[HPforGrownups] Re: Latin in Harry Potter--Arabella Figg (again)

[yr awen]

No: HPFGUIDX 42627

::list's resident Anglo-Saxonist leaps into the room, axe at the ready::

Sorry... Eloise's post caught my eye <g> This *will* be on topic, I swear it.
  Eloise:
  Are you sure about that? I understood that about 50% of the words in common 
  usage derive from Old English, which is a Germanic tongue. Of course, if you 
  include scientific, technical and medical terms, the results are going to be 
  skewed significantly towards Greek and Latin. French, Italian and Spanish 
  have much higher Latin quotients than English, I would venture.<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
  Well, French, Italian & c. are Romance languages, derived directly from Latin. I think it's Wheelocke who asserts that the Romance languages are more or less new forms of old local dialects and corruptions in spoken Latin.

  Eloise:
  In any case, as I have pointed out, Arabella already has a perfectly good 
  Latin derivation, meaning amiable (which in itself could be used to back up 
  the Sirius/Arabella theory, or to back up the 'Mrs Figg is really a lovely 
  young witch who's polyjuiced/aged herself into an old woman' theory).<<<<<<<<<<<

  This is when being two days without eckletricity (horrors!) becomes difficult to deal with... ::sighs and eyes mountains of posts, trudges out for a bit, then comes back:: Ahhhh, very interesting theory -- it makes one positively salivate in impatience for Book Five. It'll also be interesting to see whether or not Arabella is truly amiable, as her name suggests, or if she holds up the old cabbage/cats image Harry has of her.

  Gretchen:
  Back to the Dumbledore Latin meaning, the old English word of 
  bumblebee probably has significance, but I also think that if you 
  look at the Latin to give birth to or to send to die will also have 
  significance.<<<<<<<<<<

  I think JKR herself has said that Dumbledore reminds her of a bumblebee, in that she pictures him wandering around and humming to himself (I forget the interview, I'm sorry.) For myself, I can't help but remember Muhammad Ali's immortal quote: "Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee", which seems to me to describe a lot of Dumbledore's personality. As for the Latin, the only verbs I know for 'to give birth to' are 'parere' and 'gignere', and I only know these because I had to stare at 'parere's' conjugations in 501 Latin Verbs for ages. Although, the idea of 'send to die' is sort of morbidly intriguing.

  Eloise:
  I also wonder about this implication that Latin derivations are better than 
  derivaitons from other languages (which is the implication of my original 
  question of why does everything have to have a Latin root?). My Anglo-Saxon 
  roots (if such they are) are bristling. (Can roots bristle?)<<<<<<<<<

  That question is, I believe, much MUCH older than this list <g>. It probably extends all the way back to when the Anglo-Saxons and their writing were being influenced heavily by Church Latin, and writers decided that attempting to transpose Latin grammar onto English (which, in some ways, can't accept that) would be a good idea because they thought it would sound smarter. Latinate language and the preference for it survives today I think because it sounds so sophisticated and knowledgable, which is exactly how it was throughout the Middle Ages and into the Renaissance; Latin was the language of the Church, government, and the learned class, while English (or other vulgate tongues) was the property of the layman, serf, et cetera. Today, it lives on in medical terminology, bureaucracy, and academia... and occasional speculative fiction books <g>.

  HF.


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