Oxford's only Classical College

Gothic, in Headington Stone, is the preferred architectural mode at Oxford. Preferred, that is, by the general run of members of the University. It was rare to hear a good word for the modernism of St Catherine's College. I never heard anyone express admiration for the nineteenth and twentieth century farragos in the younger colleges. (People liked farragos to be medieval, in appearance if not in fact). Keble's brick was universally despised. There was a special horror reserved for the Queen's College, Oxford's only college built (all its older buildings being demolished) in the classical style. Here is a video about its architecture. Note that, despite his enthusiasm, the presenter still feels it necessary to say (at 3:42) that "it is a pity we no longer have the medieval buildings of Queen's". What were the fellows to do? build an entirely new structure alongside the old?


Easier than 1-2-3

It is well known that people use stupid passwords on the internet. An alarming number use "Password" for every "secure" site they visit. The 1Password blog has an interesting post discussing the mathematics of a cartoon from xkcd.

But that is all by the way. Apparently until 1977 the launch code for American nuclear missiles was "00000000". That's a zero followed by seven other zeroes.

Naturally I remembered this scene from Spaceballs, where the villains are extorting the code to open the shield from King Roland:


With all our heart, we deplore what has happened…

From all the 50th anniversary blither, the most interesting thing that I have seen has been this video of Pope Paul VI making a statement (note the Royal "we"!) on the death President John Fitzgerald Kennedy. I found it at New Advent but there is a better transcript at This Week at Vatican II. 

The 450th Anniversary of the end of the Council of Trent is next month, but I haven't found the "This Week at Trent" site yet. The content of "This Week at Constance" has not all been ratified by the Pope. (That's the best Conciliarist joke you are going to read all year).

The architecture of Keble

When I was at Oxford I encountered two ideas which startled me (alright, I am sure I encountered more than two, I was never that jaded). The first was High Anglicanism; here were these Protestants, begorrah, and adherents of the 39 Articles:

Article 19: …  As the Church of Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Antioch, have erred; so also the Church of Rome hath erred, not only in their living and manner of Ceremonies, but also in matters of Faith. … Article 22:  THE Romish Doctrine concerning Purgatory, Pardons, Worshipping, and Adoration, as well of Images as of Reliques, and also invocation of Saints, is a fond thing vainly invented, and grounded upon no warranty of Scripture, but rather repugnant to the Word of God. … Article 28:  … Transubstantiation (or the change of the substance of Bread and Wine) in the Supper of the Lord, cannot be proved by holy Writ; but is repugnant to the plain words of Scripture, overthroweth the nature of a Sacrament, and hath given occasion to many superstitions.

And yet they artlessly claimed "but we are Catholic". At school I had had a through history of the Reformation (and yes we had read the 39 Articles)  but, as I complained later to my headmaster, "you did nothing to prepare us for High Anglicans!" "Harry," he replied, "nothing would prepare you for High Anglicans." (This post is not going finally to explain the Church of England, I am sure that would overflow allotted bandwidth, but you can try Anglicanism: A Very Short Introduction by Mark Chapman, if you are interested).

The second idea, possessed by almost everyone, was this visceral and unreasoning loathing of brick, specifically the college built of brick, Keble. This loathing extended even to one friend, who should have been proud of her membership of such an institution, but was embarrassed by the brick of the Great Gate (1530) of Trinity College, Cambridge.

These ideas combine in this video from Oxford Today about the architecture of Keble College. Keble, you see, was made of brick and for reasons I never understood, it was a standing joke. There is a story that a French visitor remarked "C'est magnifique mais ce n'est pas la gare,"* thinking perhaps of St Pancras Railway Station.

It was John Keble who, on 14th July 1833, had preached the sermon which, so far as Newman was concerned, kicked off the Oxford Movement (last paragraph). And it was thanks to the Oxford Movement that all these Anglicans were saying (39 Articles notwithstanding) "but we are Catholic."

