In English: Some people have got tongues, other people have got teeth.
I thought this would be a good saying to follow-up on the previous days' posts about forms of alius. Today's proverb uses the dative in a way that is typically Latin, so that no verb is required. Literally, it would mean "to some [there is] a tongue; to others [there are] teeth." You can also find variants on this saying: Aliis lingua, aliis vero molares, "For some, a tongue; for others, indeed, molars," etc.
Given that it is expressed so elliptically, this is one of those proverbs which does not give you a lot of clues about its possible applications. One of the applications discussed by Erasmus in his citation of this proverb in the Adagia is at banquets: at banquets, some people come to talk and talk (lingua), while others come to eat and eat (dentes).
After having spent much of yesterday at a wedding reception, I can affirm that this is definitely the case. You can classify people as being with the party of the bride or the groom, of course - but you could also make a handy classification between the tongues and the teeth, the talkers and the eaters. There are other Latin sayings that express this same basic idea: Alteri loquaces, alteri voraces, "Some are talkers, others are eaters," or Illi enim loquaces, hi voraces, "Those, in fact, are talkers; these are eaters."
Of course, the dining arena is not the only way that this proverb can be applied. The powers of metaphor are multifarious, and it is just a matter of your own creativity in how you decide to make use of any proverb's poetic potential. For example, you could imagine this proverb to be a description of the types of people you encounter in your professional life and in your business dealings: they are some people who use their tongues (talk) in order to accomplish their goals, while other people are more ruthless: watch out for those teeth!
The proverb does not say which is more dangerous, of course. There is no guarantee that someone cannot do just as much harm with threatening words (tongue) as they might do with threatening deeds (teeth). Compare the Biblical saying from the Book of Psalms: dentes eorum lancea et sagittae et lingua eorum gladius acutus, "their teeth are a spear and arrows, and their tongue is a sharp sword."
Of course, not all words are weapons! So, here is today's proverb read out loud - with no sharp edges, I promise:
817. Aliis lingua, aliis dentes.
The number here is the number for this proverb in Latin Via Proverbs: 4000 Proverbs, Mottoes and Sayings for Students of Latin.
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April 14, 2007
April 13, 2007
Alius est amor, alius cupido
In English: Love is one thing, desire another.
I thought this would be a good follow-up to the previous proverb - Aliud cupido, mens aliud suadet, "Desire urges one thing, reason another" - for various reasons, both thematical and grammatical.
In terms of theme, the previous proverb set up an opposition between cupido, "Cupid, desire," and mens, "the mind, reason." Today's proverb sets up a different kind of opposition, that between desire and amor, "love." Both terms, love and desire, amor and cupido, are widely used in Latin, and are part of very productive semantic systems. With amor goes the verb amare, "to love," the noun amator, "lover," and so on. With cupido goes the verb cupere, "to long for, desire," the adjective cupidus, "desirous, passionate," etc.
Given that the English words "love" and "desire" do a very good job of expressing this different, the meaning of this Latin saying comes through quite clearly for us. Yet it is worth pointing out that the English word "desire" comes to us by way of a different Latin verb, desiderare. The word "desire" and its related forms is far more important in English than any of the words derived from Latin cupido, such as English cupidity, concupiscence, etc.
In terms of grammar, it is definitely worth noting how the word alius, masculine, is being used in today's proverb, as opposed to the use of aliud, neuter, in yesterday's saying. In today's saying, alius is in the predicate, agreeing with the nouns amor and cupido. Because these are both masculine nouns, the masculine form alius is used in the predicate. In yesterday's proverb - Aliud cupido, mens aliud suadet, "Desire urges one thing, reason another" - the word aliud, meaning "another thing," is the neuter object of the verb, suadet.
