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The french word "miction", which is the medical-technical term for urinating, is an obvious descendant of the latin's take a piss. Is it specific to french and should it appear on the page ?
@Bogdangiusca You make the confusion between French and English. French being a langage derivated directly from the latin, it's not borrowed, it's inherited directly (except words that kept the same form), English having no links with latin language (except through French), words are borrowed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A01:E35:8A8D:FE80:5BE:A00F:9223:230C ( talk) 16:46, 30 July 2016 (UTC)
As someone who doesn't know Latin and has seen (I can't say "read") only a few of Catullus's poems, I'm hoping for "glubo" to be discussed here, at least in brief. — JerryFriedman 20:30, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
Some of the Catullus poems are incorrectly labelled, I think. Will someone with more knowledge correct that, please?
Also, where does "I will bugger and ream you, you faggot Aurelius and you pervert Furius, because you thought me indecent because my poems are somewhat sissified." come from? I cannot find that translation anywhere.
surely? (unsigned comment)
Keenan Pepper asked whether "Is this notable??". Yes, Dalmatian language, although extinct, is notable for being on a different branch from the other Romance languages. Also, I'll say that people who read this kind of articles are interested in obscure things such as how to say "shit" in an extinct language. :-) bogdan 22:29, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
It is eery -to say the least - hearing in Romanian the identical expression as in the Latin fiction "cum veni(i) futui" (meaning "as soon as I came I fucked").
Well, this expression can be easily found in the Pompeii inscriptions ("ego cum veni futui"), which might be interpreted as belonging to the vulgar Latin, but it also can be found in the Latin texts (Latin literature). I will check some examples. When I encountered this expression in the literary Latin I was astonished because it is identical to the everyday language in Oltenia-Romania, where I used to live for a while. It is one of the very few examples to illustrate how the ancient Latin - a very concise language, like the Ancient Greek and other ancient languages - has preserved part of its concisiveseness in at least one of the modern neolatin languages (Romanian). "Cum veni futui" - 3 words - can only be translated in modern languages like Englsih or others by using no less than 7 words : "as soon as I came I fucked".
The "i" in the paranthesis reflects the modern Romanian ortography for the expression. In Latin: "cum veni futui" can be translated in Romanian by "cum venii, futui". Same expression, same pronounciation, one more "i" added in the Romanian writting. I would add that it is not the only example where we can see entire expressions being conserved in Romanian from the Latin: when you are saying in Latin "multae caprae sunt", this expression is absolutely identical with the Romanian "multe capre sunt" or "sunt multe capre". To my knowledge the Romanian is the only neolatin language that has preserved whole expressions from Latin; in other words it has preserved the spirit of the Latin language. Other neolatin languages have "processed " the words and the expressions according to their new rules.
I have also changed the text about "shit" (merda); it was incorrect to consider that the Romanian language has lost this word since the verb "a desmierda" comes directly from merda and it is used on a daily basis in Romanian. It was only a an omission of the author, I think.
Giuvan
Isn't this rather debatable, given what Grimm's Law did to other Latin words beginning with the same sound? Marnanel 03:16, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
What article on Latin profanity could be complete without this gem, pedicabo ego vos et irrumabo, from Catullus 16 (I will make you my boy etc):
Aureli pathice et cinaede Furi, qui me ex versiculis meis putastis, quod sunt molliculi, parum pudicum. Nam castum esse decet pium poetam ipsum, versiculos nihil necesse est; qui tum denique habent salem ac leporem, si sunt molliculi ac parum pudici, et quod pruriat incitare possunt, non dico pueris, sed his pilosis, qui duros nequeunt movere lumbos. Vos, quod milia multa basiorum legistis, male me marem putatis? Pedicabo ego vos et irrumabo.
