Eamus Catuli

Masondeanm

Member

Location:
CANADA
So every so often my dad will give me a Latin phrase to translate, and today he gave me this one. Knowing the context, it's supposed to mean Let's go Cubs and indeed, the litteral translation does use those words. My question is, is let's go used idiomatically like this in Latin? My guess would be no but I'd like to be sure—for all I know the idomatic meaning came from Latin haha.
 

Araneus

Umbraticus Lector

  • Civis Illustris

Location:
Norvegia
Eamus would mean "let's go", yes. It's a hortative subjunctive.
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium
Something like "come on, let's do this well"?
 

Masondeanm

Member

Location:
CANADA
What does it mean instead?
Let's go X has the idomatic meanings:

I wish for X to do well.
I consider what X just did (or what I was just told that X had done) to be good.

There may be some other's but those are what I can think of.
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium
The first meaning could be render with something like bene/feliciter vertat! the second one with something like bene factum! or euge! or macte virtute!
 

Masondeanm

Member

Location:
CANADA
One could say Let's go Cubs! while someone is at bat, before they hit the ball, to show you're wishing the Cubs do well. One could also say Let's go Cubs! after someone from the Cubs just hit a home run, to show their enthusiastic approval of what just happened. Personally, however, I generally use different intonations for those two uses.
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium
One could say Let's go Cubs! while someone is at bat, before they hit the ball, to show you're wishing the Cubs do well.
In this sort of situation I could imagine agite being used.
 

Masondeanm

Member

Location:
CANADA
Based off what you guys are syaing, it seems that I was correct and eamus catuli, although litterally translated to let's go Cubs, does not, infact, mean in Latin what it is supposed to mean.
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium
At any rate I personally don't think I've ever seen eamus used that way.
 

Masondeanm

Member

Location:
CANADA
A quick scan of the Wikepidea page on the phrase doesn't seem to suggest it is incorrect in anyway, however.
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium
Sorry, I'm not sure what you mean. Does Wikipedia say that Romans used eamus in the same way that "let's go" is used in English in the contexts you described earlier?
 

Masondeanm

Member

Location:
CANADA
Sorry, I'm not sure what you mean. Does Wikipedia say that Romans used eamus in the same way that "let's go" is used in English in the contexts you described earlier?
No, sorry, there is a Wikepidia page for the phrase Eamus Catuli.
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium
The fact that a Wiki article (which probaly wasn't even written by Latinists) doesn't say that the phrase is wrong means very little. Anyway, it isn't terribly wrong in that it's grammatically correct and makes some sense, but I just have big doubts as to eamus ever having been used in authentic Latin with the meanings you described earlier in this thread.
 

Aurifex

Aedilis

  • Aedilis

  • Patronus

Location:
England
You're never going to obtain a completely satisfactory translation when the meaning of the English varies so radically according to the context it is used in.

Eamus, Catuli! isn't an unreasonable choice under the circumstances, and it has one virtue at least, which is that the intended meaning is transparent.

In view of this transparency, it's a puzzle to me why it took so long (according to the Wiki page) for someone to work out the meaning of the phrase when it was first used publicly.
 
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