So, as a result, in one proverb you get alius cupido and in the other proverb you find aliud cupido. This is because word order and proximity do not mean anything in terms of Latin grammar. In alius cupido you are dealing with a noun and a predicate pronoun that stand next to each other in the sentence. In aliud cupido, you are dealing with a noun and a direct object that stand next to each other in the sentence. The fact that the words stand next to each other does not mean anything in terms of grammar. Instead, you have to use the word endings and the syntax to reveal what the actual grammatical structure is in each instance.
So, hoping you experience some sweet love today instead of just the sting of Cupid's arrows, here is today's proverb read out loud:
810. Alius est amor, alius cupido.
The number here is the number for this proverb in Latin Via Proverbs: 4000 Proverbs, Mottoes and Sayings for Students of Latin.
If you are reading this via RSS: The Flash audio content is not syndicated via RSS; please visit the Latin Audio Proverbs blog to listen to the audio.
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I thought this would be a good follow-up to the previous proverb - Aliud cupido, mens aliud suadet, "Desire urges one thing, reason another" - for various reasons, both thematical and grammatical.
In terms of theme, the previous proverb set up an opposition between cupido, "Cupid, desire," and mens, "the mind, reason." Today's proverb sets up a different kind of opposition, that between desire and amor, "love." Both terms, love and desire, amor and cupido, are widely used in Latin, and are part of very productive semantic systems. With amor goes the verb amare, "to love," the noun amator, "lover," and so on. With cupido goes the verb cupere, "to long for, desire," the adjective cupidus, "desirous, passionate," etc.
Given that the English words "love" and "desire" do a very good job of expressing this different, the meaning of this Latin saying comes through quite clearly for us. Yet it is worth pointing out that the English word "desire" comes to us by way of a different Latin verb, desiderare. The word "desire" and its related forms is far more important in English than any of the words derived from Latin cupido, such as English cupidity, concupiscence, etc.
In terms of grammar, it is definitely worth noting how the word alius, masculine, is being used in today's proverb, as opposed to the use of aliud, neuter, in yesterday's saying. In today's saying, alius is in the predicate, agreeing with the nouns amor and cupido. Because these are both masculine nouns, the masculine form alius is used in the predicate. In yesterday's proverb - Aliud cupido, mens aliud suadet, "Desire urges one thing, reason another" - the word aliud, meaning "another thing," is the neuter object of the verb, suadet.
So, as a result, in one proverb you get alius cupido and in the other proverb you find aliud cupido. This is because word order and proximity do not mean anything in terms of Latin grammar. In alius cupido you are dealing with a noun and a predicate pronoun that stand next to each other in the sentence. In aliud cupido, you are dealing with a noun and a direct object that stand next to each other in the sentence. The fact that the words stand next to each other does not mean anything in terms of grammar. Instead, you have to use the word endings and the syntax to reveal what the actual grammatical structure is in each instance.
So, hoping you experience some sweet love today instead of just the sting of Cupid's arrows, here is today's proverb read out loud:
810. Alius est amor, alius cupido.
The number here is the number for this proverb in Latin Via Proverbs: 4000 Proverbs, Mottoes and Sayings for Students of Latin.
If you are reading this via RSS: The Flash audio content is not syndicated via RSS; please visit the Latin Audio Proverbs blog to listen to the audio.
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April 11, 2007
Aliud cupido, mens aliud suadet
In English: Desire urges one thing, reason another.
Like yesterday's proverb, today's saying uses the coordinating pronouns aliud...aliud, "one thing... another thing..." as the objects of the verb suadet, with the nouns cupido and mens as the subject of the verb.
The passage comes from Ovid's Metamorphoses, the story of Medea and Jason. Medea exclaims:
Yet for the ancient Romans, Mens was a goddess, known also as Bona Mens, "Good Mind." She had a festival on June 8 (a. d. VI Idus Iun.), and she had a temple on the Capitoline Hill in Rome, dating back to the third century B.C.E. (You can read an account in Livy of the temple for "Good Mind," founded after the battle of Trasimenus during the Second Punic War.)
