Harrius Potter et Philosophi Lapis

I am a hobby linguist and generally a language and communication geek ;-) I speak, read and write three languages well and can make myself understood in a few more. Whilst I did have some Latin classes in school, today it is very rusty and barely good enough to decipher old inscriptions in Churches, Museums and so on. Reading one of my favorite books in Latin seemed like a good idea to brush up my Latin skills. Here is what I discovered to far:

Pretty easy, everybody that had at least one year of Latin in school or college will enjoy reading and working through the text. Here a quick example of the first sentence of the book in Latin, so that you see what I mean:

"Dominus et Domina Dursley, qui vivebant in aedibus Gestationis Ligustrorum numero quattor signatis, non sine superbia dicebant se ratione ordinaria vivendi uti neque se paenitere illius rationis. ..."

It is also the shortest book of the series, making it a good length to read without being overwhelming. Around 200 pages to be exact ;-)

Having a good basic dictionary is always a good idea if you are working with a foreign language. Chances are if you are a student or teacher of Latin, you will have a few of these around ;-) If not, or if they fail you, there are a great number of free English – Latin dictionaries online. You can either try good, old >Google Translate< or, a bit more sophisticated, you can try >this one< from the University of Notre Dame.

The rules of grammar and punctuation in Latin depend greatly on the time a text was written in, just as in any other language. In the end, we don't spell English anymore the way Shakespeare did ;-) So the translator had to make a decision which rules to follow and also if it looks weird at first, you get quickly used to it. Here are the main points:

Peter Needham, who translated 'Harry Potter and The Philosopher's Stone' into Latin is a, now retired, former teacher of Classic Languages (Latin and Greek) at the world-famous Eton College (UK) where he taught for more than 30 years. He famously said about this task: ¨It's an ideal job for an old bloke in retirement." He also translated: Harrius Potter Et Camera Secretorum (Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets), Paddington Bear (Ursus Nomine Paddington) and other children's books such as Peter Rabbit and Alice in Wonderland into Latin.

• Simple, studying a dead language like Latin can get a bit dusty and tiring over time, reading something else than the usual stuff (Cesar's “Commentarii de Bello Gallico / On the Gallic War comes painfully to mind) can put the fun back into it.
• J.K. Rowling herself read Latin at university and it shows through the whole series, especially in the name of the characters and the spells. Reading them in Latin is kind of a logical step for a fan ;-)
• Apart of reading it, you can also try to translating it back into English, or, if you have the English version, try to translate that one into Latin on your own and compare your version with the official translation.
• Teachers can use the book to let students write essays about how and why certain words were used to translate modern concepts like car (autocinetum) or as an alternative to the usual, boring material. There are really endless possibilities to use this book in a classroom or in home studies.

On Translating Modern Books into Ancient Languages
This is a great article by the translator of the first Harry Potter book into Ancient Greek who explains nicely how he did it, what the challenges of such a translation are and why he did things the way he did. I would have loved to read a similar essay by Peter Needham, but alas, it seems he hasn't published one ;-( If you know of one, please leave a reference in a comment ;-)

• A great book for brushing up your Latin skills and putting the fun back into studying the Lingua Latina.
• A fun, and intelligent, gift for the philosopher in your life.
• Endless possibilities for classroom activities and home study.

Did you like this article? Check out my other >Harry Potter< articles here on Wizzley ;-)