Although Classical Studies primarily focuses on Graeco-Roman antiquity, the fact that Latin—in more or less petrified form—remained actively used and relevant throughout the medieval and early modern periods has inspired many a classicist to dedicate part or even all of their efforts to post-ancient Latin. This has even led to the emergence of new, dynamic disciplines such as Neo-Latin Studies. The increasing recognition by scholars of classical antiquity of this long-standing Latin-language tradition as a legitimate extension of their field is evidenced by its occasional appearances in classicist publications, including (rarely, but still) the current journal. The reason for this is not merely linguistic—the entire Latin literary tradition, on multiple levels, is deeply rooted in its ancient sources, with which it continuously engages.
While in the Middle Ages Latin was the principal language of literature, religion, science, and diplomacy across Western and Central Europe, the Renaissance period saw a gradual but steady decline in its use. By the end of the eighteenth century, only the Roman Catholic Church, some scholarly disciplines—including classical philology, philosophy, and medicine—and two countries in unique political circumstances—Hungary and Croatia—retained the language in active use to some extent.
Not everyone accepted this state of affairs. A list of up to 50 works published between 1759 and 1840 advocating the preservation of Latin as the world’s lingua franca has been compiled.[1] All these theoretical dissertations, occasionally accompanied by some examples of practical applications of Latin to modern circumstances, were written to no avail: Latin could not compete with the convenience of using living languages in public life, and by the second half of the nineteenth century, the publicly relevant use of Latin had effectively ceased. No replacement was readily available—as the main European powers still waged wars against each other, there was no hope that they would agree on any of their languages as a universal one. Therefore, a wave of attempts to establish a neutral international auxiliary language started to multiply in the last decades of the century; for example, this was the time of the origins of Volapük (1879) and Esperanto (1887).
The return of Latin also had its advocates, one of whom is the hero of the book under review. Karl Heinrich Ulrichs (1825-1895) made it his mission to promote the active use of Latin, but he chose a different approach from his predecessors. Having decided to demonstrate what the language could do rather than theorise (“Introduction”, p. xxxix), in 1889, he began writing a Latin journal, Alaudae, and sending it to up to 200 subscribers worldwide. Although Alaudae was discontinued shortly before Ulrichs’ death after six years of publication, it played a crucial role in creating a community that eventually grew into the Living Latin movement, which has endured to the present day.[2]
Ulrichs was one of those rare individuals who are remembered as defining figures in two quite different fields. Besides being a significant Latin revivalist, he has been recognised as the first gay rights advocate (and the first openly gay person), and the founder of Gender Studies. In this regard, Ulrichs can be compared to ancient geniuses like Xenophon and Caesar, who excelled in both warfare and writing and would have gained fame even if they had focused on a single career.
Born in the now-defunct Kingdom of Hanover, Ulrichs courageously challenged the traditionally homophobic society for many years. As his progressive views only brought him trouble and he could not accept Prussian dominance in unified Germany, he left his homeland for good in 1880 and settled in Italy, initially in Naples, then in L’Aquila, where he spent the final twelve years of his life. This physical move was accompanied by a profound shift in Ulrichs’ interests—from that point until his last days, he dedicated himself to writing Alaudae and promoting the active use of Latin as a means of fostering equality and unity among nations.
Living his final years alone as a poor, unkempt hermit with an aura of dignity and erudition, he maintained, through Alaudae, international connections. His subscribers included royalty and distant readers across five continents, from North America to China and from Uzbekistan to New Zealand. Alaudae was soon followed by several Latin-language journals, such as Phoenix, Praeco Latinus, Vox Urbis, and Civis Romanus, which drew inspiration from Ulrichs’ work and occasionally explicitly acknowledged this.
After several decades of initial interest, the reception of Ulrichs’ activist writings was suppressed by the Nazi regime in the 1930s. When the gay liberation movement gained ground in the 1970s, his works began to be researched and published again, with Ulrichs’ stature rising to widespread recognition and a sort of cult following among activists for the rights of sexual minorities. One of them, Michael Lombardi-Nash, took a decades-long personal interest in Ulrichs and translated all his German works into English. To publish Ulrichs’ entire opus by including the Latin part, he assembled, through a crowdsourcing campaign, an international group of around 30 people, who translated and commented on Alaudae.[3] Lombardi-Nash also joined forces with Llewelyn Morgan of the University of Oxford, who revised the translations. Together with Lombardi-Nash, he co-wrote the “Introduction” and expanded the translators’ notes. As a result, a diverse group of experienced scholars and young beginners, pure classicists and part-time Neo-Latinists, academics and amateurs, Queer activists and their straight allies produced the edition that is not meant to be an in-depth study of Alaudae, but rather a way to make Ulrichs’ work accessible to a wider readership (“Introduction”, p. xlv). By publishing the transcription of the Latin text, they also enabled the public to read the original.
