You may have seen the Lorem Ipsum text many times on websites or elsewhere, but you’ve always wanted to know what the English translation of this ancient Latin text would be. The truth is that, over the centuries, the original text (first written by Cicero in the 1st century B.C.) has been repeatedly corrupted to the point where common Lipsum snippets are not even pure Latin, and do not really make much sense.
Translation of common Lorem Ipsum phrases:
| Latin text (written by Cicero in the 1st century BC) | English translation |
|---|---|
| lorem ipsum | "pain itself" |
| lorem ipsum dolor sit amet (sic) | "pain itself it is pain" (sic) |
| lorem ipsum, quia dolor sit amet (original text) | "pain of itself, because it is pain" (translated) |
Now, let’s return to the most commonly shared Lipsum snippet:
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.
If ancient Romans were to read the paragraph above, they simply would not understand the meaning, because it is so corrupted. However, in 1914 Mr. Horace Rackam, one of the original stockholders in Ford Motor Company and a noted philatropist, attempted to translate this jibberish into American English which he contributed to the Loeb Classical Library in 1914 edition:
“…pain of itself, because it is pain, but occasionally circumstances occur in which toil and pain can procure him some great pleasure. To take a trivial example, which of us ever undertakes laborious physical exercise, except to obtain some advantage from it? But who has any right to find fault with a man who chooses to enjoy a pleasure that has no annoying consequences, or one who avoids a pain that produces no resultant pleasure? Blinded by desire, that they cannot foresee, blame belongs to those who fail in their duty through weakness of will, which is the same as saying through shrinking from toil.”