InRebus Blog

  1. John XXII, Pope of Rome, at the request of King Edward II granted this bull to the University of Cambridge. It seems to be qute similar to the document that the Vatican has on display.

  2. It's been demonstrated many times that when an average person aspires to have a Latin tattoo, an engraved ring or simply a clever motto they likely to have the desired Latin phrase badly mangled, often to the point of complete nonsense.

  3. According to Cassio Dio's Roman History (58, 22), Sextus Marius, an incredibly wealthy Plebeian, once demonstrated his might to a neighbor in a rather unusual way.

  4. As all highly advanced and well developed languages, Latin has a good number of words that can be rendered as the word 'death' in a modern English translation.

  5. The phrases chosen here come from a variety of sources: medieval sayings, classical authors and modern usage.

  6. Company names are so recognizable as such and so familiar sounding that it takes a special effort to notice their Latin roots. I trust these little snippets of corporate Latin may be useful for teaching Latin. One root at a time.

  7. Out of love for the truth and the desire to bring it to light, the following propositions will be discussed at Wittenberg, under the presidency of the Reverend Father Martin Luther, Master of Arts and of Sacred Theology, and Lecturer in Ordinary on the same at that place.

  8. I chose just a few Latin proverbs that go back to the Middle Ages. For the most part they rhyme, which usually automatically gives away Medieval Latin. They sort of roll off your tongue, and represent common wisdom of the bygone days.

  9. As I was sifting through some modern materials about the Salem witchcraft trials I stumbled upon a curious term which came up in one of the physical examination accounts.

  10. This maxim attributed to Francis Bacon is very often quoted as 'Scientia est potentia.' Perhaps a little too inspired by this motto, I decided to gain knowledge about the original quote, and, to my surprise, found none.

  11. To me, slogan is a funny word with an almost non-Indoeuropean ring to it. Where does it really come from?

  12. A short but magnificently funny poem about Statius, Silver age Roman writer.

  13. Shortly after returning from exile in 58 B.C.E., Cicero sent a brief note to Atticus with the sole purpose of requesting his friend's assistance in arranging his library. This letter and a few others that followed it, became a source of some conjectures about the specifics of bookmaking in classical Rome and Greece.

  14. Most famous quote attributed to Cicero does not exist in his works. Yes, the one that says that a room without books is like a body without a soul.

  15. I was unable to find this text online, but it should definitely be in public domain, as it was first published in 1899. If you have never read this before, keep in mind that the poem gets really good closer to its middle.

  16. It was interesting to look into Casanova's use of Latin mottos and even see a brief discussion of them in the book.

  17. 'Malleus Maleficarum' is one of those books that we should feel fortunate not to have to deal with any longer. Thousands of people had to suffer horrible deaths because of it. It is by no means the only book that discussed in depth the issue of witchcraft, but it is by far the most notable one.

  18. This very famous palindrome, written in a square, is usually interpreted in such a way that rotas is taken as Accusative Plural of rota.)

  19. This phrase is actually a magic spell, supposed to alleviate pain and suffering caused by torture. Well, maybe. Maybe not. The Latin language is the one being tortured here, because the original phrase looked like this (a little piece of Medieval poetry)

  20. I recently decided to purchase an iPhone app called SPQR. The program is supposed to be a reader for popular Latin texts with English translations, along with Lewis&Short dictionary