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AI Translation  ·  Case Study

Geographia Sacra — Samuel Bochart
Latin Original (1646)  ·  Commonplace AI Translation

Bochart’s monumental work on biblical geography and the Table of Nations — the landmark of Protestant Oriental scholarship — compared passage-by-passage between the 1646 Latin and Commonplace’s AI translation.

Latin text from the first edition (Caen: Pierre Cardonnel, 1646), as reprinted in the fourth edition (Leiden: Boutesteyn & Luchtmans, 1707) with additions by Petrus de Villemandy. No complete English translation has previously existed.

Samuel Bochart (1599–1667), French Huguenot pastor, orientalist, and biblical scholar, published Geographia Sacra in two parts in 1646: Phaleg (on the dispersal of nations after Babel, based on Genesis 10) and Canaan (on the land of Canaan and its peoples). The work combined extraordinary knowledge of Hebrew, Aramaic, Arabic, Phoenician, and Greek to identify biblical place-names and peoples with classical geographical sources.

Bochart was perhaps the greatest biblical philologist of the 17th century. His method — tracing place-names through etymological chains across multiple Semitic and classical languages — remained the standard reference in biblical geography for more than a century. Commonplace holds the first English translation of the complete work, rendered by AI from the 1646 Latin.

Preface  ·  Petrus de Villemandy, 1707

The Scope and Method of Sacred Geography

Why Bochart’s work surpassed all prior efforts in biblical geographical scholarship

The 1707 preface by Petrus de Villemandy describes the scope of Bochart’s achievement. The passage illustrates the kind of multilingual scholarly prose the AI is translating throughout the work — dense with classical allusions, Greek technical terms, and careful scholarly qualification.
Latin Original — 4th Ed., Leiden 1707

Multa sunt in Antiquitatis thesauro commendanda: sed omnium maxime hoc: si quid in Gentium origine et per varias terras dispersione notatu dignum, et vetustate obscuratum, dignitate, utilitate et iucunditate sua e tenebris oblivionis et caligine temporis vindicandum est — uti regna et imperia principia et incrementa, Religionum origines et fundamenta, fabularum ethnicarum origines et fundamenta, et alia nonnulla similia — ea omnia mira àγχινοίà investigat et detegit, detectaque perspicue demonstrat.

Eos qui declinante saeculo XIV et ineunte XV, Mundum novum, multis inde millibus annorum nobis absconditum et penitus separatum, per Sacerdotum quorundam Aegyptiorum narrationes, navigatones Phoenicum et Carthaginensium, ac Platonis aliorumque testimonia, detexere, omnium laudibus in caelum efferuntur, meritissime ; quamvis numero multi, litoraque tantum regionum Americanarum lustrasse fuerint.

Commonplace AI — from 1646/1707 Latin

But what in this treasury of antiquities is to be commended above all else is this: if anything in the origin of nations and their dispersal through various regions seems particularly worthy of note, and deserving to be rescued from the darkness of oblivion and the obscurity of time on account of its dignity, usefulness, and interest — such as the beginnings and progress of kingdoms and empires, the origins and foundations of religions, the origins and foundations of pagan myths, and certain similar matters — these things it investigates and discovers with truly remarkable agchinoiá [shrewdness], and having discovered them, demonstrates them clearly.

Those who, in the declining fourteenth century and the dawning fifteenth, discovered the New World — which had been hidden from us for some thousands of years and entirely cut off, by means of the accounts of certain Egyptian priests, the voyages of the Phoenicians and Carthaginians, and the testimonies of Plato and others — are raised to the heavens by the praises of all, and most deservedly so.

Translation note — àγχινοίà and scholarly register: The Greek term àγχινοίà (agchinoiá, “shrewdness” or “acuteness of mind”) is left in Greek by Bochart as a mark of the learned style. The AI correctly identifies it as a Greek loanword, transliterates it, and provides a gloss. The phrase vetustate obscuratum (“obscured by antiquity”) is rendered “the obscurity of time,” shifting from a process (“having been made obscure by age”) to a state — a minor loss in precision but natural in English.
Phaleg  ·  Introductory Section

On the Dispersal of Nations and the Table of Nations

Bochart’s program: tracing all nations to the sons of Noah

Latin Original — 1646 First Edition

Illi autem qui non ad unum aut alterum genus se restrinxerunt, sed omnium gentium origines ex Noachi posteris derivarunt, nulli non errori obnoxii fuere: sive a veritate aberrarunt Gentis Israeliticae historicos negligentes, sive fabulis ethnicis plus iusto crediderunt — a quibus nec Berossum Babylonium, nec Manethonem Aegyptium, nec alios multos liberos fuisse constat.

Bochart vero, his omnibus vitiis immunis, unicum veritatis fontem, Scripturae sacrae auctoritatem secutus, relicta via aliis trita et aspera, novam aperuit et planam: et tot errorum ac fabularum confusionem immensam, unius Noachi posterior progeniis in tres stirpes distinctae, ratione solida et firmissima dissoluit.

Commonplace AI — from 1646 Latin

But those who did not restrict themselves to one or another lineage, but derived the origins of all nations from the descendants of Noah, were liable to no small error: whether they strayed from the truth by neglecting the historians of the Israelite people, or trusted too much to pagan fables — from which it is established that neither Berossus the Babylonian, nor Manetho the Egyptian, nor many others were free.

Bochart, however, immune to all these faults, following the single source of truth — the authority of Holy Scripture — left behind the road trodden and made rough by others, and opened a new and level way: and the immense confusion of so many errors and fables he dissolved, by solid and very firm reasoning, through the posterity of one Noah, divided into three branches.

Translation note — nulli non errori obnoxii: The phrase is a double negative litotes: nulli non = “not to no” → “to some,” combined with obnoxii (“liable to”). The AI renders this as “were liable to no small error,” correctly identifying the litotes but slightly understating it. A literal rendering would be “were liable to every kind of error.” The phrase novam aperuit et planam (“opened a new and level [way]”) is rendered exactly, preserving the road metaphor.

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