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English To Latin Translation: "life Is Beautiful"


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me and my brothers are getting tattoos for our father that just passed away and we wanted to get "to my father" translated into latin...does anybody know how to say that?

Sorry we were slow to answer. You can say PATRI MEO. That's pater = father, meus = my, both words in the dative case which gives the meaning "to ..." It is possible to reverse the order of the words, but PATRI MEO would be the most usual.

 

OK?

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me and my brothers are getting tattoos for our father that just passed away and we wanted to get "to my father" translated into latin...does anybody know how to say that?

Sorry we were slow to answer. You can say PATRI MEO. That's pater = father, meus = my, both words in the dative case which gives the meaning "to ..." It is possible to reverse the order of the words, but PATRI MEO would be the most usual.

 

OK?

 

so does that mean that ad patri meo doesn't make sense? or pro patri meo?

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so does that mean that ad patri meo doesn't make sense?

Well, not for what you want to say. You can only use Ad+accusativus in alternative to simple dativus, so if you want to use ad you have to say "Ad patrem meum" or simply "ad patrem".

 

Pro patri meo is incorrect because pro always needs an ablative, in fact my suggestion in the other thread was pro patrE meo. I suggested the forms with "pro" for the sole motivation that I have seen them in commemorative inscriptions and they are for no reason to be preferred to the others.

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The saying "Life is beautiful," doesn't hit me as a very Roman thought. Frankly, it doesn't seem very Italian either, despite its use in an Italian movie.

 

"Life is difficult," is more like it. "Life is tricky," maybe. "Life is to be dominated," better. "Life is to be put into order," very Roman. Or "Life is a patron-client relationship," very Roman culturally.

 

I'm not criticizing the translation of "Life is beautiful." We've got the right to use any language to translate any thought. It's just that the idea of proclaiming life as beautiful seems very un-Roman.

 

What do others think?

Edited by Ludovicus
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The saying "Life is beautiful," doesn't hit me as a very Roman thought. Frankly, it doesn't seem very Italian either, despite its use in an Italian movie.

 

"Life is difficult," is more like it. "Life is tricky," maybe. "Life is to be dominated," better. "Life is to be put into order," very Roman. Or "Life is a patron-client relationship," very Roman culturally.

 

I'm not criticizing the translation of "Life is beautiful." We've got the right to use any language to translate any thought. It's just that the idea of proclaiming life as beautiful seems very un-Roman.

 

What do others think?

Salve, L!

 

Publius Vergilius Maro didn

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The saying "Life is beautiful," doesn't hit me as a very Roman thought. Frankly, it doesn't seem very Italian either, despite its use in an Italian movie.

 

"Life is difficult," is more like it. "Life is tricky," maybe. "Life is to be dominated," better. "Life is to be put into order," very Roman. Or "Life is a patron-client relationship," very Roman culturally.

 

I'm not criticizing the translation of "Life is beautiful." We've got the right to use any language to translate any thought. It's just that the idea of proclaiming life as beautiful seems very un-Roman.

 

What do others think?

Salve, L!

 

Publius Vergilius Maro didn

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Thanks for the link to the beautiful Eclogue IV. It's theme is about the future, the coming of a child (Christ, as was interpreted by Roman Christians), and a new golden age, not about life as it was then experienced.

Salve, L!

 

Glad you liked it. Oh, rest assured! It was no Christ.

 

Anyway, maybe you shall prefer this one (among hundreds of examples):

 

Eclogue VIII

 

Cheers and good luck!

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  • 3 years later...

If this is for Trotsky. let us remember the famous words of his housekeeper when the assassin arrived

 

Domine, quod est homo cerebrum suum volat excavare. (Sir, a man is here. He wants to pick your brain.)

 

With grovelling apologies.

 

M

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Just as "my father, my friend" has been pointed out as foreign to Roman thinking, I'd like to submit that "Life is beautiful" is similarly unRoman. Life, a struggle or duty or curse or an enigma perhaps. But not "beautiful."

Additionally, I grew up with native born Italians and don't ever remember anyone voicing such a notion.

What do others think of the slogan?

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