Quo usque tandem abutere, Catilina, patientia nostra?
The Latin phrase Quo usque tandem abutere, Catilina, patientia nostra? translated means "How long, Catiline, will you abuse our patience?" ( Cicero , Catilinaria 1).
These words form the famous incipit - the beginning of the first of the four speeches against Catiline given by Cicero in the Roman Senate on November 8, 63 BC. Chr. Was held to the second Catiline conspiracy , a coup attempt Catiline and his followers against the Roman Republic , detect and punish.
The phrase Quo usque tandem “How much longer ?” Is still used now and then as a rhetorical figure to scold or - in a joking tone - expose the hypocrisy of an addressee; but occasionally also simply in its literal meaning, without alluding to hypocrisy.
The conjugation form abutere with the ending -re for the 2nd person future tense (“you will abuse”) is a poetic subsidiary form. This form is usually formed with the ending -ris, but Cicero likes to use the variant with -re for landfills .
This winged word of Cicero is not to be confused with the similar sounding Bible quote “Usquequo, domine” (How long, Lord) from the 13th Psalm (in the Latin Vulgate Ps. 12). The phrase “Quousque tandem” does not appear in the Bible.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Report on serious rhetorical use: Bavarian State Medical Association: "Quo usque tandem ..." . In: Bayerisches Ärzteblatt . 12, 2006, p. 626. (PDF; 66 kB)
- ↑ comedix.de
- ↑ Cf. Duden-Schülerlexikon
- ↑ See Bibleserver, Psalm 12/13
- ↑ This confusion z. B. in: Edzard Schaper : Quousque tandem. Domine? In: Die Zeit , No. 48/1950, use in the biblical sense.