Brevissima: 1001 Tiny Latin Poems

BREVISSIMA:

1001 Tiny Latin Poems

Collected and edited by Laura Gibbs

Brevissima: 1001 Tiny Latin Poems Collected and edited by Laura Gibbs

Published by Lulu Publishers 860 Aviation Parkway Morrisville, NC 27560

? 2012 Laura Gibbs. All rights reserved. Please note that the texts of the poems themselves are in the public domain and may be freely reprinted, modified and remixed in any way. What is copyrighted here is the organization of the poems and the accompanying notes.

Dedication

I would like to dedicate this book to David Boren, President of the University of Oklahoma, and Paul Bell, Dean of OU's College of Arts & Sciences. As part of the Arts & Sciences online course program, I teach mythology courses during the academic year while being able to spend my summers ? those long, luxurious, wonderful summers - working away on Latin fables, proverbs and poetry. Over the past ten years of teaching online for OU, I have completed five different Latin books, while planting the seeds for yet more books to come. I am glad to be part of the University of Oklahoma and grateful for the opportunity it has given me to bring these long-forgotten Latin authors back to life.

~

Free PDF Copies

To distribute this book as widely as possible, I have made a complete PDF version of the book available for free download at the Bestiaria Latina website, Brevissima.. Even if you have a printed copy of the book, you might find it useful to have a PDF copy as well. Here's why:

? You can use the PDF version to print out selected pages (or the whole book), with room for notes.

? You can have the Latin Core Vocabulary List open in one window and the PDF book open in a second window, viewing them together.

? You can search the PDF for words and phrases, or you can search for poems by a specific author.

? You can read the PDF on a tablet or handheld mobile device (little poems like these look great on a handheld).

What's the catch? Free copies? There is no catch: my goal in creating this book was to reach as many readers as possible. So, I am happy to be able to share copies of the book with anyone and everyone. You can also download a free copy of my previous book, Mille Fabulae et Una: 1001 Aesop's Fables in Latin. Latin teachers, please encourage your students to get their own free PDF copies of these books!

INTRODUCTION

In this book you will find 1001 Latin "distichs," poems that are just two lines long. I have chosen poems that contain the most commonly used words in Latin so that you will be able to read them without constantly consulting a dictionary. In Part I you will find poems that contain only the most commonly used words in Latin, Part II contains poems that have one word not in common use, and in Part III there are poems with two less commonly used words. These less commonly used words are all glossed for you next to the text of the poem. I hope that this vocabulary-driven approach will make the poems accessible to the widest possible range of Latin readers.

You will find quite a variety of poems in the pages of this book ? moralizing poems, love poems, philosophical poems, religious poems, mythological poems, jokes, riddles... in short: all kinds of poems. Within each part, the poems are organized by topic, and you will find the topic(s) listed at the bottom of each page. You will see that the poems come from all periods of Latin literature ? classical, medieval, and modern. Hopefully you will find a few poems that you can really connect with, perhaps even a poem that you might want to memorize and adopt as your personal motto!

Bestiaria Latina and Brevissima.

Those of you who read my Bestiaria Latina blog know that this project has been taking shape over the past two years, and there is even a special blog - Disticha Latina - which is dedicated to these little poems. Each of the poems in this book has an accompanying blog post where you can find vocabulary and grammar notes, along with an illustration for each poem. Quite a few of these poems come from the emblematic tradition, and I have included those visual emblems in the blog posts. So, please visit Brevissima. to learn more about the poems. You can also ask questions there about the poems and I will do my best to supply an answer.

Latin Core Vocabulary List

For core vocabulary, see the Latin Core Vocabulary List for the Dickinson College Commentaries project at DCC.Dickinson.edu. Christopher Francese, Classics Professor at Dickinson College, has combined information about vocabulary frequency from a wide variety of sources in order to prepare a list of the 1000 most commonly used words in Latin, a "core vocabulary" for reading Latin.

The 130 poems in Part I contain only words on the Dickinson Latin Core Vocabulary List. So, as you read these poems, jot down any words you have to look up from the List in the white space on the right-hand side of the page. That will give you a running list of useful Latin core vocabulary to review and master before you proceed to the remaining poems in the book. Be sure to visit the DCC.Dickinson.edu website for additional study materials to help you expand your Latin vocabulary.

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