# Ne psuchor ultra uterum



## Ovidius

Hi everyone,

*Ne psuchor ultra uterum*

This is a sentence I read in a book named _Poetics of Space _and the chapter talks about psychoanalysis and its relation to the works of art. 

I would like to ask you if some of you can give me the traslation of this Latin sentence in English.

Thanks a lot,

Greetings


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## Scholiast

Greetings

If this is Latin at all, it is a misquotation. In the weird context of psychanalysis, _ultra uterum_ could quite literally be "beyond the womb".

But I suspect some garbling in transmission here.

Are you sure you have transcribed it correctly?


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## Ovidius

Scholiast said:


> Greetings
> 
> If this is Latin at all, it is a misquotation. In the weird context of psychanalysis, _ultra uterum_ could quite literally be "beyond the womb".
> 
> But I suspect some garbling in transmission here.
> 
> Are you sure you have transcribed it correctly?



I very much appreciate your help, Scholiast.
,
In fact the author didn’t mention the phrase was Latin or not. I have checked up in the book and I’m sure I had made no mistake in transcribing it above.

Shortly before this sentence he had written another one in Latin, which is comprehensible to me, that is *Ne sutor ultra crepidam*. But this one could be some invention of his, because we commonly know that philosophers sometimes in favour of coining new terms.


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## Scholiast

OK.

We are dealing here with some pretentious git who thinks it appropriate to try impress with pseudo-science. (Most psycho-analysts do, but this is egregious).

These bits of "Latin" are utter nonsense.

"ne sutor ultra crepidam" could mean "lest I a shoemaker further socle"

This is entirely _merda_.


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## CapnPrep

Ovidius said:


> Shortly before this sentence he had written another one in Latin, which is comprehensible to me, that is *Ne sutor ultra crepidam*.


This one is a adaptation/misquotation of Pliny's _ne supra crepidam sutor iudicaret_. See this Wikipedia article for further explanation: _Sutor, ne ultra crepidam_. Your author then let his imagination run wild with this expression and made up a rather un-Latin noun _psuchor_, which I guess is supposed to mean "psychologist" or "psychiatrist". So if the first one says "Shoemaker, don't go beyond the sandal", the second one says "Shrink, don't go beyond the womb". I hope you can make some sense of this in the context of the book.


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## MargaritaHR

Thanks CapnPrep. You are right!! It makes sense...


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## Eqmeliten

CapnPrep clarifies it nicely. Google "psuchor..." and Google Books quotes enough of the book in question to show you the context.  For consistency, the usual translation of "ne sutor..." is "Let the cobbler stick to his last."


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