Felix Felicis, Geoff and Latin grammar

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 129117

Deborah wrote:
> <snip>
> So they do an' all, but I've always justified this by assuming that
> since languages change over time when they are used creatively, some
> words (like 'Expelliarmus', which would have driven Cicero into a
> frothy frenzy) have become modified simply because they are used in
> the WW in a way they could never be used in the classroom, or
> presumably the Vatican. 
> 
> That still leaves me convinced that Felix Felicis cannot be human.
> Cannot be a name. Not in the Latin system. Felix Felixson, yes
maybe. Felicity Felixdaughter, why not? (She's probably in the Iceland
Quidditch team.) But real, live Latin speakers didn't name their sons
things like Julius Julianus. And I don't think that Felix Felicis,
with or without initial capital letters, is a likely phrase. It's an
entry in a filing system, providing information about where 'felix'
fits into the language, and it's useful narrowly, just as it is
narrowly useful to know where gold appears in the periodic table,
> though when discussing Snitches or one's wedding ring one says
'gold' and not 'Au', or '79'. <snip>

Carol responds:
Names even in the RW seldom constitute "likely phrases" or follow the
rules of grammar, and most have lost their original meaning. Do we
think of a potmaker when we read the name Potter? "Lily Potter" could
be read as having not only a grammatical but a semantic meaning--one
who pots lilies--but I'm sure JKR had no such literal meaning in mind
when she named that character. 

And it's not as if Felix Felicis (assuming, as I do, that he's a man)
were an ancient Roman. I'll grant you that no such name would have
been given to him by Roman parents, but Felix's parents weren't "real
live Latin speakers," they were twentieth-century people, most likely
an English-speaking witch and wizard.

But as Steve points out elsewhere in this thread, the name Felicis has
presumably existed in the WW for quite some time, along with
Ollivander and Black and other ancient family names, some of them no
doubt changed over time. I don't think Felix's parents were looking
for a grammatical phrase when they named their child. They might not
even have been acquainted with "felix, felicis" as "an entry in a
filing system" (a term used to classify an adjective as belonging to a
particular declension). They probably just wanted the name to
alliterate, much like Severus Snape, Minerva McGonagall, Filius
Flitwick and others that slip my mind at the moment. Alliterating
names seem to be a common (but not universal) custom in the WW, much
like naming girl-children after flowers or giving children of either
sex Roman first names.

JKR clearly liked the sound of "felix, felicis," the glossary listing
for a common Roman adjective, and thought it sounded like a name. (So
do I.) We can be grateful that she didn't choose a verb instead of an
adjective. How about Amo Amare as the next DADA professor or Minister
of Magic?

Carol, who will retract this entire post and crawl under a table with
a bottle of butterbeer for consolation if "Felix Felicis" turns out to
be an intensified Cheering Charm