# jus primae noctis



## bibiga

Topic:  jus primae noctis
added by Cagey, moderator. 

hi there..how can you say it in English?


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## Agró

_*Droit de seigneur.*_

Lo so che non è proprio inglese, ma...


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## Einstein

I confirm.


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## bibiga

thnx


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## Pugnator

You can also use simply "First night".


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## Scholiast

Scholiasta Pugnatori ceterisque amicis SPD



Pugnator said:


> You can also use simply "First night".



Not in English, you can't. The specific implications of _Droit de Seigneur_ are missing from the "First Night" of, for example, a theatrical production. The phrase is simply not used that way.

Σ


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## Pugnator

Scholiast said:


> Scholiasta Pugnatori ceterisque amicis SPD
> 
> 
> 
> Not in English, you can't. The specific implications of _Droit de Seigneur_ are missing from the "First Night" of, for example, a theatrical production. The phrase is simply not used that way.
> 
> Σ


This seem weird, on Game of Thrones the "Ius primae noctis" is called simple First night. Here a quote:


> The Umbers keep the first night too, deny it as they may. Certain of the mountain clans as well, and on Skagos... well, only heart trees ever see half of what they do on Skagos


.
Maybe on American English it is used while on British one not. Maybe some American could write here to clear any doubt.


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## bibiga

I guess it depends on the context, but thnx anyway


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## Scholiast

salvete iterum!



Pugnator said:


> This seem weird, on Game of Thrones the "Ius primae noctis" is called simple First night. Here a quote:



quid? doceamur, educamur, in rebus grammaticis vel syntacticis aut idiomaticis ad antiquam pristinam pulcherrimam nostram linguam Latinam pertinentibus, a "Game of Thrones"?

honestior quam ego "merda" exclamare potuerit.

Σ


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## Copperknickers

Pugnator said:


> This seem weird, on Game of Thrones the "Ius primae noctis" is called simple First night.



I can't say whether there is anyone who refers to _jus primae noctis_ as 'keeping the First Night' but it's not something I've ever seen before. Game of Thrones (or rather, 'A Song of Ice and Fire') uses a wide variety of adapted Medieval terms that would never be used as such by real scholars, and indeed George R. R. Martin is well aware of this. He does it deliberately to give the books a feel of being Medieval without being too redolent of actual European history.

And with regards to the comment above, it should be mentioned that Martin is an exceedingly well read medievalist himself and probably knows this stuff better than any of us here. Fantasy literature has unfairly acquired a reputation as being 'trashy', but read beneath the gore and sex and you'll find that at the level of Martin it's much better researched and more intelligent than the vast majority of 'historical fiction'. After all it does derive largely from the works of J R. R. Tolkien, a Professor of Anglo-Saxon and Norse Studies at Oxford. He actually studied Classics before transferring to Old English, and I daresay if he continued he could have schooled us all, including Scholiast.


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## Scholiast

Greetings



Copperknickers said:


> After all it does derive largely from the works of J R. R. Tolkien, a Professor of Anglo-Saxon and Norse Studies at Oxford. He actually studied Classics before transferring to Old English, and I daresay if he continued he could have schooled us all, including Scholiast


He took Classics Mods, then decided Greats was beyond him. And as a don, he contributed nothing whatever to Classical Languages or Literature, and precious little to research in A-S or Norse.
He enjoyed himself and his self-important inventiveness and his pipe and his beer at the Eagle and Child. But he was never really interested in scholarship, never mind the hard yards of classical discipline.
Σ


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## Copperknickers

Scholiast said:


> Greetings
> 
> He took Classics Mods, then decided Greats was beyond him. And as a don, he contributed nothing whatever to Classical Languages or Literature, and precious little to research in A-S or Norse.



That's not entirely true, he published a fair amount in the field of English philology and he also worked on the OED. He did much research into the etymology of the word 'walrus' among other things.



> He enjoyed himself and his self-important inventiveness and his pipe and his beer at the Eagle and Child. But he was never really interested in scholarship, never mind the hard yards of classical discipline.
> Σ



Well of course LotR is his primary legacy and was always his main interest, I was just making the point that things could have been different, and writing fantasy does not necessarily require that one is a poorly educated oik with no appreciation for ancient languages. 

It says as much that your defense to my bringing up Tolkien is that 'he wasn't such a great scholar anyhow,' as if it were just par for the course that a fiction author would be also one of the world's foremost experts on ancient languages. He was an Oxford professor after all, I gather by your level of Latin proficiency that you are well educated yourself to say the least, perhaps you went to Oxbridge for all I know, but unless you are a sitting or emeritus Oxbridge professor (a surpassing rare creature on an internet forum) then I think implying that such a person is not up to the 'hard yards of scholarly discipline' is rather presumptuous, to be frank.


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## Scholiast

@Coppernickers (# 12), salve

I fear this now lies outwith the confines, strictly moderated, of the question bibiga set, and will send a PM.

Σ


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