(Look, I know what the Anglican claims are. The current project means I have to make myself intimately acquainted with them. But you have to understand it from the point of view of a young man fresh out of Shack. The idea was not so much blasphemous as hilarious. It was as though the graduate student, Fritz Helmutkohlenberger, had announced at breakfast "but we are Englisch, ja!")

Note the quotation from the College's architect William Butterfield at 1:20, and the presenter's gloss on it. "Not the Roman Catholic Church, but a Catholic Church that they believed the Church of England to have been part of – to still be part of – but the Catholic Church which had lost something at the Reformation." Hmmm, yes.

Keble was also the location of a famous graffito "Hands off Vietnam" still clearly visible, more than twenty years after the Fall of Saigon, when I was up. It seems to have faded almost to invisibility since then.

*h/t Ceridwen.

The political catwalk

Ed Milband, the leader of the British Labour Party, recently got into a tizzy (rather in the manner of a certain on-again, off-again Australian Prime Minister on the subject of misogyny) because the Daily Mail pointed out his father was a Marxist. (By the way, has anyone else noticed the resemblance between Miliband fils and the Cbeebies star Mister Maker?)

Further or Alternatively reveals a further development. Not only was Ralph Miliband a Communist, but he was also a cat killer. In Australia we like to recruit the slayers of moggies for high political office themselves, not just their sons. Malcolm Turnbull sued and won when that story was first published. Ed Miliband seems to take it in better part:

Mickey Mouse Morals

The phrase "Mickey Mouse" used as an adjective suggests incompetence and ineptness. If you watch the classic early Disney cartoons, with their wit, their skill and their invention you realise how unfair this is. Walt Disney Animation – leaving aside the horror that is Mickey Mouse Clubhouse –   is always worth watching.

That is why it is so galling to watch Donald Duck promote population control in this propaganda film from 1968:

The naivety is refreshing. IThey are not worried about there being too many people, they are worried about too many brown people. Donald would not appear again in a Disney cartoon until Mickey's Christmas Carol from 1983.  

…it's like the female infanticide, isn't it yeah?

Abortion is illegal in the United Kingdom except when (outside of Northern Ireland) two doctors agree that it is in the interests of the psychological or physical health of the mother that the pregnancy be terminated. For some reason nobody seems to notice that two human beings go in to an abortion clinic and (usually) only one comes out alive. It absolutely is not grounds for abortion that "we wanted a boy but this is a girl".

The London Daily Telegraph filmed two doctors being told by a woman that she wanted an abortion because of the baby's gender and then conniving in putting something more acceptable on the paperwork. You can hear the woman saying of her putative baby girl "…that's not really appropriate for us right now. We were hoping for a boy and so we are not looking to have this baby at the moment." At a clinic in Manchester, Dr Prabha Sivaraman changes the subject: "I don't ask questions. If you want a termination, you want a termination". Then, on the telephone she is telling a colleague "it is basically social reasons". Sivaraman seems to be putting the strong arm on the other doctor at 1:40 "you are part of our team and she doesn't want questions asked". At 1:58 the woman says "it is the wrong gender" Sivaraman seems to be embarrassed but she says nothing.

Dr Raj Mohan in Birmingham says frankly "it's like the female infanticide isn't it?" Then the woman asks him to put down a different reason so he agrees and says "I'll put too young for pregnancy." Even though the woman has already told him she already has a child and a "partner" and wanted another baby, provided that baby is a boy.

None of this should be surprising. These doctors are already making a living ripping tiny human beings to pieces, for the convenience of adults. They can hardly be expected to refuse because the only reason for doing so is because of the baby's sex. The shocking thing is that the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) deliberated about this case for nineteen months, agreed there was enough evidence to proceed with a prosecution for criminal attempt but insisted that it was not in the public interest to do so. It is difficult to see under what circumstances, according to the CPS, it would ever be in the public interest to prosecute.

