Apparently, Sean Hannity, the conservative host of the political commentary show Hannity on Fox News, has a new book. The title is Live Free Or Die: America (and the World) on the Brink. The book is currently set to be released by the conservative publishing imprint Threshold Editions on 4 August 2020. Judging from the description on Amazon, the book is going to be yet another banal diatribe attacking liberals as evil and praising President Donald Trump as the savior of American freedom.
Some people have noticed, though, that there is a Latin motto that appears on the front cover. It reads: “Vivamus vel libero perit Americae.” Ordinarily, this wouldn’t warrant any attention. After all, Sean Hannity—an older conservative white man who thinks he knows a lot more than he really does—is exactly the sort of person you would expect to have a Latin motto. There is a slight problem with this particular motto, though; it’s complete and utter gobbledygook. It is clear that whoever came up with this motto does not even know the basic noun cases in Latin or how they work.
A breakdown of the motto
The words in Hannity’s motto are real Latin words, but, the way they are strung together, they don’t make even a lick of sense. Here’s the breakdown:
- Vivamus is the first-person plural present active subjunctive form the verb vivo, meaning “to live.” Here it is presumably functioning as a hortatory subjunctive meaning “Let’s live.”
- Vel is a conjunction meaning “or.”
- In this context, libero is most likely either a masculine singular dative or ablative form of the adjective liber, meaning “free,” but it could also be the first-person singular present active indicative form of the verb libero, meaning “I set free.”
- Perit is the third-person singular present active indicative form of the verb pereo, meaning “to die” or “to pass away.”
- Americae is either the genitive singular, the dative singular, or the nominative plural form of the name America.
The only way I was able to make any grammatical sense out of this on my own was by assuming that perit had an unstated subject, interpreting libero as a dative of disadvantage, and interpreting Americae as a genitive of separation.
Thus, with some serious creative liberties, you could maybe argue that Hannity’s motto says something like, “Let’s live or he [i.e. the unstated subject of perit] passes away from America for the detriment of a free man.” Unfortunately, this still doesn’t really make any sense and you have to jump through a ton of grammatical hoops just to get here.
The real source of Sean Hannity’s Latin motto
I was about to give up on trying to make sense of Hannity’s motto when I saw that someone else had pointed out that, if you go to Google Translate, set it to translate from English to Latin, and type the phrase “Live free or America dies” into the English box, it will give you the exact phrase “Vivamus vel libero perit Americae”:
It’s unclear who exactly came up with this motto, but, whoever they were, they apparently just typed “Live free or America dies” into Google Translate and took what came out without even questioning it. They really shouldn’t have done that.
Google Translate is comically inept at both Latin and Ancient Greek. For an article I wrote last year, I conducted a little experiment in which I typed extremely simple Latin and Greek sentences from some of the very first lessons in my old workbooks into Google Translate. Then I compared Google Translate’s translations with my own (correct) translations. The results were hilarious. Here is a link to the article.
In the particular case of Sean Hannity’s Latin motto, the errors are manifold. The location and case of libero don’t make sense. Americae is clearly in completely the wrong case as well. You would have to fix all those problems just to get the phrase to even make sense. To make it idiomatic, you’d have to make some more changes. If I were writing the motto, I would probably make it “Vivamus liberi aut America peribit,” which literally means, “Let us live free or America will die.” There may be a better way of saying it, though.
Hannity’s vilification of scholars and academics
It may come as a shock to some people who aren’t familiar with Sean Hannity that apparently neither Hannity himself nor his editors nor the people at Threshold Editions nor anyone else involved in the production of this book ever even thought to check with anyone who actually knows Latin to make sure the motto made sense. Unfortunately, this is perfectly on-brand for Hannity.
Sean Hannity has a long history of vilifying scholars and academics, disparaging them as members of the evil “liberal elite” who are trying to destroy American freedom. In fact, here is the full description for the book Live Free Or Die: America (and the World) on the Brink on Amazon:
“America is great for a reason. Built on principles of freedom, rugged individualism, and self-sufficiency, no country has ever accumulated more power and wealth, abused it less, or used that power more to advance the human condition.”
“And yet, as America blossomed, leftwing radicalism and resentment festered beneath the surface, threatening to undermine democracy first in the sixties and now—more insidiously than ever—in the form of social justice warriors, the deep state, and compromised institutions like academia and the mainstream media.”
