Why *are* the spells in HP all mangled Latin?

[conuly]

Is it just because Latin is cool? Or is there some reason for it? Would spells from other countries sound different... ooh! Does that mean that maybe Chinese people have completely different spells, or even that there's some language difficulties - no "translation" for reparo, you have to do something different, but they have a spell that wouldn't exist in England...?

On a tangentially-related note, despite whatever you have heard, alea iacta est does *not* mean "the die is cast". Latin has a really messed up tense system. Third principle part + is = has been. Don't ask me why. So "alea iacta est" means that the die has been cast, not that it is cast.

Comments

[deceptica]

Latin has a really messed up tense system.

Hey! Be careful whose grammar you diss... mainly because I think German works the same way. I.e. "er ist gegangen" doesn't mean "he is gone" but "he has gone".

And I think the question of the importance of the spells is an interesting one. I don't really have an answer to it either, though. I used to think that actually saying the spell out loud was essential to doing focused magic, but then that Death Eater in OOTP came along and cursed Hermione while he was silenced, so... *shrugs*

[grammaravenger.livejournal.com]

English used to be like that too, actually - for certain verbs like "to go," anyway, essentially the same ones that are sein verbs in German (which are generally verbs involving motion - to run, to go, to drive - or being or a change in the state of being - to be, to become). In Jane Eyre they're always saying that someone "is gone" or "is come."