Disputatio:Civitas Londinium

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Civitas Londinium

The term "city of London" dates back to the fourteenth century in English and Anglo-Norman, according to the OED. This map uses "Civitas Londinium", implying that might be a better Latin version. Lesgles (disputatio) 21:26, 17 Septembris 2014 (UTC)

That's a good source, I must admit. One quibble, one hesitation:

1. The map covers, intentionally, more than the City of London: it is shaped to include the City of Westminster at left and other suburbia on the other three sides. So are we 100% certain that the mapmaker intended "Civitas Londinium" to equate to "City of London" stricto sensu?
2. Although we know well that "civitas" is sometimes used in recent Latin to mean "city", we generally avoid using it in that sense because we prefer "urbs" for city and "civitas" for state.

Quibbles and hesitations could be resolved by finding more sources ... Google searches for "Urbs Londiniensis" and "Urbs Londinensis" are certainly not encouraging: we need to change. Andrew Dalby (disputatio) 11:57, 18 Septembris 2014 (UTC)

Here's another good source. This page, part of Camden's Britannia, may (for all I know) offer the fullest history of London in Latin. Camden seems to me inconsistent (or it may be his internet amanuensis) in that for the basic name he appears to vary between "Londinum" and "Londonum" and you can also find "Londinium" (which is the modern Latin standard).

At para. 14 he is distinguishing Westminster from the City of London (which is what we need) and he calls it "urbi Londino" in the dative. On the other hand, at the end of para. 20 he writes "Haec de Westmonasterio coniunctim cum Londino (etsi, ut dixi, per se sit civitas et iurisdictione seiuncta), quod perpetuis aedificiis ita sit coniuncta ut una eademque civitas videatur." In that sentence, then, he calls the locus simply "Londinum" but immediately adds that it is administratively a "civitas ... iurisdictione seiuncta"; and then uses the word "civitas" a second time, more impressionistically, to say that the two loci appear to be one and the same city. So, yes, on this basis "Civitas Londinium" or "Civitas Londiniensis" may be the right choice. Andrew Dalby (disputatio) 12:18, 18 Septembris 2014 (UTC)

Maurice C. Hime, Introduction to the Latin Language (1890:229):

"Urbs LONDINIUM," rarely "Urbs LONDINII"

Quod erit locutio utilis, num City of London aut Greater London Built-up Area attingat. IacobusAmor (disputatio) 12:55, 18 Septembris 2014 (UTC)

On nominative vs. genitive, I agree, and though the adjective is a third option, it also seems less common. ¶ On civitas vs. urbs, the medieval provenance and technical nature of the term (which I, an ignorant Yankee, didn't know about until a couple years ago) suggested to me that urbs might not be in line with the sources, but it does seem that they aren't too clear. I might be happiest with a royal charter or something of that sort, though pre-moderns are never as consistent as we might want them to be. ¶ As for the other terms, for en:Greater London we already have Londinium Maius, which I can't find elsewhere but which is a logical translation for a modern term. For en:Greater London Built-up Area, maybe area metropolitana or urbana; then there's the en:London commuter belt... These last two have few interwikis, though, and may not be of primary importance. Lesgles (disputatio) 17:56, 18 Septembris 2014 (UTC)