Sealionii brings us a bit of doggerel macaronic verse:
O sibili siemgo
Fortibus es inaro.
O nobili demis trux
Watis inem? Causand dux.
This little bit of faux-Latin has brought me no end of amusement. A bit of Googling reveals hundreds of different variations—the poem is apparently quite old. Google Books has a scanned copy of a publication from 1892 containing a variant quoted from the New York Tribune: “I Sabilli Hoeres ago / Fortibus es in : Aro / Nosces Mari the be trux / Votis innem . . . pes an dux.” I can only imagine that if this clever little rhyme had made it to the New York Tribune by 1892, it must be considerably older than that. The oldest reference I can find is from something published by Oxford University Press in 1849—over a hundred and fifty years ago.
The relative ancientness of it, and its many extant variations, make it quite a rich source for linguistical curiousities. The only line that remains consistent appears to be “fortibus es”, although even that has variations (such as fortubus es and fortebus es, as well as non-bus related variations), making it difficult to find all the different possibilities. But simply from the first ten google hits for fortibus es we find quite an amazing amount of differences.
In the first line, we find “Civili”, “Civile”, “Sybilli”, “si vile”, “Isabili”, “sibile”, “Sybili”, and “sibili”—some with the vocative “O” and some without. “Si ergo” is the most common continuation, although “si ego” is also relatively common. Sealionii is the only hit for “siemgo”, although there is a “sidemgo” and also “heres ago”, which is closer to the much older versions.
After “fortibus es” we find “in ero”, “in aero”, “in aro”, “enero”, and “inero”. That line, as I mentioned earlier, stays the most consistent among all the versions.
The next line has some curious variations, however. The 1849 version reads, “No ces billi themis trux,” whereas the 1892 version has Mary as the contradictory party. All the first-page Google hits had either “nobili” or “novili” (again with or without the vocative), but no extraneous “says” in between. The latter half of the line has plenty of variations, though—while “trux” remains constant, the word before can be “demis”, “doser”, “deus”, “themis”, “deis”, or “thebi”. Even curiouser is an extra bit in some versions in between the address to Billy/Willy and the correction: “doser nobus” and “deus nobuses es”.
The final line is the curiousest still. The question ranges from “watis inem” to “vadis inem”, “vatis inem”, “vattis inem”, “sivat sinem”, “vadis indem”, “vatis enim”, “vates enim”, “se vatis enim”, and “vatis indem”. The final answer, despite “peas and ducks” being the climax of the older versions, is almost always cows and ducks, although various spellings are of course present: “causand dux”, “causen dux”, “causet dux”, “causan dux”, “causem dux”, and “causa an dux”. (I guess cows somehow make more sense than peas?) There are only two exceptions: one hit which didn’t include the fourth line at all, and one “pax a dux”, which I can only assume is meant to be read as “packs of ducks”.
But the bizarre bit comes in the “English” reading supplied for the last line. In two of the ten hits, the poster of the verse describes the last line as “geese and ducks”. This led me to discover yet another series of variations, seemingly morphed into Spanish and almost all, even stranger, talking about “lorries” rather than “buses”. What makes Señor go together with lorries? I don’t know, but Google says they do.
Si senor, der dago
Forti loris inaro
Demant loris, demam trux
Fulla cowsan ensan dux.
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