It is possible to be convicted of criminal attempt if the accused believes he is committing the offence (smuggling heroin in the leading case) but in fact he is not (the heroin turned out to be harmless powder. Therefore it is immaterial whether or not the woman truly wanted an abortion or even whether or not she was pregnant.

Philip Johnston alludes to the fact that sex selection abortions are the concern of certain  *ahem* ethnic groups. 

It is hard to see any reason not to proceed with a prosecution other than because the two subjects – abortion and ethnicity – were seen as too politically toxic.

He also posts the "reasons" given by the CPS for its decision. 

Any Questions About Election Day?

Mark Dreyfus, the Australian Attorney-General (for a day or two anyway) was caught asking "any questions?" as if to a room full of journalists. There was nobody but him and the camera which may well have been remotely controlled. When going overseas, his boss is fond of waving to people who aren't there, for the benefit of the photographers. 

Much more fun for today's election, I give you the 1986 top ten hit "Election Day" by Arcadia (3/5 of the then members of Duran Duran). The shorter version is rather fuzzy so instead enjoy this song at the full 8:48 .

Immaculate Reception

See the young time traveller using an iPhone at 1:00 in this Pathé story about the proclamation of the Dogma of the Assumption on November 1st 1950.

THE ASSUMPTION PROCLAMATION

This is NOTHING like that other film from January 1928 at the premiere of a Charlie Chaplin film, showing a woman supposedly talking on a mobile telephone. There weren't any mobile phone towers back then. Obviously it is not proof of time travel. But you can use the camera function on an iPhone without needing the 3G to be working.

UPDATE: Apparently this woman visited the 1940s first. 

On the usefulness of Latin (again)

The Public Orator at Oxford (and Cambridge) is responsible for the public Latin of the University: for speeches in Latin at the awarding of honorary degrees, for addresses by the University to people like the Queen or other members of the Royal Family and so on. At present the Public Orator at Oxford is Richard Jenkyns.

Back in April, Jenkyns published an article in Oxford Today (a puff magazine they send to graduates) prompted by that journalist who scooped the world on the Papal resignation because she knew Latin.

Having paid attention in class at school, she realised what he was saying; the rest of the press had to wait for translations. Judging from their blank faces, the cardinals present did not know what was going on either.

It is an interesting piece but that typically Oxford swipe against the Cardinals' Latinity is most unjust. Cardinal Arinze makes it plain that they understood what was happening (from 0:43).

Reigniting the momentum in my collection of mixed metaphors

In 1923 A. E. Housman published a review of F. A. Simpson's Louis Napoleon and the Recovery of France 1848-1856. In the course of the review (be it noted – of a book written by one of his colleagues at Trinity College, Cambridge) he criticises "the slang with which Mr Simpson now and then defiles his pen". Housman might regard the following as (to defile my keyboard with slang) shooting fish in a barrel.

Read More

Annuntio vobis gaudium magnum: the word for blessed!

[The actual sedes vacans, courtesy of Charles Cole].

At the time of writing, the Vatican website still has a separate page on the election of Pope Benedict XVI (if that link dies you can go here).

Annuntio vobis gaudium magnum; habemus Papam: Eminentissimum ac Reverendissimum Dominum, Dominum Josephum Sanctae Romanae Ecclesiae Cardinalem Ratzinger qui sibi nomen imposuit Benedictum XVI.

Now that is not what Jorge Cardinal Medina Estévez actually said.

Annuntio vobis gaudium magnum; habemus Papam: Eminentissimum ac Reverendissimum Dominum, Dominum Josephum Sanctae Romanae Ecclesiae Cardinalem Ratzinger qui sibi nomen imposuit Benedicti decimi sexti.

He clearly uses the genitive "Benedicti decimi sexti".