It is fun to speculate just what a fully personified "Good Mind" might look like, juxtaposed with the familiar image of Cupid, the young boy toting his arrows. If you are a Latin teacher, that might be a fun classroom activity: you could review the literature and iconography of Cupid, and then imagine just what the iconography of "Good Mind" could convey! Perhaps "Good Mind" would be like the depiction of medieval angels based on Aquinas's assertion that the angels had an intelligence without body, prompting artists to depict them as heads with wings, but no body from the neck down!
So, as you listen to today's proverb, try to imagine just what that "Good Mind" looks like, urging Medea to come to her senses! Here is the proverb read out loud:
1511. Aliud cupido, mens aliud suadet.
The number here is the number for this proverb in Latin Via Proverbs: 4000 Proverbs, Mottoes and Sayings for Students of Latin.
If you are reading this via RSS: The Flash audio content is not syndicated via RSS; please visit the Latin Audio Proverbs blog to listen to the audio.
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Like yesterday's proverb, today's saying uses the coordinating pronouns aliud...aliud, "one thing... another thing..." as the objects of the verb suadet, with the nouns cupido and mens as the subject of the verb.
The passage comes from Ovid's Metamorphoses, the story of Medea and Jason. Medea exclaims:
sed trahit invitam nova vis, aliudque cupido,The Latin actually says cupido, "Cupid," which I have translated here as "Desire," although I could justifiably have said "Cupid" in English. This is a fascinating problem in translating the Latin, in fact. We are used to the idea of "Cupid" in English, toting around his arrows, making people fall in love (whether they like it or not!), but the same is not as true of the other noun in the sentence, Mens, "mind, reason, understanding." We do not have a ready-made divine personification of "Mens" that is a counterpart to "Cupid."
mens aliud suadet: video meliora proboque,
deteriora sequor...
Some strange force pulls me, unwilling; Desire urges one thing, Reason another. I see what is better, and I approve it, but I pursue what is worse.
Yet for the ancient Romans, Mens was a goddess, known also as Bona Mens, "Good Mind." She had a festival on June 8 (a. d. VI Idus Iun.), and she had a temple on the Capitoline Hill in Rome, dating back to the third century B.C.E. (You can read an account in Livy of the temple for "Good Mind," founded after the battle of Trasimenus during the Second Punic War.)
It is fun to speculate just what a fully personified "Good Mind" might look like, juxtaposed with the familiar image of Cupid, the young boy toting his arrows. If you are a Latin teacher, that might be a fun classroom activity: you could review the literature and iconography of Cupid, and then imagine just what the iconography of "Good Mind" could convey! Perhaps "Good Mind" would be like the depiction of medieval angels based on Aquinas's assertion that the angels had an intelligence without body, prompting artists to depict them as heads with wings, but no body from the neck down!
So, as you listen to today's proverb, try to imagine just what that "Good Mind" looks like, urging Medea to come to her senses! Here is the proverb read out loud:
1511. Aliud cupido, mens aliud suadet.
The number here is the number for this proverb in Latin Via Proverbs: 4000 Proverbs, Mottoes and Sayings for Students of Latin.
If you are reading this via RSS: The Flash audio content is not syndicated via RSS; please visit the Latin Audio Proverbs blog to listen to the audio.
Keep up with the latest posts... Subscribe by Email. I also post a daily round-up of all the Bestiaria Latina blogs: fables, proverbs, crosswords, and audio.
April 10, 2007
Aliud ex alio malum
In English: One bad thing from another.
After yesterday's proverb from Terence's Andria, I thought I would use a saying found in Terence's Eunuchus for today.
The saying means something like the English exclamation, "one bad thing after another!", in the sense that when things start going wrong, all kinds of things start to go wrong. The Latin phrase as cited here does not have a verb, but you can also find variants of the Latin saying that do include a verb: Aliud ex alio malum gignitur, "one bad thing is spawned from another," or Aliud oritur ex alio malum, "one bad thing arises from another," Aliud ex alio malum nascitur, "one bad thing is born from another," etc.
