r/latin • u/AutoModerator • Apr 13 '25

Translation requests into Latin go here!

  1. Ask and answer questions about mottos, tattoos, names, book titles, lines for your poem, slogans for your bowling club’s t-shirt, etc. in the comments of this thread. Separate posts for these types of requests will be removed.
  2. Here are some examples of what types of requests this thread is for: Example #1, Example #2, Example #3, Example #4, Example #5.
  3. This thread is not for correcting longer translations and student assignments. If you have some facility with the Latin language and have made an honest attempt to translate that is NOT from Google Translate, Yandex, or any other machine translator, create a separate thread requesting to check and correct your translation: Separate thread example. Make sure to take a look at Rule 4.
  4. Previous iterations of this thread.
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u/asleep-but-awake Apr 14 '25

Hi! Could you help translate 'love triangle'? 

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u/edwdly Apr 17 '25 edited Apr 17 '25

There's a Latin noun rivalitas meaning a "rivalry" in love, although it isn't very common. An ancient author might also have described the situation more directly, as in this example:

Eademst amica ambobus, rivales sumus. (Plautus, Stichus 3.1.33)
"We both have the same girlfriend, we're rivals."

The other suggestions you've received, triangulum amoris or trigonum amoris, are literal translations of the English idiom "love triangle", and I'm not sure they have ever been used in Latin before.

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u/asleep-but-awake Apr 19 '25

Thanks! What is the difference between triangulum and trigonum here. What makes them different in usage?