"Enjoy greatly"

Nina1992

New Member

Hello everyone,

Firstly, thanks for accepting me on this forum. I'll do my best to write this post in flawless English, but it's not my mother tongue so please excuse me if I make some errors.

Now to the translation request. Recently, two of my friends had a baby together. The little boy is called Max. As a present, me and some other friends want to give the newly parents both a bracelet with an inscription. Of course, we could have just went with 'Max, date of birth', but would be too unoriginal for my taste. I like wordplays. The father of the child likes Latin phrases (which I'm sure has something to do with being a University student). So, for the inscription, I would like to come up with a Latin phrase that includes 'Max'.

The name 'Max' is for me associated with the Latin 'Maximus'. In Dutch (my native language), and I guess in English too, 'Max' is often used as an abbreviation for 'maximaal' (to the limit) or 'maximum' (at the most), both words translating in English to 'maximum'. A thing Dutch people (especially students) would say to each other when having a nice time, is 'maximaal genieten'. As in, you're sitting in the sun drinking a beer, and you say to your friend: "dit is maximaal genieten!"

In English that would directly translate to: "this is enjoying greatly", but that doesn't make sense. It makes more sense in the imperative: "enjoy greatly!" Which would actually make sense in Dutch too (then it would be "geniet maximaal!"). So, I would like to get a proper Latin translation of "enjoy greatly", which has to have 'Max' in it. I tried to figure it out myself, using google translate (I know, I know, I'm sorry). I ended up with 'Fruere maximum'. Then I checked with some of my friends who had Latin in high school. They told me that 'Fruere maximum' doesn't make sense, and I should use 'Fruere in maxo' or 'Frumini maxime' instead. I have no clue whether (one of) these are correct, and it's hard to check since I never had a Latin course.

Which brings me to this forum. Can you tell me if the suggestions my friends gave me are correct? And do they correspond to the meaning of the phrase that I envisioned, as I tried to explain in the above paragraphs? And/or do you maybe have other, more Latin-appropriate, suggestions for a (short) phrase with the name 'Max' that I could use?

I hope that I have been clear in my explanation. Please let me know if more information is needed. Thanks you very much for your effort!
 
B

Bitmap

Guest

So, I would like to get a proper Latin translation of "enjoy greatly", which has to have 'Max' in it. I tried to figure it out myself, using google translate (I know, I know, I'm sorry). I ended up with 'Fruere maximum'.
That's surprisingly close for google translate. Technically, it even works, but with the caveat that maximum as an adverb is mainly encountered in poetry. The more prosaic, textbook-like choice for "enjoy greatly" would be
fruere maxime (in the singular, as a command to one person) or
fruimini maxime (in the plural, as a command to more than one person).

FWIW "This is to enjoy greatly" would be hoc est maxime frui and "This is to be enjoyed greatly/ this has to be enjoyed greatly" [which I suspect dit is maximaal genieten could mean*] would be hoc maxime fruendum est.
The word order is free, so you can juggle the words around if you want (e.g. maxime fruere is fine as well).

* My Dutch is rather limited ... is "dit is maximaal genieten" like "dit moet je maximaal genieten"?

Then I checked with some of my friends who had Latin in high school. They told me that 'Fruere maximum' doesn't make sense, and I should use 'Fruere in maxo' or 'Frumini maxime' instead. I have no clue whether (one of) these are correct, and it's hard to check since I never had a Latin course.
You should get new friends.

Can you tell me if the suggestions my friends gave me are correct?
They are not correct.
 

Nina1992

New Member

Thank you for your reply! I'm gonna go with 'Fruere Maxime'

* My Dutch is rather limited ... is "dit is maximaal genieten" like "dit moet je maximaal genieten"
No, it is more like 'this is great'. I don't know if this is common in English too, but in Dutch one could say as sort of a statement when having a nice time: 'enjoying' / 'genieten'.

You should get new friends.
Well, we weren't that close anyway...
 
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