Thomas_More
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I was taught (I opted voluntarily on Friday afternoons in school, just me and one other boy) Latin and taught to speak it in the classical way (all consonants hard). Church Latin is medieval, not classical, Latin, with Italianised consonants. Dog Latin describes the fun and invented Latin of the common people of the Middle Ages, who had a great sense of humour. Poor parish priests also spoke Dog Latin.
I heard from a student doing university Latin years later that now it is taught without the names of the cases: nominative, accusative, genitive, etc. They just say first case, second case, and so on. This is ridiculous, because the case names indicate what the cases are, and students today won’t have that grammatical resource.
The same with left and right. Latin sinistra and dextra. We say sinister for evil things, and gauche (Fr. left) for clumsy; and dextrous and adroit, both orig. right, which we also use as a synonym for correct.
For centuries left-handed children were beaten.
In theology the saved sit on Christ’s right and the damned on His left before being cast down.
And since “homo” means man, and not men and women, homosexual is a perfectly good word for males who desire other males, whereas Sapphist is good for women who desire women. (The inhabitants of Lesbos today have lost their geographical pronoun and also their adjective – which the Pride folk, normally very defensive of pronouns, have no sympathy with at all. Of course, there will also be lesbian Lesbians, but most Lesbians are not lesbians). 😀
Ain’t language a hoot?
But now we cannot use the word gay in its original sense without qualification.
For instance, when quoting the troubadours calling their music the gay science, one has to qualify whilst others stupidly chuckle at you, and adults are turned into giggling children.And everyone would have access to the means of production, and could learn how to make what he or she considered useful and beautiful.
” So we are lumbered with “homophobia” to describe dislike of homosexuals (or is it dislike of homosexual behaviour by anybody?).”
*****
Or, instead of being lumbered, you can make up your own words, as Nicolas Restif did, and as I often do (although I like to choose the archaic. It still annoys people, which I like to do. Especially professors).
Greek and Roman morality was homosexual. Women were for reproduction purposes.
The Lovers’ Battalion of Thebes was composed of men who were lovers, and was the front line force in war, since it was reasoned they would fight more ferociously to protect one another.
It was more or less required in all Greek city states that mature men would have catamites: young boys who were both students of the elder’s philosophy and also his lover.
Were David and Jonathan real?
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/06/29/in-search-of-king-davids-lost-empireThe Hebrews were again oddities, with their Unknown God and their anti-sodomy.
” I don’t think there was even a word for same sex desire before the 1870s.”
*****
I think lesbians used to be called Sapphists, after the poet of Lesbos.
“Pederast” was a word too. And of course “sodomite”, which is very old. 18th century use included “catamite” and “tribade.”
No, that’s not it. When there are so many posts and the page is due to turn, posts are swallowed and don’t appear.
Try again, but alter a word or two, so it doesn’t register as “identical post.”
