Expert: Maria - 6/8/2007

Question
Hi there Maria, Ive seen there are so many diffrent ways and variations of
spelling Fortune Favours The Brave:
  Fortes fortuna iuvat
  Audaces fortuna iuvat
  Audaces fortuna juvat
  Audentes fortuna iuvat
Could you please tell Me who originally quoted it (was it Virgil) and what is
the orginal way of spelling it. Also does it mean Fourtune Favours The Bold or
Brave. How come there are so many diffrent spellings?
  Thanks For Your Time . Sam .


Answer
Hello,

the original spelling  of the quotation from Virgil’s Aeneid, book X, line 284, is the following:

“Audentes  fortuna iuvat” which means exactly “Fortune favours the bold /the brave".

As for the variations you mention, i.e. “Fortes fortuna iuvat”, “Audaces fortuna iuvat” , “Audaces fortuna juvat”, they are simply the  adaptation of  Virgil’s  original quotation, though there are some differences which are the following:

1-the use of another adjective (audaces / fortes) instead of “audentes”, but the meaning is nearly the same as “audaces” means ‘the bold’ and “fortes” means “the brave’, ‘the strong’.

2-the incorrect use of the letter J instead of the I in ‘iuvat’.
The letter J in fact did not exist in the Latin alphabet as the Romans used the letter I (i) to represent either a vowel or a semivowel (see below).

Hope all is clear enough.
Have a nice day,
Maria
___________________________________________________________
GRAMMATICAL ANALYSIS:

-AUDENTES /AUDACES(accusative plural of AUDENS / AUDAX )=the bold.

-FORTES (accusative plural of FORTIS)= the strong, the brave.

-FORTUNA (nominative)= Fortune

-IUVAT (from the verb IUVO, I favour) = favours


A SEMIVOWEL is a sound that has the quality of one of the Latin vowels, which are A, E, I, O,U, Y, but  functions as a consonant before or after vowels, like in ‘iuvat’, ‘iugum’, ‘Iulius’, etc.