コンテンツにスキップ

利用者:加藤勝憲/ラテン語まがいの言語

Costard: Go to; thou hast it ad dungill, at the fingers' ends, as they say. Holofernes: O, I smell false Latine; dunghill for unguem.[1]
Broken "Latin" inscription in Fishguard

Dog Latin or cod Latin is a phrase or jargon that imitates Latin,[2] often by "translating" English words (or those of other languages) into Latin by conjugating or declining them as if they were Latin words. Dog Latin is usually a humorous device mocking scholarly seriousness. It can also mean a poor-quality attempt at writing genuine Latin.

History[編集]

このような例はシェイクスピアよりも古く、1590年代の戯曲『恋の骨折り損』には、犬のラテン語に関する記述がある。

Examples of this predate even Shakespeare, whose 1590s play, Love's Labour's Lost, includes a reference to dog Latin:

Fifty-two volumes in folio, of the acta sanctorum, in dog-latin, would be a formidable enterprise to the most laborious German.[3]

Thomas Jefferson mentioned dog Latin by name in 1815:

Patres conscripti took a boat, and went to Philippi;
Boatum est upsettum, magno cum grandine venti.
Omnes drownderunt qui swim away non potuerunt.
Trumpeter unus erat, qui coatum scarlet habebat;
Et magnum periwig, tied about with the tail of a dead pig.[4]

Examples[編集]

  • Illegitimi non carborundum, interpreted as 'Don't let the bastards grind you down'.
  • Semper ubi sub ubi is unintelligible as Latin, but translates word for word as 'always where under where', interpreted as 'always wear underwear'.[5]
  • A once-common schoolboy doggerel which, though very poor Latin, would have done a tolerable job of reinforcing the rhythms of Latin hexameters:

The conscript fathers [i.e. Senators] took a boat and went to Philippi.
The boat was upset by a great hailstorm of wind.
All drowned who could not swim away.
There was a trumpeter, who had a scarlet coat,
and a great periwig, tied about with the tail of a dead pig.

Insofar as this specimen can be translated, it is as follows:
Stormum surgebat et boatum oversetebat Excipe John Periwig tied up to the tail of a dead pig.[6]
The meter uses Latin vowel quantities for the Latin parts, and to some extent follows English stress in the English parts.
Another variant has similar lines in a different order:

Caesar adsum jam forte
Brutus aderat
Caesar sic in omnibus
Brutus sic in at

The meaning here is "The storm rose up and overturned the boat" and "Except for John Periwig", etc.
  • Another verse in similar vein, from Geoffrey Willans' Down with Skool, is:[7]

Caesar 'ad [had] some jam for tea
Brutus 'ad a rat
Caesar sick in omnibus
Brutus sick in 'at [hat]

which, when read aloud using traditional English pronunciation of Latin, sounds like the following:

I, Caesar, am already here by chance
Brutus was present
Caesar thus in all things
Brutus thus in but

but which means in Latin
camera necessaria pro usus cookare, cum saucepannis, stewpannis, scullero, dressero, coalholo, stovis, smoak-jacko; pro roastandum, boilandum, fryandum, et plumpudding mixandum, pro turtle soupos, calve's-head-hashibus, cum calipee et calepashibus.
  • The following spoof of legal Latin, in the fictional case of Daniel v Dishclout (from George Alexander Stevens' "Lecture on Heads", 1765),[8] describes a kitchen:
A necessary room for the purpose of cooking, with saucepans, stewpans, scullery, dresser, coalhole, stoves, smoke-jack; for roasting, boiling, frying, and mixing plum pudding, for turtle soups, calves'-head hashes, with calipee and calipashes.
In English, this is: 
  1. ^ What’s the origin of pig Latin?”. The Straight Dope (2004年6月1日). 2022年5月22日閲覧。
  2. ^ Brewer, E. Cobham. Dictionary of Phrase & Fable. Dog-Latin.”. Bartleby.com. 2022年5月22日閲覧。
  3. ^ Letter to John Adams, 08/10/1815, Gutenberg.org
    I had supposed them defunct with the society of Jesuits, of which they were: and that their works, although above ground, were, from their bulk and insignificance, as effectually entombed on their shelves, as if in the graves of their authors. Fifty-two volumes in folio, of the acta sanctorum, in dog-Latin, would be a formidable enterprise to the most laborious German.
  4. ^ Notes and Queries. (October 13, 1855). https://books.google.com/books?id=uIrWLegNZxUC&pg=PA288 2010年1月16日閲覧。 
  5. ^ S.O.M.A., Soma's Dictionary of Latin Quotations, Maxims and Phrases, 2010, ISBN 1425144977, s.v.
  6. ^ Percival Leigh (1840). The comic Latin grammar. Charles Tilt. p. 152. https://archive.org/details/comiclatingramm00leiggoog 2010年1月16日閲覧。 
  7. ^ Willans, Geoffrey; Searle, Ronald (1953). Down with Skool!. London: Max Parrish. https://books.google.com/books?id=BcAUySObyaoC&pg=PT50 
  8. ^ George Alexander Stevens (1802年5月22日). “A Lecture on Heads”. Printed by T. Bensley for Vernor and Hood [etc .]. 2022年5月22日閲覧。


  • The Red Green Show closes each episode with the recitation of the Possum Lodge motto, Quando omni flunkus moritati - which can be translated as "When all else fails, play dead".
  • Finnish death metal band Omnium Gatherum gets its name from 1500s era butchered Latin meaning "a hodgepodge of various things".
  • The title of death/folk metal Verbal Deception's debut album Aurum Aetus Piraticus is Dog Latin for "Golden Age of Piracy".
  • The songs of Era, a musical project by Eric Lévi, are usually in Latin-sounding gibberish.
  • The magazine name Atlas Obscura is not proper Latin.
  • A running gag in the series of Looney Tunes cartoons starring Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner assigns different fake Dog Latin species names in each episode to Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner.[1] The actual Latin species names for the coyote and road runner were used in a 2003 episode of the series, The Whizzard of Ow.
  • The Warhammer 40,000 wargame universe makes frequent use of pseudo-latin (which is referred to in-universe as 'High Gothic') in its product names and background material. This is to protect copyright as much as for artistic reasons, as Games Workshop (the games producers) found they were unable to trademark generic terms such as 'space marine' or 'imperial guard'.

関連項目[編集]

 

脚注[編集]

  1. ^ Roadrunner&Coyote”. Home.ku.edu.tr. 2022年5月22日閲覧。

[[Category:ユーモア]] [[Category:ラテン語]]