Blink, and the Latin has gone.

It wasn’t the Latin that people objected to, but the fact that Obama used a presidential-looking image.

Still, it had only one outing.

Could ‘vero possumus’ be part of a Latin version of Bob the Builder?

Paperback edition of Ovid Love Poems

The OUP latest catalogue includes the paperback of A.D.Melville’s translation . Those teaching Amores may welcome this. David West welcomed the hardback edition warmly in The Times:

• Melville has worked a miracle … It is difficult to imaagine that there will ever be an English version so faithful to the Latin, and written in such sound and engaging verse.

Quickly understanding A level texts

An interesting approach to reading Latin, which might be used or adapted for teaching set texts, particularly unadapted prose texts, is explained here.

Claude Pavur of St Louis University has put on line some examples from Cicero, Livy and other authors, set out in short lines, with subject, main verb and object left-justified, and other parts of the sentence indented. He uses a system of visual clues for particular bits of syntax – examples:

Parentheses set off prepositional phrases.

Slashes and braces enclose various other word-groups or phrases within phrases (e.g., ablative absolutes, participial phrases, or genitive and ablative phrases).

Italics identify the very important accusative-with-infinitive construction along with the verb or expression governing it. The general practice will be to put the subject of the infinitive flush with the infinitive itself; the object of the infinitive will be indented by one tab. Thus the reader will be able to see which accusative stands as the subject of the expression, and which as the object. Historical infinitives are treated like regular main verbs in independent clauses.

Small caps will sometimes be used for structurally significant particles like “both…and”; “so much… [that]”; “not only…but also”; etc.

It’s the sort of thing we have all written on the blackboard. Would it be useful to have A level texts available as Google Docs, for example, using this or a similar system?

Caesar BG III is on line here, with all the bells and whistles of the system.

By contrast, Pliny letters are given minimal treatment here.

I suppose that Caesar’s longer and more involved periods call for the full treatment, whereas Pliny needs only to be broken up into short lines.

Roman Day at Dorman Museum this Saturday

Posted by Museum blogger on June 23, 2008 11:52 AM | Permalink

Experince life in the Roman Army with live battles, weaponry demonstrations and military formations by ‘Hands-on History’ re-enactments in and around the Museum.

Place: Dorman Museum, Linthorpe Road, Middlesbrough
Time: 12 noon – 4 pm
Date: Saturday, 28th June
Admission: Free
Children must be accompanied by an adult.

From Gazette Live

Latin prayer before connecting to the internet

This has been around for a long time, but new to me.
From What does the prayer really say by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Oratio ante colligationem in interrete:
Omni­potens aeterne Deus,
qui secundum imaginem Tuam nos plasmasti
et omnia bona, vera, et pulchra,
praesertim in divi­na persona Unigeniti Fi­lii Tui

Domini nostri Iesu Christi, quaerere iussi­sti,
praesta, quaesumus,
ut, per intercessionem Sancti Isidori, Epi­scopi et Doctoris,
in peregrinationibus per interrete,
et manus oculosque ad quae Tibi sunt placita intendamus
et omnes quos conveni­mus cum caritate ac patientia accipiamus.
Per Christum Dominum nostrum. Amen.