Despite its early, continuous, and fruitful contacts with neighboring cultures (one need just think of the Oriental influence on the Homeric epics), ancient Greek civilization was remarkably reluctant vis-à -vis the idea of translating literary works from foreign languages: virtually no instances are known from the archaic and Classical period (8thâ5th c. BCE; a possible exception is Hannoâs Periplous, from the Phoenician), and even in Hellenistic times we can hardly find any examples of true linguistic appropriation beyond the gigantic and by all means exceptional enterprise of the Septuagint at Alexandria (see Chapter 4.3; Herennios Philo in the first century BCE translated some of Sanchuniathonâs mythical tales, again from the Phoenician).
In Roman times (1st c. BCEâ4th c. CE), Latin was taught in schools of the Eastern part of the empire, but beyond some official inscriptions and some isolated cases of Virgilian translations attested in scholastic papyri (Virgil and some works of Cicero may indeed have been translated in full into Greek), throughout Greece, Egypt, Anatolia, and the Near East the dominant language of the cultivated elite remained Greek. In Late Antiquity, while the role of Latin even as an administrative language rapidly decreased (esp. during the fifth century), Greek translations were produced of some works of the Latin Church Fathers, and of Justinianâs Corpus Iuris; but it was not before the ripe Byzantine age (13thâ14th c.) that scholars such as Maximos Planudes and Demetrios Kydones attempted to translate into Greek substantial parts of the Latin literary heritage (Cicero, Ovid, Boethius, Augustine etc.).
On the other hand, translation from Greek played a substantial role in the shaping of Latin culture, not only because the first known work of Latin literature was a version of the Odyssey (Livius Andronicus, 3rd c. BCE), but chiefly because virtually all Latin genres, from theater to epigram, from epic to lyric poetry, from historiography to rhetoric, were inspired by and modelled after Greek prototypes. Since the second century BCE, the Roman elite (as opposed to the Greek one, even under Roman rule) always regarded bilingualism as essential, and translation as a substantial act in the formation and the otium of an accomplished intellectual.1 This kind of translationâknown as vertereânot only enriched the vocabulary and the conceptual span of Latin language, but also implied a tendency towards the emulation rather than the faithful rendering of the source text.
The most influential and theoretically most explicit evidence for Latin translations of Greek literary works comes from Cicero (1st c. BCE), who tackled works of Plato, Demosthenes and Aratos, and also developed the most interesting, if not systematic, reflection on the topic: he insisted that translation from Greek was not only a stylistic aid, but also a sort of civic obligation for Latin men of letters. In several statements (some of which are quoted in Jeromeâs letter), Cicero insisted that the goal of literary translation (as opposed to a merely âtechnicalâ ad verbum translation, which he conceived of and indeed sometimes produced himself, but deemed often incapable of rendering even the bare meaning of the original) was not a word-for-word transposition of the single words,2 but rather a stylistically refined enterprise, oriented on the target language. This stance will be followed by most later Latin writers, from Quintilian to Gellius and beyond.
In Late Antiquity, translation from Greek into Latin embraced scientific, narrative, and philosophical prose, and in Christian times also theological and liturgical writings (Church Fathers, hagiographies etc.). The style of these translations slowly evolved, so that the âfreeâ rendering propounded by Cicero was gradually flanked by a more careful and respectful technique, which shaped Latin language and syntax by depriving it of its literary embellishments and by transforming it into a Wissenschaftsprache (which it was to remain for centuries). We occasionally encounter statements that justify this choice, and overtly conceive their mission as a divulgation of a foreign text rather than a feat of stylistic and rhetorical aemulatio: if in technical texts this could prove sometimes useful, in hagiographical and liturgical texts it could prevent the risks of haeretical misunderstandings, though it could also occasionally obfuscate the meaning, as some translators overtly state.3
Most important in the frame of late antique culture was the activity of two outstanding translators of Christian works (both biblical and Patristic), namely Rufinus of Aquileia and above all the Church Father Jerome (both 4th/5th c. CE): the latterâs epistle to his old friend Pammachiusâalso known by the title of Liber de optimo genere interpretandi (âOn the best type of translationâ)âis probably the most advanced theoretical reflection on translation from the ancient world, both for what it says and for the sources it quotes in support of its arguments.
