Tattoo I love Latin, but I suck at it...

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium

meisenimverbis

Civis Illustris

  • Civis Illustris

Location:
Rio de Janeiro
Does the "I suck" concept comes from the 18th century? How do Romans brag. What's like "I'm the best!" in Latin?
 

meisenimverbis

Civis Illustris

  • Civis Illustris

Location:
Rio de Janeiro
quamvis cara mihi stulto sit lingua Latina,
Hum...

cara mihi stulto lingua Latina...

quamquam cara mihi lingua Latina, stultus nescio ea uti
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium
Does the "I suck" concept comes from the 18th century?
The earliest instance of "to suck" in the figurative meaning of "to be bad" given by the OED dates only from 1971, and slightly earlier (1968) in the longer version "to suck gorilla dicks" (which, by the way, I don't think I had come across before).
How do Romans brag. What's like "I'm the best!" in Latin?
I guess you could say omnibus praesto, optimus omnium sum, or any number of similar things, but it would depend on context.
 
Last edited:

meisenimverbis

Civis Illustris

  • Civis Illustris

Location:
Rio de Janeiro
The earliest instance of "to suck" in the figurative meaning of "to be bad" given by the OED dates only from 1971, and slightly earlier (1968) in the longer version "to suck gorilla dicks" (which, by the way, I don't think I had come across before).
I mean to be derogatory in the first person, to lament the self...

(This reminds me of the "o me miserum" though... But it's different from "I'm the worst of all creatures".)
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium
I mean to be derogatory in the first person, to lament the self...
I guess the possibility of putting it in the first person was there ever since the expression appeared, but the OLD doesn't give a single example of "I suck". This comes close, though, since it's referring to an (in)ability of the author's:

1992 Just to have Fun in alt.personals.misc (Usenet newsgroup) 19 Dec. My spelling sucks donkey dick so excuse it if you would.
 

meisenimverbis

Civis Illustris

  • Civis Illustris

Location:
Rio de Janeiro
Or
quamquam cara mihi lingua Latina, stultus pauperrime ea utor
 

meisenimverbis

Civis Illustris

  • Civis Illustris

Location:
Rio de Janeiro
Quia stultissimus sum! :bawling::bawling::bawling:
 
B

Bitmap

Guest

1992 Just to have Fun in alt.personals.misc (Usenet newsgroup) 19 Dec. My spelling sucks donkey dick so excuse it if you would.
So in the expression "to suck ass", ass is actually to be taken as the animal.

quamquam cara mihi lingua Latina, stultus pauperrime ea utor
The Latin word pauper rather exclusively means "poor" in the literal sense of "not wealthy, penniless, destitute".
"Poor" in the sense of "miserable" is more like miser.
 

meisenimverbis

Civis Illustris

  • Civis Illustris

Location:
Rio de Janeiro
The Latin word pauper rather exclusively means "poor" in the literal sense of "not wealthy, penniless, destitute".
"Poor" in the sense of "miserable" is more like miser.
No metaphor is possible with pauper?
 

syntaxianus

Civis Illustris

  • Civis Illustris

Location:
Massachusetts, USA
Another option...

studiosissimus Latinae linguae sum, sed valde imperitissime ea utor.

But for parallelism with the original formulation, I favor "...nihili sum in eius usum" or "...ad eius usum." "Iam really worthless at using it."
 

meisenimverbis

Civis Illustris

  • Civis Illustris

Location:
Rio de Janeiro
No, that's why I'm pointing it out.
I'll have to go with pessime, then, I guess...

stultus pessime ea utor

I like the solution with 'stultus', because it's very much like "I suck". This feels like "I suck at it!" I'm really bad at it and I despise myself because of that!
 

Gregorius

Civis Illustris

  • Civis Illustris

What would you think of Diligō linguam latīnam, sed improbissimē eā ūtor?

Or perhaps, with a gerund in the dative of respect, Diligō linguam latīnam, sed improbissumus sum eā ūtendō?
 

willemv369

Member

Does Linguam Latinam amo, sed male novi still have the upvote?

Or did a better one come out of the discussion so far?
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium
Personally, out of all suggestions so far, I would choose one of these three, which are about equally good in my opinion:
Linguam Latinam amo, sed sane nescio = "I love Latin but, really, I don't know it."
Linguam Latinam amo, sed male novi = "I love Latin but I know it badly/I don't know it well."
Diligo quidem linguam Latinam,
sed non satis eam calleo.
A fairly literal back-translation of that last one is "I love Latin (indeed), but I don't know it very well".
 
Top