veni, vidi, vici

Dear Academics (et al.) Who Like to Make Jokes at Classicists' Expense:

I understand the urge to parody things in Latin, especially Caesar's little quip - hell, Cicero started us off in the Pro Ligario, so we can even cite ancient precedent. When done well, it can be quite funny, and I always enjoy a laugh at Caesar's (or Cicero's) expense.

What I do not appreciate is when, in your attempt to come up with a funny substitute for "vici", you end up with an actual Latin word you did not mean. Case in point.

The English is funny; the Latin is not.

Veterni is either the vocative/nominative, masculine plural or the genitive, masculine/neuter singular form of the adjective veternus, -a, -um, "old" or "ancient"; alternatively, it is the genitive form of the masculine noun veternus, -i, "old age" or "lethargy" (as brought by old age or sickness). The adjective may be used substantivally (on a completely unrelated note: why does Google not recognize that word?), but veterni, in whatever form, is not a verb. Ever. One cannot simply go around sticking an -i at the end of a recognizable stem (English or Latin) and hope that it looks like a first person singular perfect. More to the point, the joke is no longer funny if you "make up" an actual word in the language you are trying to parody.

ignaris non ignoscatur

Jon Stewart has recently called out Gretchen Carlson and Fox News for even more abhorrent behavior. He's funny enough, as usual, but there's one bit in Carlson's play-acting which he completely ignores.

Apparently, when Carlson was looking up the word "czar" (which we should expect all Stanford grads to know, I agree), she found the definition to be "king" and proceeded to use the phrase "czar-slash-king" in describing the people put in charge of banks, etc. under Bush and Obama. Clearly she (or her writer) was not looking at Merriam-Webster's or the OED or any other reputable dictionary, since "czar" ("tsar") was only considered to mean "king" in Russian before the time of Shakespeare. Had she actually gone to the OED, she would have also found that "czar" means "boss" in American English and now has a revised definition which directly applies to the sort of czars she's discussing. The use of "czar" in precisely this way seems to have been coined in 1933; somehow, I don't think Obama was around then.

Furthermore, any dictionary worth its salt lists the etymology of the word as Caesar (yes, that Caesar), who was emphatically not a king. In fact, his successors took that name as a title but always consciously spurned the term king (that's rex as in regal for Ms. Carlson). Go look up your history, or better yet, learn to read a dictionary.

And this is why we didn't go to Stanford.

amo, amas, amat

One of the broadcasters for the Ravens-Steelers matchup on Sunday Night Football two weeks ago burst out with this illuminating phrase live on air: "Fair caught!" There was some sort of "at the such-and-such yard line" afterwards, but I have to admit I wasn't really paying attention to anything except that egregious butchering of the English language.

"Fair catch" is a noun phrase. In shorthand broadcaster-speak, "Fair catch at the 20" is perfectly acceptable; the verb, "made", is implied. But the word "catch" in this phrase is never a verb, and saying "fair caught" makes you sound absolutely illiterate. Not all of us who watch football notice this stuff, or care, but some of us actually have a care for the language we speak. Bottom line: the crunch of a helmet-to-helmet tackle may be delightful, but pulling a Jack-the-Ripper on grammar is not.

id est

Many people have trouble keeping track of the difference between ‘its’ and ‘it's’. Given the prevalence of the possessive apostrophe in English, that's sort of understandable. Well, when it comes to the illiterate, at least, and those whose jobs don't rely on proper spelling and grammar.

But I never want to see the two mixed up in (semi-)reputable news publications, even online ones, ever again. (Huffington Post and NYTimes, I'm looking at you.)

anno domini

The New York Times' Dave Caldwell reported today that Harvard and Yale have been going at it since 1875, and that Saturday's game was their 126th meeting.

On the very next Sports page, however, the Associated Press acknowledged Lehigh and Lafayette as "the country's oldest rivalry", dating back to 1897. The teams have played each other 145 times to date.

And here I thought age was calculated by years, not by number of games. Silly me.

devotio

Michael Bennet, a freshman senator from Colorado, recently affirmed in an interview on CNN that he will vote for health care reform even at the risk of losing his job.

