Finland makes Latin the King

BBC ^ | 10/24/06 | Jonny Dymond

[dfwgator]

Finland, Finland, Finland.
The country where I want to be,
Pony trekking or camping,
Or just watching TV.
Finland, Finland, Finland,
It's the country for me.

You're so near to Russia,
So far from Japan.
Quite a long way from Cairo,
Lots of miles from Vietnam.

Finland, Finland, Finland.
The country where I want to be,
Eating breakfast or dinner,
Or snack lunch in the hall.
Finland, Finland, Finland,
Finland has it all.

You're so sadly neglected,
And often ignored,
A poor second to Belgium,
When going abroad.

Finland, Finland, Finland.
The country where I quite want to be,
Your mountains so lofty,
Your treetops so tall.
Finland, Finland, Finland,
Finland has it all.

Finland, Finland, Finland.
The country where I quite want to be,
Your mountains so lofty,
Your treetops so tall.
Finland, Finland, Finland,
Finland has it all.

Finland has it all...

[RoadTest]

I'm speechless.

[Cicero]

Suomi frigida sed pulchra est.

[Gordongekko909]

Norway is a part of Europe, but has twice tried to run away. Fortunately, Sweden and Finland have captured the country both times, as visible in this picture.

[x]

Latin is also supposed to be popular in Hungary. It's a portal for those who speak a non-Indo-European language to get closer to the other Western languages, whether French, Italian, and Spanish, or German and English, since so much vocabulary comes from Latin roots.

[saganite]

Lentus-a-um!

[Dead Corpse]

De clunibus magnis amandis oratio
Mixaloti equitis

mehercle!
(By Hercules!)
Rebecca, ecce! tantae clunes isti sunt!
(Rebecca, behold! Such large buttocks she has!)

amica esse videtur istorum hominum rhythmicorum.
(She appears to be a girlfriend of one of those rhythmic-oration people.)
sed, ut scis,
(But, as you know)
quis homines huiusmodi intellegere potest?
(Who can understand persons of this sort?)
colloquuntur equidem cum ista eo tantum, quod scortum perfectum esse videtur.
(Verily, they converse with her for this reason only, namely, that she appears to be a complete whore.)
clunes, aio, maiores esse!
(Her buttocks, I say, are rather large!)
nec possum credere quam rotondae sint.
(Nor am I able to believe how round they are.)
en! quam exstant! nonne piget te earum?
(Lo! How they stand forth! Do they not disgust you?)
ecce mulier Aethiops!
(Behold the black woman!)

magnae clunes mihi placent, nec possum de hac re mentiri.
(Large buttocks are pleasing to me, nor am I able to lie concerning this matter.)
quis enim, consortes mei, non fateatur,
(For who, colleagues, would not admit,)
cum puella incedit minore medio corpore
(Whenever a girl comes by with a rather small middle part of the body)
sub quo manifestus globus, inflammare animos
(Beneath which is an obvious spherical mass, that it inflames the spirits)...

[kiriath_jearim]

Do Finnish hog farmers speak pig Latin?

[livius]

Actually, the Finns have been real leaders in the revival of Latin, and any Latinist who wants to log on and listen will be amply rewarded. Also, Latin teachers out there - and their students - will enjoy the current events in Latin.

Highly recommended!

[muawiyah]

Just toss another reindeer on the barby eh!

[muawiyah]

Not good, but otherwise understandable Latin.

[muawiyah]

Actually, all that marvelous vocabulary ends up coming from Ladino, which is not exactly Latin. This is the language where advances in the sciences, arts, and engineering were made in the Medieval period.

[livius]

Latin ping-a-ling!

[Zetman]

Like the boy at the party with cheese straws stuck up his nose, it has been caught doing something vaguely disturbing - indulging a penchant for Latin.

Vaguely disturbing?? Why is that?? That seems like a rather odd thing to say.

It is like the Catholic Church today. The Pope is getting ready to allow the old Latin Mass to be said again after 40 years, and the libs in the Church are having a cow about it. I have come to the conclusion that in the case of the Catholic Church that Latin=Conservative/Orthodox, and Strongly Opposed to Latin=Liberal (it seems that those with no strong opinion on the topic can break either way).

I wonder if this article is a case of some sort of condescending anti-Latin prejudice (except it is regarding a more secular topic), or are simply being funny?? I will assume that they are only being funny (outside of the Catholic Church, I can't imagine there being any sort of political connotations being attached to the Latin language).

Other than the comment I highlighted above, I found this article to be interesting and amusing. I didn't know that Latin is still commonly used anywhere, outside of the Church. I LOVE the fact that the Latin version of their newsletter is more popular than the French version!!

Many in my parents generation (and younger too) decry the fact that Latin is no longer required in U.S. High School eductation (I never took it when I was in school). Latin is, of course, no longer commonly spoken today. However, so many modern languages are heavily based upon Latin that by learning Latin, it becomes much easier to learn these other modern languages. It also opens up the world of many classic scholarly works (which are written in Latin) to direct reading by us "common people"!!

My mom tells me that when she had French in High School, if she did not know the answer on a test, she would write down the correct answer in Latin instead, hoping that the teacher would not notice. She says he always did, but one wonders if she got bonus points for trying!!

We would probably do well as a nation to go back to requiring our students to take Latin in High School again. It would open up a much larger world, and we would be much better-educated thinkers as a result. These people have the right idea.

[Miss Behave]

ping

[Dumb_Ox]

Yay, Latin!

Can any of you Latinists point me to sites with accented Latin texts and one-letter diphtongs? I've put together a Latin reading tool at semi-fluent.com, and I'd like to evaluate whether I should spend my time treating such special cases.

[paudio]

My wife is in Linguistics Dept. She said nowadays 'Endangered Languages' issue is very hot in that field. Donor agencies (NSF, etc.) provide tons of money to research on preserving these endangered languages. Some of them only have less than 100 speakers. And now these people are making a big deal about Latin, a very important language of the past?

[razorback-bert]

All and good, but do they have Elvis on black velvet?

[Psycho_Bunny]

Like the boy at the party with cheese straws stuck up his nose, it has been caught doing something vaguely disturbing - indulging a penchant for Latin.

A complete jackass wrote this article. 

Good for Finland: Latin's one of the cooler languages in the world.