One of the big hurdles that Latin students face as they get started is coming to grips with the Latin demonstrative pronouns and adjectives, like the word aliud here in today's saying. This is the neuter form, agreeing with malum. A word like aliud is distinctively odd in Latin, ending as it does with the letter "d." Yet if you can just remember the familiar neuter pronoun id (made so famous by Freud!), then you will have a good clue for remembering that aliud is a neuter form. You can also remember illud and istud this way. And don't forget quod and quid.
It's always easier to remember things by analogy, so just keep them all these neuter pronouns in mind together: id, quid, quod, illud, istud, aliud. And if you still feel a fundamental hostility to Latin pronouns, just remember today's saying: one bad thing follows another... there are indeed lots of Latin pronouns to learn, one after another!
Meanwhile, here is today's proverb read out loud:
813. Aliud ex alio malum.
The number here is the number for this proverb in Latin Via Proverbs: 4000 Proverbs, Mottoes and Sayings for Students of Latin.
If you are reading this via RSS: The Flash audio content is not syndicated via RSS; please visit the Latin Audio Proverbs blog to listen to the audio.
Keep up with the latest posts... Subscribe by Email. I also post a daily round-up of all the Bestiaria Latina blogs: fables, proverbs, crosswords, and audio.
After yesterday's proverb from Terence's Andria, I thought I would use a saying found in Terence's Eunuchus for today.
The saying means something like the English exclamation, "one bad thing after another!", in the sense that when things start going wrong, all kinds of things start to go wrong. The Latin phrase as cited here does not have a verb, but you can also find variants of the Latin saying that do include a verb: Aliud ex alio malum gignitur, "one bad thing is spawned from another," or Aliud oritur ex alio malum, "one bad thing arises from another," Aliud ex alio malum nascitur, "one bad thing is born from another," etc.
One of the big hurdles that Latin students face as they get started is coming to grips with the Latin demonstrative pronouns and adjectives, like the word aliud here in today's saying. This is the neuter form, agreeing with malum. A word like aliud is distinctively odd in Latin, ending as it does with the letter "d." Yet if you can just remember the familiar neuter pronoun id (made so famous by Freud!), then you will have a good clue for remembering that aliud is a neuter form. You can also remember illud and istud this way. And don't forget quod and quid.
It's always easier to remember things by analogy, so just keep them all these neuter pronouns in mind together: id, quid, quod, illud, istud, aliud. And if you still feel a fundamental hostility to Latin pronouns, just remember today's saying: one bad thing follows another... there are indeed lots of Latin pronouns to learn, one after another!
Meanwhile, here is today's proverb read out loud:
813. Aliud ex alio malum.
The number here is the number for this proverb in Latin Via Proverbs: 4000 Proverbs, Mottoes and Sayings for Students of Latin.
If you are reading this via RSS: The Flash audio content is not syndicated via RSS; please visit the Latin Audio Proverbs blog to listen to the audio.
Keep up with the latest posts... Subscribe by Email. I also post a daily round-up of all the Bestiaria Latina blogs: fables, proverbs, crosswords, and audio.
April 09, 2007
Proximus sum egomet mihi
In English: I myself am closest to myself.
After yesterday's post from Terence's Andria, I thought I would include another saying from the same play.
As you will recall from yesterday's plot summary, the young man, Charinus, is in love with a woman who is engaged to be married to his best friend (his best friend, however, is in love with the disreputable "girl from Andros" of the play's title). As Charinus realizes that he has been betrayed, he confronts the fact that everyone is fundamentally selfish and he was perhaps foolish to have expected his friend to have changed his wedding plans in order to accommodate Charinus's affections.
Here, then, are the words that Charinus imagines he can hear on the lips of the friend who has betrayed him (even though, in fact, no real betrayal has taken place): quis tu es? quis mihi es? quor meam tibi? heus proxumus sum egomet mihi,, "Who are YOU? Who are you to me? Why [should I yield] mine to you? By god, I myself am closest to myself."
