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Sun 28 Mar, 2010 07:14 pm
- Bella minus utilia quam verba sunt.
- Pinum altiorem quam domum vidimus.
- Dux viam tam latam quam pontem aedificavit.
- Historia magis difficilis quam grammatica erit.
- Graecus auriga velocior hispano gladiatore in stadio pugnavit.
@inhaki,
Show us what you have so far and we'll be happy to help with whatever is
still giving you trouble.
@inhaki,
Why do you need to translate it?
All of these use comparisons such as "less than", "more than", "higher
than" and so on. To make a comparison you can use the "comparative"
form of an adjective (e.g. "more useful") and "than". The comparative
form of the Latin adjective "utilis" ("useful") is "utilior". So "words are
more useful than war" would be "verba utiliora quam bellum sunt".
What if we want to say "less than"? We use the simple form of the
adjective and "minus". So "a lamb is less strong than a wolf" is "agnus
minus fortis quam lupus est".
This should be enough information to help you translate the first
two sentences.
Let's look at the third sentence. In Latin, "tam . . . quam" means
"as . . . as" to express equality. "Domus meus tam altus quam pinus"
would be "My house is as tall as a pine tree."
Now let's look at the fourth sentence. Instead of using the comparative
form of the adjective, we can use "magis" and the simple form. So,
"I built a road wider than the bridge" is "Viam magis latam quam pontem
aedificavi."
The last sentence is an example of making a comparison without using
the word "quam". Instead, you put the thing that you are comparing
something else to in the ablative case. In this sentence that would be
"hispano gladiatore". You could have said "Graecus auriga velocior quam
hispanus gladiator in stadio pugnavit."
Does this help?
@inhaki,
What would be the idiomatic translation into English?
@inhaki,
Well, just forget it.
It's ok, I will do it by myself.
@inhaki,
You're welcome.
If you want to post your English translation, we'll be happy to make
suggestions to make it more idiomatic.