Top Qs
Timeline
Chat
Perspective

Favete linguis!

Latin phrase encouraging silence From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Remove ads

"Favete linguis!" is a Latin phrase, which means "facilitate [the ritual acts] with your tongues” ("tongues" as the organ of speech). In other words, "hold your tongue" or "facilitate the ritual acts by being silent".

The phrase is used by Cicero, Ovid, Horace, Pliny the Elder and Seneca.

Northrop Frye used the term in reference to the way that the philosophy of "new criticism" proscribes a limitation on the use of interdisciplinary criticism, suggesting that, for those who wish to dabble with a text by using tools from outside the literary tradition (i.e. using the critical techniques of other artistic disciplines on literature), they would do well to 'hold their tongues.'[citation needed]

Remove ads

Origin

'Favour me with your tongues'. During official ritual acts a herald ordered the others to be silent by saying this phrase. It was done in order to avert an interruption by a careless, maybe also an ominous, word.[citation needed]

Examples

References

Loading related searches...

Wikiwand - on

Seamless Wikipedia browsing. On steroids.

Remove ads