On Thursdays I am a man of my word

[venta]

Spot question for the day:

Without googling, does the following phrase mean anything to anybody ?

Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of the party.

Comments

[wimble.livejournal.com]

It's also a typewriter testing phrase. I think I came across it in The Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E Frankweiler where the runaway teenage heroine sneaks into a typewriter shop to type a letter, and finds this text across the top of the paper. So she carries on from there.

[wimble.livejournal.com]

Indeed, I am supported in this by http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_295a.html

(Of course, whether they're right is a good question!)

[venta.livejournal.com]

Aha! This is what I asscoiate it with. Well, not with that novel in particular, but that it's some form of typewriter testing thingy.

I not 100% sure what it tests, though. I remember my godmother vaguely referring to it as "something to do with the home keys".

[wimble.livejournal.com]

Do I win a prize?

[venta.livejournal.com]

Well, obviously the respect and admiration of the people on my friends list (or the subset thereof reading this thread).

Other than that, no.

[addedentry.livejournal.com]

It's a phrase I learnt to try on typewriters, too, along with The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.

[venta.livejournal.com]

Indeed, the two phrase are also inextricably linked in my mind.

Because I'm a classicist, and I can't help it:

[strange-complex.livejournal.com]

Your user icon here must be part of a text which can probably be expanded along these lines:

[Senatus] Populus[que Romanus]
[Imp(eratori) Caesa]ri Divi N[ervae f(ilio)]
[Traiano (Optimo?)] Aug(usto) Ger(manico) [Dac(ico) (Parthico??)...]
[Pont(ifex) Max(imus) Tr]ib(uniciae) Pot(estatis) XV[?? Imp(erator) VII (or above) Co(n)s(ul) V (or above) P(ater) P(atriae)...]


Translation:

The Senate and the People of Rome
To Imperator Caesar, son of the divine Nerva, Trajan (Optimus) Augustus Germanicus Dacicus (Parthicus??), Chief Priest, Holder of the Tribunician Power for (at least) the 15th time (and no more than the 19th), Imperator for (at least) the seventh time, Consul for (at least) the fifth time, Father of his Country... (and who knows what follows after that).


It is an honorific inscription, because it is in the dative case (the ending 'ri' tells me this). I know it's to Trajan, because only he claimed to be the son (actually adopted) of Nerva, the only emperor who was deified and whose name began with an 'N', whilst also holding the title 'Germanicus' (victor over the Germans). I know it's from between 110 and 115, since 110 is the year he held tribunician power for the 15th time, and 115 was his 19th. Working from that, I can guess the minimum number of times he must have been hailed as 'Imperator' and have held the consulship. I can't be sure if he would yet have started using 'Optimus' as an official part of his name, which he started doing in 114. It's also unlikely he would have gained the title 'Parthicus' (victor over the Parthians), as this happened in 116, but possible if I have misread the character after the 'X', and it is actually an 'X', not a 'V'. I also can't quite tell how long the lines must be. I can place a reasonable guess on the grounds that 'Populus' probably comes in the middle of a line which has nothing but 'Senatus' and 'que Romanus' on either side, but I can't know whether there was also further empty space beyond those in either direction. Fuller information about this would allow me to place more accurate guesses as to what titles he did and didn't hold by the time the inscription was cut.

At this stage, you are either thinking 'wow, very impressive', and are about to post to tell me the correct 'solution'. Or, you are wondering what the hell I'm talking about, and are about to explain to me that you really just used this image because you thought it looked nice.

Re: Because I'm a classicist, and I can't help it:

[venta.livejournal.com]

Good grief.
I'm impressed, even if Addedentry isn't ;)

Re: Because I'm a classicist, and I can't help it:

[strange-complex.livejournal.com]

Those seven years at university weren't for nothing, y'see!

[addedentry.livejournal.com]

*astonished*

It is part of the inscription on Trajan's Column in Rome (which I have visited, but I used the photo behind that link). I chose it as a classic(al) serif letterform with an enormous influence on 'modern' typography.