Saganaki- 07:37, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
There is an episode of The West Wing ( Two Cathedrals) in which Jed Bartlet gets angry at God, saying
"Gratias tibi ago, domine. Haec credam a deo pio? A deo iusto, a deo scito? Cruciatus in crucem. Tuus in terra servus, nuntius fui. Officium perfeci. Cruciatus in crucem. Eas in crucem!"
which means
"I give thanks to you, O Lord. Am I really to believe that these are the acts of a loving God? A just God? A wise God? To hell with your punishments. I was your servant here on Earth. And I spread your word and I did your work. To hell with your punishments. To hell with you!"
Would this be relevant enough to add?
MosheA says the verb is conare, "to know", but I know of no such verb. I think it's conari, the deponent verb meaning "to try", and a quick search for translations supports this interpretation. [1] [2] — Keenan Pepper 19:20, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
Surely that's its right transliteration, instead of the latter "Kakaty", or may it be some typing mistake? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Frango com Nata ( talk • contribs) 18:03, 27 January 2007 (UTC). Frango com Nata 18:04, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
In what sense is "mentula" an "obscenity"? Does a Roman say "hey, chick, dig the size of my mentula", or "fuck off, you mentula"? The wp article suggests the former, while an article about the Game of Mentula (really!) suggests the latter:
-- Isidore 21:54, 6 April 2007 (UTC)
Cunnus was listed as the equivalent of vagina. Now, even though that word is often used today of the external female genitalia, rather than the internal organ, viz. the birth canal, it is strictly speaking not correct. Since it seems reasonably clear that cunnus refer mainly to the visible parts, rather than the vagina proper I have changed it to the more fitting vulva.
However, I would actually prefer cunt, etc., as it said earlier, since it has the same connotations (vague pun intended) as the latin word, but I guess the more neutral english term is preferable in Wikipedia, and I am not bold enough.
I also think that the following sections were spurious:
This seems to stem from an improper understanding of the concept of grammatical vis-à-vis sexual gender. Words commonly change gender as languages evolve, and more often that not (as far as I know) with little regard for actual alleged sexuality of the word in question. Especially the explanation that vagin should have become masculine due to the alleged masculinity of warfare strikes me as very fanciful, and unless someone can give a quotation from a linguist that states that this is in fact the probable explanation, I think it is best left out. And, in any case, it has little to do with the subject. Alatius 11:57, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
Does it make any sense at all to have a comment in the section on this word that the person who used it did not do so correctly? Since when did Cicero become the standard by which we who come to Latin as a second language will make comments that a NATIVE Speaker of the language made an error? By that standard then all of the Russians can start telling Americans that we speak incorrectly because we don't sound like Shakespeare. I am not looking to cause a deliberate fight but really, this comment in the article in inapropriate. I feel offended myself for the poor lady who left us a bit of how she speaks and might have never written anything else in her whole life, and we are going to critisize and correct her! I actually feel that she might represent how most people said the word then and that Cicero might be wrong. Maybe all the Roman eleits spoke with a lipst and that is how they got a different spelling. A much more important question is why Cicero, who killed his own people out of sheer greed, fellow Roman Citizens, without trial so that he could rule like a dictator for the rest of his year as Consul; why is he our standard to judge this woman's bit of writting as wrong. I can not protest the comment in the article strongly enough. It clearly shows an unfair bias to the Classical Latin Only movement and needs, really really needs to be removed.-- Billiot 05:10, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
Maybe it is better to say what type of Latin it is as opposed to what type of Latin it isn't. This would allow it to be mentioned in a possitive light and not a negative light giving the impression that it is somehow wrong. I would be much better to change the article to say that it IS vulgar Latin, where now it says that it ISN'T classical Latin.-- Billiot 16:55, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
Small comment on this matter: calling something "Vulgar Latin" in *not* calling it "wrong," it is merely calling it the common spoken form of Latin. I found the statement entirely innocuous: as Latin learners, we naively expect the only form of Latin that is generally taught, the so-called classical Latin. So the statement basically said "this is different from what we (semi-naive nonnative Latin "speakers") would expect, as it is Vulgar Latin." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.26.94.161 ( talk) 06:52, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but why would -is be a Vulgar Latin perfect ending? It would simply be un-Latin. At least it never made its way even into spoken usage, witness the daughter languages, who still have the reflexes of -isti, like Italian (-esti) or Spanish (-iste). futuis is an impeccable present form, and a present fits the context. So I corrected the English translation and put the f-word in the present rather than present perfect. -- Zxly ( talk) 13:16, 21 December 2013 (UTC)
Normally I wouldn't be quite so picky, but in an article about Latin vocabulary and grammar I just cannot resist. In the following passage from the "cunnus" entry, should not "metaphorically" be something "through ' synecdoche' or ' metonymy'" (probably synecdoche):
Horace's Sermones I.2 and I.3 use the word:
- Nam fuit ante Helenam cunnus taeterrima belli
causa. . .which attributes, metaphorically, the cause of the Trojan War to Helen of Troy's vulva.
