Free Pr0n Friday!
Back in the 1890s, when Westerners had just begun to discover the unending source of fascination that is Japan, the cheerfully scatological nature of Shinto creation myths was considered too indelicate for a general readership. To combat this problem, W.G. Aston, translator of the Nihongi (if I'm not mistaken, I believe his is the only translation in English, and let me tell you, you can get most of the information out of the Kojiki and also the Nihongi goes faster if you skip over Aston's footnotes) thoughtfully put the dirty bits in Latin. This was common practice in those days, and in the words of one commentator whose name I've forgotten, it "spurred schoolboys to feats of Latin erudition which they rarely matched in the classroom".
Having come across this delightful reminder of a simpler time, I felt the stirrings of civic duty deep in my heart. After all, as a classicist, it is my charge to bring the torch of Enlightenment to those of you not so fortunate as to know an ancient language.
As ever, this is a free service. I've thoughtfully provided the Latin text so that anyone who does read Latin can feel free to correct my translation. I've also tried to abstain from too many profanities, since the tone of the Latin doesn't lend itself to that. Ergo, if it sounds very formal and stilted, it's me being a not-very-skillful translator faithful to Aston's Latin.
Context: Izanagi no Mikoto and Izanami no Mikoto, the creator deities, are, well, creating Japan and that. Actually, they're creating a pantheon first.
Postemo* cupiebant coire, sed artis nescii erant. Tum erat motacilla quae advolavit, atque concussit suum caput et suam caudam. Quod cum vidissent duo Dei, imitati sunt eam, et in hoc modo artem coeundi potiti sunt.
At last, they wanted to have intercourse, but they were ignorant of the art. Thereupon a wagtail flew towards them, and brought together her head and her tail. When the two gods had seen this, they mimicked her, and in this manner they acquired the art of intercourse.
O BBY. Now go have yourself a cold shower and lie down after all that nervous excitement.
* I was unable to find a gloss for "postemo", but given that it contains the root "post" I think it's safe to say that we're talking about a sequence of events happening AFTER the preceding sentences. Were I not so intellectually lazy, I would have gone upstairs to get my Latin dictionary.
[EDITED per augustuscaesar's suggestion that postemo might be a typo for postremo. Tara is my one love. Also, cupiebant has been changed to "wanted" rather than "desired", since the former is a more natural word choice.]
Having come across this delightful reminder of a simpler time, I felt the stirrings of civic duty deep in my heart. After all, as a classicist, it is my charge to bring the torch of Enlightenment to those of you not so fortunate as to know an ancient language.
As ever, this is a free service. I've thoughtfully provided the Latin text so that anyone who does read Latin can feel free to correct my translation. I've also tried to abstain from too many profanities, since the tone of the Latin doesn't lend itself to that. Ergo, if it sounds very formal and stilted, it's me being a not-very-skillful translator faithful to Aston's Latin.
Context: Izanagi no Mikoto and Izanami no Mikoto, the creator deities, are, well, creating Japan and that. Actually, they're creating a pantheon first.
Postemo* cupiebant coire, sed artis nescii erant. Tum erat motacilla quae advolavit, atque concussit suum caput et suam caudam. Quod cum vidissent duo Dei, imitati sunt eam, et in hoc modo artem coeundi potiti sunt.
At last, they wanted to have intercourse, but they were ignorant of the art. Thereupon a wagtail flew towards them, and brought together her head and her tail. When the two gods had seen this, they mimicked her, and in this manner they acquired the art of intercourse.
O BBY. Now go have yourself a cold shower and lie down after all that nervous excitement.
* I was unable to find a gloss for "postemo", but given that it contains the root "post" I think it's safe to say that we're talking about a sequence of events happening AFTER the preceding sentences. Were I not so intellectually lazy, I would have gone upstairs to get my Latin dictionary.
[EDITED per augustuscaesar's suggestion that postemo might be a typo for postremo. Tara is my one love. Also, cupiebant has been changed to "wanted" rather than "desired", since the former is a more natural word choice.]