"But I Digress" in Latin, as a heraldic motto?
June 23, 2022 4:29 PM Subscribe
I've just been noticing that I use the phrase a lot, and I feel like, if I was a Knight of Chivalry, this would be my motto: such as "No One Attacks Me With Impunity" or 'I Shine But Burn Not". What would the correct Latin be, to say, basically, "I wander/wonder about and get distracted, but I am proud of this, not ashamed"?
Extra points if it has anything to do with Eris/Discordia, chaos, or general whimy!
Extra points if it has anything to do with Eris/Discordia, chaos, or general whimy!
I can't seem to find the origin of this idiom I remember, and it's a bit of a cheat, but "superbia in meteoria" is what popped into my head. Essentially "pride in..." and meteoria was mentioned in a book I read as a description of the condition of being easily distracted and flitting from thing to thing. But it's clearly greek... adopted into medieval latin later apparently. Anyway, just a thought to consider!
Edit: Found it!! It was in Suetonius's Twelve Caesars: "Claudius's scatter-brainedness and short-sightedness — or to use the greek terms, meteoria and ablepsia — were marveled at." Sadly this means it's definitely greek.
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 4:57 PM on June 23, 2022 [5 favorites]
Edit: Found it!! It was in Suetonius's Twelve Caesars: "Claudius's scatter-brainedness and short-sightedness — or to use the greek terms, meteoria and ablepsia — were marveled at." Sadly this means it's definitely greek.
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 4:57 PM on June 23, 2022 [5 favorites]
I don’t know what the Latin would be, but Dorothy Sayers’ Lord Peter Wimsey has “as my whimsy takes me”?
posted by The AhForgetIt Tendency at 5:21 PM on June 23, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by The AhForgetIt Tendency at 5:21 PM on June 23, 2022 [3 favorites]
I went poking around a little to see what the Latin idioms around mind-wandering might be.
Latin has *vagus*, which according to Wiktionary has both a literal meaning of "wandering," and a range of metaphorical applications to states of mind. *vagus animis* means "crazy," taken leave of your senses. *vagus animi* means undecided of mind. I found *mens vaga* in a late classical source and it seems to mean "wandering mind." *vagus* also has cognate verbs *vagor* and *divagor*. So you might say something like *divagor animi*, which would mean something like, "My mind is wandering."
I thought a little about something like, *mens vaga, mens sana*, "A wandering mind is a healthy mind," as a play on, "A sound mind in a sound body." But that doesn't quite have the sound of a personal motto.
Another theme to work on might be stuff like, My mind is wandering but don't bug me, which can be presented in different tones depending on what you feel like. *vaga mens mihi non agita* = "Don't harass my wandering mind." This feels a little aggro to me though.
Maybe what is wanted is something like, "My mind is wandering and / but I'm vibing." Uhhh maybe something like, *mens vaga mihi placet*, "I'm happy with my wandering mind." Or *mihi placet ut mens divager*, "I'm happy that my mind wanders" (NB I'm not completely sure the *ut* complement works like this, sorry; I have greater confidence in the rest of my answer).
posted by grobstein at 6:46 PM on June 23, 2022 [6 favorites]
Latin has *vagus*, which according to Wiktionary has both a literal meaning of "wandering," and a range of metaphorical applications to states of mind. *vagus animis* means "crazy," taken leave of your senses. *vagus animi* means undecided of mind. I found *mens vaga* in a late classical source and it seems to mean "wandering mind." *vagus* also has cognate verbs *vagor* and *divagor*. So you might say something like *divagor animi*, which would mean something like, "My mind is wandering."
I thought a little about something like, *mens vaga, mens sana*, "A wandering mind is a healthy mind," as a play on, "A sound mind in a sound body." But that doesn't quite have the sound of a personal motto.
Another theme to work on might be stuff like, My mind is wandering but don't bug me, which can be presented in different tones depending on what you feel like. *vaga mens mihi non agita* = "Don't harass my wandering mind." This feels a little aggro to me though.
Maybe what is wanted is something like, "My mind is wandering and / but I'm vibing." Uhhh maybe something like, *mens vaga mihi placet*, "I'm happy with my wandering mind." Or *mihi placet ut mens divager*, "I'm happy that my mind wanders" (NB I'm not completely sure the *ut* complement works like this, sorry; I have greater confidence in the rest of my answer).
posted by grobstein at 6:46 PM on June 23, 2022 [6 favorites]
Best answer: In Lewis & Short's Latin Dictionary on Perseus I found what might be a perfect, Ciceronian quote for this in the entry for aberro:
The translation in the dictionary citation is a bit weird — a better one in Perseus has:
TL;DR "sed tamen aberro" has good classical provenance, and is an okay translation for "but I digress".
Other promising Latin verbs for wander: alucinor — so you could say "sed tamen alucinor", also in a Cicero letter "sic epistulae nostrae debent interdum alucinari" "so ought our letters at times to digress into loose chat." (here the translator is saying "to digress into loose chat" for "alucinari")
You also have the option of using "digredior", the ancestor of "digress" — "sed digredior" is such a lovely simple translation that anyone with a bit of Latin would recognize.
Here is the list of other verb options that had been translated as "digress" as of 1879: http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/searchresults?target=en&inContent=true&q=digress&doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0059 (you probably need to click the "More(9)" to see them all).
posted by xueexueg at 6:58 PM on June 23, 2022 [20 favorites]
To divert the mind or attention, to forget for a time: “at ego hic scribendo dies totos nihil equidem levor, sed tamen aberro,” I am indeed not free from sorrow, but I divert my thoughts, Cic. Att. 12, 38"Cic. Att. 12, 38" means it is from Cicero's letters to Atticus, Book 12, letter 38. So not mega-discordian, but it is a fairly whimsical letter — see next link below to read it.
The translation in the dictionary citation is a bit weird — a better one in Perseus has:
But I am here, writing from one day's end to another without getting any relief, though I do at any rate distract my thoughts.The core meaning defined in the entry in my first link is "to wander from the way, to go astray", which seems to fit digression even better than those translations.
TL;DR "sed tamen aberro" has good classical provenance, and is an okay translation for "but I digress".
Other promising Latin verbs for wander: alucinor — so you could say "sed tamen alucinor", also in a Cicero letter "sic epistulae nostrae debent interdum alucinari" "so ought our letters at times to digress into loose chat." (here the translator is saying "to digress into loose chat" for "alucinari")
You also have the option of using "digredior", the ancestor of "digress" — "sed digredior" is such a lovely simple translation that anyone with a bit of Latin would recognize.
Here is the list of other verb options that had been translated as "digress" as of 1879: http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/searchresults?target=en&inContent=true&q=digress&doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0059 (you probably need to click the "More(9)" to see them all).
posted by xueexueg at 6:58 PM on June 23, 2022 [20 favorites]
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posted by The otter lady at 4:43 PM on June 23, 2022