-- BSweezy 21:19, 16 July 2007 (UTC)
This article is about obscene language, not profane language. The title of the article is wrong. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.93.17.66 ( talk) 23:46, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
Dave, if you have specialist knowledge on this, I'm sure the world would benefit from your expertise. Please improve the page. Thanks Muleiolenimi ( talk) 19:54, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
The article claims makes it sound like vargă is the preferred word for penis. As a Romanian speaker, I never have heard this word and it's obscure at best. The preferred word in Romanian is "pulă" which probably derives from the Latin 'pilum' or spear. So the article is correct in that the word is euphemistic and indirect, but the article just uses the wrong word! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.166.64.3 ( talk) 15:36, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Why does the article translate "merda" as "shit", but "cunnus" as "vulva"? Yet the text itself makes clear that "cunnus" was considered an obscene word - meaning that the translation would be "cunt" or perhaps "pussy". Alternatively, if Wikipedia's policy is to give formal translations that don't reflect the vulgarity of the Latin words, why is "merda" not translated as "faeces" or "excrement"? 86.155.66.63 ( talk) 17:13, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
Could there be a connection between the German "Fotze" and the Latin "Fossa"? -- Slashme ( talk) 15:03, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
Caesari Servilia futatrix would more accurately translate as "a bitch to Caesar", considering the dative case (caesari) and not the genitive (which would have been caesaris), although it's also possible it was a mistake on the part of the producers. I'm also wondering if the frequent use of cunt (which was subject to censorship in many editions of the series) is in any way related to actual Roman use of cunnus.
Does anyone know (or can provide a source for) the graffiti seen during the opening credits? There appears to be futuere simul written on one of the walls (not quite sure due to the use of Roman cursive), but that would appear ungrammatical. Other graffiti include correct nobilitas miseria nostra ("artistocracy (is) our trouble") and arma ("weapon") beneath a soldier with a giant sopio (the word sopio doesn't appear, but the graphic style fits).
And while we're at it, some sources for Pompeii graffiti examples would have been nice. -- 93.105.205.33 ( talk) 11:08, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
This was the only "swear" we learned in Latin class. Although it's not nearly as naughty as the other words here (I wish I had had this reference in high school), it seems like it deserves a mention. Does anyone else think it belongs and maybe have some knowledge about the etymology / usage examples? Klinebottle ( talk) 04:18, 23 March 2011 (UTC)
The list of languages in the sentence “The derivatives of this Latin word appear in Spanish, Catalan, Portuguese, Italian (cacca), Romanian, and French.” should be expanded to include German since it features the word “kacken” which is the equivalent to the English “to crap” and was apparently derived from this Latin term as well (cf. the corresponding Wiktionary entry). -- 95.223.152.23 ( talk) 12:47, 3 July 2013 (UTC)
cũlus does not mean 'anus' but 'arse, posteriors, fundament'. (See e. g. Charlton T. Lewis, Charles Short, A Latin Dictionary, available online.) For 'anus' there was the word ānus.
In the Romance languages, too, the meaning is 'arse', not 'anus'.
