Disputatio:Liber nubeculatus

Page move

I recommend moving this page to "comicus" and having a disambig notice at the top with the link to comoedia. Most actual Latin-speakers would never search for comoedia by looking for comicus (for the same reason we wouldn't search for "comic" expecting to find the article on "comedy"), and those that do will be no less inconvenienced by a disambig notice at the top of an article then by a distinct disambig page, and since there are only two terms involved... Additionally, the reason for the move is because "liber pictus" (which literally means "painted book" or "decorated book") is more precisely the Latin phrase for a picture book, not for a "comic" per se. This page should really be discussing things like children's literature, not comics, which are defined more by their sequential nature then by whether or not they're liber or even pictus. Since "ars in serie" would be a bit more cumbersome than just "comicus", going with the most obvious name is probably the best idea in this case. Or another option, if we wanted a really literal translation of the origin of "comics" and didn't want to devote the comicus page to comics, would be liber comicus (the original meaning of "comic book" extended, as in the English), but that would probably cause more confusion with the "comedy" or "humor" genre of literature than it does in English. So, I'm going with comicus. Support/dissent? -Adamas 02:46, 5 Martii 2006 (UTC)

I agree. Your suggestion would even solve some problems with interwiki linking, which arise when the terms are differently structured in different languages. --Roland2 08:52, 5 Martii 2006 (UTC)

Right. I actually checked a few dozen interwiki sites to make sure I wouldn't be out-of-line with suggesting a move to Comicus, and found that almost all of them already use some variant of "comicus" or at least mention one in the opening sentence of the article. I don't think this will cause much confusion, especially when we have some better images and more descriptive text for the article (when I first saw this article, I thought it was about cartoons because it had a picture of Bugs Bunny and a link to Donald Duck! what do they have to do with "picture book"?!). -Adamas 09:18, 5 Martii 2006 (UTC)

I feel guilty. ;-) I read "Liber pictus praeclarus hodiernus Asterix est", which I think is a comic (ZANG, ZOK, PUFF, ...). However, surely one of the serious ones, bordering to a de:Bilderbuch (= picture + book) like de:Max und Moritz. The definition "Liber pictus praeclarus opus Comenii erat: Orbis sensualium pictus." clashed with my interpretation, of course. Maybe Asterix is not the best example for a liber pictus, but a borderline case. --Roland2 10:13, 5 Martii 2006 (UTC)

Why ComicUS

Why comicus and not comicum?

A "comicus" in Latin is a person (a comedian, a comediographer) one way or the other involved with comedy.

I agree with Usor:Roland2 that most actual Latin-speakers would never search for comoedia by looking for comicus (for the same reason we wouldn't search for "comic" expecting to find the article on "comedy"). But Latin-speakers who don't know English (and though fortunately I am not one of them I know they exist) would arguably not search for "comic book" under the term "comicus" either. For instance, comics are not called "comics" in any of the major Romance languages. If you check the Wiki links to the English comics page, you get "Historieta" (Spanish), "Bande dessinée" (French), "Fumetto" (usually in the plural "fumetti", Italian), "Banda Desenhada" (Portuguese in Portugal, as here in Brazil we use História em Quadrinhos".

As far as I can tell, widely used lexica of modern Latin include the term “comic book”. The Latinitas people have created the neologism "picta historiola" and Helfer has "libellus pictographicus". I understand that the Roman Catholic church, C. Helfer or any other famous Latinists should not be our only source for neologisms, but then I believe a direct translation from English may not always be the best solution either.

Finally, as far as my understanding of the way Latin speakers borrowed new terms from other languages goes, if people still spoke Latin in Italy or in any other parts of the world nowadays and they were like all the rest of us under the strong influence of the English language (which I don't resent at all, by the way), I believe they would most likely not translate "comic book" as "comicus, -i", a term they already had for a living person of a certain kind, but would rather make it a neuter term, "comicum, -i". I am sorry if this sounds absurd to any of you. This is just little "no expert on these matters" me venturing a guess.D Ambulans 14:08, 5 Martii 2006 (UTC)

One thing you seem to not have noticed: in the English language, just as in your hypothetical scenario above, "comic" does mean either a person or a thing, and there isn't any way whatsoever to distinguish the two without context (or using a synonym, like "comedian" or "graphic novel"), and people who speak English handle it juuuust fine. :) But anyway, to address your points and questions...

