Re: CHAT Latin sig? (was: Conlang Flags)

On Tuesday, September 7, 2004, at 12:11 , Mark J. Reed wrote:

> On Mon, Sep 06, 2004 at 08:52:54PM +0100, Ray Brown wrote:
>>> I've seen this many, many times, usually with the "est" included,
>>
>> But not many times with *viditur I hope!
>
> I'd only seen it that way until your correction.  A Google search finds
> 10,000 web pages with that phrase using "viditur", and only 2,300 with
> it using "videtur".
Good grief! Obviously some guy somewhere along the line made the mistake
and 9999 people followed like unthinking sheep.

Are we humans really so sheep-like? A little worrying for democracy   :=(
==========================================================
On Tuesday, September 7, 2004, at 12:19 , Mark J. Reed wrote:

>> On Mon, Sep 06, 2004 at 08:52:54PM +0100, Ray Brown wrote:
>> Umm - 'dictum est' = "is said" - must be medieval, not Classical. But
>> even
>> in medieval Latin, "seems" is 'videtur'.
>
> My mistake, btw - most of the occurrances of that phrase online, both
> viditur and videtur, use "sit", not "est".
In Classical Latin clauses introduced by the words by "quicumque" or
"quisquis" (both meaning 'whoever'; "quidquid" is the neuter of "quisquis"
) have their verb in the _indicative_ mood, i.e. "est".

It is a mark of medieval Latin that there is a confusion between the use
of indicative and subjunctive in subordinate clauses. If "sit" is in the
original, then it surely points to a medieval origin.

Post-medieval Latin modelled itself on Classical norms.

But even in medieval Latin, *viditur would surely be considered an error.
===========================================================
On Tuesday, September 7, 2004, at 04:22 , Roger Mills wrote:

> Mark J. Reed wrote:
>
>>> But not many times with *viditur I hope!
>>
>> I'd only seen it that way until your correction.  A Google search finds
>> 10,000 web pages with that phrase using "viditur", and only 2,300 with
>> it using "videtur".
>
> Times like this, I wish I saved the long-ago "Bloom County" comic strip,
> the
> gist of which was "Even if 2,000,000 people say (do?) it, it's still
> wrong."
> So suitable to so many occasions.
Quite so! I suppose one ought to forestall the complaint that we are being
prescriptivists. That just ain't so. Latin is no longer a living language,
  as we normally understand the term. We can report now what its norms were
at various different times.

I am actually making a _descriptivist_ observation in saying that 'viditur'
  does not conform to the norm at any period. Someone made an error and the
majority have followed.

> (Later) Unbelievable...! Blessings on google! I found it on-line; not
> quite
> as I remembered it, but still
> apt--http://www.angelfire.com/vamp/shoopshoop/opus.html   About 2/3 of the
> way down; it starts with Opus saying "May I interject with a parable about
> foolishness?"
Exactly! Maybe I was being unfair on sheep above and should have said
'penguins'   :-)
=================================================

On Monday, September 6, 2004, at 10:46 , Philippe Caquant wrote:

> --- Ray Brown <ray.brown@...> wrote:
>
[snip]
>> Umm - 'dictum est' = "is said" - must be medieval,
>> not Classical. But even
>> in medieval Latin, "seems" is 'videtur'.
>>
>
> Then this one will set your teeth on edge:
Don't get me wrong about medieval Latin. I think it is a valid language in
its own right. I do not hold to the silly idea that Classical Latin is the
only "true Latin".

> "Magis magnos clericos non sunt magis magnos
> sapientes".
>
> (Francois Rabelais)
Ach!!! "magis magnus" = 'greater', I can go along with - But using the
accusative case for the subject!! Ach!

It is obviously an early example of one of the many, many neo-Latin
conlangs   :-)

Ray
===============================================
http://home.freeuk.com/ray.brown
ray.brown@freeuk.com
===============================================
"They are evidently confusing science with technology."
UMBERTO ECO				September, 2004

Reply