Written in 395/396, the letter is above all a defense from the attacks levelled against Jerome by anonymous critics (we deduce that foremost amongst them was his former friend Rufinus) with respect to alleged mistakes in his translation of an epistle of Epiphanios of Salamis (4th c. CE). After claiming that his translation was not intended for public circulation and had therefore been unduly stolen, Jerome insists that in refraining from a dull and literal version he had simply followed the traditional method of translation (so-called ad sensum), consecrated by a long tradition stretching from Cicero down to his own day (these are chapters 5â6, reproduced below). Jerome also claims that this methodâas long as it does not significantly alter the meaning of the source text4âis by far the best, with the only exception of the Holy Scriptures, for which a literal translation (verbum de verbo, a locution that will become standard down to the present day for describing this kind of translation) recommends itself because it can help avoid dangerous misunderstandings. The latter principle, however, is often disregarded by Jerome himself in his capacity as a translator of the Bible; and, as he argues in his letter to Pammachius, this ideal had been legitimately violated not only by the authors of the New Testament (who often quote biblical passages rather freely), but also, for instance, by the translators of the Septuagint.
Latin Text
|
Jerome, Letter 57, §§â¯5â6, excerpted from Sancti Eusebii Hieronymi epistulae. Pars I: epistulae IâLXX, ed. Isidorus Hilberg, Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum 54, (1910; repr., Vienna: Verlag der Ãsterreischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1996), 508â551. 57.5 Ego enim non solum fateor, sed libera uoce profiteor me in interpretatione Graecorum absque scripturis sanctis, ubi et uerborum ordo mysterium est, non uerbum e uerbo, sed sensum exprimere de sensu. habeoque huius rei magistrum Tullium, qui Protagoram Platonis et Oeconomicum Xenofontis et Aeschini et Demosthenis duas contra se orationes pulcherrimas transtulit. quanta in illis praetermiserit, quanta addiderit, quanta mutauerit, ut proprietates alterius linguae suis proprietatibus explicaret, non est huius temporis dicere. sufficit mihi ipsa translatoris auctoritas, qui ita in prologo earundem orationum locutus est [Cicero, de optimo genere oratorum 13â14]: âputaui mihi suscipiendum laborem utilem studiosis, mihi quidem ipsi non necessarium. conuerti enim ex Atticis duorum eloquentissimorum nobilissimas orationes inter seque contrarias, Aeschini et Demosthenis, nec conuerti ut interpres, sed ut orator, sententiis isdem et earum formis tam quam figuris, uerbis ad nostram consuetudinem aptis. in quibus non pro uerbo uerbum necesse habui reddere, sed genus omnium uerborum uimque seruaui. non enim me ea adnumerare lectori putaui oportere, sed tamquam adpendere.â |
English Translation Adapted from St. Jerome, Letters and Select Works, trans. William H. Fremantle (New York, 1893), 117â118. 57.5 For I myself not only admit but proclaim with free voice that in translating Greek authors (with the exception of the holy scriptures, where even the order of the words is a mystery) I render sense for sense and not word for word.5 My teacher in this course of action is Tullius [Cicero], who has translated Platoâs Protagoras, Xenophonâs Oeconomicus, and the two magnificent orations which Aeschines and Demosthenes have delivered against each other.6 This is not the time to indicate how much he omitted, how much he added and altered in those texts in order to explain the idioms of another tongue through those of his own. I shall content myself with the authority of the translator, who has spoken as follows in the prologue to the orations:7 âI have thought it right to embark on a labour useful for scholars, albeit not necessary for myself. I have namely translated the most noble speeches (one delivered against the other) of the two most eloquent Attic orators, Aeschines and Demosthenes; and I have not rendered them as a translator but as an orator, keeping the same sense and the figures of speech and thought, but altering the words to suit our own usage. I have thought I should not give back to the reader the same number of words, butâso to speakâthe same weight.â And again at the close of his treatise he |