Comicum would mean "funny thing" or "comedic thing". Comicus (or comici, "comics") would be the shortened form of comicus liber, "comic book", which is the exact origin of the phrase "comics" in English. Comicum might make more sense at first glance, but if we mirror the Latin phrase after the English phrase (which is probably the only course that makes sense other than just outright defining the phrase in its name, as "liber pictus" attempted to do), we'll need to make it an adjective modifying liber which subsequently was commonly used on its own. So the only reason comicum (plural comica) might not work is that we'd be going from "comicus liber" to "comicum" (rather than merely and simply dropping the "liber"), which is a rather unnatural evolution, since it requires more than simple shortening. Of course, the English phrase evolved somewhat too (since the English article is named "comics", not merely "comic", the shortened form of "comic book"), so there is an argument to be made for "comicum"—but the mere argument that "it's already a word for something in Latin" is a weak argument indeed, since most words in Latin have numerous, often barely-related, meanings, and since comicum itself would also already be a valid word in Latin, meaning "comedic thing".

Also, I would mind picta historiola and libellus pictographicus less than "liber pictus". But I still don't see anything wrong with comicus (or possibly "comicum", "comica", "comici", etc.). From context, it'll always be obvious (just as it is in English!) whether the word means a "comic" that's a person or a "comic" that's a thing, and an article on comics is much more important and needed an an article on comedians (since an article on comedians would likely be a very small stub and a sub-article of the already-existing comoedia). I suppose we could make the page named comicum or comica (the plural, "comics", modeled fully after the English page), if there's support for that; then it would be a simply change to liber comicus for "comic book" and lacinia comica for "comic strip".. *shrug* There are options.

Oh, also, I'm the one who said "most actual Latin-speakers would never search for comoedia by looking for comicus (for the same reason we wouldn't search for "comic" expecting to find the article on "comedy")", not Ronald2. But anyway, your evidence for the romance-language Wikipedias is persuasive (though most of those pages still offer some variant of "comic" as an alternative form near the start of the article), so, as I said, I'm open to using one of those alternative names provided by Helfer or the RCC, if we can reach any sort of consensus on which to go with and then use them pretty consistently in articles (since one reason I came here was that I kept seeing 'comicus' used on tons of article pages, but the article itself wasn't there)... -Adamas 15:45, 5 Martii 2006 (UTC)

Comicum again

• Hi, Adamas. I'm really sorry to have quoted you as if you were Roland2.

Well, I'm also sorry if I did not make myself clear. The word I suggested (comicum) would be a noun originating from the adjective comicus -a -um but in the neuter form. Your example from your Latin-English dictionary actually helps to support my suggestion rather than refute it. A comic book would then be another kind of comicum (a comedic or comic thing) instead of another kind of comicus (a comedic or comic person).

I fully know that people who speak English handle just fine "comic" both as a person or a thing, and also that there isn't any way whatsoever to distinguish the two without context (or using a synonym, like "comedian" or "graphic novel"). But I think that's irrelevant to the case in question. Both "comics" in that case are English nouns which originated from "comic", an English adjective of Latin origin. One may represent a higher register than the other in terms of formality, but both nouns exist in the language and people are very unlikely to mix them up. In other (obvious) words, that's all very fine, but that's English, not Latin.

As you pretty well know, when you make a noun out of an adjective in Latin, a language that has the triform adjective comicus, a, um, you have to choose one of the three forms every time. This way, you will make this new noun masculine (-us, -i), feminine (-a, -ae) or neuter (-um, -i). What I am suggesting is that, in case we use the root "comic-" for the Latin neologism for "comic" in the sense "comic book", a move both you and Roland2 prefer over Latinitas, etc., is that we then opt for the noum comicum, -i, which as you also know comes from the neuter form of comicus, -a, -um. If English handles comic for both nouns (comedian and comic book) just fine, that's because your native language does not have the three forms for the adjective (or three options for the noun) 'comic', whereas Latin does.

That's why I suggested before that Latin speakers would arguably not reduce the adjective from "liber" or any other masculine noun and therefore make it masculine in form (as you suggest, which I think reflects the English way of approaching the process), but would instead use the neuter form and make the noun neuter (comicum, -i). Those who spoke Latin handled the neuter form for things like that juuuuuust fine.