There are two things wrong with this. Firstly the Latin for "sixteenth" is sextus decimus not decimus sextus. If you search the Perseus database using Philologic you can use lemmas to show this. At Perseus under PhiloLogic put (without the angled brackets) into the "Search for:" field and click the "Proximity Search in: Sentence" radio button. This will allow you to find any form of sextus which is in the same sentence as any form of decimus. Click the button and you get 29 results, of which fifteen mean "sixteenth" (n.b. decumus is a variant spelling of decimus). There is no example of decimus sextus. It is worth noting that "sixteenth" in Spanish (Cardinal Medina Estévez' native tongue) is dieciséis, i.e. "ten" is followed by "six". (And in any case there is no need to include the numeral – see the video of the announcement of the election of Pius XII below).

The other thing wrong is indicated by the "official transcript". The Protodeacon should have used the accusative ending (-um) instead of the genitive (-i). The accusative is what was used in the past. It agrees with nomen, which is a neuter accusative (object of imposuit) and with which Benedictum is in apposition. When a noun is in apposition to another (typically a name as in "the orator Cicero", where Cicero is in apposition to orator) it agrees, so far as possible, in gender, case and number. Cicero, in his second speech against Verres, describes Syracuse in Sicily:

in hac insula extrema est fons aquae dulcis, cui nomen Arethusa est, incredibili magnitudine… (Ver. 2.4.118)
At the very end of this island is a fountain of sweet water, of which the name is Arethusa, incredible in size…

Arethusa agrees with nomen in case (nominative) and number (singular) . It does not agree in gender because there is no neuter form of Arethusa.

Camillo Cardinal Caccia Dominioni was Protodeacon at the conclave of 1939 when Pius XII was elected.

He clearly says "qui sibi nomen imposuit Pium". He also brings his hands together which strongly suggests (Italian stereotype) he has finished speaking and is not going on to say "duodecimum", although the video does immediately cut to a shot of the new Pope on the sedia gestatoria. It is somewhat nonsensical to mention the ordinal number. Papa Pacelli's name was not "Pius The Twelfth" but "Pius". The ordinal simply allows us to distinguish him from other popes of that name.

I cannot find footage of the relevant part of the announcement of John XXIII by Cardinal Canali in 1958. Here is Alfredo Cardinal Ottaviani announcing the election of Paul VI in 1963 (beginning at 2:40):

He says "…qui sibi nomen imposuit Paulum sextum". The numeral creeps in (the name "Paulus V Burghesius" of course was inscribed straight above his head on the facade of St Peter's [large jpeg]) but he preserves the accusative.

Pericle Cardinal Felici got to announce a new Pope twice. Here he is announcing the election of John Paul I on 26th August 1978 (from 0:55):

"…qui sibi nomen imposuit Ioannis Pauli primi". It is clear that he uses the genitive.

(You can add a wrinkle to the "John Paul I was murdered" conspiracy theory by noting that Cardinal Felici used an ordinal – "the First" – when there was no need, since no other Pope had ever had that name…unless he knew that there would soon be another. Note the uploader inadvertently suggests this is the announcement of Pope St John I (523-526). One of the commentators in this video of the announcement of the election of John Paul II (at 4:14) says that John Paul I chose to have the numeral inserted.)

Cardinal Felici was back on the evening of 16th October 1978 to announce the election of John Paul II. The fullest coverage is from this capture of the live broadcast by ABC News in the United States. Some journalists like to insert themselves into any story (the BBC coverage of the funeral of John Paul II was egregious in this regard) but these blokes just manage not to obscure what he says. The Cardinal gets to the name at about 2:05.

"…qui sibi nomen imposuit Ioannis Pauli." Again he uses the genitive but this time he leaves out the ordinal (conspiracy!).

I have the Ordo rituum conclavis (you never know when you will need to run a Papal election) which at n.74 at the beginning of chapter 5 has the following for the Cardinal Protodeacon to say:

Annúntio vobis gáudium magnum;
habémus Papam:
Eminentíssimum ac Reverendíssimum Dóminum,
Dóminum N …… ,
Sanctæ Románæ Ecclésiæ Cardinálem N …… ,
qui sibi nomen impósuit N. ……

So that is no help on the case to put the name in. The text at the Vatican website suggests that someone with enough power over the website at least, thinks that the accusative to agree with nomen is correct.