“Our fate if we succumb to a Democratic victory in 2020? A big step toward full-blown socialism along with the economic dysfunction and social strife that are its hallmarks. With radical Democrats demanding the Green New Deal, socialized medicine, abortion on demand, open borders, abolishing the Electoral College, packing the Supreme Court, and an end to free speech, our great nation will be fundamentally transformed beyond recognition.”
“Ronald Reagan once said, ‘Freedom is but one generation away from extinction,’ and his words have never rung truer. In Live Free or Die, Sean demonstrates why now is an All Hands on Deck moment to save the Republic. His solution is simple: if all you can do is vote, then vote. But if you can inform people of the truth, that’s even better. And the truth is that the future of American freedom rests on Donald Trump’s reelection.”
This stuff is really too crazy to make up. Notice that Hannity specifically names “academia” as one of the “compromised institutions” that he thinks left-wing radicals are using to undermine American freedom.
It seems that Hannity, his publicist, or whoever came up with his motto, couldn’t bring themself to ask a professional classicist to check the translation they got from Google Translate because, according to the book itself, academics are a bunch of evil left-wing radicals who want to destroy freedom.
Conservatives like Sean Hannity feel like they need Latin mottos because they know Latin mottos are old and traditional, but they despise the people who actually know Latin because they think they are left-wing radicals on a relentless quest to destroy freedom and enslave humanity, so they end up just trusting whatever Google Translate tells them.
What this illustrates
The reason why I am writing about this is partly because I find it hilarious that no one bothered to check the grammar of the phrase that is emblazoned on the front cover of a book that is about to be professionally published, but also because I think this example perfectly illustrates the essence of Sean Hannity’s variety of conservativism.
People like Sean Hannity revere old things that they don’t understand and that they have no desire to understand, often without justification, all while accusing those who try to correct their misunderstandings of being indoctrinated into liberal ideology. They reject experts as biased and untrustworthy, but they are more than willing to trust anything they hear from the least reliable sources of information imaginable without question.
In spite of all this, people still believe the things they say because we live in a deeply divided world in which truth is determined not by evidence or reason, but rather by which party you belong to.
I agree with Sean Hannity that we are living in a dark time, but I think he’s wrong about the reason why. If “radical leftists” are a problem at all, they certainly aren’t the main problem.
Hilarious!
Spot on, Spencer.
I love the way you call out Hannity; surely he is not witty, competent, or capable of acknowledging the error of his ways.
Awesome work!
Spencer:
Just for the sake of clear understanding, what would be the correct motto in Latin?
Thanks.
Bressan
Well, “Vivamus liberi aut America peribit” would at least be intelligible Latin. That would give you “We must live free or America will die.” There may be a more idiomatic way of saying it, though. My Latin is far better than that of Google Translate, but I will admit that it isn’t the best Latin in the world. If I were going to put a Latin motto on the front cover of a book, I would definitely check with a classics professor.
“Vivamus liberi” would be “Let us live free” (i.e. Let us live as free people, or Let us live being free). To get “We must live free” you’d need to use the gerundive in a passive paraphrastic I think (recalling the old “Carthago delenda est).
Absolutely not important, but it’s quarantine and I’m bored.
I agree with you that the translation was entirely botched, and your Latin makes sense to me. I have taught Latin for 15 years but do not consider myself an expert in prose as I have taught Latin poetry only
Isn’t the sentence fragment “Live free…” in the imperative mood? Why would anyone translate it as a subjunctive?
It’s because the command to live free presumably applies not only to the audience, but also to the speaker (i.e. Hannity himself). There’s no first-person imperative in Latin, so the most accurate translation is a first-person plural hortatory subjunctive.
I hadn’t thought of that angle; now it makes sense. Thanks! Pax tecum .
While I think Hannity’s motto is certainly syntactically unintelligible, Latin syntax can sometimes rearrange the order of words in ways that seem very illogical to an English speaker.
It is possible that ‘vivamus vel libero perit Americae’ can be interpreted as ‘vivamus libero Americae vel perit’, which might mean ‘Let us live in the free (way) of America or (America) perishes’?
I think it’s the case that’s a problem here. Americae is wrong no matter what. If America is the subject of perish, it has to be nominative– America. And libero makes no sense in the dative singular. It is the declensions that allow the word order to be flexible.