|
rursumque in calce sermonis [23]: âquorum ego,â ait, âorationes si, ut spero, ita expressero uirtutibus utens illorum omnibus, id est sententiis et earum figuris et rerum ordine, uerba persequens eatenus, ut ea non abhorreant a more nostro, quae si e Graecis omnia conuersa non erunt, tamen, ut generis eiusdem sint, elaborauimusâ (et cetera). sed et Horatius, uir acutus et doctus, hoc idem in Arte poetica erudito interpreti praecipit [Horace, Ars Poetica 133â134]: ânec uerbum uerbo curabis reddere fidus interpres.â Terentius Menandrum, Plautus et Caecilius ueteres comicos interpretati sunt: numquid haerent in uerbis ac non decorem magis et elegantiam in translatione conseruant? quam uos ueritatem interpretationis, hanc eruditi unde et ego doctus a talibus ante annos circiter uiginti et simili tunc quoque errore deceptus, certe hoc mihi a uobis obiciendum nesciens, cum Eusebii |
says: âIf, as I hope, I have been able to render their speeches by employing all their merits, that is, the ideas, the figures and the general arrangement, and following the actual wording only so far as it did not deviate from our taste, even if not all the words will result translated from the Greek, we have tried our best to make them appear of the same style.â Horace too, such an acute and knowledgeable author, in his Art of Poetry gives the same prescription to the learned translator:8 âYou will not care to render word for word, as a faithful translator.â Terence has translated Menander, while Plautus and Cæcilius the old comic poets: do they ever stick at words, or donât they rather preserve in their versions the beauty and elegance of the original? What you call exact interpretation, the learned term it kakozelia [pedantry].9 About twenty years ago, as I translated Eusebiusâs Chronicon into Latin, instructed by such teachers and deceived by such an âerrorâ (I could not guess that you would soon reproach me precisely this), I wrote in my preface, amongst other things:10 âIt is hard, when following lines traced by others, not to diverge from them in some places, and it is difficult that what has been said perfectly in one language may preserve the same elegance in another. Something has been expressed appropriately by one specific word: I have no word of mine to express this, and trying to complete the sentence, I make a long detour covering with difficulties a short distance. To this must be added the windings of hyperbata, the differences in the use of cases, the diversity of the rhetorical figures, and finally the peculiar and, so to speak, inbred character of the language: if I render word for word, the words will sound absurd; if, compelled by necessity, I alter anything in the order or wording, I shall seem to have departed from the translatorâs duty.â And after many considerations, which it would be tedious to follow out here, I added: âIf anyone does not believe that the beauty of a language is transformed by translation, let him render Homer word for word into LatinâI shall say more, let him translate Homer in his language in prose, and he will see the ridiculous style and the most eloquent of poets scarcely able to speak.â |
|
57.6 Uerum ne meorum parua sit auctoritasâquamquam hoc tantum probare uoluerim, me semper ab adulescentia non uerba, sed sententias transtulisseâqualis super hoc genere praefatiuncula sit, in libro, quo beati Antonii uita describitur, ipsius lectione cognosce [Euagrius Ponticus, in vitam S. Antonii, Patrologia Latina, 26.834]: âex alia in aliam linguam ad uerbum expressa translatio sensus operit et ueluti laeto gramine sata strangulat. dum enim casibus et figuris seruit oratio, quod breui poterat indicare sermone, longo ambitu circumacta uix explicat. hoc igitur ego uitans ita beatum Antonium te petente transposui, ut nihil desit ex sensu, cum aliquid desit ex uerbis. alii syllabas aucupentur et litteras, tu quaere sententias.â dies me deficiet, si omnium, qui ad sensum interpretati sunt, testimonia replicauero. sufficit in praesenti nominasse Hilarium confessorem, qui homilias in Iob et in psalmos tractatus plurimos in Latinum uertit e Graeco nec adsedit litterae dormitanti et putida rusticorum interpretatione se torsit, sed quasi captiuos sensus in suam linguam uictoris iure transposuit. |