Your chain of deductions is an impressive example of how classicists infer so much about the ancient world from sources which are so partial (in both senses).

[venta.livejournal.com]

Can I have half marks for visiting it in the V&A :)

In case it's of interest, there's a fantastically thorough-looking site dedicated to Trajan's Colum here (http://cheiron.humanities.mcmaster.ca/~trajan/).

[strange-complex.livejournal.com]

Oh, yes, I've used that site quite a bit, and often recommend it to my students. It's really cool, although it sadly doesn't have images of the entire column: just most of it!

[strange-complex.livejournal.com]

*astonished myself*

Now that I see the full text, I can see my deductions were more-or-less bang on, although I missed out Trajan's own adoption of the name 'Nerva'.

I can now date the inscription to precisely AD 112, and tell you that the last two lines of it (the bits I couldn't guess were there from your icon) say 'to show how high a mountain, and the site for such great works, had been cleared away'. It is probably a claim that the height of the column represents the height of a hill cleared away to build Trajan's forum, but scholars are a bit dubious about whether this is really true...

Guessing what I guessed from the section of the inscription I could see initially is actually a lot less hard than you might think, since imperial titles were very standardised, and most inscriptions start in very much the same way. But still, I'm proud of my deductions!

I also agree that the script here is absolutely beautiful: official inscriptions in this period are pretty much the apogee of ancient epigraphic technique.

Re: Because I'm a classicist, and I can't help it:

[strange-complex.livejournal.com]

And who said a Classical eduction was no longer worth the bother? ;)

Actually, I have just friended you, because it's obvious we have a lot in common, and I also have a feeling I gave you some of my ear-rings (through Laura) just before I left Oxford at the end of August (although I don't think we've ever formally met).

And if you think Christopher Lee is the sexiest man in the world (which obviously he is!), may I invite you to join christopherlee_?

[chrisvenus]

Yeah. I was about to say that with less detail. I got it from my dad who always used it when the need came to type "something". You know when you just want to play and need something, anything to write.

So "Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of the party." is what was always written.

I figured you probably didn't know it from my dad though. :)

[lanfykins.livejournal.com]

Given that the home keys are asdf jkl; then I think that may be rubbish.

It does seem to use most of the most-used keys, though. Perhaps that's it.

[venta.livejournal.com]

Having examined my typing of it, I'm guessing that you can type it easily whilst keeping at least one finger on the its home key at all times. Discounting double letters, typing each letter with the 'correct' finger means that you are typing alternate left-right all the time, so you can keep your hands in position very easily. There are also no 'awkward' letters like Q and Z to reach for.

[venta.livejournal.com]

you are typing alternate left-right all the time

Well, nearly.

[pm215]

Er, what layout are you using? NO, IM, OM, ART are all same-hand strings. Given that one of these is the first letter pair in the string your theory doesn't hold up very long :-)

Anyway, aren't you meant to keep your spare fingers on the home keys all the time when touch typing?

[venta.livejournal.com]

QWERTY, see the ammendment to 'nearly' :)

Yes, you are supposed to keep your fingers on the home keys. I don't. Do you ?

I noticed when typing that phrase the it was much easier to do so than it usually is. That it's mostly alternate hands, thus giving you time to re-locate after each keystroke, was the best explanation I could come up with in a hurry for why.

[lanfykins.livejournal.com]

Of course I don't keep my fingers on the home keys.

I don't rest my fingers on any keys at all. They're permanently poised just above the home keys, ready to leap into action the moment I decide I want something typed.

Given that, and the fact that I look at what I'm typing and not down at the keyboard, I can only presume I have some mysterious superpower that enables me to locate the right keys.

[helenbr.livejournal.com]

Bartleby's Quotations suggests it was devised in order to test the speed of the first typewriters (http://www.bartleby.com/73/1388.html), i.e. to test the machine rather than the typist. That may explain why it swaps hands quite frequently so you can type faster with less risk of the typewriter keys becoming entangled.