50 Fun Facts About Latin Language

The word 'trivia' goes back to the Latin 'trivium', a public place where three of what met?

Roads met at a trivium, from 'tri' (three) and 'via' (road). Because a crossroads was an open public place, the related word 'trivial' came to mean commonplace.

The English word 'muscle' comes from the Latin 'musculus', which literally means a little what?

Mouse is the root: 'musculus' is the diminutive of 'mus', because a flexed biceps was thought to resemble one. The shellfish 'mussel' takes its name from the same Latin word.

Which tiny European state has bank cash machines that offer on-screen instructions in Latin?

Vatican City has them, at the Vatican Bank. The Holy See still issues most of its official documents with the authoritative version in Latin, while the city state itself legislates in Italian.

Which European carmaker's name is Latin for 'I roll', first registered in 1911 for ball bearings?

Volvo is the first-person form of the Latin verb 'volvere', to roll. The bearing maker SKF registered the name in 1911, and the first car to carry it was built in Gothenburg in 1927.

The word 'salary' comes from 'salarium', a Roman allowance named in Latin after which commodity?

Salt, 'sal' in Latin, lies behind 'salarium'. The popular story that Roman legions were paid in it has no ancient support, but the same root did give English 'salad' and 'sauce'.

Canariae Insulae, the Latin name behind the Canary Islands, means the islands of which animals?

Dogs gave the islands their Latin name: Pliny the Elder wrote of 'vast multitudes of dogs of very large size' there. The songbird was named after the islands, not the reverse.

The Latin motto of Hogwarts, 'Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus', warns never to do what to a sleeping dragon?

Tickle it is the thing to avoid: the motto means 'Never tickle a sleeping dragon'. Its last word comes from 'titillare', the Latin verb that also gave English 'titillate'.

The word 'bus' is short for 'omnibus', the Latin nickname of an 1820s French carriage service, meaning what?

For all is what 'omnibus' means, the dative plural of 'omnis'. Citizens of Nantes gave the nickname to Stanislas Baudry's horse-drawn service, and he took the idea to Paris in 1828.

'Candidate' comes from the Latin 'candidatus', because Roman office-seekers wore togas of which colour?

White togas, brightened with chalk, marked out Romans campaigning for office, and 'candidatus' meant white-robed. The same root, 'candidus', gives English the word 'candid'.

Alexander Lenard's Latin translation of which children's classic spent 20 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list?

Winnie-the-Pooh became 'Winnie ille Pu' and sold 125,000 copies in the US. Lenard had to self-publish the first printing in 1958, because publishers doubted the book's potential.

What does 'E pluribus unum' mean, the Latin motto with thirteen letters on the Great Seal of the United States?

Out of many, one suited a union of thirteen colonies, and the phrase has thirteen letters to match. 'In God We Trust' only became the official national motto in 1956.

Which Latin boast is Julius Caesar said to have sent to Rome after his swift defeat of Pharnaces II at Zela?

Veni, vidi, vici means 'I came, I saw, I conquered', a report on a war that was over in days. Suetonius adds that Caesar displayed the three words as an inscription at his triumph.

'Citius, Altius, Fortius' is the Latin motto of which sporting event, borrowed by its founder from a Dominican priest?

Olympic Games founder Pierre de Coubertin took 'Faster, Higher, Stronger' from his friend Henri Didon. In 2021 the IOC added a fourth word, 'Communiter', meaning together.

Which French philosopher's first principle is known by the Latin sentence 'Cogito, ergo sum'?

René Descartes first wrote it in French, as 'je pense, donc je suis', in 1637 so that more people could read it. The Latin version, 'I think, therefore I am', appeared later.

Which playwright made the Latin line 'Et tu, Brute?' famous as the last words of the stabbed Julius Caesar?

William Shakespeare gave the line to the dying dictator in Act 3 of his tragedy. Ancient writers report either silence or a Greek phrase meaning 'You too, child', never the Latin words.

Which Latin phrase did Elizabeth II use for 1992, a year of royal break-ups and a fire at Windsor Castle?

Annus horribilis, a horrible year, plays on the older 'annus mirabilis', a wonderful one. She used it in a speech at Guildhall four days after the castle caught fire.

Horace's 'carpe diem' is usually translated 'seize the day', but what does the Latin verb 'carpe' more literally mean?