Since the u is long, cũlus cannot possibily derive from an IE root *kel-. Rather, obvious cognates are Celtic words like Old Irish cúl 'back', Welsh cil 'angle'. These suggest that the original meaning of cũlus had been 'back'. (See etymological dictionaries by Ernout & Meillet, de Vaan, or the Encyclopedia of IE culture by Mallory & Adams.)
There would thus be a lot to be changed in this section. -- Zxly ( talk) 13:47, 21 December 2013 (UTC)
I'm deleting a lot of irrelevant material. Cf. a previous note "citation needed" (June 2013, I've not ried to trace the author) with the comment "there's no way 'mokry', 'miazga' and 'myža' can all be cognates -- in Balto-Slavic there are no s--r alternations, no ks -> sk type metatheses (some irregular and poorly evidenced ones at best) and differences in voicing between cognates in various languages (like szydzić but шутить, gomoły but комолый) are EXTREMELY rare"-- Zxly ( talk) 15:03, 21 December 2013 (UTC)
The unsourced discussion here is mistaken on several points. See, e.g., "The Etymology of Lat. Mentula" in *Classical Philology* (Oct. 1956), Vol. 51, No. 4, pp. 247 ff. It doesn't appear (on its face anyway) to be a diminutive of 3rd-declension mens but 2nd-declension mentum or 1st-declension menta. That appearance may very well be mistaken since Cicero's letter does not derive the term from 'mintlet' but says Latin lacks the ability to discuss 'mintlets' precisely because mentula had already poisoned that well. The source of that etymology is actually Kretschmer, based on supposed but probably mistaken analogies in Greek. Tucker's is a source for the 'projection' etymology but not the source of it, which Messing gives as Zeuss. There's also Messing's own suggestion, as well as another (probably mistaken) one based on a similar-sounding word in Sanskrit. — LlywelynII 05:12, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
See also the chapter on "Mentula and its Synonyms" in J.N. Adams's 1982 Latin Sexual Vocabulary. — LlywelynII 07:45, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
It's really an aside, but I thought experts now think poppycock comes from Dutch meaning "doll poop" rather than "soft shit" aka diarrhea. Here's a source on that which I find more credible than the same old repeated tale on public wikis and reddit:
http://www.worldwidewords.org/weirdwords/ww-pop1.htm
I've looked around and basically everyone is citing OED. I recall someone in some comments mentioning they were Dutch and confirming that poppekak, not pappekak, is the correct word but I can't find it. (And yes the word is definitely from Dutch via American English--there were a lot of Dutch settlers in New York which was originally a Dutch colony, and New York state has a great deal of Dutch place names such as Schuylkill, Spuyten Duyvil, Harlem, etc.)
Okay editing to add that American Heritage Dictionary concurs: https://ahdictionary.com/word/search.html?q=poppycock
its not at all educational. its vulgar and absurd. there's nothing special about sexuality and toilet habits. this article is utter unbelonging in encyclopedia, unless footnote on rome. Yoandri Dominguez Garcia 00:11, 11 May 2020 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Yoandri Dominguez Garcia ( talk • contribs)
A discussion is taking place to address the redirect
Latin slang. The discussion will occur at
Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2021 August 9#Latin slang until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. signed,
Rosguill
talk
12:17, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
The examples provided in this section do not seem accurate either in their Latin form, nor in their translations. Unless I’m ignorant of some inscriptions which use these phrases and words like this (I’m especially thinking of “futatrix”), then I would recommend adding an explicit disclaimer that it’s pseudo-Latin, or just removing the section, since it seems to have no use. Futatrix (not a word found in Lewis and Short, so I assume it’s a misspelling of fututrix) would be active (penetrative) in meaning, not passive. Being someone’s bitch is being passive, in my opinion. The translation is therefore highly inaccurate, and, imo, cannot stand, since it is obvious misinformation. AemiliaNor ( talk) 17:30, 9 October 2023 (UTC)
![]() | Latin obscenity received a peer review by Wikipedia editors, which is now archived. It may contain ideas you can use to improve this article. |
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The french word "miction", which is the medical-technical term for urinating, is an obvious descendant of the latin's take a piss. Is it specific to french and should it appear on the page ?
