# Need help translating a Latin phrase

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-help-translating-a-latin-phrase/120624>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [July 24, 2002, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-help-translating-a-latin-phrase/120624 "2002-07-24T20:04:05Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Sunshine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Sunshine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunshine)\
**Post date:** [July 24, 2002, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-help-translating-a-latin-phrase/120624/1 "2002-07-24T20:04:05Z")

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I am trying to translate the following Latin phrase into English:

**Uva uvum vivendo varia fit**

But I can’t find an online translator that does Latin to English. Doing Italian I get “Grape uvum living varied fit” so I still don’t really know what it means.

Can anyone translate or help me find a free, online translator? I’ve already looked at Google but all I could find was single word dictionaries and that doesn’t do me a lot of good.

A little help, oh Teeming Millions? Thanks!

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**Author:** ![bashere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/779978/32.png) [@bashere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bashere)\
**Post date:** [July 24, 2002, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-help-translating-a-latin-phrase/120624/2 "2002-07-24T20:19:03Z")

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Plugging the whole thing into Google, I get

“A grapes [changes,becomes variegated] from seeing other grapes”.

Roughly, “A bad apple spoils the bunch”.

Further reading suggests that this is from Juvenal’s, and that the exact quote you supply is a slight misquote. Regretably, I don’t have my quote books handy and cannot verify that

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**Author:** ![Sunshine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Sunshine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunshine)\
**Post date:** [July 24, 2002, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-help-translating-a-latin-phrase/120624/3 "2002-07-24T20:52:28Z")

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Ok, thanks.

FYI, this is what’s written on the sign going in to the town of Lonesome Dove. This and “we don’t rent pigs”.

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**Author:** ![Nametag](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nametag/32/406_2.png) [@Nametag](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nametag)\
**Post date:** [July 24, 2002, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-help-translating-a-latin-phrase/120624/4 "2002-07-24T21:24:33Z")

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From [here](http://www.geocities.com/danidarc/dove/text/uva.txt).

> [@](#):
>
> The text, however, is misquoted; and as written is meaningless. It derives from the scholia to Juvenal 2.81 which cites the proverb “uva uvam videndo varia fit” (see Courtney’s commentary to Juvenal). This means something like “a grape changes color (i.e., ripens) when it sees (another) grape”; this in turn goes back to a Greek proverb “botrus pros botrun pepainetai”, “a bunch of grapes ripens in the presence of (another) bunch of grapes”. This is first attested, I think, in Oration 7. 225b of the emperor Julian (4th cent.).
> 
> The line from Juvenal that prompts the scholiast is “uvaque conspecta livorem ducit ab uva” - “a grape assumes a sickly hue from a nearby grape (i.e., one that it has seen)”. This is something along the lines of ‘one bad apple spoils the barrel’, and thus is rather the opposite of what the scholiast’s proverb is getting at (that a bunch of grapes is spurred on to ripen more rapidly at the sight of nicely ripened, neighboring bunch of grapes).