Ammian(us): your advice needed

[Bill Thayer]

Some of you know that a Latin text of Ammian is parked on my site, in an "as is" state, being a rescue from another website that had suddenly disappeared for over a week; and that, after that scare (that site was the only Web source for the text) I've decided to keep this text onsite.

I find, though, that it needs fixing — inserting Greek passages, local links, general proofreading, etc. I'm now starting the job then, but have on my desk three different editions of the Latin text: Gardthausen (Teubner, 1874), Clark (Weidmann, 1901-1915), and Clark with J. C. Rolfe's changes, I believe most of them slight (Loeb, 1935-1939). Since you guys are on top of Late Antique military history, your opinions as to which edition might be best to follow are very welcome, with your reasons of course.

The English is a no-brainer, a transcription of Rolfe's Loeb is in progress; not all the Loeb translators are that good, but Rolfe certainly is.

Finally, a little side item, of no importance at all, but that has piqued my curiosity. I'm well aware that English-speakers normally refer to this writer as "Ammianus"; I prefer to follow older usage (as for example in Sir Thomas Browne) and call him Ammian: since I almost always opt for simplicity, and we say Appian, not Appianus; Arrian, not Arrianus. My question is: how did this non-parallel "Ammianus" get started? (My partner's tentative theory is that English-speakers were primed for simplicity in the other cases, being long used to "Aryan" and "Appian" as in the Appian Way, but to no corresponding "Ammian"; but this leaves me a bit unsatisfied.)

[Roy]

Some of you know that a Latin text of Ammian is parked on my site, in an "as is" state, being a rescue from another website that had suddenly disappeared for over a week; and that, after that scare (that site was the only Web source for the text) I've decided to keep this text onsite.

I know of these sites with the Latin text:
[url:rfck1yg0]http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/ammianus.html[/url]
[url:rfck1yg0]http://www.ancienttexts.org/library/latinlibrary/ammianus.html[/url]

English translation
Dutch translation


Can't help you with the different editions I'm afraid.

[Dan Diffendale]

Finally, a little side item, of no importance at all, but that has piqued my curiosity. I'm well aware that English-speakers normally refer to this writer as "Ammianus"; I prefer to follow older usage (as for example in Sir Thomas Browne) and call him Ammian: since I almost always opt for simplicity, and we say Appian, not Appianus; Arrian, not Arrianus. My question is: how did this non-parallel "Ammianus" get started? (My partner's tentative theory is that English-speakers were primed for simplicity in the other cases, being long used to "Aryan" and "Appian" as in the Appian Way, but to no corresponding "Ammian"; but this leaves me a bit unsatisfied.)

Perhaps because he's often referred to in full as "Ammianus Marcellinus"?

[Bill Thayer]

Hmm; Camden's edition — the original one, which was what went down for a week — has been spreading; not a bad thing, although in general (and I believe in this specific case) such copies deteriorate as they go, just as in the Middle Ages.

Latin Library got theirs from Camden, by agreement with him; and now AncientTexts has got picked it up from LatLib, it would seem.

Wasn't familiar with the Dutch site, thanks Roy, that's nice to see; Roger Pearse's stuff of course is very nicely done, and when I get sorted out with my own edition (a different one from his), both these sites will get their links on my orientation page.

[Bill Thayer]

Perhaps because he's often referred to in full as "Ammianus Marcellinus"?

I thought of that, Dan, but it begs the question. (Why isn't that other guy for example then referred to as Tullius Cicero? us older people call him Tully, of course, and the youngsters are calling him Cicero these days.) There are very few authors referred to by both names: Tite-Live, Quinte-Curce and Aulu-Gelle by the French; Polemius Silvius, Quintus Curtius/Curtius Rufus by English-speakers, sometimes Cornelius Celsus (to differentiate from Origen's Celsus I guess?); but there is no other Ammianus, I don't think.

[Dan Diffendale]

For what it's worth, Google returns:

about 56,500 English pages for "Ammian"
about 250,000 English pages for "Ammianus"
about 159,000 English pages for "Ammianus Marcellinus"

[Robert Vermaat]

Perhaps because he's often referred to in full as "Ammianus Marcellinus"?

I thought of that, Dan, but it begs the question. (Why isn't that other guy for example then referred to as Tullius Cicero? us older people call him Tully, of course, and the youngsters are calling him Cicero these days.) There are very few authors referred to by both names: Tite-Live, Quinte-Curce and Aulu-Gelle by the French; Polemius Silvius, Quintus Curtius/Curtius Rufus by English-speakers, sometimes Cornelius Celsus (to differentiate from Origen's Celsus I guess?); but there is no other Ammianus, I don't think.

