Background
In the TV series Fallet, some of the upper class of the fictional town of Norbacka use the phrase
supra se servitium
as a sort of salutation. Its meaning is never elaborated upon.
My attempt
I tried and failed to understand this phrase with my rusty Latin:
- supra means over, before, or similar and takes the accusative.
- se is the reflexive pronoun in the accusative or ablative, i.e., roughly himself, herself, etc.
- servitium means servitude or servantry and is in the nominative or accusative case.
My ideas so far are:
The object of supra is se. This would yield a meaning like
servitude over oneself
which I fail to make sense of in this context (or any other).
The object of supra is servitium. This would yield something like
over the servitude/servantry
which makes more sense, but leaves the se dangling.
It is false Latin whose intended meaning may be appreciated with some knowledge of Swedish. This would be consistent insofar as the entire town of Norbacka is oozing with incompetence.
Question
What’s the meaning or intended meaning of this phrase?