57.6 But in order to prevent the authority of my writings from being inadequate (though I only wanted to demonstrate that since my youth I have always translated meanings rather than words), learn what says the book carrying the life of St. Antony, and read its preface on this topic:11 âA word-for-word translation from one language into another conceals the sense, and chokes the fields with luxuriant grass. If it follows slavishly the cases and the figures, it fails to explain by a long circumlocution what it could have signified by means of a short sentence. In order to avoid this fault, I have translated at your request the life of St. Antony in such a way that nothing may lack in the sense, even if something lacks in the words. Let others hunt for syllables and letters: you will look for meanings.â |
Abbreviations
| pro. |
prohoemium/prooemium |
See Pliny the Younger (firstâsecond century CE, Rome), Letter 7.9.3â4, translated in McElduff, Roman Theories of Translation, 174: âThe most useful activity and one which many people suggest is to translate (vertere) from Greek into Latin or from Latin into Greek. This form of exercise produces ownership (proprietas) and brilliance in languageâand by imitating the best writers you gain a like ability for invention. And also, what has escaped someone who is only reading, cannot flee the grasp of someone translating. In this way understanding and judgment is acquired. It doesnât harm, after you have read through something sufficiently to keep its main argument in your mind, to write as if in competition with it, and then compare your efforts with the original and consider carefully where your version is better or worse.â
Cicero, On Moral Ends 3.15, translated in McElduff, Roman Theories of Translation, 115: âIt is not necessary to squeeze out [a translation] word by word, as ineloquent interpreters do, when there is a more familiar word conveying the same meaning. Indeed, I usually use several words to expose what is expressed in Greek by one, if I am unable to do anything else.â
Marius Mercator, preface to the translations of Nestoriusâs sermons (early fifth century, Rome): âIn these sermons I have attempted to translate word for word, as best I could, so that I may not later appear as a forger rather than a true translator. Therefore I beg your pardon, pious reader, if the style is less eloquent, or if your ear will be struck by the strangeness of words chosen throughout the text: I have preferred to expose myself to the tongues of critics rather than to stray far from the task of expressing the truth of meanings, in which lies the danger of falsehood.â Eduard Schwartz, Acta Conciliorum Oecumenicorum, I.5, 29, my translation.
See also Jerome, Letter 84.11 to Pammachius and Oceanus, sub fine (400â¯CE, Rome): âTo change something from the Greek is not the work of translation, but of destruction [non est vertentis, sed evertentis], and to express the Greek word by word is not the work of someone who would like to conserve the charm of the speechâ; my translation.
Jerome notoriously translated the Old Testament in Latin (the so-called Vulgata), and in his numerous exegetical works on the various books of the Bible he often comes back on the mystic purport of every single word in the holy scripture. It should be stressed, however, that both in his praxis as a translator and in some other theoretical statements, Jerome insisted on a much freer approach to the version of the Bible.
Marcus Tullius Cicero (first century BCE), one of the greatest Roman orators and intellectuals, translated several works of Attic writers, notably the philosopher Plato (fifth century BCE), the historian Xenophon, and the two oratorsârival to each otherâAeschines and Demosthenes (fourth century BCE). In other works, Jerome quotes (and occasionally criticizes) Ciceroâs translations (none of which extant to the present day), which shows that he was familiar with them and by and large consented with their theoretical approach to translation, though remaining in practice slightly more faithful than Cicero to his models.