Let's ignore for the moment that voting for health care will likely improve his chances for re-election in 2010, as noted (rather subtly) at the end of the article. The question itself was phrased in such a way that had he said anything other than "yes", he would have openly admitted to putting concern for his job over the best interests of his constituents. In other words, any other politician would have said the same thing.

Bottom line: Bennet's answer doesn't amount to much of a sacrifice, and it should not be advertised as such.

Of course, propaganda of this sort isn't likely to change anytime soon ever. It seems Ambrose Bierce hit upon something timeless when he defined politics as "a strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles; the conduct of public affairs for private advantage." But the media should do better than falsely promoting politicians like this.

Oh, for the days when self-sacrifice meant dedicating yourself to the gods, throwing yourself at the enemy, and to hell with you if you survived!

cogito ergo deleo

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) - who is currently trumping up his experience as a medical doctor and making a rather poor attempt at covering up the fact that his colleagues won't take Medicaid patients because they simply don't pay as well - just used the term "less good" on the floor, and not in the sense of "to do less good" but in the sense of "I don't know the word 'worse'" (I would even have taken "not as good").

You could object that "less good" might be used when you want to acknowledge that, say, the result of patient care through Medicaid is not exactly bad, but rather not as good as that provided by private insurance. I still say it's wrong, except maybe in rhetorical play: "a less powerful tool, and therefore less good", or "Some Good (and Less Good) News". The last time the phrase "less good" was popular on its own was when it appeared in a (much-ridiculed) quote from a Microsoft exec describing Windows Vista. Coincidentally, that's about the quality of oratory coming from Republicans at the moment. Bottom line: go back to grammar school, Dr. Coburn.

And Sen. Hatch (R-UT), learn how to articulate if you want anyone to listen (I really can't say "understand"). Though maybe it would be smart to keep a lid on your "holy war" against health care reform, unless you actually want to attract the attention of Homeland Security.

Meanwhile, Republicans continue to parade their ignorance. Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) just compared reading through the 2,074-page HCR bill to reading the New Testament in Greek, saying "it's better to have someone help translate." Seriously? I get that you can't read Greek - I don't actually expect you to know Greek, though it would be nice - but apparently you can't understand English either, even legalese. Oh wait, isn't that your job?

sal ac lepos

First, the practical:
I won't promise to update this thing every day. Some days there will be a few entries, others none. That's how life goes. It also depends, naturally, on the availability of material - that is, how many stupid people have said stupid things or done stupid stuff. "Stupid" being entirely subjective, of course.

Now, a brief explanation:
When he was disparaged for writing verses too soft, Catullus composed a vicious little poem in defense of their wit and charm, sal ac lepos (not to be confused with lepus, which is not only soft but also cuddly and normally possessed of a short, fluffy tail and long, furry ears). The difference between sal and lepos is hard to define, but when Cicero juxtaposes them the first tends to mean "biting wit" or "sarcasm" and the second, "charming wit" or "allure". Sometimes I like to think of them as House and Patrick Jane, at which point I know I need to stop watching TV while doing Latin.
The unofficial motto of this endless series of complaints thoughtful commentary on life, the universe and everything is sal gratia salis, which any MGM fan should now be able to translate. I'm afraid you won't find much lepos (or many lepores) here to help the sarcasm go down, but if you get sick of it you can always go watch Mary Poppins with a bunny.
Finally, for those unfamiliar with the fight song "Ten Thousand Men of Harvard", illegitimis non carborundum is fake Latin for "don't let the bastards wear you down". It's funny precisely because it isn't actually Latin at all, so save your breath (or spare your fingers) if you were planning to post a snarky brilliant comment about how a Classicist, even an ancient historian, should know better. (In my defense, I'm not a philologist, no matter how often I pretend otherwise.)

For those who are interested, the Catullus poem is number 16. If you haven't read it, find yourself a good translation and enjoy, but be warned that it's the epitome of the sort of fun which gentlemen of upstanding character used to take great pains to omit from their morally unimpeachable texts.