Good, Better, Best

My students are usually amused when I recite the following rhyme about a positive-comparative-superlative adjective in English:

Good, better, best

Never let it rest

'Til the good is better

And the better best.

My Latin 2 class is memorizing tonight five irregularly compared adjectives, and I think English derivatives are most helpful in learning the Latin words. But I also like mottoes that contain the irregular forms. The motto of Hotchkiss School in Lakeville, Connecticut is Monitī meliora sequāmur, a quotation from Book 3 of Vergil's Aeneid, rendered by me literally as having been warned/advised, let us follow better things. You may already know that meliora is the Latin word meaning better things, because we've mentioned the English word ameliorate, to improve, make better, elsewhere. But did you know that meliorate, meliorable, meliorative, and meliorism are also English words? Meliorism, according to my dictionary, is the belief that the world naturally tends to get better--what a happy thought!

TINY PRINT

This past Sunday I was reading through the New York Times Magazine section, and I noticed an ad for Northeastern University, which was graced by a small rendering of the university's seal next to the name at the bottom of the page. Clearly legible on a tiny scroll in the seal were the words LUX VERITAS VIRTUS, and on a ribbon below the scroll, harder to see, were the words FOUNDED A.D. 1898. The Latin word lūx, lūcis f. means light; the Latin word vēritās, vēritātis f. means truth; and the Latin word virtūs, virtūtis f. ranges in meaning from manliness to courage to moral excellence. I had discussed the mottoes of Harvard (VERITAS) and Yale (LUX ET VERITAS) in my classes last week, and I was interested to learn Northeastern's motto and to see the addition of the powerful word virtūs. I also found this article about the evolution of the current seal interesting.

Great Caesar's Ghostly Name

Yesterday when I checked on the progress of SV Concordia's current voyage, I glanced at the map of Spain, and one town name caught my eye, Zaragoza. If you do not know, the name Zaragoza (also spelled in English Saragossa) is derived from the name of Caesar Augustus. Those of you who may be teaching the AP Vergil curriculum right now may also be interested in some of the helpful links found here about the great first Roman emperor.

SEEKING HARMONY

I'm still going through the cache of summer photos, and here is one of SV Concordia, which features the Latin motto CONCORDIAM SECTEMUR, which itself features a frequentative verb form, sector (1) I keep on following, chase, hunt from the more familiar sequor (3) I follow, the source of many English words containing the letters sequen or secut, as in sequence, sequential, consequent, consecutive, executive, and prosecute. The motto can be translated LET US KEEP FOLLOWING HARMONY, CONCORD, FRIENDSHIP; the verb, a deponent, is present subjunctive, hortatory, hence "let us." SV Concordia is the home of West Island College Class Afloat based at Lunenburg Academy in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, Canada. You can read about the current voyage here.

RINGING IN LATIN

Yesterday in class when I asked a Latin 2 student what I had in my hand, he said, "Chalkus," instead of the real Latin word crēta, but he was following an old trick of creating a Latin-sounding word by adding the ending -us to an existing English word.

On my drive to school this morning, I heard a radio ad for a new product called Quietus, which provides relief for sufferers of tinnitus. Unlike chalkus, in Latin quiētus, a, um is a real word, a first and second declension adjective meaning quiet, at rest, and in Latin tinnitus, ūs m. is a fourth declension noun meaning ringing. When I checked the origin of tinnitus, I found that it is from the verb tinniō (4) whose origin is given in the Oxford Latin Dictionary as onomatopoeic, i.e., imitating the sound of ringing. So chalk another one up for Latin in advertising!

Dawn of a New Convertible

I caught sight of a new and appealing Volkswagen vehicle earlier in the summer. Searching for the model name I located the word EOS, the Greek word for the dawn. What a great name for a car which resembles, with the top down (to my mind), a dawning sun, something about the gently curving lines. In English words eo- appears as a prefix to mean 'dawn' or 'early' as in the Eolithic age, the early Stone Age or the eohippus, a possible early form of a horse. Can you find another word containing the prefix eo-?

Mercury at the Racetrack

Continuing with some photos from the vintage car show at Lime Rock: above is a photo of a medallion featuring the logo of the Royal Aero Club, a fascinating endeavor whose history you can read here. Can you 1) name the symbol featured on the logo and 2) find another mythological reference (hint: it's a color photo) within the history of the Club?