Originally, Charinus expected his friend to act, not in his own interest, but in an altruistic manner, deferring to the fact that Charinus is madly in love with his own fiancee. With these words, Charinus now realizes that true altruism is hard to find in this world! Instead, there is rampant egotism, proxumus sum egomet mihi.
The language of Roman comedy is often a bit difficult for beginning Latin students, who are used to having things always spelled the same way. Here in Terence, instead of the expected proximus, you have proxumus. This is simply because spelling is not an exact science, especialy when it comes to unstressed short vowels! Eventually, -imus because the standard spelling for the superlative in Latin, although you can find forms such as proxumus, maxumus, etc. in archaic Latin.
The emperor Claudius, who had quite an interest in the Latin language, realized that there were not enough letters to keep up with the sounds of the Latin language as he knew it. As a result, he proposed that three new letters be added to the Latin language! It seems likely one of those letters was intended precisely for the vowel that was in-between "i" and "u" in pronunciation, accounting for the sound that fluctuated between "i" and "u" in Latin orthography.
English, of course, suffers from the same problems and the most famous promoter of a reform in English orthography was Ben Franklin! The “Franklin Fonetic” alphabet would consist of 26 letters, like our existing alphabet, but he proposed removing 6 of the letters and replacing them with new letters of his own devising. You can read a discussion of Franklin's alphabet online here, and Franklin's own writing on the subject is also available online.
So here is today's proverb read out loud, with the standard classical spelling proximus:
770. Proximus sum egomet mihi.
The number here is the number for this proverb in Latin Via Proverbs: 4000 Proverbs, Mottoes and Sayings for Students of Latin.
If you are reading this via RSS: The Flash audio content is not syndicated via RSS; please visit the Latin Audio Proverbs blog to listen to the audio.
Keep up with the latest posts... Subscribe by Email. I also post a daily round-up of all the Bestiaria Latina blogs: fables, proverbs, crosswords, and audio.
After yesterday's post from Terence's Andria, I thought I would include another saying from the same play.
As you will recall from yesterday's plot summary, the young man, Charinus, is in love with a woman who is engaged to be married to his best friend (his best friend, however, is in love with the disreputable "girl from Andros" of the play's title). As Charinus realizes that he has been betrayed, he confronts the fact that everyone is fundamentally selfish and he was perhaps foolish to have expected his friend to have changed his wedding plans in order to accommodate Charinus's affections.
Here, then, are the words that Charinus imagines he can hear on the lips of the friend who has betrayed him (even though, in fact, no real betrayal has taken place): quis tu es? quis mihi es? quor meam tibi? heus proxumus sum egomet mihi,, "Who are YOU? Who are you to me? Why [should I yield] mine to you? By god, I myself am closest to myself."
Originally, Charinus expected his friend to act, not in his own interest, but in an altruistic manner, deferring to the fact that Charinus is madly in love with his own fiancee. With these words, Charinus now realizes that true altruism is hard to find in this world! Instead, there is rampant egotism, proxumus sum egomet mihi.
The language of Roman comedy is often a bit difficult for beginning Latin students, who are used to having things always spelled the same way. Here in Terence, instead of the expected proximus, you have proxumus. This is simply because spelling is not an exact science, especialy when it comes to unstressed short vowels! Eventually, -imus because the standard spelling for the superlative in Latin, although you can find forms such as proxumus, maxumus, etc. in archaic Latin.
The emperor Claudius, who had quite an interest in the Latin language, realized that there were not enough letters to keep up with the sounds of the Latin language as he knew it. As a result, he proposed that three new letters be added to the Latin language! It seems likely one of those letters was intended precisely for the vowel that was in-between "i" and "u" in pronunciation, accounting for the sound that fluctuated between "i" and "u" in Latin orthography.
