Latin tobacco

[taxanpete]

Anybody willing to try and translate "Beware: lethal plant!" into latin. Its a caption for a tin of hand rolling tobacco. Maybe the owner will take more notice if he cannot understand it.

[Quizmonster]

"Cave: planta letalis!" might do. ('Cave' is pronounced ka-vay and the other two words pretty much as they look, with the stress on the 'a' in 'letalis'.)

[Gratia]

Okee, this is the best I could do. "Praecaveo: Letalis e Aproxis". Now Aproxis is plant or close to it (aproxis, oxis (f) plant whose root takes fire (ignites easily?)). There's no tobacco, so I thought that it (aproxis) would not only be funny, but it would work.

[Gratia]

Oopppsss, I forgot to give the def's with it: Praecaveo Letalis e Aproxis praecav.eo V 2 1 PRES ACTIVE IND 1 S praecaveo, praecavere, praecavi, praecautus V guard (against), beware****; letal.is ADJ 3 2 ACC P C POS letalis, letalis, letale ADJ deadly, fatal; lethal****, mortal; * e PREP ABL e PREP ABL out of, from; by reason of; according to; because of, as a result of****; aprox.is N 3 3 ACC P F Early aproxis, aproxis N F Pliny a plant whose root takes fire (ignites easily?)****; Okee that's all.

[Quizmonster]

I'm certainly no expert in Latin, but the instruction: "Beware!" is generally given as just "Cave!" (pron. kavay). We see this in corrupted, anglicised form in that old schoolboy warning "Cavey!" called out when a teacher is seen to be approaching the classroom. It's there, too, in "Cave canem!", a notice sometimes seen on garden gates, meaning "Beware of the dog!"

And surely, 'praecaveo' means 'I beware' rather than an instruction that you should beware.

It's a long time since my own schooldays, so obviously I'm prepared to be corrected on the two points above; however, they seem valid to me at this moment.

[Gratia]

Quizmonster - You're poby. correct. Latin (and Latin puzzles) is just something I mess around with at nights. Ahah! cav.e V 2 1 PRES ACTIVE IMP 2 S caveo, cavere, cavi, cautus V take precautions/defensive action, beware, avoid; give/get surety; stipulate; I bow to you Quizmonster!!! You are the Sapientis!

[Quizmonster]

Actually, in this case, no I'm not, Gratia. However, it's a kind thought...so thank you. Just before falling asleep last night I said to myself: "You plonker! The thing that one has to beware of must be in the accusative case...not the nominative." (One sees this in the example I myself gave with 'canem' rather than 'canis'.

So here's my final take on the matter: "Cave plantam letalem!" (Of course, I'm still open to correction.)

[Gratia]

Well eck. I was way off... I'll have to change to a Q person rather than an A. Ha! Well I gave it a shot.

[Quizmonster]

I do hope you realised, Gratia, that - when I used the words, "You plonker!" above - I was referring to myself and not to you.