@Bogdangiusca You make the confusion between French and English. French being a langage derivated directly from the latin, it's not borrowed, it's inherited directly (except words that kept the same form), English having no links with latin language (except through French), words are borrowed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A01:E35:8A8D:FE80:5BE:A00F:9223:230C ( talk) 16:46, 30 July 2016 (UTC)
As someone who doesn't know Latin and has seen (I can't say "read") only a few of Catullus's poems, I'm hoping for "glubo" to be discussed here, at least in brief. — JerryFriedman 20:30, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
Some of the Catullus poems are incorrectly labelled, I think. Will someone with more knowledge correct that, please?
Also, where does "I will bugger and ream you, you faggot Aurelius and you pervert Furius, because you thought me indecent because my poems are somewhat sissified." come from? I cannot find that translation anywhere.
surely? (unsigned comment)
Keenan Pepper asked whether "Is this notable??". Yes, Dalmatian language, although extinct, is notable for being on a different branch from the other Romance languages. Also, I'll say that people who read this kind of articles are interested in obscure things such as how to say "shit" in an extinct language. :-) bogdan 22:29, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
It is eery -to say the least - hearing in Romanian the identical expression as in the Latin fiction "cum veni(i) futui" (meaning "as soon as I came I fucked").
Well, this expression can be easily found in the Pompeii inscriptions ("ego cum veni futui"), which might be interpreted as belonging to the vulgar Latin, but it also can be found in the Latin texts (Latin literature). I will check some examples. When I encountered this expression in the literary Latin I was astonished because it is identical to the everyday language in Oltenia-Romania, where I used to live for a while. It is one of the very few examples to illustrate how the ancient Latin - a very concise language, like the Ancient Greek and other ancient languages - has preserved part of its concisiveseness in at least one of the modern neolatin languages (Romanian). "Cum veni futui" - 3 words - can only be translated in modern languages like Englsih or others by using no less than 7 words : "as soon as I came I fucked".
The "i" in the paranthesis reflects the modern Romanian ortography for the expression. In Latin: "cum veni futui" can be translated in Romanian by "cum venii, futui". Same expression, same pronounciation, one more "i" added in the Romanian writting. I would add that it is not the only example where we can see entire expressions being conserved in Romanian from the Latin: when you are saying in Latin "multae caprae sunt", this expression is absolutely identical with the Romanian "multe capre sunt" or "sunt multe capre". To my knowledge the Romanian is the only neolatin language that has preserved whole expressions from Latin; in other words it has preserved the spirit of the Latin language. Other neolatin languages have "processed " the words and the expressions according to their new rules.
I have also changed the text about "shit" (merda); it was incorrect to consider that the Romanian language has lost this word since the verb "a desmierda" comes directly from merda and it is used on a daily basis in Romanian. It was only a an omission of the author, I think.
Giuvan
Isn't this rather debatable, given what Grimm's Law did to other Latin words beginning with the same sound? Marnanel 03:16, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
What article on Latin profanity could be complete without this gem, pedicabo ego vos et irrumabo, from Catullus 16 (I will make you my boy etc):
Aureli pathice et cinaede Furi, qui me ex versiculis meis putastis, quod sunt molliculi, parum pudicum. Nam castum esse decet pium poetam ipsum, versiculos nihil necesse est; qui tum denique habent salem ac leporem, si sunt molliculi ac parum pudici, et quod pruriat incitare possunt, non dico pueris, sed his pilosis, qui duros nequeunt movere lumbos. Vos, quod milia multa basiorum legistis, male me marem putatis? Pedicabo ego vos et irrumabo.
