Prayer to Carmenta

A petitionary prayer of the modern order; for the general explanation see carmenta-001.

The Latin here is markedly older than one would expect from a present-day composer. Iteradum is a form with the enclitic -dum, alive only in Plautus, Terence and the tragedians; the string of clipped imperatives age adsta, mane, audi is likewise a mark of early Latin, the language of the second-century BC stage.

So the phrase has either been taken wholesale from somewhere or imitates such language very closely. The particular passage could not be identified. But given that borrowing has been demonstrated in three other cards of this set (carmenta-004, carmenta-010, carmenta-011), the first is the more likely.

The card's English text adds a whole second half — about an end to hardship and rest from labours — which is not in this line.