Ah, but then why Julius Caesar, and not July? Or why Polybius, and not Polyby? Or Augustus, and not August (seems a normal name, too)If it's a fashion thing, as may be judged from those names you supplied, my guess would also be that it's the double name that causes the pronounciation. There seems to be no grammatical behind it, anyway.

To us Dutch all these shorthened names are odd, by the way.. :wink:

[Jona Lendering]

Ah, but then why Julius Caesar, and not July? Or why Polybius, and not Polyby? Or Augustus, and not August

I understand that the "short" English names have come to that language through France. During the process in which Latin became French, many personal names were abridged (e.g. Chlodevich >> Louis, but also Homerus >> Homère, Horatius >> Horace and Lucianus >> Lucian). The English accepted this, except for names that were already known (Augustus, Julius Caesar) or still had to be rediscovered (Herodotus, Thucydides).

To us Dutch all these shortened names are odd, by the way.. :wink:

As to Greek names, the Dutch originally used the German system of direct transcription (Homeros, Ploutarchos), as you can still see when you read a novel by Louis Couperus. During World War II, our (grand)parents switched to the French system of latinizing. they also started to write kultuur as cultuur, because they did not want to resemble German. I am glad we are now reverting to the original system, which several people now call "our traditional system" and already plagues our library catalogs. I wrote a piece on it in the Handelsblad: go here.

[D B Campbell]

Latin text of Ammian ... needs fixing — inserting Greek passages, local links, general proofreading, etc. I'm now starting the job then, but have on my desk three different editions of the Latin text: Gardthausen (Teubner, 1874), Clark (Weidmann, 1901-1915), and Clark with J. C. Rolfe's changes, I believe most of them slight (Loeb, 1935-1939). Since you guys are on top of Late Antique military history, your opinions as to which edition might be best to follow are very welcome, with your reasons of course.

Bill, for Ammianus Marcellinus, the Dutch seem to be the masters. Particularly for the long-running series of commentaries from Groningen, revived in the 1980s/1990s.
You may profit from the Rijks Universiteit Groningen web site.
(In particular, they recommend Seyfarth's Teubner edition of the text.)

[Robert Vermaat]

Bill, for Ammianus Marcellinus, the Dutch seem to be the masters.

But of course we are :wink: we have something with Late Romans...

[Bill Thayer]

Thanks everybody, including for your ideas on my side-item (have you ever heard of anyone hijacking their own thread?!) —

It looks like I'll be going with Clark; Seyfarth is of course firmly under copyright, and what appears to differentiate Gardthausen and Clark is the latter's extensive research into metrical clausulae, which in the case of the rhetorically-minded Ammian, seem to have determined his text, or at least so the (near!) consensus following and praising Clark.

I don't much like putting a text online that is already there, it's only human nature: but the Forum Romanum Latin text, from which all the others (including mine for the moment, although I've already started on the corrections), is deficient, and in spots sadly so, as for example whatever Greek rears its ugly head, like the long Vatican Obelisk inscription in Book 17, which is just omitted. The English at Tertullian.Org, on the other hand, is worse than deficient, it's inadequate: I'm hardly finding fault with Roger Pearse's superbly careful stuff, of course; but the 1862 translation predates the three key critical editions of the Latin text (with the inclusion of new manuscripts) of Eyssenhardt, Gardthausen, and Clark, which have much improved it.

The Loeb text I'm transcribing, 1935-1939, that is a definite improvement then over Bohn's 1862, is already partly online too, even: here. The Loeb texts, as late as 1963, are almost all in the public domain, because the publishers usually failed to renew U. S. copyright at the appropriate time; and I guess few website owners bother to check, so we wind up with text editions online that are older than they need to be. (The Copyright Office estimates that only 15% of book copyrights were renewed to insure their full protection.)

Finally, with local links (both chapters and sections), the cross-linking of the Latin with its English translation, and the inclusion of all the footnotes, introductory material, etc., the Lacus Ammian should, I hope, be a step up. Quite a few texts by the way, the reason I started putting them up myself was that I was tired of hunting for the exact passage each time Smith's Dictionary gave me a citation! If anyone lurking out there happens to read this and is putting up a text, please, please, provide the local links.

For those, then, that are tracking Ammian domo mea, the orientation page is here.