31 thoughts on “Chapter 5: Lit, page 51.”

  1. This would be easier if we knew what it was supposed to say. “Watch for all the gods of” (Google Translate)??

  2. I wanna say that it should be “Dei” as the nominative plural of god, but I’m not sure. (You were going for “all (the) gods are watching,” right? With “gods” being the subject?)

    Otherwise it looks okay to me!

    Also… a possible explanation for all that graffiti on earlier pages? I know I’ve seen figures with inverted question marks before….

    1. YES!!! It certainly looks like it doesn’t it? Man, I’ve been waiting forever to find out about the graffiti!

      There’s something really devastating about “ALL GODS ARE WATCHING”. Like it. It reminds me of something but I can’t quite put my finger on what. Might be all the Gaiman and Santeria in my diet recently ;)

  3. Looks correct to me for “All the gods are watching,” though “dii” (dius) is a much less common word for “gods” than “dei” (deus). Also you could use another word for “watch,” depending on the context you’re going for. As you might guess, “vigilant” sort of has the connotation of standing guard, whereas “spectant” would be more of a passive observation and “praesident” would be watching in more of a supervisory capacity.
    [/latinnerd]

    Also there’s a lot of great stuff going on in that first panel. Tuesday looking genuinely worried about something, and Moze just, well, Moze-ing in response to the insults.

    1. That seems good. As someone who last studied Latin in 8th grade, I would have caught on a bit better to the meaning if it had been “dei” and not “dii,” via reminding me of Agnus Dei, Opus Dei, etc. – of course those are genitive singular, not nominative plural, but it would still have made it clear that it’s from “deus.” Also “vigilant,” by looking exactly like the English adjective, made me think it was some kind of faux-Latin, turn my brain off, and forget that -nt is the present third-person plural, so another verb might be better. I note that one of the definitions of “videre” on Wiktionary is “look out for, care for, provide,” though of course it still mostly means “watch” – there the conjugation you’d need would be “vident.” Or one of those suggested by Tom W. (though “praesident” might have the same effect on people, looking like “president”).

      1. I gotta disagree with what looks like the general consensus here. Admittedly, it’s been a while since I took my Latin IV AP test, but if memory serves me correctly I ran into “di” (which IS in fact nominative plural; so far as I know there’s no alternate declension for acc. pl. “deos”) and its derivatives a lot more frequently than “dei” in the Aeneid (although that might be confirmation bias). I would say that while “dei” is certainly the more regularly declined version of the word, “di” seems to be the word of choice for fixed expressions and religious connotation (e.g. “Di boni!” for “Good heavens!” or “Dis Pater,” the forebear of Jupiter). I have to say I didn’t see a lot of the version with two I’s, so OMNES DI looks more natural to me.

        As for the verb, I gotta say I’m astounded that nobody’s yet opted to take a cue from Juvenal (or Alan Moore, for that matter) and go with “custodio, -ire,” as in this gem: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quis_custodiet_ipsos_custodes%3F If you were to go that route, it’d come out to OMNES DI CUSTODIUNT. My Latin dictionary translates that particular verb as more being “watch over” or “guard” in a benevolent sense, but the quote from Juvenal seems to indicate it could trade in less kindly senses as well.

        1. But this isn’t a fixed expression, it’s presumably something coined relatively recently (maybe around 1978 when the Mission was rededicated), when those who spoke Latin would be more comfortable with regular inflections.

          1. Please note: “fixed expressions AND religious connotation.” This, like the Aeneid, is something meant to promote faith (or at least put the fear of God, or gods, into people). But you’re right: if she’s looking for something that looks more like recent coinage by somebody who’s not well-versed in the Latin classics, then “dei” would be the way to go.

            If she’s shooting for more medieval/church Latin than classical Latin, then that’s out of my wheelhouse, for sure. Not raised Catholic.

  4. “The gods see all”? If so, it seems basically right, but I would have chosen “vident” over “vigilant” — “vigilant” seems to be more like “watch for.”

    Also, dii can be used for the accusative plural but dei is more standard.

  5. DAMMIT MOZE
    I didn’t notice that before but now I can’t unsee it.
    It is both hilarious and a bit scary all at the same time.

    1. Honestly, the more we learn stuff like this about Moze, the more I like him. At first I was very ambivalent, and not at all sure what Spike was doing with his character, but now I A) have a much greater faith in Spike and her characters/narrative but B) have a genuine interest in Moze that I have for only a handful of other characters. (For example, Tuesday and Curio don’t interest me, although I recognise their importance.)

      I do like Sunny and Shep, though–Shep more than Sunny.

  6. “Omnes dei spectant” is probably your best translation. The problem with this Latin is that it could mean both “All gods are watching,” or “The gods watch all people.” Either makes sense, but…

  7. Hmm… I wonder if that’s in Classical (“v” sounds like a “w”) or Ecclesiastical (“v” sounds like a “v”) Latin. Did they ever get around to inventing the Catholic Church in Spike’s narrative?

    1. There’s no way there wasn’t a Catholic Church. No Church = no Middle Ages = no Renaissance = no Enlightenment = no United States = no Arizona.

    1. I thought it was more of a “yeech, so that’s what a rabid raving priest looks like” – kinda like she’d stepped in mental crap. :-P

  8. The latin to english translators don’t seem to like omnes – they like omnis as a plural for “All men” better. I’d translate it as “The gods are always watching everyone”.

  9. BTW, I only now paid enough attention to what Tuesday actually said in the second (the small) panel – I wonder which family SHE isn’t dealing with? As in, what dark secrets will we eventually learn? ;-P

  10. Man I re-read this page like 5 times before I finally twigged Shep’s lines are exactly what indicates he’s seen Moze. Which is awesome but now I feel slow :(

  11. I just realized that “All the gods are watching” would not be “Omnes dii vigilant.” “All” take the genitive case in Latin, so the proper translation would be: “Omnes deorum vigilant.”

  12. Shouldn’t there have been a “god’s eye” too as part of it? Since that is a representation of the omniscience of god by a shining single eye seeing all things.

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