Sherry Chandler » 2006 » July » 24
Uncertainty about word origins can be fun:
Catullus 94
Mentulla moechatur, moechatur mentulla? Certe
Hoc est quod dicunt: ipsa olla olera legit.Dickweed adulteritizes, adulterates Dicky? Yo.
Just as They say: an herb bottle decocts its own.
Moechor is a deponent verb derived from the Greek for Adulterer. But the real quibble here is the root of the word mentula. C. implies here that it is the diminuitive of the mint plant menthum/mentum.
I was puzzled for years about why there was any wit to this poem until I looked up some etymologies.
But in poem 115 he caps a catalog of M.’s possessions with
….omnia magna haec sunt, tamen ipsest maximus ultro,
non homo, sed vero mentula magna minax.…All these thing being great, yet the greatest thing is he himself,
Not a man but a huge overhanging menace-prick.
C. here plays with the concept that mentula derives from the deponent minari “to jut forth, overhang”– by way of “chin” mentum–literally that which overhangs. A mentula would be like a “little chin” in this case.
Odd how poets always seem to know how to have archaic and eat it as well.
This post was written by poppysmatus