As I implied before, I'm obviously merely trying to help and I apologise again in case my ideas seem absurd. Although I am no nativer speaker of English myself, I must admit that I know infinitely much more about English than I will ever have the opportunity to learn about Latin, so it is English not Latin the foreign language I'm supposed to handle just fine... Thanks for your time and patience. D Ambulans 16:39, 5 Martii 2006 (UTC)

"The word I suggested (comicum) would be a noun originating from the adjective comicus -a -um but in the neuter form." - What I don't understand is why you assume that I don't already know this, especially since your original post made that perfectly clear and since nothing in my response misunderstood your original intent and recommendation. I mentioned, and demonstrated, several times that your suggestion was the neuter form of the adjective, just as comicus is the masculine and comica the feminine. Where di you get the impression that this was anything other than obvious? Everything I said was a direct response to that fact.

"Your example from your Latin-English dictionary actually helps to support my suggestion rather than refute it." - From my Latin-English dictionary? Do I detect a note of disdain? How bizarre. Which example, specifically, are you referring to?

"A comic book would then be another kind of comicum (a comedic or comic thing) instead of another kind of comicus (a comedic or comic person)." - What you seem to misunderstand is that comicus is only an adjective describing a male person, and comicum an adjective describing an object, if they're not referring to a specific noun. If "comicus liber" ("comic book") is shortened, we end up with "comicus". Switching to comicum would reqire not only an abbreviatory step, but also an interpretatory one, since we're not going the extra step further of changing the gender because the noun being defined by the adjective is assumed for the sake of brevity. I didn't say that this is necessarily a terrible idea, just that you're going a step farther than the English root-word does, and thus your argument is a more effective one against using any variant of "comicus/um/a" for the page name than it is for specifically using "comicum". I understand your logic, but "book", despite being an object, is a masculine noun (not just liber, but also libellus and codex), and if that noun is assumed, changing the adjective's gender will obfuscate rather than clarify the adjective's meaning and what it's referring to.

"If English handles comic for both nouns (comedian and comic book) just fine, that's because your native language does not have the three forms for the adjective (or three options for the noun) 'comic', whereas Latin does." - This is not necessarily true; triformation may be a factor, but it's not as absolute and world-alteringly different a situation as you're making it out to be. "Comic" for the person existed as a word long before "comic" for the thing did, so English is a pretty good example of a situation where people adapted well to the adjective referring to two very different things. The difficulty of masculine gender wouldn't be significantly greater than the difficulty of recognizing that "a comic" is not a human being. However, as I said above, I'm very willing to discuss alternative ways of rendering the word based on a descriptive phrase (akin to liber pictus, but more accurate) rather than an attempt to Latinize the English word comics directly (though we can mention that as an alternative rendering in the article text) as a way to avoid the sort of confusion that could arise; just because English was able to handle it just fine and Latin probably would be able to too doesn't mean we should go out of our way to do something that could cause a little potential future confusion, when it's simpler to just pick a more explicit (though, unfortunately, longer and more unwieldy...) phrase and avoid any (or most) potential misunderstandings at all. Since this is an encyclopedia, rather than a Latin chatroom or message board or somesuch, brevity is less important than clarity, so in this case I'm willing to concede that using a more explicit formation would be beneficial, and I am also willing to concede that comicum (or the plural, comica) is a valid rendering of the English "comics", though I have yet to see you show why, for example, comicae would be an unacceptable rendering (as a shortening of the phrase laciniae comicae, "comic strips") just because comics are objects rather than a group of ladies. The fact of the matter is that Latin isn't Russian; countless objects, concepts, etc. have masculine and feminine forms, and neuter adjectives are not required for all of them, only for when a completely generic "thing" is being mentioned (i.e. "comicum" with the implication of "something comedic", rather than the specific implication of either "comic strip" or "comic book"). If I'm misunderstanding how Latin adjectives work and "implied nouns" don't work that way, feel free to enlighten me; I'm just working with what I've got.