Pluck is the literal sense: Horace pictures gathering the day like ripe fruit. The full line in his Odes goes on to advise putting very little trust in tomorrow.

Which Latin phrase for a favour traded for a favour first described swapping one medicine for another?

Quid pro quo is Renaissance Latin for 'something for something'. English writers of the 1530s used it when one drug was substituted for another, whether by accident or by fraud.

What does 'alma mater', the Latin phrase graduates use for their old university, literally mean?

Nourishing mother was first a title for Roman goddesses such as Ceres and Cybele. The University of Bologna later took it into its motto, 'Alma Mater Studiorum'.

What does 'ante meridiem' mean, the Latin phrase shortened to a.m. on a 12-hour clock?

Before midday is the meaning, built on 'meridies', the Latin for noon. Because noon is neither before nor after itself, strictly speaking neither a.m. nor p.m. applies to it.

What does 'anno Domini' mean, the Latin phrase behind the A.D. dating system devised by the monk Dionysius Exiguus?

In the year of the Lord counts from the birth of Jesus as Dionysius reckoned it in 525. Reading A.D. as 'after death' would leave the years of Jesus's life outside both eras.

The abbreviation i.e., often mixed up with e.g., is short for a Latin phrase that means what?

That is translates 'id est', and the abbreviation introduces a rephrasing of what was just said. Its lookalike e.g. stands for 'exempli gratia', for the sake of example.

What does 'post scriptum' mean, the Latin phrase behind the P.S. added below a letter's signature?

Written after is the literal sense of 'post scriptum'. A further afterthought becomes a P.P.S., for 'post-post-scriptum', and the chain can in theory go on ad infinitum.

The abbreviation 'lb' for a pound of weight comes from which Latin word, also the name of a zodiac sign?

Libra, Latin for a pair of scales, was also a Roman unit of weight, and the phrase 'libra pondo' gave English both 'lb' and 'pound'. The £ sign is a stylised L for the same word.

What does 'curriculum vitae' literally mean, the Latin phrase that job applicants shorten to CV?

Course of life uses 'curriculum' in its first sense of a running or a race, from 'currere', to run. The same Latin verb gives English 'current' and 'courier'.

Which day of the week did the Romans call 'dies Lunae', the Latin root of French lundi and Spanish lunes?

Monday is the Moon's day in both traditions. Germanic speakers translated the Latin name piece by piece instead of borrowing it, swapping in their own word for the Moon.

September to December keep Latin number names from an early Roman calendar said to begin in which month?

March opened the ten-month year that Romans credited to Romulus, so September really was the seventh month and December the tenth. Winter was at first just an unnamed gap between years.

What does 'sapiens' mean in Homo sapiens, the Latin name Carl Linnaeus gave the human species in 1758?

Wise is the usual translation, from the verb 'sapere', which also means to have a taste. That double sense is why food with no flavour is called 'insipid'.

What does 'rex' mean in Tyrannosaurus rex, the Latin half of the name Henry Fairfield Osborn chose in 1905?

King rounds off a name that reads 'tyrant lizard king'. The first two parts come from Greek, 'tyrannos' and 'sauros', so 'rex' is the only Latin in it.

The word 'vaccine' goes back to 'vacca', the Latin for which animal, thanks to Edward Jenner's smallpox work?

Cow is the root because Jenner used cowpox, 'variolae vaccinae', to protect people against smallpox. In 1881 Louis Pasteur proposed stretching the word to cover every such inoculation.

'Calculate' and 'calculus' come from the Latin for which small objects, used as counters on Roman abacuses?

Pebbles were pushed around Roman counting boards, so the Romans called reckoning 'placing pebbles'. Doctors still use the word 'calculus' for a kidney stone.

'Sinister' is, letter for letter, a Latin word that Roman augurs used for omens seen on which side?

Left is the only thing 'sinister' meant at first; under Greek influence, omens seen on that side came to be read as unlucky. Its opposite, 'dexter', gave English the word 'dexterity'.

The Moon's dark plains are called 'maria', the Latin for what, because observers once believed them full of water?

Seas is the meaning of 'maria', the plural of 'mare'. The plains are really vast sheets of ancient basalt lava, and Apollo 11 touched down on one of them, Mare Tranquillitatis.