English, of course, suffers from the same problems and the most famous promoter of a reform in English orthography was Ben Franklin! The “Franklin Fonetic” alphabet would consist of 26 letters, like our existing alphabet, but he proposed removing 6 of the letters and replacing them with new letters of his own devising. You can read a discussion of Franklin's alphabet online here, and Franklin's own writing on the subject is also available online.
So here is today's proverb read out loud, with the standard classical spelling proximus:
770. Proximus sum egomet mihi.
The number here is the number for this proverb in Latin Via Proverbs: 4000 Proverbs, Mottoes and Sayings for Students of Latin.
If you are reading this via RSS: The Flash audio content is not syndicated via RSS; please visit the Latin Audio Proverbs blog to listen to the audio.
Keep up with the latest posts... Subscribe by Email. I also post a daily round-up of all the Bestiaria Latina blogs: fables, proverbs, crosswords, and audio.
April 08, 2007
Facile omnes cum valemus recta consilia aegrotis damus
In English: We all find it easy to give the right advice to the sick when we are well.
I thought this would be a good follow-up to yesterday's proverb about how a person's attitude in the world is very much a matter of context. In yesterday's proverb, we saw that when the mouse was full he did not have a very high estimation of common fare. Today's proverb uses the metaphor of sickness and health: we all find it easy to give the right advice to sick people when we are well, we find it easy to give the right advice to poor people when we are rich, easy to give the right advice to students who are failing a class when we are getting an "A" and so on. What you think about the world is based on just who you are and how you are living your own life.
The English saying comes from Terence's comedy, Andria, "the girl from Andros." The story is about a young man, Pamphilus, in love with a disreputable "girl from Andros," although his father has arranged for him to be married to a very respectable girl next door. Just to complicate things, as in any good comedy, the young man's best friend, Charinus, is in love with his betrothed, the girl next door. Of course, everything works out well in the end. It turns out the girl from Andros is really the long lost daughter of the family next daughter, and hence sister to the girl next door. Our hero marries his beloved, his best friend marries the girl next door, and everyone lives happily ever after. Curious? You can read an English translation at Google Books. (Normally, I'd link to the English version at the Perseus website, but the Perseus website has been dead for several days now; I wonder if they will manage to bring it back to life after the latest server crash.)
Today's saying comes up early in the play, when a slave has come to tell Charinus the good news: the Pamphilus is getting married to the girl next door. Charinus, of course, is devastated. The slave advises him to just to put the woman out of his mind: quanto satiust te id dare operam qui istum amorem ex animo amoveas tuo,quam id loqui quo mage lubido frustra incendatur tua!, "how much better it would be for you to direct your efforts to removing that love from your mind, rather than to talk about it, when it only inflames your passion even more, to no avail." Although this is definitely good advice, Charinus explains that it does not do him any good: facile omnes quom valemu' recta consilia aegrotis damus, "We all find it easy to give the right advice to the sick when we are well."
Charinus then goes on to add: tu si hic sis aliter sentias, "you, if you were in my place, would feel differently."
That, indeed, is the unspoken implication of today's saying. We are very good at giving advice to the sick when we are well, but if we ourselves succumb to sickness, all that good advice just goes out the window! It's all a matter of context. If this slave were love-sick, as his master is, he would not find it so easy to keep his mind from turning constantly to thoughts of his beloved.
I will confess to being a great fan of Roman comedies. Even if you are just a beginning Latin student, you can read the wonderful adapted comedy, Auricula Meretricula, "The Little Prostitute Named Earlobe," which reprises the stock characters and basic plot of the comedies. It's easy enough to read in the first semester of Latin, and is great preparation for reading Plautus and Terence later on!
Meanwhile, in honor of Roman comedy, here is today's proverb read out loud:
1560. Facile omnes cum valemus recta consilia aegrotis damus.
The number here is the number for this proverb in Latin Via Proverbs: 4000 Proverbs, Mottoes and Sayings for Students of Latin.
