From the bottom of this bust of John Hay, Lincoln’s aide and McKinley’s and Roosevelt’s Secretary of State, Scripsit et fecit: File:John Hay Bust.jpg - Wikipedia
Scripsit: 3rd person singular, perfect indicative active of the verb scribo, scribere, scripsi, scriptum…“to write”
Fecit: 3rd person singular, perfect indicative active of the verb facio, facere, feci, factum…“to do, make, create, perform etc”
So…perhaps something like “he wrote and he achieved”
yeah, I have no new information to add, but I definitely second that. They are both:
3rd singular (he/she/it)
perfect (completed action in the past. He _____ed/ has _____ed/ did _____),
active, (subject does the verb)
indicative (actual action as opposed to subjunctive (may/might), or imperative(write!))
so yeah, he wrote and he did, or made…but achieved is probably a better sense of what they meant.
Sorry had to answer as this is one of the few questions that I am sure of the answer to.
perhaps a reference to the fact that Hay (along with Lincoln’s other aide, John Nicolay) wrote a 10 volume biography of Lincoln, and then himself became a notable public figure as Secretary of State?
Seconded. I think they are saying that he both wrote history and made history.
Makes sense to me. Thanks, everyone!
I’m not sure if it’s relevant, but fecit was used by artists to sign their works. Michelangelus fecit means “Michelangelo made (this).” Scripsit was used similarly by calligraphers and scribes (not by authors). Something like an illuminated manuscript might conceivably contain both a fecit and a scripsit attribution.
This may seem a stretch, folks, but here goes:
I agree with others about the parallel perfect indicative construction. I also agree with the suggestion that the inscription memorializes Hay’s life in the sense that he walked the talk.
However, for me, “scripsit et fecit” translates most readily as “it is written and it is done”–a recognition of the human propensity for delaying our considered acknowledgment of an event until it has been recorded…or, at the very least, linking the act to the record.
Older readers of this site may recall watching Cecil B. DeMille’s epic film “The Ten Commandments.” Each time the Pharaoh (played by Yul Brynner) gives an order, he makes it a formal decree with these words: “So let it be written; so let it be done.”
[Did you like the way I snuck the word “Cecil” into my comment?]
Your version is passive, but the Latin inscription “Scripsit et fecit” is most definitely active.
Scripsit is past perfect, meaning “he wrote.” “Fecit” is also past perfect, meaning “he did.”
Remember Pontius Pilates’s famous quote? “Quod scripsi, scripsi.” ("“I wrote what I wrote,” or “What I have written, I have written”). Scripsit is just the third person equivalent of “Scripsi” (“I wrote”).
Nicely reasoned but almost certainly wrong. The epigram is active voice, and Latin, with single-word constructions for the passive, scrupulously avoids reversing voice. Your construction would call for “Scripsitur et fit.”
Given Hay’s fame as both author of historical works and a public figure who “made history,” the rendering suggested by YourAdHere and Northern Piper, roughly “He wrote it and he made it,” “it” being understood as history, makes sense.
Since this thread is bumped anyway, I’ll note that “facio” (along with “ago”) is one of the hardest verbs to translate in Latin, since it can be used for pretty much any action. The single closest equivalent (for either) in English would probably be “do”, but it can be all sorts of other things, depending on context.