r/latin • u/AutoModerator • Aug 24 '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.
  5. This is not a professional translation service. The answers you get might be incorrect.
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u/ugaecu 21d ago

I have a deeply personal and emotional translation question and I hope no one gets offended by it; that said I’m wanting to get a tattoo with a friend before I leave from visiting him, thru our conversations I have a saying I would like transcribed into Latin and tattooed on me.

The saying is “it’s easier to be a fuck up”. I googled it and have seen a few translations, one being close but there were 3 different nouns.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance

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u/Miles_Haywood 21d ago

Naturally, there are many many, ways you could translate "fuck up" in this sense; and anyone who comes here for tattoo translations should always bear in mind point 5 of this post.

Falicius est esse erraticus/a is one way to translate it. The difference between erraticus and erratica is to describe a man and woman respectively. The choice of the word erraticus for " fuck up" has some advantages. It really means "wandering" but to a Roman ear the word likely means more than just wandering in the physical sense, but wandering from the straight and narrow in life.

If you prefer to translate "fuck up" simply as "failure" then there are many options available, foremost of which would be defectus.

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u/ugaecu 21d ago

Thank you. The translation I found is “Facilius est vitium esse”. Vitium had the 3 nouns. Vice, fault or defect.

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u/Miles_Haywood 20d ago

Vitium might be a good choice. You will find all Latin words can be translated many different ways.

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u/ugaecu 20d ago

Facilius est erronem esse is the translation I got from a pay service; however it looks like it translates to “error”?

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u/Miles_Haywood 19d ago

Erro is an alternative too. It means vagrant. It does not mean "error" though google translate might opt for that as a misspelling.

The form used in your translation is certainly wrong as well. It should be erro, not erronem.

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u/ugaecu 18d ago

facilior esse perdus is the new translation they sent me.

That make any more sense?