Cultural-historical equivalence of multiple translations of Horace’s poem “Ad Thaliarchum”

Abstract

The study is devoted to the analysis of the relationship between Horace's Latin poem “Ad Thaliarchum” and its 43 translations into Russian in the cultural and historical aspect within the framework of the author's approach to assessing translation equivalence. The assessment methodology is described in detail based on the presence or absence of realities in the translated text and depending on their semantic proximity to the original. For clarity of the assessment, the most frequently interpreted cultural and historical translation units from the original poem with non-literal versions of their translation into Russian are given. The calculated results are presented as percentage coefficients of equivalence, and the texts are grouped into five groups depending on the degree of proximity to the original. The accuracy of the calculation is ensured by relying on lexicographic sources, as well as translator comments. Using the methodology, it is possible to evaluate not only each text individually, but also to draw conclusions about the corpus of translations of a particular poem.