So far as I can tell the formula used three times since 1978 – nomen + genitive – means, apart from the obvious (So-and-so's name), "a reputation for" or "the word for". For obvious reasons (a search for any form of nomen returns 1251 answers from the Perseus database, for Cicero alone) it is practically impossible to dig out every example of nomen taking the genitive. Somewhere I made a note of the fact that in Cicero nomen amicitiae (genitive) means "the word for friendship". In the De Natura Deorum i.122 he has:

carum ipsum verbum est amoris, ex quo amicitiae nomen est ductum.
There is something attractive in the very sound of the word 'love,' from which the Latin term for friendship [amicitiae nomen] is derived. (Loeb [facsimile]).

In the De Finibus Bonorum et Malorum ii.78:

quid autem est amare, e quo nomen ductum amicitiae est, nisi velle bonis aliquem affici quam maximis, etiamsi ad se ex iis nihil redundet?
What is the meaning of 'to love' — from which our word for friendship (nomen…amicitiae) is derived — except to wish some one to receive the greatest possible benefits even though one gleans no advantage therefrom oneself? (Loeb).

And again in De Amicitia 92:

…delet enim veritatem, sine qua nomen amicitiae valere non potest.
…it utterly destroys sincerity, without which the word friendship (nomen amicitiae) can have no meaning. (Loeb).

On the other hand, there are examples of nomen plus genitive of X meaning "the name X" in passages when someone adopts a new name. Famously Octavian (the Caesar Augustus of Luke 2:1) took the name Imperator Caesar Divi Filius Augustus on 16th January 27 BC, an event which is taken as the start of the Imperial Rome. I don't have access to "Imperator Caesar: A Study in Nomenclature" by Ronald Syme which is the most important modern work on Augustus' name known to me. So far as I know the chief literary source for this event (Syme presumably also drew on inscriptions and coins) is Dio Cassius, a Roman who wrote in Greek. According to Wikipedia his Greek is full of Latinisms. Dio discusses the process in 53.16. Where necessary I quote the Greek and mention the grammatical form used.

And when Caesar had actually carried out his promises, the name Augustus [τὸ τοῦ Αὐγούστου ὄνομα – genitive] was at length bestowed upon him by the senate and by the people. For when they wished to call him by some distinctive title, and men were proposing one title and another and urging its selection, Caesar was exceedingly desirous of being called Romulus [Ῥωμύλος ὀνομασθῆναι – passive verb with a nominative], but when he perceived that this caused him to be suspected of desiring the kingship, he desisted from his efforts to obtain it, and took the title of "Augustus," [Αὔγουστος … ἐπεκλήθη – passive verb with a nominative] signifying that he was more than human; for all the most precious and sacred objects are termed augusta. (Loeb).

Suetonius mentions how the Emperor Caligula got his name in Caligula 9.

Caligulae cognomen castrensi ioco traxit, quia manipulario habitu inter milites educabatur.
He took the surname "Caligula" (genitive) from a joke in the camp, because he was brought up among the soldiers and dressed in a private soldier's uniform. 

I would like to think that Cardinals Felici and Medina Estévez had been reading the primary sources for the renaming of Caesar Augustus – even though one normally takes Cicero's Latin as an example above the Latin of Suetonius or the Greek of Dio Cassius – but I think they were simply mistaken.

Jean-Louis Cardinal Tauran is the current Protodeacon. If he is elected Pope, presumably it will be the next deacon in precedence, Attilio Cardinal Nicer. Cardinal Tauran should use the form given on the Vatican website, putting the name in the accusative, and not in the genitive like his predecessors in 1978 and 2005.