The Ancients Were Full Of Shit
After my pretentious rambling in the last post, how bout some shitposting! And when I say shitposting, I mean shitposting. Lots of nasty language below, skip if you’re sensitive about that.
No matter how indifferent y’all feel about the reformation, you probably know that it caused quite a fuss at the time. Luther lost a lot of friends about it and made a lot of enemies, and here’s a rather hilarious (if you don’t mind gutter language) exchange between a former student and friend, Simon Lemnius, and Teh Reformator Himself, now thoroughly fallen out with each other.
So Lemnius writes a poem to/about Luther. Now these guys are theologians a.k.a. Educated Fellas (TM) so clearly, they’re going to hash out their differences in a rational and sophisticated manner, right?
Ipse dysenteriam pateris clamasque cacando,
Quamque aliis optas, evenit illa tibi.
Dumque cacatores clamas, tu nempe cacator
Factus es, et merda dives es ipse tua.
Ante tibi rabies distorta resolverat ora,
Et solvit culus iam tibi ventris onus.
Noluit haec tantum rabies e faucibus ire;
Nunc etiam natibus profluit illa tuis.
Non poterat fundi pestis tibi tanta labellis;
Unde tamen rumpat, repperit illa viam.
Sed puto, rumpetur citius tibi venter et exta,
Exeat e culo quam tibi tanta lues.
Well, that looks really erudite, I mean, it’s Latin and all. I’m sure that cacare is not at all related to Modern German kacken, “to crap”, right? Welll. I’m too lazy to write my own translation and I don't want you to loose half the juicy bits through Google translate so I’m going to use the one by Carl P.E.Springer:
You yourself suffer from diarrhea and cry out when shitting
and what you wish for others happens to you.
While you call others shitters, you become
the real shitter and become rich with your own shit.
Before, fury had loosed your distorted mouth,
and now your ass releases the load of your stomach.
This fury did not want to come out of your throat only,
now it also spurts forth from your behind.
Such an affliction could not be handled by the lips alone;
nonetheless it found a way where it could burst forth.
But I think that your stomach and intestines will burst
sooner than such a great flood of bilgewater could come out your ass.
Classy, Lemnius, classy. (He also wrote a polemic work about the family lives of Luther and some friends under the title of Monarchopornomachia, and yes, that’s exactly the P word you’re thinking of.)
Not to be outdone, Luther penned down a response that’s just as... um... juicy.
Quam bene conveniunt tibi res et carmina, Lemchen!
Merda tibi res est, carmina merda tibi.
Dignus erat Lemchen merdosus carmine merdae,
Nam vatem merdae nil nisi merda decet.
Infelix princeps, quem laudas carmine merdae!
Merdosum merda quem facis ipse tua.
Ventre urges merdam vellesque cacare libenter
Ingentem, facis at, merdipoeta, nihil.
At meritis si digna tuis te poena sequatur,
Tu miserum corvis merda cadaver eris.
Again, translation by Springer:
How well your verses and their content suit you, little Lemnius!
Your content is shit; your verses are shit.
Little shitty Lemnius was worthy of a poem of shit,
for nothing but shit is fitting for a poet of shit.
O, unhappy the prince, whom you praise with a poem of shit,
whom you yourself befoul with your shit.
You try to press shit from your bowels, and would gladly have a huge shit,
but you produce nothing, O poet of shit.
But if a penalty worthy of your deserts follows you,
you will be a miserable corpse, shit for the crows.
Yep, some really sophisticated high-quality content, as you can see.
Why do I think this is at all relevant today? Well, for one, with all the highbrow articles that are currently being published, I think it’s useful to also remember just how vulgar Luther and his contemporaries could be. People sometimes picture the past (TM) as a time of aloof ladies and gentlemen, well, sometimes people were burnt for heresy but really, what a civilised time and how rotten our modern customs are in comparison, right? Wrong. If people were well-educated, they cussed in Latin and in verse, but you can cook up a shitstorm in Latin just as nicely as in Early Modern German or Postmodern English.
QED.
Poetry and translation gratefully taken from Carl E.P. Springer’s article “Luther’s Latin Poetry and Scatology“, in Lutheran Quarterly 23 (2009).
The next post will be less shitty (but very silly)... stay tuned!