Saganaki- 07:37, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
There is an episode of The West Wing ( Two Cathedrals) in which Jed Bartlet gets angry at God, saying
"Gratias tibi ago, domine. Haec credam a deo pio? A deo iusto, a deo scito? Cruciatus in crucem. Tuus in terra servus, nuntius fui. Officium perfeci. Cruciatus in crucem. Eas in crucem!"
which means
"I give thanks to you, O Lord. Am I really to believe that these are the acts of a loving God? A just God? A wise God? To hell with your punishments. I was your servant here on Earth. And I spread your word and I did your work. To hell with your punishments. To hell with you!"
Would this be relevant enough to add?
MosheA says the verb is conare, "to know", but I know of no such verb. I think it's conari, the deponent verb meaning "to try", and a quick search for translations supports this interpretation. [1] [2] — Keenan Pepper 19:20, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
Surely that's its right transliteration, instead of the latter "Kakaty", or may it be some typing mistake? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Frango com Nata ( talk • contribs) 18:03, 27 January 2007 (UTC). Frango com Nata 18:04, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
In what sense is "mentula" an "obscenity"? Does a Roman say "hey, chick, dig the size of my mentula", or "fuck off, you mentula"? The wp article suggests the former, while an article about the Game of Mentula (really!) suggests the latter:
-- Isidore 21:54, 6 April 2007 (UTC)
Cunnus was listed as the equivalent of vagina. Now, even though that word is often used today of the external female genitalia, rather than the internal organ, viz. the birth canal, it is strictly speaking not correct. Since it seems reasonably clear that cunnus refer mainly to the visible parts, rather than the vagina proper I have changed it to the more fitting vulva.
However, I would actually prefer cunt, etc., as it said earlier, since it has the same connotations (vague pun intended) as the latin word, but I guess the more neutral english term is preferable in Wikipedia, and I am not bold enough.
I also think that the following sections were spurious:
This seems to stem from an improper understanding of the concept of grammatical vis-à-vis sexual gender. Words commonly change gender as languages evolve, and more often that not (as far as I know) with little regard for actual alleged sexuality of the word in question. Especially the explanation that vagin should have become masculine due to the alleged masculinity of warfare strikes me as very fanciful, and unless someone can give a quotation from a linguist that states that this is in fact the probable explanation, I think it is best left out. And, in any case, it has little to do with the subject. Alatius 11:57, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
Does it make any sense at all to have a comment in the section on this word that the person who used it did not do so correctly? Since when did Cicero become the standard by which we who come to Latin as a second language will make comments that a NATIVE Speaker of the language made an error? By that standard then all of the Russians can start telling Americans that we speak incorrectly because we don't sound like Shakespeare. I am not looking to cause a deliberate fight but really, this comment in the article in inapropriate. I feel offended myself for the poor lady who left us a bit of how she speaks and might have never written anything else in her whole life, and we are going to critisize and correct her! I actually feel that she might represent how most people said the word then and that Cicero might be wrong. Maybe all the Roman eleits spoke with a lipst and that is how they got a different spelling. A much more important question is why Cicero, who killed his own people out of sheer greed, fellow Roman Citizens, without trial so that he could rule like a dictator for the rest of his year as Consul; why is he our standard to judge this woman's bit of writting as wrong. I can not protest the comment in the article strongly enough. It clearly shows an unfair bias to the Classical Latin Only movement and needs, really really needs to be removed.-- Billiot 05:10, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
Maybe it is better to say what type of Latin it is as opposed to what type of Latin it isn't. This would allow it to be mentioned in a possitive light and not a negative light giving the impression that it is somehow wrong. I would be much better to change the article to say that it IS vulgar Latin, where now it says that it ISN'T classical Latin.-- Billiot 16:55, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
Small comment on this matter: calling something "Vulgar Latin" in *not* calling it "wrong," it is merely calling it the common spoken form of Latin. I found the statement entirely innocuous: as Latin learners, we naively expect the only form of Latin that is generally taught, the so-called classical Latin. So the statement basically said "this is different from what we (semi-naive nonnative Latin "speakers") would expect, as it is Vulgar Latin." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.26.94.161 ( talk) 06:52, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but why would -is be a Vulgar Latin perfect ending? It would simply be un-Latin. At least it never made its way even into spoken usage, witness the daughter languages, who still have the reflexes of -isti, like Italian (-esti) or Spanish (-iste). futuis is an impeccable present form, and a present fits the context. So I corrected the English translation and put the f-word in the present rather than present perfect. -- Zxly ( talk) 13:16, 21 December 2013 (UTC)
Normally I wouldn't be quite so picky, but in an article about Latin vocabulary and grammar I just cannot resist. In the following passage from the "cunnus" entry, should not "metaphorically" be something "through ' synecdoche' or ' metonymy'" (probably synecdoche):
Horace's Sermones I.2 and I.3 use the word:
- Nam fuit ante Helenam cunnus taeterrima belli
causa. . .which attributes, metaphorically, the cause of the Trojan War to Helen of Troy's vulva.
