: Hey, folks. I did a little snooping earlier tonight on HBO and Bnet's forums,
: as well as Google, and found that no decent effort had been made to
: translate the Latin names of Halo's species as given in the Bestiarum --
: some poor, half-arsed ones (usually via online translator) were all I
: could find. So, I've undertaken the task myself -- and here are the
: results. Let me know what you think!
: Bestiarum (Of Animals)
: Brute - Servus Ferox (Wild slave)
: This translation assumes that the Bestiarum transcribes the Jiralhanae's raw,
: unbridled, martial sensibilities somewhat condescendingly -- an idea
: backed up by its approval of the humans dubbing them 'Brutes', and the
: unambiguously derogatory appellations it bestows on a couple of the other
: species. Were the Bestiari tone more approbative, it might be rendered
: 'Ferocious Servant', or similar; but that doesn't seem to be the case.
: Drone - Turpis Rex (Ugly king)
: The least interesting one. Pretty straightforward, though seemingly a bit off
: grammatically -- had it been up to me, a more pleasing rendering would
: have been 'Regis Turpis' (King of ugly). That's got a vervacious ring to
: it, no?
: Elite - Macto Cognatus (I honor my father's blood)
: Not exactly a proper appellation, but there's little doubt as to the meaning.
: Very cool -- my personal favorite.
: Engineer - Facticius Indoles (Artificial nature)
: I think there was a mix up on this one, because it doesn't really make sense.
: The instantly obvious blunder is that the gender of the noun and adjective
: disagree ('Indoles' is feminine). But even looking past that, it doesn't
: come together for me. Were the grammatical i's and t's dotted and crossed,
: the Latin would still read 'Artificial Nature' (as in 'Man-made Innate
: Disposition'). I'd guess that they wanted to say something more like
: 'Dextra ad Indoles', or 'Dexter Naturaliter' (Dexterous by nature).
: Flood [Pure Form] - Inferi Redivivus (The renovated dead)
: Some excellent diction here. 'Redivivus' very specifically refers to old
: building materials that had been re-used in assembling something else.
: Whether you take this to mean the host body being re-used as a prefab home
: for the parasite, or as one small brick in the massive edifice that is the
: Flood's collective conciousness -- it's very apposite.
: Flood [Gravemind] - Inferi Sententia (The dead -- way of thinking)
: Bungie's guilty of shoddy linguistics on this one. It doesn't make sense to
: me, anyway -- two nouns in the nominative case. The literal English
: translation seems to make sense, but that's incidental. The Latin doesn't.
: The proper Latin to express what the English seems to want to would be
: 'Inferorum Sententia' (The dead's way of thinking).
: Grunt - Monachus Frigus (Cold monk)
: I don't quite get this one. 'Frigus' is obvious -- Balaho is a cold place.
: But 'Monachus'? I can't say for sure. The only parallels the Bestiari
: description offers are the organizational attributes of 'Tribal' and
: 'Pack' (implying communal living) and -- this one's a bit of a stretch --
: language. Monks in the ancient world were often linguists, and the Grunts
: are said to have an affinity for such things. But their society is
: matriarchal, and they're sure as heck not celibate. Anybody have better
: ideas on this one?
: Hunter - Ophis Congregatio (Serpent union)
: Interesting wrinkle on this one -- 'Ophis' is Greek, not Latin. Maybe
: intentional, maybe an oopsie -- we'll never know. Regardless, it describes
: pretty accurately what's going on under that armor.
: Jackal - Perosus Latrunculus (Hated little bandit)
: Previous self-styled translators have failed to notice the diminutive form of
: 'Latrunculus', apparently being unfamiliar with the root 'latro'. It's
: fitting for its derisive connotation, as well as its factual description
: -- despite its attitude, the Jackal just barely tops 5 feet and 100
: pounds.
: Prophet - Perfidia Vermis (Worm of treachery)
: No bones about this one. It doesn't make sense at all unless 'Vermis' is in
: the genitive case (as opposed to the identical nominative) -- and given
: that, there's no doubt of the exact rendering here. Obviously it's quite
: fitting.
: Reclaimer - Homo Sapiens Augeous (Wise man -- ?)
: Another snafu. 'Augeous' is not a proper Latin word, as far as I'm aware.
: Seemingly they were wanting to take off on 'Augeo' (to grow, increase),
: but I'm not aware of any conjugation that would render it '-ous'. My best
: guess is that it's supposed to mean something like 'Enlarged human' -- in
: which case it would best read 'Homo Sapiens Auctus', making use of the
: comparative participle.
: Well, there it is. I'll qualify all of it heavily by saying that I'm no
: expert, just a lover of the language -- and if any other, more competent
: Latinists want to add or detract anything, they're more than welcome to do
: so.
not ccriticizing, but i didn't quite understand some of that.
| 
