Disputatio:Nuptiarum praeceptum Theophanus imperatricis

Page contents not supported in other languages.
E Vicipaedia

According to the German page, the Latin form should be Theophania. I can't understand where you get the stem Theophanun- if the nominative is Theophano (or in German '-u'). Pantocrator 12:38, 14 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)[reply]

According to the German page, the Latin form is Theophanu. See: Theophanu HRR: "Theophanu (lateinische Form. . .)." IacobusAmor 12:41, 14 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I guess I shouldn't have said the Latin form. It's the best of the given forms, I think, because clearly the original (given the etymology) and it fits into the Latin declension system. Note Theophano that we have now. I am uncertain how Theophano is supposed to be declined; our article has Theophanun accusative and Theophano ablative; I assume from that the stem is Theophanu- and the nominative in '-u' was a regularization in Latin (or in German). Hence I would imagine the genitive to be Theophanus, if you will change it back.
Also note en:Tiffany (given name) and en:Theophano_(10th_century) which says '... named Anastasia, or more familiarly Anastaso ...', suggesting to me that '-o' originated as a sort of diminutive for the proper '-ia' in Mediaeval Greek. Pantocrator 12:58, 14 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Google (not a very clear result, and sometimes changing?):
Theophania imperatrix 360
Imperatrix Theophania 370
Theophanu imperatrix 350
Imperatrix Theophanu 360 --Alex1011 13:17, 14 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)[reply]

She is usually called Theophano in Greek, Theophanu in Latin (as Iacobus says above), by contemporary and authoritative sources. As for the genitive, I find Fabricius hesitating, see this page [1], but of his two choices I would go for Theophanus.

Note that in the text of the preceptum, linked to on our page, the dative of her name is Theophanu, same as the nominative: eidem sanctissime et dilectissime Theophanu sponse nostre concedimus ... (medieval -e represents classical -ae). Andrew Dalby (disputatio) 14:27, 14 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I won't argue with the attested -u (wherever it comes from), but if it's Θεοφανώ in Greek, one would assume the declension would be like that of Callisto (Καλλιστώ) — i.e. the same as the nominative in all cases but the genitive, which would be in -us. —Mucius Tever 21:29, 14 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)[reply]
We have, though, the accusative Theophanun as I pointed out above - is that present in Greek? Also, all these women on our Theophano page have the same name; either '-o' or '-u' should be adopted for all, we can't have '-o' in the title and '-u' in the lemma.
The mediaeval text may well have considered Theophanu as indeclinable. This is why I prefer Theophania - at least it can be declined regularly, and there's no doubt to its correctness, and I would say indeed that it's the only Latin form of the name. Pantocrator 01:00, 15 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)[reply]
What we have here is her original marriage contract, written in Latin. By all means find a more authoritative source: meanwhile, if she and her husband and his chancellery preferred -u, the fact that Pantocrator prefers -ia doesn't yet cut much ice!
As to the declension, the marriage contract gives the nominative as -u and the dative as -u. I've cited a genitive in -us (typically Greek). This all fits beautifully. One can compare the masculine declension of Iesūs (also originally Greek, and seeming-irregular in Latin) which perhaps exercises an attraction). For this feminine name, then, Latin sources hesitate between the original -ō (there are numerous Greek feminine names ending in -ō, especially mythological ones, but it wasn't, I guess, very familiar in Christian Latin) and the Iesūs-analogy -ū. And so to the question what the accusative should be: Mucius is, I guess, right that it should be the same as the nominative (as with Callisto), but I wouldn't be surprised if -ūn is found somewhere.
For the genitive I can see why Alex wondered about -unis, and I can see why Fabricius wondered about -onis, but I don't think either of them would really claim to know better than this document (which Fabricius, I guess, hadn't seen). Andrew Dalby (disputatio) 09:01, 15 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think we differ on anything factual here. First, as to the declension: I don't see any close parallel between this and Iesus, although probably they were closer in Greek. They are of course, both irregular u-stems, but the declension is quite different:
Nom, Acc, Gen, Dat/Abl
Iesus Theophano/u Callisto
Iesum Theophanun Callisto
Iesu Theophanus Callistus
Iesu Theophano/u Callisto
(the aforementioned declension of Callisto and similar mythological names is given for comparison). What's the order to this?
The 'somewhere' that -un is found is our own Theophano_(uxor_Romani_II)! That's where I got it, as mentioned above.

As for names, I do not think, and have said so, that her own usage, or even that of her contemporaries, should be determining. The idea that one should control the spelling of one's own name is a modern barbarism that's wholly inappropriate for Latin, the eternal language. Christian names ought to follow the same rules as any other words do, which means having a single standard form.
I apply this principle, of what should be considered appropriate for Latin, to other things too: my complaint on Disputatio Categoriae:Pornographia was because of my considering the idea that pornography deserves any recognition whatever to be vulgar, and hence including pornographic actors that have no significant notability outside porn is also vulgar. I admit grudgingly that it's acceptable to use the metric system in Latin, following the example of Gauss and other of his contemporaries, but I would say the English or Imperial system ought to be preferred where possible, as the only modern successor of the Roman system of measures.
In this particular case though, I grant that you have a legitimate argument that Theophano/u may be one of those name variants that is sanctified by time, and so do not seek to press the point farther, except to note that my opinion remains that '-o' is an unnecessary Hellenism and '-u' is just a mistake no more worthy of our consideration than the mediaeval confusion of 'e' and 'ae'. Pantocrator 09:59, 15 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that '-u' may be a medievalism, though I don't see how one can have unnecessary Hellenism in a word of Greek origin that still apparently has a Greek declension. (Especially since this 'Theophanun' is apparently invented by Vicipedia; it has no Google hits outside us.) There's at least one source that explicitly gives the 'Callisto' declension 'Theophano, -us' to the name. —Mucius Tever 11:19, 15 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)[reply]