- - - Crossposted via Dreamwidth. Feel free to comment here or there.
No matter how indifferent y’all feel about the reformation, you probably know that it caused quite a fuss at the time. Luther lost a lot of friends about it and made a lot of enemies, and here’s a rather hilarious (if you don’t mind gutter language) exchange between a former student and friend, Simon Lemnius, and Teh Reformator Himself, now thoroughly fallen out with each other.
So Lemnius writes a poem to/about Luther. Now these guys are theologians a.k.a. Educated Fellas (TM) so clearly, they’re going to hash out their differences in a rational and sophisticated manner, right?
Ipse dysenteriam pateris clamasque cacando,
Quamque aliis optas, evenit illa tibi.
Dumque cacatores clamas, tu nempe cacator
Factus es, et merda dives es ipse tua.
Ante tibi rabies distorta resolverat ora,
Et solvit culus iam tibi ventris onus.
Noluit haec tantum rabies e faucibus ire;
Nunc etiam natibus profluit illa tuis.
Non poterat fundi pestis tibi tanta labellis;
Unde tamen rumpat, repperit illa viam.
Sed puto, rumpetur citius tibi venter et exta,
Exeat e culo quam tibi tanta lues.
Well, that looks really erudite, I mean, it’s Latin and all. I’m sure that cacare is not at all related to Modern German kacken, “to crap”, right? Welll. I’m too lazy to write my own translation and I don't want you to loose half the juicy bits through Google translate so I’m going to use the one by Carl P.E.Springer:
You yourself suffer from diarrhea and cry out when shitting
and what you wish for others happens to you.
While you call others shitters, you become
the real shitter and become rich with your own shit.
Before, fury had loosed your distorted mouth,
and now your ass releases the load of your stomach.
This fury did not want to come out of your throat only,
now it also spurts forth from your behind.
Such an affliction could not be handled by the lips alone;
nonetheless it found a way where it could burst forth.
But I think that your stomach and intestines will burst
sooner than such a great flood of bilgewater could come out your ass.
Classy, Lemnius, classy. (He also wrote a polemic work about the family lives of Luther and some friends under the title of Monarchopornomachia, and yes, that’s exactly the P word you’re thinking of.)
Not to be outdone, Luther penned down a response that’s just as... um... juicy.
Quam bene conveniunt tibi res et carmina, Lemchen!
Merda tibi res est, carmina merda tibi.
Dignus erat Lemchen merdosus carmine merdae,
Nam vatem merdae nil nisi merda decet.
Infelix princeps, quem laudas carmine merdae!
Merdosum merda quem facis ipse tua.
Ventre urges merdam vellesque cacare libenter
Ingentem, facis at, merdipoeta, nihil.
At meritis si digna tuis te poena sequatur,
Tu miserum corvis merda cadaver eris.
Again, translation by Springer:
How well your verses and their content suit you, little Lemnius!
Your content is shit; your verses are shit.
Little shitty Lemnius was worthy of a poem of shit,
for nothing but shit is fitting for a poet of shit.
O, unhappy the prince, whom you praise with a poem of shit,
whom you yourself befoul with your shit.
You try to press shit from your bowels, and would gladly have a huge shit,
but you produce nothing, O poet of shit.
But if a penalty worthy of your deserts follows you,
you will be a miserable corpse, shit for the crows.
Yep, some really sophisticated high-quality content, as you can see.
Why do I think this is at all relevant today? Well, for one, with all the highbrow articles that are currently being published, I think it’s useful to also remember just how vulgar Luther and his contemporaries could be. People sometimes picture the past (TM) as a time of aloof ladies and gentlemen, well, sometimes people were burnt for heresy but really, what a civilised time and how rotten our modern customs are in comparison, right? Wrong. If people were well-educated, they cussed in Latin and in verse, but you can cook up a shitstorm in Latin just as nicely as in Early Modern German or Postmodern English.
QED.
Poetry and translation gratefully taken from Carl E.P. Springer’s article “Luther’s Latin Poetry and Scatology“, in Lutheran Quarterly 23 (2009).
The next post will be less shitty (but very silly)... stay tuned!
- - - Crossposted via Dreamwidth. Feel free to comment here or there.