-- BSweezy 21:19, 16 July 2007 (UTC)
This article is about obscene language, not profane language. The title of the article is wrong. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.93.17.66 ( talk) 23:46, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
Dave, if you have specialist knowledge on this, I'm sure the world would benefit from your expertise. Please improve the page. Thanks Muleiolenimi ( talk) 19:54, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
The article claims makes it sound like vargă is the preferred word for penis. As a Romanian speaker, I never have heard this word and it's obscure at best. The preferred word in Romanian is "pulă" which probably derives from the Latin 'pilum' or spear. So the article is correct in that the word is euphemistic and indirect, but the article just uses the wrong word! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.166.64.3 ( talk) 15:36, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Why does the article translate "merda" as "shit", but "cunnus" as "vulva"? Yet the text itself makes clear that "cunnus" was considered an obscene word - meaning that the translation would be "cunt" or perhaps "pussy". Alternatively, if Wikipedia's policy is to give formal translations that don't reflect the vulgarity of the Latin words, why is "merda" not translated as "faeces" or "excrement"? 86.155.66.63 ( talk) 17:13, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
Could there be a connection between the German "Fotze" and the Latin "Fossa"? -- Slashme ( talk) 15:03, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
Caesari Servilia futatrix would more accurately translate as "a bitch to Caesar", considering the dative case (caesari) and not the genitive (which would have been caesaris), although it's also possible it was a mistake on the part of the producers. I'm also wondering if the frequent use of cunt (which was subject to censorship in many editions of the series) is in any way related to actual Roman use of cunnus.
Does anyone know (or can provide a source for) the graffiti seen during the opening credits? There appears to be futuere simul written on one of the walls (not quite sure due to the use of Roman cursive), but that would appear ungrammatical. Other graffiti include correct nobilitas miseria nostra ("artistocracy (is) our trouble") and arma ("weapon") beneath a soldier with a giant sopio (the word sopio doesn't appear, but the graphic style fits).
And while we're at it, some sources for Pompeii graffiti examples would have been nice. -- 93.105.205.33 ( talk) 11:08, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
This was the only "swear" we learned in Latin class. Although it's not nearly as naughty as the other words here (I wish I had had this reference in high school), it seems like it deserves a mention. Does anyone else think it belongs and maybe have some knowledge about the etymology / usage examples? Klinebottle ( talk) 04:18, 23 March 2011 (UTC)
The list of languages in the sentence “The derivatives of this Latin word appear in Spanish, Catalan, Portuguese, Italian (cacca), Romanian, and French.” should be expanded to include German since it features the word “kacken” which is the equivalent to the English “to crap” and was apparently derived from this Latin term as well (cf. the corresponding Wiktionary entry). -- 95.223.152.23 ( talk) 12:47, 3 July 2013 (UTC)
cũlus does not mean 'anus' but 'arse, posteriors, fundament'. (See e. g. Charlton T. Lewis, Charles Short, A Latin Dictionary, available online.) For 'anus' there was the word ānus.
In the Romance languages, too, the meaning is 'arse', not 'anus'.