Medusa at the Racetrack

Last Sunday my husband and I went to the vintage car show at Lime Rock Race Track in Lime Rock, CT. I love old cars, especially sports cars, but also touring cars. Truly the Jaguar E-type is the most beautiful, a quintessential sports car, and there were plenty on view. But I was really delighted by a Ford circa 1922, a picture of which is above. I wandered all round it, inspecting all the details of construction, and as I was about to walk away, I noticed the name painted on the hood, just above the number 29. Can you see it in the photo? (The glare makes it hard to read without a magnifying glass!) It reads "Medusa." Now, why would an early motor car be named Medusa, the former beauty turned Gorgon with snakes for hair? I have an idea, but I invite your speculations.

Leader of the Pack

Aeneid 1.364 contains the phrase dux femina facti to describe Dido as she escapes from Tyre and her wicked brother Pygmalion. I thought of this phrase tonight as I headed off-campus from an evening meeting, and the car ahead of me had a license plate beginning with the letters DUX followed by four numbers. I think it was a random collection of letters, like my fairly new license plate that begins with the letters EGB. (My husband and I were pleased to receive this random plate, as it brought to mind a beloved past member of our pack, a little Cavalier King Charles Spaniel named Egbert. Alas, Egbert was the runt of his litter, and consequently a dear.) So the Latin word of the evening is dux, ducis m. leader.

FOCAL POINT

Many years ago my current classroom at school was the Faculty Room. Over the summer this room was cleaned and refreshed. Old tables and chairs were removed, and some used chairs-cum-desktops were brought in yesterday, while we await the arrival of a new Harkness table and chairs. When I arrived this morning to reclaim some books, I was amused to notice that the maintenance staff had oriented the desks towards the fireplace; I was amused, because the blackboards are on two other walls. But a fireplace is often the focus of a room; home decorators often look to a fireplace to provide focus in a living room, den, library, even bedroom. And why not? The Latin word for the day is focus, -i m. hearth, fire-place. The fireplace in my classroom is boarded up (a good idea; one year squirrels came down and had a merry time over a weekend), but the bricks and mantel provide interesting decoration, and give me another little springboard into Latin with my students.

REMEMBERING

To go to the drug store in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, one needs to park at a meter in a lot next door to The Royal Canadian Legion, which is advertised by several versions of the sign above. I missed the Latin words around the inside the first time I saw the signs, and the next time, I brought my camera. MEMORIAM EORUM RETINEBIMUS, we will hold on to the memory of them. The Legion is the largest former service organization in Canada; more information here, along with a mini-version of the same sign.

Frequently in a newspaper you may see listed among the obituaries remembrances, or announcements published in memoriam. Be careful to notice the spelling; memoria, ae f. memory is a first declension noun, so it must end in the letters -am.

A BUSY BEE

Above are two photos I took a couple of years ago at a Celtic fair in Goshen, CT. I was so delighted to find many Latin mottoes among the booths for the many clans present. Clan Fergusson as seen in the photos has the motto DULCIUS EX ASPERIS, a sweeter [thing] from/out of harsher [things] or more sweetly from difficulties. The bee among the motto words is checking out a thistle, the national flower of Scotland.

WEEKLY STANDARDS

I guess I was so caught up in four sightings of classical learning in one article in this week's edition of The Weekly Standard that I forgot to write about them, so here goes. On page twelve in the August 31st issue is an article by William Anderson entitled "Who Owns Your Body? Under Obamacare, not you." Within the article can be found the Latin phrases ad nauseam, ipso facto, and ad hoc, and later in the article is the phrase Procrustean protocols. The three Latin phrases have become so common in English as to not merit italics in an English dictionary; ad nauseam (to the point of sickness), ipso facto (by/from the deed/fact itself), and ad hoc (for this purpose) are familiar to many readers. For readers of Greek mythology, Procrustes is also a familiar figure, one of the villains met by Theseus on his way to Athens. Procrustes forced all passersby to lie down on his special bed; if the traveler's legs were too long, Procrustes lopped them off, and if the traveler was not long enough to cover the bed, Procrustes stretched him until he fit. Thanks, Weekly Standard, for keeping us supplied with Latin phrases and mythological references.