'Alibi', a suspect's strongest defence in a courtroom, is simply a Latin word with which meaning?

Elsewhere is the whole meaning of the Latin 'alibi'. English lawyers took it up in the 1740s, and its looser sense of any kind of excuse is only recorded from 1912.

The word 'veto' is a Latin verb form, tied to the blocking powers of Rome's tribunes, meaning what?

I forbid is the literal meaning. A tribune of the plebs could single-handedly block a magistrate's act or a decree of the Senate, a power the Romans themselves called 'intercessio'.

The word 'placebo', now used for a dummy pill in drug trials, is a Latin verb form meaning what?

I shall please opens a psalm verse sung at Vespers for the dead, the word's first use in English. By 1785 it meant a medicine given more to please than to benefit the patient.

What does 'sic' mean, the Latin word editors put in brackets after an error inside a quotation?

Thus tells the reader that the slip stood in the original and has been copied faithfully. English editors have only used the bracketed word this way since about 1856.

The word 'mile' comes from the Latin 'mille passus', a Roman marching distance of one thousand what?

Paces to a Roman meant double steps, counted each time the same foot hit the ground. At five Roman feet apiece, a thousand of them came to about 4,850 modern feet.

'Ignoramus' began as a Latin verdict that grand juries wrote on weak indictments, with which literal meaning?

We do not know was a jury's way of throwing out a case for lack of evidence. The insult came later, from the foolish lawyer in George Ruggle's 1615 Latin comedy 'Ignoramus'.

Which Central European kingdom kept Latin as an official language of government until as late as 1844?

Hungary had given Latin official status since the 11th century, before Hungarian took over as the sole official language. The Croatian Parliament held on to Latin even longer, until 1847.

Which national language of Eastern Europe descends from Latin, although most of the languages around it are Slavic?

Romanian descends from the Latin spoken in Rome's provinces near the Danube, and it is the only major Romance language that has kept a case system inherited from Latin.

The Romans took their alphabet from which neighbouring people, who had adapted it from Greek colonists at Cumae?

Etruscans, who ruled early Rome, passed on a script they had learned from Greeks. Their own language may have lacked voiced stops, which is why Latin C at first stood for both G and K sounds.

Classical Latin used which single letter for both the vowel sound of u and the consonant sound of w?

V did both jobs for the Romans, and W began in the Middle Ages as two of them joined together. Only after the Renaissance were U and its pointed twin treated as separate letters.

In the line 'Et tu, Brute', the name Brutus changes its ending because Latin uses which case for direct address?

Vocative forms are used for calling to someone, and most look exactly like the nominative. Second-declension nouns in -us are the exception, which is why Brutus turns into Brute.

Which class of small words, essential in English, is missing from Latin, so that 'puer' can mean 'a boy' or 'the boy'?

Articles do not exist in Latin, so context has to show whether a noun is definite. The languages descended from it grew their own, mostly making 'the' out of the Latin demonstrative 'ille', meaning 'that'.

Which saint produced most of the Vulgate, the Latin Bible that Pope Damasus I set in motion in 382?

Jerome was asked only to revise the older Latin Gospels, but on his own initiative he went on to translate most of the Bible, working from Hebrew for the Old Testament.

The dummy text 'lorem ipsum' used by designers is a scrambled passage from which Roman orator and philosopher?

Cicero wrote the source, a treatise on ethics called 'De finibus bonorum et malorum', in the 1st century BC. The filler starts mid-word: 'lorem' is the tail end of 'dolorem', meaning pain.

Which Roman poet opened his epic about the Trojan hero Aeneas with the words 'Arma virumque cano'?

Virgil's opening means 'Of arms and the man I sing'. He died in 19 BC with the poem unfinished and is said to have asked for it to be burned, but Augustus had it published instead.

Which Nordic country's public broadcaster aired 'Nuntii Latini', a weekly news bulletin in Latin, from 1989 to 2019?

Finland's Yle ran the five-minute bulletin for thirty years. The country has a reputation as a bastion of the language: a Finnish academic, Jukka Ammondt, even put Elvis Presley songs into Latin.

Which English scientist wrote his 1687 masterwork, the 'Principia', in Latin?

Isaac Newton published the whole work in Latin, then the common tongue of European science. English readers had to wait until 1729 for Andrew Motte's translation.