Duty requires sacrifice

Nessunday

New Member

Hey guys,

Can anyone tell me what the translation would be for
'Duty requires sacrifice'

(Its for part of a tattoo design)
Cheers
 

Adrian

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One way of translating your request could be (quite litteral version):
Officium requirit sacrificium.
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

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Location:
Belgium
Sacrificium is a religious sacrifice, as when you slay a bull before an altar or so.

I might suggest iacturam instead.
 

Agrippa

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How about

Nullum officium
sine labore


NVLLVM OFFICIVM
SINE LABORE

(No duty without labor)


Cf. Horace sat. 1, 9, 59f.:

Nil sine magno vita labore dedit mortalibus

(Life allows nothing to mortals without great labor.)
 

Agrippa

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Additional remark:

Nullum officium sine labore] more detailed: Nullum officium sine labore praestatur (verbatim: No duty is fulfilled without labor/pain/suffering)

praestatur
may be omitted to get a more concise motto.
 

Nessunday

New Member

I should clerify,

'Duty requires sacrifice'
As in sacrificing everything (parts of your mind and body) for military service/in the service of others

Hope that helps
 

Agrippa

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Thank you for clarifying. Your military motto could be:

Nullum officium sine capitis devotione.

i. e. No duty without devoting of yourself.
 
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Bradicus

New Member

Duty requires sacrifice.

Duty: certainly officium is technically correct in this sense, but seems a bit impersonal. I would suggest pietas, which expresses a duty to the gods, family (particularly parents), friends, and country; duty based on personal devotion.

Sacrifice: Agrippa had it right, labor - toil requiring sacrifice.

Requires: requiro works and is a safe choice; but exigo - to demand, require, enforce, exact the performance of any ... duty (L&S, sv.) takes the sense up a notch.

pietas exigit laborem

not a standard word order (s-o-v), nor based on the English, but rather emphasis and euphony.
 

Michael Zwingli

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Duty: certainly officium is technically correct in this sense, but seems a bit impersonal. I would suggest pietas, which expresses a duty to the gods, family (particularly parents), friends, and country; duty based on personal devotion.
Yes, pietas is better, but I don't think that the Romans had a word for "duty" in a particular modern sense: doing what one requires of oneself based solely upon ones own concept of duty, rather than upon personal devotion or official obligation. I don't think that either officium or pietas could properly be used to translate Oscar Wilde's statement that: "Mr. Henry James writes fiction as if it were a painful duty."
 
E

Etaoin Shrdlu

Guest

Where did he say that? I rather like it, but the internet only throws up sites that often trade in fake quotes, and without chapter and verse it all looks slightly dodgy.
 

Agrippa

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In that sentence, officium would actually work well, I think.
I agree, as well: Consentio cum Bitmap et Pacifica. Inspicite quaeso, ut alia praetermittam, Thesaurum Linguae Latinae (TLL) s. v. officium. Permulta ibi exempla afferuntur quibus officium confirmatur. Cic. inv. 1, 6:
id quod facere debet (sc. orator), officium esse dicimus
Mar. Victorin. rhet. p. 197, 14:
officium, quod ex legibus vel ex natura necesse est nos implere
Coniungunter saepe cum hac notione officii denominationes professionum: officium vilici, tonsoris, remigis, rhetoris, oratoris, medici, militis (cf. Caes. Gall. 5, 33, 2: Cotta ... in pugna militis officia praestabat) &c..
 

Agrippa

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By the way: How about Nelson’s famous battle signal hoisted to the mastheads of the Victory:

“England expects that every man will do his duty.”

Britannia exspectat ut suum quisque praestet officium

respectively:

Britanni exspectant ut suum quisque praestet officium.
 

syntaxianus

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“England expects that every man will do his duty.”
Or possibly...

Expectat Britannia ut unus quisque munere suo fungatur.

Munus
would fit the possible Oscar Wilde quotation as well.
 
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Agrippa

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... Oscar Wilde's statement that: "Mr. Henry James writes fiction as if it were a painful duty."
Where did he say that? ...
Source of quotation:
Oscar Wilde: The Decay Of Lying: An Observation
___________________________________________________________________________________
Henricus James sic narrat tamquam officio ingrato sive molesto munere fungatur.
 
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