Double Dactyls

[ginlindzey]

Know anything about double dactyls?

Well, before I lose the ones that I wrote back in the late 1990s (and a few others since), I thought I'd post them here for your amusement. But note that Double Dactyls and haiku (more on those in another note, perhaps) are great ways to translate things like Martial's epigrams.

Martial VII.3
Cur non mitto meos tibi, Pontiliane, libellos?
    Ne mihi tu mittas, Pontiliane, tuos.

Fear of Reciprocity

Higgledy Piggledy
Pontilianus, ac-
quaintance of Martial and
    Rather a pest:
"Send me your book!" M said
Epigrammatic'ly
"Risk reciprocity?
    Surely you jest!"


I.19
Si memini, fuerant tibi quattuor, Aelia, dentes:
    expulit una duos tussis et una duos.
Iam secura potes totis tussire diebus:
    nil istic quod agat tertia tussis habet.

Free to Cough

Higgledy Piggledy
Elderly Aelia,
Subject of Martial's po-
    etical jeer,
Lost her teeth (four) in two
Superpertussial
Fits; from a third fit she
    now has no fear.


Women Peacekeepers (from a passage in Livy)

Higgledy Piggledy
Woman of Sabine, who
Rushed into battle 'twixt
    Husband and dad,
Though their own rapes started
Filiopatricide,
Dropped the bomb: PREGNANCY--
    No one left sad.

Haunted House (from a passage in Pliny)

Clinkity Clankety
AthenoDOrus, phi-
losopher, purchasing
    Cheap real estate,
Faced up to hauntings with
parapsychology,
buried the bones--now he's
    Lost his roommate.



Here's one that isn't a translation but is just about Claudius:

Luck of the Dice

Whammity, Whackity
Emperor Claudius
Suffered from passions--yea
    Verily--VICE:
Gambled on marriages
(LUdifuTUtio)*
Bettered his chances by
    Playing at dice.

(Ludifututio is a Latin term coined by the illustrious Peter Green. It means
"f***king game," as in Nil nisi ludifututio--it's just a f***ing game.)


Ah, well, gotta run. We can discuss double dactyls later. For the results from a contest that Doug Parker at UT ran a decade ago, please go to:
http://www.txclassics.org/exrpts7.htm

Comments

[ginlindzey.livejournal.com]

I thought I looked but I better look again because I don't remember the DD! :(

Ah, yes, Carpe Cafaeum. Will try to get to it this weekend. Thanks for shopping!