If you are reading this via RSS: The Flash audio content is not syndicated via RSS; please visit the Latin Audio Proverbs blog to listen to the audio.
Keep up with the latest posts... Subscribe by Email. I also post a daily round-up of all the Bestiaria Latina blogs: fables, proverbs, crosswords, and audio.
I thought this would be a good follow-up to yesterday's proverb about how a person's attitude in the world is very much a matter of context. In yesterday's proverb, we saw that when the mouse was full he did not have a very high estimation of common fare. Today's proverb uses the metaphor of sickness and health: we all find it easy to give the right advice to sick people when we are well, we find it easy to give the right advice to poor people when we are rich, easy to give the right advice to students who are failing a class when we are getting an "A" and so on. What you think about the world is based on just who you are and how you are living your own life.
The English saying comes from Terence's comedy, Andria, "the girl from Andros." The story is about a young man, Pamphilus, in love with a disreputable "girl from Andros," although his father has arranged for him to be married to a very respectable girl next door. Just to complicate things, as in any good comedy, the young man's best friend, Charinus, is in love with his betrothed, the girl next door. Of course, everything works out well in the end. It turns out the girl from Andros is really the long lost daughter of the family next daughter, and hence sister to the girl next door. Our hero marries his beloved, his best friend marries the girl next door, and everyone lives happily ever after. Curious? You can read an English translation at Google Books. (Normally, I'd link to the English version at the Perseus website, but the Perseus website has been dead for several days now; I wonder if they will manage to bring it back to life after the latest server crash.)
Today's saying comes up early in the play, when a slave has come to tell Charinus the good news: the Pamphilus is getting married to the girl next door. Charinus, of course, is devastated. The slave advises him to just to put the woman out of his mind: quanto satiust te id dare operam qui istum amorem ex animo amoveas tuo,quam id loqui quo mage lubido frustra incendatur tua!, "how much better it would be for you to direct your efforts to removing that love from your mind, rather than to talk about it, when it only inflames your passion even more, to no avail." Although this is definitely good advice, Charinus explains that it does not do him any good: facile omnes quom valemu' recta consilia aegrotis damus, "We all find it easy to give the right advice to the sick when we are well."
Charinus then goes on to add: tu si hic sis aliter sentias, "you, if you were in my place, would feel differently."
That, indeed, is the unspoken implication of today's saying. We are very good at giving advice to the sick when we are well, but if we ourselves succumb to sickness, all that good advice just goes out the window! It's all a matter of context. If this slave were love-sick, as his master is, he would not find it so easy to keep his mind from turning constantly to thoughts of his beloved.
I will confess to being a great fan of Roman comedies. Even if you are just a beginning Latin student, you can read the wonderful adapted comedy, Auricula Meretricula, "The Little Prostitute Named Earlobe," which reprises the stock characters and basic plot of the comedies. It's easy enough to read in the first semester of Latin, and is great preparation for reading Plautus and Terence later on!
Meanwhile, in honor of Roman comedy, here is today's proverb read out loud:
1560. Facile omnes cum valemus recta consilia aegrotis damus.
The number here is the number for this proverb in Latin Via Proverbs: 4000 Proverbs, Mottoes and Sayings for Students of Latin.
If you are reading this via RSS: The Flash audio content is not syndicated via RSS; please visit the Latin Audio Proverbs blog to listen to the audio.
Keep up with the latest posts... Subscribe by Email. I also post a daily round-up of all the Bestiaria Latina blogs: fables, proverbs, crosswords, and audio.
April 07, 2007
Mus satur insipidam diiudicat esse farinam
In English: The mouse, when full, considers the flour insipid.
I thought this would be a good follow-up to yesterday's proverb about a mouse. Today's proverb is not a word game, however. Instead, it is one of those metaphorical proverbs. When the mouse is full, it isn't interested in eating flour. So, too, with people - when you've got a pantry full of gourmet food, you're not interested in eating Ramen noodles. Or, to expand the metaphor from beyond the world of food: when you've got closets full of clothing, you are interested in darning your socks, for example.
