Expert: Maria - 4/19/2010

Question
"Aspicite ut trahitur sauvi modulamine vocis/
Quidquid habent aer sider terra fretum"

Can you translate this for me please. It is on a harpsichord in the V & A.

Answer
Hello,

Latin inscription we read on this harpsichord made in Rome in 1521 by Girolamo da Bologna (Jerome of Bologna ) and one of the earliest dated examples to survive means:

“Behold how whatever the sky, stars, earth, sea have is brought out  by the sweet modulation of its voice”.

These words in fact want to emphasize the sweet play of the harpsichord (‘clavicembalo’, in Italian) which is able to express everything that air, stars, earth, or sea contain, i.e. all the pleasant /beautiful sounds as well as the bad ones.

Best regards,
Maria
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Note that the correct spelling of this inscription is the following:
“ASPICITE UT TRAHITUR SUAVI MODULAMINE VOCIS
QUIDQUID HABENT AER SIDERA TERRA FRETUM”

GRAMMATICAL ANALYSIS

-ASPICITE  (2nd.person plural, imperative of ASPICIO, I behold, I see)= Behold

-UT ( conjunction) = how

-TRAHITUR (3rd.person singular, present indicative, passive voice, of TRAHO) = is brought out

-SUAVI( not” sauvi”) ( ablative of the adjective SUAVIS agreed with MODULAMINE)= sweet

-MODULAMINE ( ablative of MODULAMEN, 3rd.declension) = modulation

-VOCIS (genitive of VOX, 3rd.declension) = of voice

-QUIDQUID  (nominative/accusative neuter of QUISQUIS) = whatever

-HABENT (3rd.person plural , present indicative of HABEO) = have/possess

-AER (subject, nominative singular, 3rd.declension) = sky/air/atmosphere

-SIDERA (not, “sider”) (subject, nominative neuter plural of SIDUS,  3rd.declension) = stars

-TERRA (subject, nominative singular, 1st.declension) = earth

-FRETUM (subject, nominative neuter singular, 2nd.declension)= sea (literally, “strait” and then “sea”)

Finally note that Latin word order can be different from English since Latin  is an inflected language where syntactical relationships are indicated by the endings of each term, not by the order of the words.