Since the u is long, cũlus cannot possibily derive from an IE root *kel-. Rather, obvious cognates are Celtic words like Old Irish cúl 'back', Welsh cil 'angle'. These suggest that the original meaning of cũlus had been 'back'. (See etymological dictionaries by Ernout & Meillet, de Vaan, or the Encyclopedia of IE culture by Mallory & Adams.)
There would thus be a lot to be changed in this section. -- Zxly ( talk) 13:47, 21 December 2013 (UTC)
I'm deleting a lot of irrelevant material. Cf. a previous note "citation needed" (June 2013, I've not ried to trace the author) with the comment "there's no way 'mokry', 'miazga' and 'myža' can all be cognates -- in Balto-Slavic there are no s--r alternations, no ks -> sk type metatheses (some irregular and poorly evidenced ones at best) and differences in voicing between cognates in various languages (like szydzić but шутить, gomoły but комолый) are EXTREMELY rare"-- Zxly ( talk) 15:03, 21 December 2013 (UTC)
The unsourced discussion here is mistaken on several points. See, e.g., "The Etymology of Lat. Mentula" in *Classical Philology* (Oct. 1956), Vol. 51, No. 4, pp. 247 ff. It doesn't appear (on its face anyway) to be a diminutive of 3rd-declension mens but 2nd-declension mentum or 1st-declension menta. That appearance may very well be mistaken since Cicero's letter does not derive the term from 'mintlet' but says Latin lacks the ability to discuss 'mintlets' precisely because mentula had already poisoned that well. The source of that etymology is actually Kretschmer, based on supposed but probably mistaken analogies in Greek. Tucker's is a source for the 'projection' etymology but not the source of it, which Messing gives as Zeuss. There's also Messing's own suggestion, as well as another (probably mistaken) one based on a similar-sounding word in Sanskrit. — LlywelynII 05:12, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
See also the chapter on "Mentula and its Synonyms" in J.N. Adams's 1982 Latin Sexual Vocabulary. — LlywelynII 07:45, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
It's really an aside, but I thought experts now think poppycock comes from Dutch meaning "doll poop" rather than "soft shit" aka diarrhea. Here's a source on that which I find more credible than the same old repeated tale on public wikis and reddit:
http://www.worldwidewords.org/weirdwords/ww-pop1.htm
I've looked around and basically everyone is citing OED. I recall someone in some comments mentioning they were Dutch and confirming that poppekak, not pappekak, is the correct word but I can't find it. (And yes the word is definitely from Dutch via American English--there were a lot of Dutch settlers in New York which was originally a Dutch colony, and New York state has a great deal of Dutch place names such as Schuylkill, Spuyten Duyvil, Harlem, etc.)
Okay editing to add that American Heritage Dictionary concurs: https://ahdictionary.com/word/search.html?q=poppycock
its not at all educational. its vulgar and absurd. there's nothing special about sexuality and toilet habits. this article is utter unbelonging in encyclopedia, unless footnote on rome. Yoandri Dominguez Garcia 00:11, 11 May 2020 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Yoandri Dominguez Garcia ( talk • contribs)
A discussion is taking place to address the redirect
Latin slang. The discussion will occur at
Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2021 August 9#Latin slang until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. signed,
Rosguill
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12:17, 9 August 2021 (UTC)
The examples provided in this section do not seem accurate either in their Latin form, nor in their translations. Unless I’m ignorant of some inscriptions which use these phrases and words like this (I’m especially thinking of “futatrix”), then I would recommend adding an explicit disclaimer that it’s pseudo-Latin, or just removing the section, since it seems to have no use. Futatrix (not a word found in Lewis and Short, so I assume it’s a misspelling of fututrix) would be active (penetrative) in meaning, not passive. Being someone’s bitch is being passive, in my opinion. The translation is therefore highly inaccurate, and, imo, cannot stand, since it is obvious misinformation. AemiliaNor ( talk) 17:30, 9 October 2023 (UTC)