All we have of Ciceroâs translations of the orations by Aeschines and Demosthenes (Against Ctesiphon and On the Crown respectively, both delivered at Athens in 330â¯BCE) is the preface, known in manuscripts as De optimo genere oratorum (On the best kind of orators): Jerome quotes some paragraphs of this text, namely those devoted to the issue of literary translation, insisting particularly on Ciceroâs claim to have translated not as a Dolmetscher (interpres), but as an orator dealing with fellow orators, and thus refraining from using odd calques or words not familiar to the usage of the target language. Furthermore, when Jerome speaks of the proprietates of each language, he must also have in mind the case of the Bible, and particularly the idioms of Hebrew that made their way into the Greek of the Septuagint, and finally into the later Latin versions.
The great Latin poet Horace (first century BCE) wrote amongst other things the Ars poetica, an epistle in verse concerning style, elegance, literary genres and the debt of Rome towards the Greek heritage: the lines quoted here describe in a short gnome the task of the ideal translator.
Jerome refers to the Latin translations of Greek comedy (Plautus, Terentius, and Caecilius Statius, third and second century BCE; their Greek models are Menander [fourth century BCE], and the veteres comiciâperhaps Aristophanes and his colleagues are intended), which numbered to the first literary achievements of Latin literature and were ârecreationsâ rather than faithful translationsâthis is meant by the idea of vertere. The technical term kakozelia belongs to rhetorical vocabulary.
Jerome translated the Chronicon of Eusebius during his stay in Constantinople in 380/81. This passage of the preface echoes several ideas and terms used by Quintilian, especially as far as rhetorical figures and stylistic peculiarities are concerned. When talking of the pedestrian translation of Homerâs epics, he might be thinking of Attius Labeo; a version of Homer in inadequate Latin prose was to be realized many centuries later (ca. 1366) by the Greco-Calabrian scholar Leonzio Pilato at the request of Petrarch and Boccaccio: Leonzioâs achievement was to mark the âreturnâ of Homer to the West after centuries of neglect.
Evagrius of Antiochâs translation of this Life of Antony, commanded by and dedicated to Innocentius presbyter (â â¯373), replaced an earlier version that has been handed down to us anonymously. The metaphor of the choked fields comes from Quintilian (Institutio Oratoria 8, pro. 23), who applies it to style in general.
Bibliography
Primary Text
Critical Edition
St. Jerome. Sancti Eusebii Hieronymi epistulae. Pars I: epistulae IâLXX. Edited by Isidorus Hilberg. Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum 54. 1910. Reprint. Vienna: Verlag der Ãsterreischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1996.
Text and Commentary
St. Jerome. Liber de optimo genere interpretandi (Epistula 57). Commentary by G.J.M. Bartelink. Mnemosyne, Supplements 61. Leiden: Brill 1980.
English Translation
St. Jerome. Letters and Select Works. Translated by William H. Fremantle. New York, 1893.
Further Primay Sources
Eduard Schwartz, ed. Acta Conciliorum Oecumenicorum, I.5. Berlin, 1930.
Secondary Sources
McElduff, Siobhán. Roman Theories of Translation. London: Routledge, 2013.
Further Reading
Bianconi, Daniele. âLe traduzioni in greco di testi latini.â In La cultura bizantina, edited by G. Cavallo, 519â568. Vol. 1 of Lo spazio letterario del Medioevo III. Le culture circostanti. Roma: Salerno, 2004.
Chiesa, Paolo. âAd verbum o ad sensum? Modelli e coscienza metodologica della traduzione tra tarda antichità e alto medioevo.â Medioevo e Rinascimento 1 (1987): 1â51.
Kytzler, Bernhard. âFidus Interpres.â Antichthon 23 (1989): 42â50.
Rochette, Bruno. Le latin dans le monde grec. Bruxelles: Latomus, 1997.
Venuti, Lawrence. âGenealogies of Translation Theory: Jerome.â Boundary 37, no. 2 (2010): 5â28.