"That's why I suggested before that Latin speakers would arguably not reduce the adjective from "liber" or any other masculine noun and therefore make it masculine in form (as you suggest, which I think reflects the English way of approaching the process)," - I never speculated on whether or not native or experienced Latin-speakers would abbreviate a phrase in such a way, independently of English-speakers doing so; that seems like a rather strange hypothetical to consider, since, from a purely odds-wise perspective, it'd be nearly impossible for the two phrases to form similarly independently without some contact with each other. I have yet to judge how the phrase should be abbreviated, as you have apparently done; such analysis is too vulnerable to bias. I merely saw that it has been abbreviated in English, and proposed a way to abbreviate it near-identically in Latin, on the grounds that both the concept and the word are of English (the language, not the country) origin and will be intelligible to most of our readers from the start, and to all of them once context has been made clear, which is more than can be said for the current state of the liber pictus article. However, while your analysis of my motives and thought processes in recommending comicus is faulty, your judgment of the latinitas of removing the noun from a noun-abbreviation phrase seems perfectly fine, so I'll agree that comicus would probably cause unnecessary confusion. It wouldn't exactly cause rioting in the streets, but if we can avoid even a minor possible misunderstanding, there's no pressing reason not to do so. Comicum is also an ambiguous phrase, though, so I don't see your alternative as dramatically better; one of the aforementioned "expert" Latinizations would probably be a good idea in this case, even though, as you said, we are obviously not slaves to their renderings.

"As I implied before, I'm obviously merely trying to help and I apologise again in case my ideas seem absurd." - Again, I don't see what you're responding to here. Nothing you say, or said, seems especially "absurd"; you're being fairly reasonable. I disagreed with some of what you said and agreed with many other parts of what you're said; by apologizing in case your ideas are absurd, I can't tell whether you're being overly humble or insinuating that I'm being incivil in my responses; it's difficult to tell from context, and the Internet ain't a good place for subtle tonalities, so I apologize if I'm misunderstanding your intent or meaning. I'm probably misjudging what you're saying (and perhaps vice versa) because of the language gap you mention, as you're not a "nativer" (though you're probably vastly better in Latin than I am); sorry for any ambiguous statements I made, and for my excessive verbosity. Bonam diem habe! -Adamas 18:31, 5 Martii 2006 (UTC)

The "Liber Comicus" is a Spanish liturgical book that has been used for well over a thousand years. I doubt that even in this small world one would go looking for those words trying to find the X-men. V.S.S. -- (joseph.suaiden@gmail.com)

It is not "liber comicus" but "liber coMMicus" with two m's. It's a peculiar word for the books containing the readings and it is not related to "comicus", but to "comma": "the book of sections" [Scripsit 200.89.45.54]

Most common spellings refer to it, including the manuscripts themselves if I recall, as "comicus". 173.86.25.110 17:22, 7 Octobris 2014 (UTC)

Image

I don't think it's such a good idea to use an animated cartoon image to illustrate an article about comics. There's no better image to use here? 85.226.122.238 14:50, 20 Aprilis 2007 (UTC)

Title

Comicus is absurd. It means "comedian." Comicum isn't much better: though "comic" has become the standard label in English, it's not a terribly accurate name in general, nor for that matter all that universal. At conventicula the usual word is liber nubeculatus (inspired by Italian "fumetto, the idea behind both being that the speech captions look like 'smoke" or "little clouds") but I strongly suspect people are going to want actual citations. I'll see waht I can get you. --Iustinus 09:51, 15 Decembris 2007 (UTC)

It's in Morgan, traceable to the Lexicon Recentioris Latinitatis. Harrissimo 13:35, 15 Decembris 2007 (UTC).

"Comics" and the distinction between comic books and comic strips

Hey, howdy! Sorry for the English, but it looks like all the discussion so far has been in English so I'll go with it for now. Happy to switch to Latin if that's easier. To me the thing missing so far in all this talk of comicus/comicum, etc. is the distinction between comic books and comic strips. In English both of these are considered examples of the genre or medium of "comics" but they're usually distinct. Comic strips appear in newspapers or magazines (e.g., Peanuts, Dan Dare), comic books in, well, comic books. Some strips, like the early Asterix strips, are later collected into books. Personally, I like nubeculatus, -, -um as the adjective for this sort of thing, even though plenty of comics don't use word balloons. A page for the genre of "comics" could simply be the neuter plural nubeculata or ars nubeculata, or imago nubeculata. Then there could be separate pages for libri nubeculati and, I don't know... narrationes nubeculatae? (This could be a subset of narrationes pictae.) Or "picturae nubeculatae"? "fabulae nubeculatae"? Just a suggestion. I'd be happy to write some of that up.

Yes, many genres are involved, and each wants to have its own page. For some of them, see the blue links and other terms in the first three paragraphs here. Ultimately, you're talking about a set of ideas that will eventually spawn thousands of articles, as these catalogued articles prove. IacobusAmor (disputatio) 12:48, 10 Martii 2015 (UTC)