Who is carmina?

Answer 1

During a presentation of "Carmina Burana " in my city (Medellin, Colombia), I heard a woman asking her friend which one of the female singers could be Carmina (stressing the second syllable). Like many people, she made two mistakes:

First mistake: In the context of "Catuli Carmina", and "Carmina Burana", two musical works of Carl Orff (not operas, as some people say), the word "carmina" is not a personal or given name, but a common Latin name. "Carmina" means "songs" or "poems" in plural. Its singular form is "carmen".

Second mistake: Both forms of the word (singular and plural) have the accent on the first syllable ['kar-men], ['kar-mi-na]. (The pronunciation [kar-'mi-na] is not correct in Latin).

The names of the works:

· "Catuli Carmina", means "The Poems of Catullus" (Gaius Valerius Catullus, a Roman poet of the first century BC.). · "Carmina Burana" means "The Poems of Beuern". Burana is a Latin adjective referering to the town or Beuern" (i. e. "from Benediktbeuern", a municipality in Bavaria, Germany, where the "Carmina Burana" manuscript was found in 1803 in an Abbey of the Benedictine Order founded during the eighth century). And by the way, the word "carmen" as "poem" or "song" has no relation with the Spanish name "Virgen del Carmen" ("Our Lady of Mount Carmel"), since her original name was "Virgen del Carmel", in reference to "Mount Carmel" (a coastal mountain range in northern Israel).

Christian Betancur, Professor of Latin Language