My wife and I were watching the Matrix last night. She had never seen it and it’s been years since I watched it. When Neo goes to see the Oracle, she points to a sign that says “Temet Nosce”. She says that it means “know thyself”. My wife, a Latin teacher, was uncomfortable with the Latin used in the movie. She says:
So I was having a problem with the “temet” part…”te” is you, but I had never seen “met” before and didn’t know what it was. In my research last night I found that “met” is used emphatically but I have never seen that before (“ipsum” is much more common for that, so it would be “te ipsum” for “yourself”).
An internet search yields no clues as to why the creators of the movie chose to use this form. The wiki article on Know thyself says that the aphorism is from ancient Greek and is generally given in Latin as nosce te ipsum. Searches for temet nosce all reference the movie. The wiki article on [List of Latin phrases (N)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Latin_phrases_(N)#nosce_te_ipsum) only says that it’s a “non-traditional Latin rendering”.
So the question remains, where did this form come from and why did they chose to use it over the more traditional form?
My wife found something that helps answer the first question:
As I was reading through my lines this morning for the Aeneid, I saw a “met”! This time it was “vosmet” (“yourselves” – it’s plural). So apparently that does exist and I have seen it. Like I said though, it is not very commonly used, at least in my experience. I read that the original phrase is Greek, and I couldn’t get a clear answer on whether or not “te ipsum nosce” or “temet nosce” was the original Latin rendering.
Comments
pstamato • 12 points • 2011-11-07
It was actually fairly colloquial, and as a result you’ll find the -met intensive suffix more in letters, early comedies, and in the Vulgate. I’ve actually only noticed it with ego and vos but by principal it’s any pronoun and -met.
The only example I found from Classical Latin of temet was:
Seneca, Ad Lucilium Epistulae Morales (Letter 20, line 8)
Huc ergo cogitationes tuae tendant, hoc cura, hoc opta, omnia alia vota deo remissurus, ut contentus sis temet ipso et ex te nascentibus bonis.
All the others are from the Vulgate:
Ezra 2, 4.34
et respondit ad me et dixit: non festina spiritu super Altissimum; tu enim festinas propter temet ipsum spiritum, nam Excelsus pro multis.
Acts 26.1
Agrippa vero ad Paulum ait permittitur tibi loqui pro temet ipso. Tunc Paulus extenta manu coepit rationem reddere.
Deuteronomy 4.9
custodi igitur temet ipsum et animam tuam sollicite ne obliviscaris verborum quae viderunt oculi tui…
It goes on like that for a while. You can also find them at Exodus 32, John 17 and 18, Leviticus 19, Luke 23, Mark 15, Matthew 27, and Proverbs 3 and 6.
It’s an ending that was clearly highly colloquial, so tends to be avoided in proper writing. The Neolatin community has embraced it fully as a result.
As to why they would have used it for “nosce te ipsum” I have no idea. A phrase with that much weight would have probably rightly been in the more literarily common and heavy “te ipsum” not “temet.” Although, they were perhaps going for the same conciseness of two words as in the original Greek “γνῶθι σαυτόν” (gnōthi sautón).
oilytheotter • 15 points • 2011-11-07
Great answer. Thanks for the insight. I might be reading too much into the movie, but the colloquial form actually fits in context. The audience is made to think that The Oracle is a mysterious, powerful figure and allowed to assume that The Oracle will be rather ceremonious. In the scene in question, the audience finds out that The Oracle is the exact opposite of what they expected. She is a cheerful old lady who enjoys smoking cigarettes and baking cookies. The scene takes place in her tiny apartment kitchen. The phrase Temet Nosce is on a little wood carved sign above the doorway. It’s a trinket that could only appeal to your grandmother. The scene has a lot of weight in terms of the plot, but the director chooses to juxtapose that weight with an unassuming set. Temet Nosce fits right in.
pstamato • 6 points • 2011-11-07
Dang. That analysis was beautiful.
IshiiTib • 2 points • 2022-03-25
Agreed!!
