P*rl in Latin, whither Python?

[pricerbumanto at my-deja.com]

In article <8venh60462 at news1.newsguy.com>,
  "Alex Martelli" <aleaxit at yahoo.com> wrote:
> "Erik Max Francis" <max at alcyone.com> wrote in message
> news:3A1AB720.728F96C6 at alcyone.com...
> > Konrad Hinsen wrote:
> >
> > > The first sentence was in Latin, the Esperanto translation would
be
> > > "Kio estis pruvenda", meaning "what had to be proven".
> >
> > The word _pruv/end/a_ doesn't really work here, because the _/end/_
> > affix indicates a compulsion, not simply future tense.  I would
write,
> > _Kio estis pruvota_.
>
> "Demonstrandum" also connotes a degree of 'compulsion', rather
> than 'future', at least in the most common usage.  The common
> (considered literal) translation of "Quod erat demonstrandum" in
> Italian is "Come dovevasi dimostrare", i.e. "as it HAD to be
> proven" (my emphasis), which is also what Konrad is suggesting
> as the English equivalent of the Esperanto he suggests.
>
> [Another well-known Latin quotation using a gerund is Cato Major's
> "Carthago delenda est" (although his exact wording was more
> likely "censeo Carthago delenda esse", but that's by the by).  He
> wasn't *predicting* Carthago's destruction, he was (vehemently)
> *inciting* it: "Carthago IS TO BE destroyed", i.e. "we MUST
> destroy Carthago".  The Holy Office's official monicker, "Propaganda
> Fide" (from which English also gets its current meaning for
> "propaganda"), is another example of compulsion-indicating
> gerund -- the faith is indicated as "having to be propagated"
> (connoting a sense of duty help it spread)].
>
> My fluency in Esperanto is _absolutely_ not sufficient to be able
> to tell whether there is some subtle semantic difference in it that
> may make gerunds inappropriate where they'd be appropriate in
> Latin -- I just wanted to point out the Latin connotations here
> are not far at all from the "compulsion" you indicate.

Actually, I'm inclined to favor "Tio, kio estis pruvinda", after reading
the comments in the "Plena vortaro": (my translation) Although "ind" by
itself doesn't express an idea of compulsion, it howver presents often
in its pasive sense a nuance quite close and sometimes equivalent to
that idea.  Indeed "nepardoninda kulpo" is a fault which doesn't
deserve pardon, and which in consequence ought not to be
forgiven...[some examples omitted]. In the same fashion also the
participial ending "ot" often presents as sense of compulsion analogous
to that of teh suffix "ind", because the idea of futureness is confused
in many cases with that of compulsion.  In such cases one can use
either "ot" or "ind", indifferently."

George


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