Salvete,
I recently read the Spanish version of Marguerite Yourcenar’s Mémoires d’Hadrian and I ran into the translation of Hadrian’s famous epitaph. Unlike the Spanish translation, I think that PALLIDULA RIGIDA NUDULA refer to the soul and not to the LOCA. In my own analysis I don’t find any (grammatical) reason why I couldn´t be so. Actually, I find more reasons to think that these words refer to the soul and not otherwise:
Animula vagula blandula
Hospes comesque corporis
Quae nunc abibis in loca
Pallidula rigida nudula
Nec ut soles dabis iocos.
A. The epitaph’s composition
ANIMULA VAGULA BLANDULA
1 2 3
PALLIDULA RIGIDA NUDULA
1 2 3
B. To my limited understanding of the Latin language, it makes somehow more sense that the soul goes to places in the state of being pale, hard and nude/bare and not that the soul goes to places that are pale, hard and nude/bare themselves.
Am I missing something? Is there something in the grammar that wouldn’t allow this interpretation?
Thank you all for your feedback. I am a new member.
@Pacifica: In an earlier post, you mentioned this possibility as well: THREAD: the-quotations-expressions-association-thread
I recently read the Spanish version of Marguerite Yourcenar’s Mémoires d’Hadrian and I ran into the translation of Hadrian’s famous epitaph. Unlike the Spanish translation, I think that PALLIDULA RIGIDA NUDULA refer to the soul and not to the LOCA. In my own analysis I don’t find any (grammatical) reason why I couldn´t be so. Actually, I find more reasons to think that these words refer to the soul and not otherwise:
Animula vagula blandula
Hospes comesque corporis
Quae nunc abibis in loca
Pallidula rigida nudula
Nec ut soles dabis iocos.
A. The epitaph’s composition
ANIMULA VAGULA BLANDULA
1 2 3
PALLIDULA RIGIDA NUDULA
1 2 3
B. To my limited understanding of the Latin language, it makes somehow more sense that the soul goes to places in the state of being pale, hard and nude/bare and not that the soul goes to places that are pale, hard and nude/bare themselves.
Am I missing something? Is there something in the grammar that wouldn’t allow this interpretation?
Thank you all for your feedback. I am a new member.
@Pacifica: In an earlier post, you mentioned this possibility as well: THREAD: the-quotations-expressions-association-thread