5Point5Hole • 2 points • 2024-04-08
+1 beautiful
Shpegg • 4 points • 2022-08-06
Fire analysis . Also just commenting to let you know that this thread is helping people interested but uneducated in latin discern more apt defintions and usages 10+ years down the line from the date of posting. Thank you for creating the thread, which can be found via google searches on the subject, and for contributing to this online spot of free clarification.
PsychPaycheck • 4 points • 2023-11-21
12 years now
No-Shortcut-Home • 3 points • 2024-10-03
13 years now. Education has no time limit. I really appreciate this. Thank you!
SeaWolf24 • 2 points • 2024-11-18
13 years too, and i could not agree more. Thank you!
5Point5Hole • 2 points • 2024-04-08
Just wanted to say thank you for this comment. Reddit misses this sort of thing
Icy_Breakfast5154 • 1 points • 2024-11-14
Presumably they used it because it also translates to know that he is afraid. It’s a way of saying a lot of things including to know thyself
[deleted] • 0 points • 2011-11-17
Well I had about three paragraphs written that was really awesome reference to all the s*** in the matrix and how it’s a unique movie in the f****** face should be a unique phrase and that the articulation was brilliantly f****** something that would translate as custom yoga mats but it all mysteriously erased when I was reading it to my girlfriend so now you get this concise reiteration throughout the time that the matrix covers do it’s three-part series I’m not counting the fourth f****** movie The individual neo goes through many different phases of self to know therefore the singular emphatically referencing ipsy is probably an incorrect injection into the phrase so it is left out correctly. Yeah this also leaves us wondering why I think yoga mats is a proper translation for the same idea well here you go where one my practice more continually you would have to think would be something like a mat compared to without a mat and yoga is where you might I don’t know discover yourself so there you go
Unusual_Honeydew_Lit • 1 points • 2023-10-09
Well I had about three paragraphs written that was really awesome reference to all the s*** in the matrix and how it’s a unique movie in the f****** face should be a unique phrase and that the articulation was brilliantly f****** something that would translate as custom yoga mats but it all mysteriously erased when I was reading it to my girlfriend so now you get this concise reiteration throughout the time that the matrix covers do it’s three-part series I’m not counting the fourth f****** movie The individual neo goes through many different phases of self to know therefore the singular emphatically referencing ipsy is probably an incorrect injection into the phrase so it is left out correctly. Yeah this also leaves us wondering why I think yoga mats is a proper translation for the same idea well here you go where one my practice more continually you would have to think would be something like a mat compared to without a mat and yoga is where you might I don’t know discover yourself so there you go
Fun-Desk1381 • 1 points • 2024-04-14
She is just a teacher, doesn’t mean she knows how it should be written. My knowledge is higher and I know, “TEMET NOSCE”, is the right way to be written and I do not need to explain you why. Big difference than being a teacher and to have the knowledge.
tsubasaxiii • 1 points • 2024-04-21
How about you go fuck yourself.
Domiah-Mt-Titaness-1 • 1 points • 2022-09-19
11 years late, but could the movie’s meaning be saying “Know yourselves” plural, rather than “know yourself” singular?
TheGreedyZucchini • 1 points • 2022-11-05
Any insights to why that is a possibility? The Latin plural form would be vosmet noscite.
Domiah-Mt-Titaness-1 • 1 points • 2022-11-05
I thought it was more likely to be plural because this was humanity fighting against the machine. It’s possible they were trying to imply “We should know ourselves not to be the same as programs” or from the machine’s point of view “Programs shouldn’t empathize with the humans too much” considering the war they have had and all the “injustices” during the machine uprising we can see in the Animatrix show.
[deleted] • 1 points • 2023-03-13
you have a good mind.
NeatUse4711 • 1 points • 2023-04-27
So if I wanted a tattoo of this what exact words should I get thanksssssssssss
fixbraila • 1 points • 2024-04-21
I think of that for myself too, what waa your decision?
Cultural_Attempt_986 • 1 points • 2025-03-23
This is my exact reason for being here lol now im stuck trying to figure out which way I want to go
[deleted] • 1 points • 2023-09-15
did you end up getting that tattoo?