The edition begins with brief biographies of the editors and contributors, followed by a comprehensive “Introduction”, which provides information about Ulrichs’ life and work and describes the character of Alaudae. Near the end of the “Introduction”, the editors conveniently publish a translation of an autobiographical account of Ulrichs’ life (scilicet, written in Latin). Lastly, they briefly outline the history of the current edition and its technical details.
Ulrichs published Alaudae for six years, until shortly before his death. The complete run spans 388 pages. Its core comprises Ulrichs’ Latin poems; the prose sections, initially intended as a simple appendix to the poetry, grew to be much more, including fantasy prose, ancient stories, antiquarian bits, anecdotes, vignettes from private life, descriptions of nature, riddles, astronomical observations, travelogues, news from around the world (particularly about the contemporary use of Latin), translations of poetry and journal articles into Latin, political commentary, and more.
Serialisation and interactivity are two key methods for creating cohesion in Alaudae. By corresponding publicly with his readers through the journal, Ulrichs fostered a close-knit community, similar to other journals of the same period, with the use of Latin being the main difference.
Ulrichs’ command of Latin was excellent, but without access to modern lexicographic aids, it is understandable that he was, for example, unaware of the ancient Latin name of Zadar—Jad(e)ra, calling it instead by the Italian version Zara; similarly, the adjective from Dalmatia is for him the Italian-derived Dalmatinus rather than Dalmaticus; furthermore, although Braşov has half a dozen Latin names, Ulrichs simplifies it to the non-existent Brasov (all on p. 122). Furthermore, he selectively translates newspaper titles, leaving some in the original, not only when he does not know the language (Czech and Polish papers, p. 90), but also when he does (“Deutsches Dichtersheim”, p. 62).
Ulrichs’ language is clear and did not cause major issues for the translators. There are moments where alternative choices might seem preferable (e.g., guardianus on p. 92 is probably a guardian, not a warden, as he is styled “the Reverend”). The translation is fluent, accessible, and idiomatic; it is never overly literal, and it is evident that one editor reviewed the text.
The volume is prepared reasonably well, with very few errors; I noticed only some typos (e.g., “Ijsewijn” instead of “IJsewijn”, p. liv; “correspondence” instead of “correspondance”, p. lvi; the original ἒτ rendered as ᾽ὲτ in the translation, p. 87; episolis instead of epistolis, p. 90) and incorrect renderings from Czech on p. 103 (the correct forms are: “třesem” rather than “tṙesem”, “blažena” rather than “blażena”, “Vrchlický” rather than “Vrchlicky”—correctly on p. 115, “růže” rather than “ru̇że”—correctly by Ulrichs on p. 102). In many places, the spacing between words is uneven (at least in my digital copy of the book, e.g., at the bottom of p. 68), and in one instance, the letter size is inconsistent in the translation (p. 54, verses with capital letters).
Like many modern advocates of Living Latin, Karl Heinrich Ulrichs was an amateur, a non-classicist. Perhaps this was a necessary precondition for him to become what he was.[4] This ingenious and erudite man embodies a fundamental dichotomy: on one hand, he had a mindset ahead of his time; on the other, he was a lover of an ancient language, deeply immersed in the heritage of the past. In terms of his stated goals, Ulrichs’ enterprise was utopian and futile; but the active use of Latin persisted—and due credit should be given to Ulrichs, inter alios. Following the footsteps of early enthusiasts who bridged the gap between Latin as a void symbol of the nineteenth-century elites and its repeated reintroduction into modern life, a new pedagogical approach emerged. Classical educators are increasingly aware that a language is best learnt through active use, and incorporating elements of Living Latin into teaching is no longer a fringe phenomenon. This is arguably the most tangible, albeit unintentional, part of Ulrichs’ Latinist legacy.
Notes
[1] Jozef IJsewijn – Dirk Sacré, The ultimate efforts to save Latin as the means of international communication, History of European Ideas 16 (1993), 51-66.
[2] On literary and ideological origins of the Living Latin movement, see Karolis M. Lyvens, Living Latin (1880-c. 2000): Ideology and Identity, PhD thesis, University of Manchester, Faculty of Humanities, 2023, 33-75.
[3] Concurrently with Volume I, which the present text reviews, Volume II (1891-1892) and Volume III (1893-1895) were also published.
[4] Some would even argue that the establishment of Classical Philology as a discipline was an acknowledgement—or perhaps a cause—of Latin’s definitive death. Cf. Joseph Farrell, Latin Language and Latin Culture from Ancient to Modern Times, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001, 96; Vim Verbaal, The burden of the past. By way of introduction, Latinitas Perennis. Volume 1: The Continuity of Latin Literature (eds Wim Verbaal, Yanick Maes, Jan Papy), Leiden-Boston: Brill, 2007, 3-13. Be it as it may, in my experience, surprisingly many opponents of Living Latin are classicists.