacere et usibus parere, sicut nec auditum, ita nec creditum cognoscitur.
“Indeed, since [the Cynocephali] take care of other kinds of beasts living with themselves, especially of the domesticated kind, and since they treat them with carefulness, and herd them with commands, in order to master and prepare them for use, we wouldn’t know this was heard if it was not accordingly believed as such. “animantia” has to be a present participle of “animare” but that word only seems to mean “animate, encourage, fill with life”... but “a se animantia” only seems to make sense in the sentence if it means “living with themselves”.
“sicut nec auditum [esse], ita nec creditum [esse] cognoscitur” – literally, “just as it is not known to be heard, it is accordingly not known to be believed” (I later flipped the passive of “it is known” around to be an active “we know”). Ratramnus is careful since he has to rely on rumours about these people, so while he will not commit to saying that this picture is completely accurate, the stance he takes on Cynocephalic behaviour is that “if there’s smoke, there’s probably fire”. At vero Cenocephali, cum domesticorum animalium dicuntur habere multitudinem, eis minime convenit bestialis feritas, quorum animalia domestica lenitate mansuerunt.
“But surely, since the Cynocephali are said to keep a great number of domesticated animals, the wildness of beasts doesn’t seem fitting in the least for those who tamed their household animals with tenderness. “minime convenit” ==> lit. “it suits them not at all” ==> “doesn’t seem fitting in the least”... I could probably find a better phrasing for that, though. ---------------------------------------- In the next part, he spends about four sentences talking about a book written by Saint Clement which Rimbert was had some queries about, and then takes another sentence to sign himself off. ;D I am so close to finishing this. |
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Post by Pacmanite on Jul 24, 2011 9:43:13 GMT -5
FINISHED! ;D ---------------------------------- Haec sunt quae de Cenocephalis arbitror sentienda. Caeterum an et aliis sic sentire placuerit, an e diverso, non erit nostri judicii.
“This is what I think about the sentience of the Cynocephali. Besides, whether you find it agreeable to think about them this way, or if you differ in opinion, that is not for us to judge. This point marks the end of what Ratramnus says about the Dog-Headed people. With a sign of humility and perhaps caution, he notes that what he extrapolated about the Cynocephali is, after all, mostly his opinion, and Rimbert is welcome to disagree.
I took “aliis” to mean “some things”, which I then assumed would be the things he said about the Cynocephali. It’s hard to make grammatical sense out of “an e diverso”, but it seems like an idiom that means “or if you differ [in your opinion]”. De libro vero beati Clementis quod interrogastis, non inter doctos viros plenae auctoritatis habetur, quamvis non usquequaque repudietur.
“Certainly, in regards to what you had asked about the book of Saint Clement, learned men do not consider it completely authoritative, although it is not always rejected. There are several Saint Clements, and I’m not totally sure which one Ratramnus is talking about. But it seems the only ones that would be famous writers by his time would be Clement of Rome and Clement of Alexandria. I think that if he’s talking about Clement of Rome, the only genuine extant work by that man is known to be a letter, not a book. So he could be questioning the authorship of a book that has been attributed to the Roman St. Clement. With “non... habetur,” I turned the passive sense of “it is not considered to be of full authority among the learned men” into an active construct. Leguntur enim quaedam in illo nostro, id est ecclesiastico, dogmati non usquequaque respondentia.
“For certain things are read in that [book] of ours, which support a dogma that does not always correspond with the one held by our church. Very shaky sentence there. And the suddenly common use of “usquequaque” just makes me imagine he’s imitating a duck or something.
“Leguntur enim quaedam in illo nostro” = “For certain things are read in that of ours,”
“id est ecclesiastico” = “it is with our church/that which is of our church,” (this is the shaky bit, because “id” usually doesn’t have the latter demonstrative sense in Classical Latin)
“dogmati non usquequaque respondentia” = “things corresponding not always to the dogma.”
Hmm. I think I got it in my translation. Verum quae de gestis Pauli apostoli scribuntur in illo, recipiuntur, at pote nihil quod doctrinae Christianae vel contradicat vel repugnet, continente.
“But actually, the things written in there about the accomplishments of Paul the Apostle are accepted, and it contains nothing that would possibly oppose or contradict the doctrine of Christ. So I suppose this book is not part of the canon or fully embraced by the church, but it’s worth keeping for what it says. Don’t get too tied up about it, Rimbert.
I had trouble reasoning out why “continente” (lit. “with it containing...”) is in that form. It’s a participle in the ablative case... so I guess that would probably make this into an ablative of attendant circumstance or something. Still seems a bit weird. Why wouldn’t you just say “and the book contains” instead of “with the book containing”. Valere beatitudinem vestram semper in Christo gaudemus, et ut memor sis nostri deprecamur.
