How do I say Disney World in Latin? I googled it but I’m still not sure. Disney Mundi? Disney Mundum?
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1I'm sorry for writing this comment although I do not speak Latin language at all. In school we learned that names are never translated to another language: Even in France - where a law exists that forbids using foreign words in French language (!) - "Disney World" remains "Disney World" and does not become "Monde Disney" or similar. In Latin, you have the problem that the ending of the words change depending on the position in the sentence, so you might need to do this here, too. However, really translating words ("World" -> "Mundus") seems not to be correct for names.– Martin RosenauCommented Feb 18, 2021 at 15:32
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2@MartinRosenau "In school we learned that names are never translated to another language" -- I'm afraid that's not quite true, and if someone does not adhere to this maxim, it is the Disney company :-)– Sebastian KoppehelCommented Feb 18, 2021 at 17:26
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@SebastianKoppehel However, the name "Univers de canards" is not a translation of the English term; it is a completely new name invented by Disney for French customers. Just like the Spanish name of the movie "Sister Act" literaly translates to "Changing the Robe". Doing it the same way, you can use the literal Latin translation of "Duck Land" (or similar) if you want to express the term "Disney World" in a Latin text. And unlike the name "Disney", the word "Duck" definitely exists in Latin.– Martin RosenauCommented Feb 18, 2021 at 21:32
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2@MartinRosenau Names were often, but not always, inflected in Latin, even when they came from non-Latin languages. For example, Vercingetorix was fully inflected, and the genitive was Vercingetorigis. That said, most modern institutions tend not to be translated anymore.– cmw ♦Commented Feb 19, 2021 at 1:14
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3 Answers
Proper names aren't always translated in common speech. Plenty of Hebrew names were left without endings in the Latin translation of the Bible (and Greek as well, it should be noted). But if you wanted to inflect Disney, we could find similar-sounding names. For example, 'Maccabee' in Latin was Maccabaeus, so we could plausibly have Disnaeus, or maybe even Disnius or Disneius (for they weren't wholly consistent with transliterating names).
In that case, as the subject of a sentence, "Disney World" would be Mundus Disnaei.
If you want to work back even further, Disney is from the French d'Isigny, and Wikipedia provides a few examples of the town's Latin name:
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isigny_(Manche)
Isigny est désignée en latin médiéval sous les formes de Isienio vers 1120, de Iseneio 1168, Ysigné vers 1191, Isigneio en 1214, Ysigney en 1488.
François de Beaurepaire propose le nom de domaine gallo-roman *Isiniacum, basé sur le nom de personne germanique Iso (cité par Marie-Thérèse Morlet). Il y a plusieurs noms de ce type dans la Manche. En outre, on trouve Isigny-sur-Mer (Calvados), Saint-Lubin-d'Isigny (Eure-et-Loir), Isigné (Sarthe), Isenay (Nièvre) et peut-être Isignacum, un lieu non identifié du Gard. Cependant, on rencontre ce type de toponyme : nom de personne germanique + suffixe -(i)acum principalement au nord de la France, plus germanisé. Dans ce cas, il s'agit du suffixe -INIACU, forme allongée de -acum, basé à l'origine sur des anthroponymes terminés en -in qui a acquis une autonomie.
We therefore could conceivably have Mundus Isigniacus.
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Could you provide a reference for when you state that "Disney is from the French d'Isigny" ?– RudierCommented Feb 18, 2021 at 15:22
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If the phrase would be about 'going to' Disney World, I assume we'd be using the dative Mundo instead?– MastCommented Feb 18, 2021 at 21:35
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3@Mast: Motion is generally expressed with ad (or another preposition) + ACC, so it'd be ad Mundum.– jwodderCommented Feb 18, 2021 at 21:40
"World" is mundus, so "Disney World" would be mundus Disneyi or Disneyi mundus (both mean literally "the World of Disney", the word order doesn't matter). Of course you'd have to properly inflect mundus when using the phrase, so it would be mundi in the genitive, and mundum in the accusative.
Actually, world is "orbis terrarum", short orbis. Remember, the Easter blessing from the Pope is called "Urbi et Orbi", "(for) the city (Rome) and the world". "Orbis Disneyi" seems correct to me.
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9There are lots of words that mean "World", even in English: Planet, Earth, Globe... "Orbis" being correct does not negate other words being correct, or more idiomatically appropriate. Commented Feb 19, 2021 at 13:35
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4Yes, orbis is one option, but so is mundus. Have a look at its definition under II.B.– cmw ♦Commented Feb 19, 2021 at 16:25