Monday, November 21, 2011

De Ortu et Occasu

Here is today's distich by John Owen, with an English translation by Thomas Harvey, 5:39. There the epigraph is based on a paired parallelism: the sunrise should remind us of resurrection (and remember Owen's little poem comparing sleep and death, De Somno), while sunrise should remind us of death.

Sole oriente, tui reditus a morte memento.
Sis memor occasus, sole cadente, tui.


Remember at Sun-setting Death, thine Urn:
And at Sun-rising mind thy thence return.


The vocabulary is keyed to the DCC Latin Vocabulary list. There are only three words in this poem that are not on the DCC list:

memor, memoris - mindful of, remembering
occāsus, occāsūs m. - falling, going down, setting, west
reditus, reditūs m. - returning, return

ā ab abs: from, by (+abl.)
cadō cadere cecidī cāsum: fall, be killed
meminī meminisse: remember, recollect
mors mortis f.: death
orior orīrī ortus sum: arise, begin
sōl sōlis m.: sun
sum, esse, fuī: be, exist
tuus -a -um: your