Talk:List of English translations of De rerum natura

Name

As the Wikipedia article on Lucretius' work is named De rerum natura (lower case), shouldn't this article also be calledd List of English translations of De rerum natura?

PS: I think this list ought to be in Category:Literature lists. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 12:06, 18 October 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for noticing my new little article. Category is added. As to caps, I did notice the discrepancy, but assumed that the lowercase version was in error. De Rerum Natura is after all the proper name of a book. A quick search on Amazon reveals that most (though not all) instances capitalize each word. I'm certainly open to the change, but at this point it seems to me that the list is right and the main article is wrong. Is there a special Latin literature naming convention I'm missing? Phil wink (talk) 15:36, 18 October 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia convention, in line with The Chicago Manual of Style, is to capitalise only proper names for all Latin-language works, eg Commentarii de Bello Gallico and Libri Carolini, but De architectura, De re publica, Ars grammatica, or, from more recent times, De analysi per aequationes numero terminorum infinitas. As can be expected, this convention is not fully implemented, and there are plenty of inconsistencies, eg Ars amatoria which uses Ars Amatoria as the page title but the lower case variant as the bolded headword. The WikiProject Opera has a similar convention: La traviata, La bohème, La voix humaine, or in this context, Oedipus rex and Sub olea pacis et palma virtutis. Similar rules are used at Wikipedia:WikiProject Classical music/Guidelines#Capitalization: original language titles. Hope this helps. Cheers, Michael Bednarek (talk) 06:37, 19 October 2014 (UTC)

Requested move

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: Moved for consistency, without prejudice for the broader naming convention (NAC) No such user (talk) 10:58, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

---

List of English translations of De Rerum Natura → List of English translations of de De rerum natura – Must be consistent with current title of the Latin work, de rerum natura. George Ho (talk) 00:53, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

The title above is now back to De rerum natura. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 06:13, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Why did you change the "De" to lowercase in the title of the Latin work? Dekimasuよ! 01:06, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Is there a consensus or a rule against lowercasing the first word of a non-English work? --George Ho (talk) 01:10, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

There are a large number of examples in the section above, the examples of De triumphis ecclesiae and De bello Troiano in the same category as De rerum natura, and I have never seen this done before, since the caps are part of the indication that the title of the work is beginning. I'd suggest List of English translations of De rerum natura and reinserting the caps in the parent article. Dekimasuよ! 01:21, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Most sources use "De", but U-T San Diego doesn't. However, reading WP:NCCAPS, it recommends capitalizing non-English works per English sources or whatever creator intended at the time. --George Ho (talk) 01:46, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

The Chicago Manual of Style (14th ed., §9.56) says: "In English-speaking countries ... titles of ancient and medieval books and shorter pieces are capitalized not as English titles but as English prose; that is, only the first word, proper nouns, and proper adjectives are capitalized: De bello gallico — De viris illustribus — Cur Deus homo?"

By that standard, the appropriate capitalization would be De rerum natura. --SteveMcCluskey (talk) 03:15, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

I have changed to De. @SteveMcCluskey, Dekimasu: come and vote. --George Ho (talk) 03:18, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

• Support naturally, as I've raised the matter originally. Such a move doesn't require administrator action. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 06:13, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

I'd agree that this wouldn't normally be controversial, but it would be good to get @Phil wink: on board given his concerns in the section above. Dekimasuよ! 06:49, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

• Don't fix the player, fix the game. Thanks, Dekimasu, for your ping. I don't feel that strongly about DRM versus Drm. What I do feel strongly about is that this is not the correct scope for the discussion. This is not an issue that needs to be resolved for this article, but for English Wikipedia. After Michael Bednarek's earlier note above, I tried to initiate this discussion more broadly at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Capital letters#De Rerum Natura or De rerum natura? and got exactly zero reaction (despite the fact that evidently people get very exercised about the prepositions in pop songs!). Perhaps some of you know better how to shake this tree.

I will assert that -- until the MOS is updated -- I have capitalized the title correctly... because that is how titles are capitalized in English and this is an English article. The fact that the title itself is not English is (I think) not helpful in this case because the only germane guidance I've found on Wikipedia is "...in foreign-language titles...generally, retain the style of the original" (Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Titles_of_works) and I don't think anyone is advocating for DE RERVM NATVRA. What I'm saying is that I have used the default title capitalization, and I think anyone wishing to alter it has the burden of producing the Wikipedia guidance that requires an exception. I have not seen this yet, because it apparently doesn't exist. And whichever way the guidance ends up going, it is needed. Phil wink (talk) 17:42, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Yes, the lack of lowercase in Latin is a problem according to the way we generally use the titles of works guideline; presumably, we are basing the current status quo on medieval usage and not classical usage, or it is something that's turned out parallel to WP:NCO for rendering titles. I've been unable to find anything either. However, once we get into WP:UE or WP:EN, it seems like we'll end up with List of English translations of On the Nature of Things, and I don't think anyone is advocating that either. There is also an ongoing discussion at WT:NCCAPS#Capitalization of foreign-language recordings that is on a similar subject. The best I can come up with at this point is suggesting we ask for help from Wikipedia:WikiProject Classical Greece and Rome, which seems to be pretty active. Dekimasuよ! 20:41, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose lightly I'm from CGR. I would use DRM in the titles in both cases, for clarity; both usages are defensible, and both occur in English. We are writing for a non-professional audience, and we should make clear to every reader that DRM is a title, and not just a foreign phrase - so italicization is irrelevant. The Chicago Manual of Style (and so MOS, in following it) is thinking primarily of running text. Capitalization in titles is different, after all. (For an example, addressed to non-classicists - see [1]. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:56, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

---

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.