“Let us be glad to bid you farewell and happiness in Christ always, and we pray that you may keep us in mind.” Ratramnus ends his letter with a formal goodbye. I translated “memor... nostri” (lit. “mindful of us”) as “keep us in mind”, but “remember us” would fit as well. ---------------------------------- Yay! That's the end! This was a really fun piece of Latin to translate. I'm not sure if I could have sustained my enthusiasm for it if it wasn't such an interesting and amusing topic. And the Dog-Headed letter has become a good talking point for dinner parties and such. So awesome. <3 What intrigues me about Ratramnus is how he writes so rationally about a subject that seems so irrational by nature - legendary people who have dog heads and bark. But the way he reasons it out is very insightful, and I've ended up quite liking this guy Ratramnus. He treats these "monsters" with uncommon dignity. And I really like the way he thinks. His writing style admittedly isn't something too flashy. I've lost count of how many times he's said "vero" or "verum", (both of which mean "indeed", "actually", "truly", "in fact", "surely" etc.), and it irritates me that I have to find tons of synonyms for his overused words to make my prose sound good when he only bothered to randomly alternate two forms of essentially the same word. But then again, I did hear that this tendency to fall back on, "well, in fact" in this letter is symptomatic of how unsure he is about the veracity of his sources. I think he does sound a bit insecure. But in all fairness it does seem like he just wrote this letter rather quickly as he was thinking about it. Earlier on he defined the key question as "Are the Cynocephali descended from Adam or from beasts?", but then as he thought about all the mindless monsters and even animals who were also descended from people, he refined the question to that of: "Are the Cynocephali rational and sensible people?" which, for him, would carry a lot more significance because in his mind the only difference between humans and beasts is in terms of sentience. This was a very strange and very satisfying piece of Latin to work with. It makes me want to find an actual published English translation of it so I can compare how well I fared and maybe give the whole thing another edit. I know there's a translation in "Carolingian civilization: a reader", but that book's selling for $36 on Amazon and I don't really want to buy the book for just the one chapter on Ratramnus. Maybe I'll be able to find it in my libraries or something. Until then, I hope you enjoyed reading along with Ratramnus and his modest, law-abiding, intelligent Dog-Headed people.  |
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Post by M is for Morphine on Jul 24, 2011 10:22:00 GMT -5
Awesome, congratulations on finishing the translation! I definitely enjoyed reading it.  |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 24, 2011 10:49:54 GMT -5
Congratulations! I didn't really read much, but it's amazing that you did this. |
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Post by icon on Jul 24, 2011 11:49:33 GMT -5
Congratulations on completing this. =D I've been lurking for the most part, but it's certainly been enjoyable watching you translate this.
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Post by Nimras on Jul 25, 2011 23:58:43 GMT -5
Congrats on finishing! That's an impressive summer accomplishment! As for the book, "Carolingian civilization : a reader," you mean the one by Paul Edward Dutton, right? My university has it in its library, so even if your school doesn't, you can request it though either Summit or InterLibrary Loan -- it's a member of both programs. |
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Post by Pacmanite on Jul 26, 2011 9:11:06 GMT -5
Yay, thanks for all the congratulations! And thanks for sticking around, everyone. Even if you were just lurking, I had a feeling that at least someone would be reading this, and I don't think I would have quite had the stamina to keep on translating the whole thing if it weren't for you guys. I don't think I explained it right, but I can definitely feel the difference between showing my creation stage by stage to friends like you, versus working in the dark by myself all alone. You motivate me, NTWF! And Nimmy, thanks for the heads up, but I found the book in my university library today! So I was able to read through a professional translation of the letter. I had my nose buried in the book even as I was just pulling it off the shelf, I was so excited. The words sounded very familiar, so that was a good sign. I can sort of estimate that I got about 85-90% of it right, but there were a few sentences I stuffed up. Maybe when I get the time I'll break out a red pen and give my translation a proper correction. <3 This was a really good experience for me personally, because for a while with my uni Latin work I've been able to "cheat" easily and flip over to an English translation any time I had trouble translating a sentence. Now I know my translation of Ratramnus isn't perfect but it's still really satisfying to know that I got the most of it correct without consulting another person's translation, and just plowing through it. I'm so pumped for this new semester's Latin class now. ;D |
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and I'd love to be able to do something like this...
(Although, I guess in some high density slums around the world where there isn't good sanitation, that proportion would be pretty close to the reality of life expectancy... sadly.)
