AUTHOR’S CORNER
FALCON BOOKS INTERVIEWS
EXPLORING LITERATURE
With Maxwell Lewis Latham
The Corpus Hermeticum by Marsilo Ficino
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Author’s Corner is a platform to explore literature ranging from esoteric to historical works. offering the opportunity for authors to discuss their titles in their own words, to go behind the veil of their thoughts.
Presenting today Maxwell Latham to discuss his latest and first publication the translation of the Corpus Hemeticum by Marsilio Ficino..
An impressive and ambitious undertaking, for a first publication. This title has been translated from Latin into English: a scholar in Latin in his own right.
Having completed an BSc（Hons) in Classical Studies in 2016 at the Open University, Max Latham is an ancient historian, a classical scholar, an archaeologist and most of all: a contemplative spiritual seeker. Although Max has studied agency theory, anthropology, medieval history, Reception Studies, Classical Latin, archaeology, Greek and Roman mythology and philosophy, his specialism is in Roman imperial history and archaeology (circa 27 B.C.E. – c.117 C.E.). Yet it is his spiritual journey which has redirected his knowledge of various fields of scholarship into other areas, specifically: Hermetic philosophy, esoteric literature and practising higher mysticism.
Maxwell is also currently studying towards a master’s degree in Classical Studies with the Open University. To find out more about his work please view his facebook page .and his blog.
Welcome and thank you Maxwell for participating in this interview.
- Falcon Books: Congratulations on your first publication! I think you took on a huge undertaking. How did you begin to tackle such a title?
Maxwell Latham: You’re welcome Tanya, and thank you for publishing my first translation. One of the first things I had to do was to read Adriano Capelli’s book Elements of Abbreviation in Latin because the manuscripts I was working from had several truncation signs. After that, I just spent between 8-18 hours a day translating, one line at a time.
2. Falcon Books: What was the most challenging aspect of translating a book of this kind?
Maxwell Latham: You’re welcome Tanya, and thank you for publishing my first translation. One of the first things I had to do was to read Adriano Capelli’s book Elements of Abbreviation in Latin because the manuscripts I was working from had several truncation signs. After that, I just spent between 8-18 hours a day translating, one line at a time
3. Falcon Books: What was the most challenging aspect of translating a book of this kind?
Maxwell Latham: Trying to find the most appropriate sense for a word. For example, some verbs have different meanings so I had to choose which sense would be most appropriate in the context of the sentence. The verb volere can mean ‘to turn over in the mind’ so I translated this consistently as ‘meditate’, and a cognate verb with a similar prefix (volare) means ‘to fly’. Another example is the adjective altus which can mean ‘high’ but could also mean ‘deep’ or even ‘ancient’. I often chose a word in English which encapsulated each meaning the Latin held. For the most part I stuck strictly to the primary dictionary definition of a word (it’s what the words say) but very occasionally I had no choice but to be selective, depending on each sentence in order to make the sentence readable in English. I often spent whole hours pondering the meaning of even a single sentence: philosophical texts are like that, even in our language. I translated each sentence several times then had to be quite choosy about which one made it into the final draft. I translate very deliberately and carefully.
4. Falcon Books: Were there any differences you found in the expression of Latin that would normally be different when translating other texts?
Maxwell Latham: Yes. Some of the sentences seemed to be paradoxical, but after speaking with a friend (a former lecturer in philosophy) there was no paradox. There is no contradiction, only wisdom to be contemplated. It was not so much individual words but phrases which Ficino uses. He was very fluent in Latin as evidenced by his many letters.
5. Falcon Books: How does this translation differ from other translations of the Corpus Hermeticum?
Maxwell Latham: As far as I am aware this is the only translation of the Latin Hermetica. Roughly a third of these core Hermetic texts survive in Latin (namely the ‘Asclepius’ dialogue), the rest are in ancient Greek. They were translated into Latin so that the western world could read them. Greek was rarely studied during medieval times and the Early Modern period in the west.
6. Falcon Books: I wonder if you could share with us a bit background about the author (Marsilio Ficino) of this title and why you chose to translate this Latin version?
Maxwell Latham: The best evidence we have for Ficino is from his letters. He was the principal translator for the Medici family. Cosimo de’ Medici (a kind of benevolent king and a great patron of the arts) was his patron. It is important to note that Ficino was undertaking a translation of Plato’s works at the time the Corpus Hermeticum arrived in Florence from Macedonia (and before that the east). He was ordered to put translating Plato on hold and to translate the Hermetica instead because it was deemed that important. Ficino was more broad minded than some other humanists at the time (such as Ludovico Lazzarelli). From his introduction it is evidenced that he was more sympathetic to Lactantius’ views than Augustine’s. Some of the early church fathers were rather dogmatic and hostile towards other religions, particularly ancient polytheistic religions. This was not so with Ficino. Although he was a Christian he was also a great lover of classical studies in general, like some of his contemporaries. The Italian Renaissance must have been quite an exciting time.
7. Falcon Books: What first inspired you to take up the ‘classics?’
Maxwell Latham: I originally chose history as my specialism but was told by the arts and humanities faculty at the university that studying Latin and archaeology came under the umbrella of classics, not history. Once I developed a taste for the classics, there was no turning back. I actually love studying mythology as much (if not slightly more so) than history.
8. Falcon Books: What differences have you found in studying Latin texts compared to that in our modern language?
Maxwell Latham: In many cases the words carry different meanings which are not often translated. A translator usually has to choose between one definition or another, so quite often some meanings are lost in translation. For hermeticists there are marked differences which are quite important. For example, in the Picatrix some specifics are translated in different ways so it might be important to understand the various definitions in order to be more effective as a practitioner. (I usually mark these in footnotes where there is ambiguity to help hermeticists along their path).
9. Falcon Books: What are the benefits or knowledge we can gain from understanding documents written in Latin that are not available to us now?
Maxwell Latham: One hermetic text which has only been relatively recently rediscovered is the Summa Sacrae Magicae (‘Height of Sacred Magic’) by Berengario Ganell (1346). It has not been translated before except into Russian. Therefore it is very worthwhile studying Latin for hermeticists. Furthermore, some spirits of the Earth and Moon zones speak and write in ancient languages. According to Nenad Djordjevic-Talerman’s pioneering research some heads are fond of classical Latin texts. These include the heads of the Earth Zone Jamaih (25° Gemini) who cites Tacitus (Annals, 1.1) and Hoson (15° Sagittarius) who quotes Juvenal (10.356). Kadiliya Aili (co-author with Nenad Djordjevic Talermanof The Moon Zone) discovered from Emcheba (the 13th head of the Moon Zone) that even today certain divinities still speak in ancient languages. I am learning ancient Greek for my master’s degree (under Gina May) and will be studying Hebrew after that to understand the Cabala (in conjunction with the ciphers found in the Holy Bible) more fully. I have always been interested in Old Norse (for practising runelore) and intend to master both this language and Arabic.
Thank you very much for this very interesting and insightful interview.
To Find out more about Maxwell please view his author page. Please view below to purchase this title and other view other related titles from Falcon Books Publishing.