The humor of the proverb, of course, depends on the fact that the mouse is a creature who very rarely has more than enough for food to eat. The little mouse spends most of its life in a desperate quest for food, nibbling away at anything that it can find. Yet if some mouse is fortunate enough truly to have a full belly, then that mouse might turn into a little snob, turning up its nose at the food it would normally be quick to devour.
There's a great little saying that provides a counterpoint to today's saying: Fames optimus est coquus, "Hunger is the best cook" (you can read a previous blog post about this saying). The mouse is not hungry, so it considers the flour to be tasteless, but hunger would definitely give that flour a delightful savor!
Another saying that today's proverb reminds me of is the famous "sour grapes." When the hungry fox was not able to reach the grapes, it declared that the grapes were sour anyway, and not worth having.
So, judgments about what is tasty and what is not are relative judgments. When the mouse has no hunger, the flour has no appeal. When the fox cannot reach the grapes, the grapes are sour. The larger message is that when we dismiss something as worthless, we might consider our own situation, and just what it is that prompts us to make such a judgment!
So, hoping that like the little mouse you got plenty to eat today (and did not go hungry, like that fox), here is today's proverb read out loud:
1173. Mus satur insipidam diiudicat esse farinam.
The number here is the number for this proverb in Latin Via Proverbs: 4000 Proverbs, Mottoes and Sayings for Students of Latin.
If you are reading this via RSS: The Flash audio content is not syndicated via RSS; please visit the Latin Audio Proverbs blog to listen to the audio.
Keep up with the latest posts... Subscribe by Email. I also post a daily round-up of all the Bestiaria Latina blogs: fables, proverbs, crosswords, and audio.
I thought this would be a good follow-up to yesterday's proverb about a mouse. Today's proverb is not a word game, however. Instead, it is one of those metaphorical proverbs. When the mouse is full, it isn't interested in eating flour. So, too, with people - when you've got a pantry full of gourmet food, you're not interested in eating Ramen noodles. Or, to expand the metaphor from beyond the world of food: when you've got closets full of clothing, you are interested in darning your socks, for example.
The humor of the proverb, of course, depends on the fact that the mouse is a creature who very rarely has more than enough for food to eat. The little mouse spends most of its life in a desperate quest for food, nibbling away at anything that it can find. Yet if some mouse is fortunate enough truly to have a full belly, then that mouse might turn into a little snob, turning up its nose at the food it would normally be quick to devour.
There's a great little saying that provides a counterpoint to today's saying: Fames optimus est coquus, "Hunger is the best cook" (you can read a previous blog post about this saying). The mouse is not hungry, so it considers the flour to be tasteless, but hunger would definitely give that flour a delightful savor!
Another saying that today's proverb reminds me of is the famous "sour grapes." When the hungry fox was not able to reach the grapes, it declared that the grapes were sour anyway, and not worth having.
So, judgments about what is tasty and what is not are relative judgments. When the mouse has no hunger, the flour has no appeal. When the fox cannot reach the grapes, the grapes are sour. The larger message is that when we dismiss something as worthless, we might consider our own situation, and just what it is that prompts us to make such a judgment!
So, hoping that like the little mouse you got plenty to eat today (and did not go hungry, like that fox), here is today's proverb read out loud:
1173. Mus satur insipidam diiudicat esse farinam.
The number here is the number for this proverb in Latin Via Proverbs: 4000 Proverbs, Mottoes and Sayings for Students of Latin.
If you are reading this via RSS: The Flash audio content is not syndicated via RSS; please visit the Latin Audio Proverbs blog to listen to the audio.
Keep up with the latest posts... Subscribe by Email. I also post a daily round-up of all the Bestiaria Latina blogs: fables, proverbs, crosswords, and audio.
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