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"remember" here means "to call to mind", and I considered "facilis + supine" construction, but verbs for this meaning (memini, reminiscor, recordor) are all too special to have a supine form.

Though the sentence can be paraphrased as something like "I/we can easily remember it", but I want to keep the "it is" structure.

Are there any workarounds?

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    Remember that facilis can also take the infinitive (just like English) and also the gerund preceded by ad.
    – Figulus
    Aug 3 at 0:21
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    @Figulus You're right but I guess the point here is try to find constructions that resemble the pattern "X is easy to remember" and sound idiomatic. For example, on the basis of attested exs. like quod non modo facile ad credendum est (Cic. Tusc. 1,78), one could say things like facile ad {reminiscendum/tenendum memoria}, which are grammatical but do not sound fully idiomatic, right? One can indeed say Hoc {recordari/memoria tenere/...} facile est but I guess the interesting point here is how to say Hoc memoria facile tentu est (see Cairnarvon's answer below) in an idiomatic way.
    – Mitomino
    Aug 3 at 3:02
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    Wiltionary lists memorō as one of the "synonyms" of meminī... perhaps it's not the same? It does have supines...
    – Nicolas Miari
    Aug 13 at 13:38

3 Answers 3

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How about an adjective memorābilis, "memorable, remarkable, easy to remember"? It no longer has a verb in it, but you can still use the "it is" construction.

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    I was wondering whether one could find any example where memorabilis can be interpreted as 'easy to remember' (cf. perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/… ).
    – Mitomino
    Aug 3 at 0:49
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    Since my answer below is not, properly speaking, an answer, I was wondering if I should rather convert it into a comment on your answer. The problem is that it's too long for a comment, right?
    – Mitomino
    Aug 3 at 3:06
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    @Mitomino It's a bit unorthodox, but (personally speaking, as a user of the site) I'd say it contributes enough to understanding the question that it should stay. The alternative is to create a separate chatroom for discussing this more.
    – cmw ♦
    Aug 3 at 3:17
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This is not an answer to your question but is just an addendum to (my comment on) Draconis's answer. The meaning of memorabilis,-e is not the same as that of 'easy to remember' but rather 'worthy of being remembered'. Memorabile can then be paraphrased with the so-called "Second Supine Construction" dignum memoratu, which is also idiomatic in Latin: see the 41 results here.

Kroon (1989: 218) provides examples like the following ones to show the parallelism between dignum memoratu and memorabile:

Proximo anno Num. Fabio Vibulano T. Quinctio Capitolini filio Capitolino consulibus ductu Fabii ... nihil dignum memoratu actum (Liv. 4, 43, 1)

... tribunos militum consulari potestate creavere, . . . Q. Servilium Fidenatem iterum Q. Sulpicium Camerinum iterum. His tribunis ad Veios nihil admodum memorabile actum est (Liv. 5, 14, 6).

Kroon (1989) is an important reference for those of you who can be interested in knowing more about the so-called "Second Supine Construction":

Kroon, Caroline (1989). «_Rarum dictu_: The Latin Second Supine Construction». Glotta LXVII: 198-228.

As pointed out by this author, the Second Supine Construction has often been related to the English so-called "Tough Construction" (aka "easy-to-please" construction) but she shows that both are not comparable in productivity. It is then not surprising that the Latin construction has many more restrictions than the English one (e.g. see my first comment on Cairnarvon's answer).

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If you really want to use a form with a second supine, you could use the idiomatic expression memoriā teneō (literally 'to keep in memory', I.B.2.d.) and go for memoriā facile tentū.

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    memoria tenere is indeed an idiomatic expression, but note it is not idiomatic to use a predicate like 'X has Y in Z (e.g. in memory)' in the second supine construction. In fact, note that three-place predicates are not found in this construction (e.g. ?? in navibus faciles collocatu). It is very important to bear in mind that the second supine construction never developed into a common expression type comparable to the English "Tough Construction" (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tough_movement ). For more discussion, take a look at this article: jstor.org/stable/40266836
    – Mitomino
    Aug 2 at 23:18
  • This might be better discussed off this answer, but that Wiki article is suspect. "This problem is tough to solve" is not equivalent to "To solve this problem is tough." The latter finds a nice parallel with "To think up solutions is easy." But that doesn't mean the solutions are easy; it is the "thinking up" of them that's easy. Likewise, the "solving" is what's tough. In that one case they're identical, but to equate them is to badly misunderstand the syntax here. I see it's all unsourced, but I thought that line of inquiry had been abandoned (or problemtaized?) decades ago.
    – cmw ♦
    Aug 3 at 3:30
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    @cmw Just a clarification: I decided to include that Wiki article on the so-called "tough construction" (aka "easy-to-please construction") basically for those people who do not know what this famous construction refers to. Unfortunately, I'm afraid this is the only Wiki article on this construction. Its inclusion above does not mean that I agree with what is written there: e.g. I'm skeptical about the famous proposal that both examples are derivationally related in the syntax, basically because, as you rightly point out, there are meaning differences between the two alleged "variants".
    – Mitomino
    Aug 3 at 4:14
  • @Mitomino I once read that the old passive and active English infinitives 'merged' in a way, long ago, as a result of which we have both active "she was the first poetess to win eternal renown" and passive "the prize to win was a talent of silver [= to be won]".
    – Cerberus ♦
    Aug 4 at 1:27

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