| LATIN FACTS |
Did You Know These Fun Latin Facts?
Find out how London developed in Roman times.
Ancient Rome's biggest Colosseum was the Circus Maximus, which had seating for 250,000 Romans. Today, the biggest stadium in Europe is Barcelona's Camp Nou, which has a capacity of only 98,787. Wembley only seats 90,000.
The Romans invented central heating.
In Harry Potter, the school motto for Hogwarts is DRACO DORMIENS NUNQUAM TITILLANDUS: Never tickle a sleeping dragon.
Arsenal’s motto is VICTORIS CONCORDIA CRESCIT: Victory grows through togetherness.
Manchester United’s motto is PERFECTIO IN SPIRITU: Perfection in spirit.
James Bond's motto is ORBIS NON SUFFICIT: The world is not enough.
In Star Trek, Starfleet Command's motto is AD ASTRA PER ASPERA: Through adversity to the stars. The motto for Starfleet Academy is EX ASTRIS, SCIENTIA: From the stars, knowledge.
Julius Caesar decided that the calendar should be based on the time it takes the Earth to go around the sun (solar calendar). Before that, the calendar was based on the time the moon takes to go round the Earth (lunar calendar). Although the solar calendar has been modified since Roman times, it is essentially the calendar we use today.
Frescos and mosaics from around the Roman Empire show that Roman children played many games still in use today: hide and seek, chase, hopscotch, leapfrog
and ball games. They also had swings, seesaws, hoops, kites, yo-yos, board games, building blocks and wooden dolls.
"Hocus pocus" is thought to come from HOC EST CORPUS – an expression used in church ceremonies. Actually meaning "this is the body [of Christ]", non Latin speakers may have misheard the phrase as "hocus pocus".
"Pedigree" comes from Medieval French: "pied" means foot (from the Latin PED), and "grue" means crane which is derived from the Latin GRUS, GRUIS. The word was coined because the lines joining members of a family tree look like cranes' feet.
Round the edge of some pound coins is the phrase DECUS ET TUTAMEN: An ornament and a safeguard. It forms a decorative edging and prevents forgers shaving off the edges of the coin to melt down to make more coins (a problem in the days when coins were made of precious metals). This phrase comes from Virgil's Aeneid and appears on coins with English and Northern Irish designs. Pound coins with the Scottish design have the edge inscription NEMO ME IMPUNE LACESSIT: No One Provokes Me with Impunity.
The Romans were the first to experiment with cement. They made it out of volcanic ash, lime and water.
Angelina Jolie's tattoo reads QUOD ME NUTRIT ME DESTRUIT: What nourishes me also destroys me.
Honey-roast dormouse was a delicacy in ancient Rome. The mice were kept in vases called glirari in order to fatten them up.
The motto of Garisson Keillor's fictional hometown of Lake Wobegon, Minnesota is SUMUS QUOD SUMUS, or "We are what we are."
The Discworld novels often use "Latanian" to mock real mottos, such as the motto of the city of Anhk-Morpork: QUANTI CANICULA ILLE IN FENESTRA: "How Much is That Doggy in the Window"