Orationi tuae condimenta - Spice for your speech - Examples of Roman's thinking

The Egyptian-Greek-Roman God of Silence, Harpocrates

If you want to “untie your gullet”- to open your mouth to say something, which is different from the “earlier” – ordinary- , “rubbed off” - worn off - phrases, you can find plenty of inspiration in foreign languages like Latin.

If you think “Oh no!”, then stop reading after having said this in Latin: “Ei” or “Euheu”!

But if you say  “Ei mihi”- Woe is me - because you “lead fire” and “love of someone has come”  - because you have fallen in love with someone that is -you’ll find examples, which will ”attach you with amusement” – amuse you-  in order to express things concerning that now:

-          Are you saying “Thanks to your superb efficiency” - Well done! – and are you “leading a move with a sigh” – sigh - every time you get to know things done by him or her?

-          Are you “carrying the spirit” - feel like doing - to “join kisses” - to give kisses - with him or her and give “honey sweet bites” to him or her?

-          Do you want to “go to sea” - have sex -, being accompanied by “running winds” with you “hanging on the wave”- swimming on the comb of the wave ; do you want to “beat the air with pressed out water” -  to sprinkle with a fountain?

-          Are you “attaching a song of the swans” - a song of suit or courtship - to your beloved?

-         Are you trying to improve your outlook after having looked at your picture in the mirror, which was “struck back through the air”, and are you beginning to arrange your clothes, which are “bitten by the braces” – or clasped by them - in another way?

-          Are you trying to “catch the commandments” – satisfy the regulations – of other people giving you love advice?

Then hopefully those things won’t happen to you:

-          You should not lead the boat into a “rushing river” where another person fallen in love with him or her lives – a rival (= living on the river = rivus in Latin) that is.  

-          You should not “lead a box on the ear “of your rival, but “act with the peace of others” – act without offending someone

-          Hopefully the adored person “sows no trouble” by “deceiving your face” – cheating you

-          Hopefully you won’t “become soft of love”  - become ill because of love-, because of having difficulty “picking the air” – breathing”  and having a “narrow breath” – being short of breath - because you “were burnt by love”

-          You should not “accept the iron” – accept the deathblow by a sword, if you “have a damaged thing” – if you are in an awkward situation. 

 If the other person does not love you, you might try to “lead the adored person to your opinion”, by “throwing yourself back and forth” – by boasting that is – in order to “brake him or her by your alleged reputation” – in order to convince him or her of yourself.

 Don’t end up like Daphne or Callisto: hunting but not wanting to love at all.

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Some References:

·         “damaged thing” (res adflicta, Caesar de bello Gallico) =  “awkward situation”

·         “to lead someone to your opinion”  = “you convince somebody of something”

·        “to lead somebody through a box on the ear” (alapa ducere, Gregorius Magnus, Vita benedicti)= “to hit somebody”

·         urere alqm = to turn somebody’s head

·         To do something with the peace of somebody else (Cic Milone Oratio, aliquid pace tua agere): You do something without offending somebody else

·         aliquis trahit ignes (you fall in love if you are leading Fire)

·         to knock/beat the air with pressed out water = to sprinkle with a fountain (Ovid, Metamorphosen) (pulsare aera expressis aquis)

·         ferrum recipere (= to accept the deathblow) (Cicero, tusculanae)

·         to assume a face = fingere vultum = to show a beeming smile (Metamorphosen, Ovid)

·         love of something comes (amor alicuius venit) love is awakening (Tacitus Annales)

·         if you have a feeling, you are attached by it (affici) (to put into a mood = to be  attached with soul = animis adfici)

·          Sing songs to so. = to attach someone with songs

·         If you are short of breath, then your breath is narrow (spiritus angustus est)

·         Well done! = Thanks to your superb efficiency! (Macte virtute! Cicero, Tusculanen)

·         you do not convince somebody with your reputation, but you brake him (auctoritate frangere, Cicero, Tusculanae)

·         to pick the air = to breathe (Vergil, Aeneis)= to reciprocate the air (reciprocare animam)

·         To ask for trouble = to sow trouble (serere certamina, Livius, ab urbe)

·         Limata oratio = rasped speech (Cicero De oratore)

·         Animus ferre (Ovid, Metamorphoseon, I, 775) = to feel like doing, to fancy  Literal. “to carry the spirit”

·         Fauces resolvere (Ovid, Metamorphoeson, III, 282) = to open the mouth, Literal “to untie the abysm/gullet”

·         Oscula iungere (Ovid , M. II, 357) = give kisses

·         Trahere motu suspiria (Ovid II, 753) sigh

·         Decipere ora alicuius (Ovid, Metamorphosen VII, 783) = to lead somebody around by the nose

·         Trahere in exemplumalqm.  = to model oneself on someone (Vergil, Aeneis VIII, 245)

·         Fibula mordit = braces bite = braces clasp (Vergil, Aeneis VIII, 318)

·         Flumen currit  = riverruns = riverflows (Vergil, Aeneis, VIII 560)

·         summo in fluctu pendere = to swim on top of the wave (Vergil Aeneis I, 106)

·         iussa capessere = to fulfill prescriptions

·         venti ruunt = it's storming, storms are blustering

·         to go to sea = to have sex

·         Urere alqm= to turn somebody's head (Piccolomini, Euryalus u. Lucretia)

·         Amore languere = to get sick of love

·         Melliflui morsus = bites which are sweet as honey

·         Komos = song of swans, Comedy, Song of courtship/suit