I definitely agree with this comment, and with Spencer’s syntactical analysis above. My sense is that this phrase would make more sense in Latin as a future more vivid conditional: Nisi vivemus liberi, America peribit. Not quite as catchy, I guess. 😉
Ok. What I meant is that liberō can be Abl. of Manner, with the word ‘modō’ omitted: ‘liberō modō Americae’ with Americae being genitive.
So glad to see this. A friend and I were just going back and forth, and had gotten close–we entered “Live free or an American dies” into Google Translate.
My Latin prof is going to get such a huge charge out of this.
Doesn’t Sean Hannity think that even Google is run by “radical leftists”? If so, then he shouldn’t have even used Google translate as they might be in on the plot to destroy America (I guess by mistranslating a patriotic quote?). The only person he can now trust to ask about Latin I suppose is some Classics professor at Liberty University or something (if they have any). To be honest though I think he’s just lazy and doesn’t care about getting the Latin correct even if it’s on the cover of his book since most of his readers won’t know Latin anyways.
I don’t know if Sean Hannity himself got the motto off Google Translate or if someone else (like maybe his publicist) did. In any case, though, I think you’re probably right that simple laziness is a big factor here, since there are definitely plenty of conservative classics professors out there that they could have asked for help who surely would have been willing to give it to them.
For instance, Victor David Hanson is an emeritus professor of the classics at California State University, Fresno, and also a well-known conservative commentator. He writes articles for conservative media outlets like The National Review and The Washington Times and he is a vocal supporter of President Trump. Indeed, Hanson literally published a book in 2019 titled The Case for Trump, which the president himself praised.
I think that pride is probably also a major factor here. Hannity and his crew pride themselves on their supposed “rugged individualism” and “self-sufficiency”; asking someone else for help in making a Latin motto would have probably ruined that sense of pride.
You’re an idiot!
You have every right to hold that opinion of me. I suspect that others will probably disagree with you, however.
Perhaps the imperative form of vivo would work?
My Latin’s terrible but I could see there was no case agreement and “vel” seemed awkward compared to “aut.”
Something along the lines of “Live thou by liberty, or America will perish,” whatever that would work out to. “Vivite cum (redundant preposition?) libertate, aut America peribit,” perhaps?
Tucker’s better anyway—Hannity’s a neocon blowhard.
Tucker Carlson has his own problems. For one thing, he is pretty blatantly a white supremacist who barely even tries to disguise his true beliefs. Here’s a video that talks about how he uses all kinds of racist dog whistles to appeal to closet white supremacists.
Whatever would make a correct and elegant Latin phrase, it should use the “aut” instead of the “vel”.
I think you illustrate how this is a pretty perfect encapsulation of the problem: the past is to be revered along with its traditions, understanding the past is not possible or unimportant because it’s the domain of liberals who are (by definition) bad, therefore we don’t understand things simply know they are true AS HARD AS WE CAN!
As you also say, the problem isn’t with the “liberals”. I wonder if we’re going to reach a point where anti-intellectuals are going to do the social equivalent of collapsing in on themselves due to their own gravitational mass? Are we going to get “Freedom states” that become so firmly committed to rejecting anyone with more than a highschool education or who thinks the Earth isn’t flat that they live in a society that eventually disintegrates because all the people who know how to make technology work are driven out (or worse)? I guess I’m kind of describing what Gilead is in the Handmaid’s tale, however those who ran Gilead didn’t believe in the ideology they were espousing or follow it themselves, they just used it on the masses for control. The same as many populists, of course.
The sad thing about many leading Republicans and other right wing politicians is that some of them really do start believing their own lies. That way lies madness.
I am sorry but a Classics professor at Liberty University would have to be the loneliest person on campus.
Spencer, I have a word in Greek that I was wondering if you could translate for me. It shows up in my intro to Koine textbook and the author himself says that he is unable to translate it. Could you help me out? Keep up the good work.
I can’t make any promises that I will be able to translate the word. After all, I’m just a student and I’m sure the author of your textbook probably knows a lot more Greek than I do. Nonetheless, you’re welcome to tell me what it is and I will try to find a definition for it.
I thought I submitted the word but my reply isn’t showing. Did you get it?
No. I have not received any information about what word you want to know the meaning of.
A comment on “what should have Hannity done if he wanted to have a nice traditional motto?” :
Maybe I am only a French old school guy, but the very idea of a XXIth century politician creating a new motto for himself in Latin seems ridiculous to me and the real mistake here. Similar to a new renaissance castle built in concrete.
