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Quintilla at the Baths
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Some questions for Quintus
1. What’s your background?
· Quintus was educated at the University of Cambridge and taught Latin Prose and Verse Composition at the University before taking on the leadership of the Classics department of one of England's most prestigious independent boarding schools. His radio broadcasts include talks on ‘Virgil’ and ‘Caligula’. Quintus is now enjoying retirement, which he divides between translating Latin, exploring the rural byways of England by bicycle and on foot, railway journeys and out-door swimming. He is ascetic by nature, and practises the now sadly neglected virtues of self-reliance and thrift.
· Quintus’ doughty consort Quintilla was educated at the University of Oxford and has acted as the Latin language consultant for a number of television documentaries.
2. Why not use free online software and online dictionaries to translate Latin? Because they don’t work! The real damage is done by sites which offer translations from English into Latin, because if you don’t know Latin you have no way of knowing whether these translations are correct or not, and Latin is so different from English that it’s impossible to check them by simply looking up the words in a Latin dictionary.
Not convinced? Here’s an interesting test: feed any English sentence of 10 or so words into an English-to-Latin translation program; then take the resultant Latin and feed it into a different Latin-to-English translation program. You will be surprised – or horrified – by the results!
Unfortunately these translation programs are useless – that’s why they’re free - and sadly people who use them to translate phrases into Latin don’t realize this, and end up with gibberish for their company motto, tattoo etc.
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3. What about other Internet Latin translation agencies?
Only a handful of other sites offer Latin translations, and very few are dedicated Latin sites run by Latinists. Almost all are run as multi-lingual sites with no special expertise in Latin, which is farmed out to untested third parties. We know this because they frequently email us to help out with difficult assignments. With us you are in direct contact with a combined 120 years of experience in Latin (that’s more than twice the average lifespan of a Roman!)
4. What positive reasons are there for choosing Quintus?
· Lifelong academic experience of translating Latin.
· Unparalleled experience in internet Latin translation work over more than thirteen years.
· Inbuilt quality assurance from a highly satisfied verifiable customer base (more than 1000 verified Paypal customers in the last twelve months alone – see our Paypal pages).
5. What sort of translations do you do?
Every sort! Latin bons mots for an erudite Californian nursery, Ph.D. prefaces, funerary inscriptions, huge amounts of academic research, mottos, tags for wedding rings and tattoos, genealogy, alchemy, scientific writings (including geology, biology, chemistry and mathematics), company logos, love-letters, medieval Latin (for much of which no English translation exists), diplomas, theology, weapons systems, etc., etc.
6. Examples?
2024 is seeing a brisk demand for Latin translations with academic works to the fore. Currently I have just completed a translation of a collection of hand-written letters of Theodoor Jansson van Almeloveen to Martin Lister, and next week I will start work on an anonymous medieval poem on Viking attacks in Northern Europe and a work by Mercator on the calculation of the declination and right ascension of heavenly bodies. Early scientific writings from the Enlightenment and theology have formed the staple of our work for some time, including works on medical topics, astronomy, optics and animal and plant taxonomy, by authors such as Ray, Martin Lister, Gassendi, Huygens, Biancani, Sartorius, May, Ulmus and many others. Previous notable long works have included several medieval grimoires, the 1,600,000 word Historia Rerum Norvegicarum (History of Norway) by Torfaeus into English for a Norwegian academic foundation, the 35,000 word Lun Yu of Confucius into Latin for the Confucius Publishing Company of Hong Kong, both for publication on the web, and the Latin dialogue text and sound files for a History Channel documentary on Boudicca. Shorter translations for tattoos, family mottos, ring inscriptions and funerary head-stones remain in demand. It is gratifying to see so many delighted customers returning for further translations.
7. Extras
We can supply sound files in .mp3 format for a small extra charge, with Quintus reading your translation in an authentic Roman accent. The $30.00 budget service includes a free sound file of your translation.
Quintus’ Latin Translation Service
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