The elegant way would have been to find a quote of a Latin hero or writer (Cicero etc.), I think.
Cicero has a line in his Philippics 11:24 that goes like this:
Sean Hannity could have easily just taken that exact quote word-for-word and pasted it on the front cover of his book with an attribution to Cicero. If he’d done that, instead of looking like a pretentious idiot, he’d just look pretentious.
Great job on the motto. I only wish that you’d waited until after publication – they might fix it, and deprive us of the fun of seeing all those young eejits who’ve tattooed it on their faces. Sadly, the substance is just as dumb. “Built on principles of freedom, rugged individualism, and self-sufficiency, no country has ever accumulated more power and wealth, etc., etc.” Sure, except that all that wealth was created by slaves, owned by people who didn’t believe in freedom and obviously weren’t self-sufficient. “Rugged individualism”? OK, maybe. What’s that in Latin?
I could not like you more if you were one of my own family. Brilliant job here.
Thank you so much! I am so glad you enjoy my work!
I have four years of college Latin, two years of graduate school Latin, and one year as a graduate assistant, and I could not make sense of that.
Willem Kinaeda:
I also have an Ancient Greek dictionary (I minored), so if you all need help, perhaps I could have a look.
Just saw came across this post, I hope it’s ok that I’m commenting a full month after you first put it up. There must be multilingual conservatives out there, but I can tell you that Sean Hannity is not the only one who’s made a mistake like this. A year and a half ago, I read a book Dinesh D’Souza published early in the Trump administration. A few parts of it were thought provoking, and it was not the train wreck I expected, but it was not a very good book, and the only thing it convinced me of was that I didn’t need to read anymore books by Dinesh D’Souza or take his opinions seriously. One reason I came away feeling this way was because of carelessness with a foreign language, though not quite on the order of the poor Latin you discuss in your post.
Much of D’Souza’s book was devoted to accusing Liberals of being Fascists/Totalitarians/Intolerant Bad Mean People, and thus there were many comparisons to the Nazis. Putting my (too rarely used) undergraduate degree in German to work, I looked closely whenever he used a term from that era in the original German and noted that many of them were spelled wrong. At least once, I noted that the same German word was spelled two different ways on the same page. Presumably this was more a failure of the proofreaders than D’Souza himself, but he lost a lot of what credibility he had left with me because of this.
Even worse was the egregious historical error of claiming that Lenin had Trotsky assassinated. I was eager to hear D’Souza explain how Lenin managed to have someone assassinated 16 years after his own death, but sadly this went unaddressed. I still can’t believe that the book went to press without a fact checker somewhere catching that. I would compare it to claiming that Alexander Hamilton died in a duel with George Washington. Not only is it completely and demonstrably wrong, you have to wonder how someone who’s supposed to be a serious intellectual could make a mistake like that.
Romanes eunt domus.
This just reads like the 2020 version of Romanus eunt domus.
Haha, beat you to it by 50 minutes. 🙂
Cannot imagine why nobody else brought that up.
Wonderful analysis! I’m another Classics major- Yale ’91, teaching Latin & Greek ever since- chiming in after hearing the NPR story. When I caught your literal analysis of the quote, and your translation of “libero,” my ears perked up and my morning coffee sloshed as I immediately thought, “Ahhh- dative of disadvantage!” Then I read your entire article and saw we were in agreement. I mean… what else would it be? Mostly, a share your amazement at folks who love the old stuff just because it seems “old,” “traditional,” “established,” blah blah blah. Keep up the great work!
Thank you so much! I’m glad you appreciate my work. Honestly, it has really surprised me how much impact this article has had. When I first published it, I expected it to just be one of my less popular articles and I was really rather shocked when it blew up. It started getting shared all over the place on social media and getting thousands of views.
Eventually those views did die down, but, then, about a week ago, I checked up on the book and found that the Latin motto had been changed, so, on August 2nd, I published a follow-up article in which I tongue-in-cheek suggested that maybe someone at Threshold Editions had read my article. I thought that would be the end of it, but, then, on August 4th, Business Insider published an article about the changed motto that extensively quoted this article. Then, on August 5th, The Guardian picked it up with an article that extensively quoted both this article an my follow-up article from August 2nd. Then, on August 6th, I got interviewed by Peter Breslow for NPR. It has really been quite an exciting experience!
Why did you mention Mr. Hannity’s race? Why did you describe him as older?