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Working on conforming to the Chicago Manual of Style an authorized new edition of book first published decades ago at OUP (New York). This passage was originally rendered as:

The architects of medieval England were simple masons but they harbored erudite aspiration and called their rules 'Constitutiones Artis Geometriae Secundum Euclidem' (Regulations of Geometrical Art according to Euclid).

Should the Latin title of the masons’ regulations be in italics or double quotes?

... they harbored erudite aspiration and called their rules Constitutiones Artis Geometriae Secundum Euclidem (Regulations of Geometrical Art according to Euclid).

Or perhaps both italics, as the language is foreign, and quotes as it follows the declarative they called their rules?

... they harbored erudite aspiration and called their rules "Constitutiones Artis Geometriae Secundum Euclidem" ("Regulations of Geometrical Art according to Euclid").

The medieval masons’ regulations were mentioned by this name in other works over time, but it’s not established if they ever constituted a printed or published standalone work. Also, the seeming typo of aspiration not aspirations is noted, but changes to content can’t occur unless indisputably a typo.

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I would be inclined to treat the masons' rules as a formal work, whether actually published or only quasi-published, in which case section 11.59 of the sixteenth edition of Chicago would apply:

11.59 Latin capitalization—titles of works. In English-speaking countries, titles of ancient and medieval Latin works are capitalized in sentence style—that is only the first word in the title or subtitle, proper nouns, and proper adjectives are capitalized ...

The same section goes on to say that Renaissance and later titles in Latin should be initial-capped in accordance with modern English style rules.

Since the title of the (published or unpublished) work that you are discussing dates to medieval times, I would render it in sentence-case italics, with no quotation marks, as follows:

Constitutiones artis geometriae secundum Euclidem

Only Euclidem would qualify as a proper noun under these rules.

For the parenthetical English translation, I would either use sentence case again:

("Regulations of geometrical art according to Euclid")

or switch entirely to modern English title style:

("Regulations of Geometrical Art According to Euclid")

Either approach seems consistent and reasonable—and therefore irreproachable.

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  • To clarify, is the parenthetical English translation in quotes because no such official translation was ever published (and conversely, if one did, the quotes would be removed and the official translated title would be given in Roman)? The translation is the author's, who was known to be versed in Latin. Thank you.
    – Typothalamus
    Commented Dec 30, 2023 at 22:41
  • @ Typothalamus: If there were an actual published translation, I would use something like the following form: Constitutiones artis geometriae secundum Euclidem (published in an English translation as "Regulations of Geometrical Art According to Euclid"). If the work were the length of a full-size book (say, 100 or more pages, normal U.S. editing style would be to italicize the translated title, rather than setting it in quotation marks: Constitutiones artis geometriae secundum Euclidem (published in an English translation as Regulations of Geometrical Art According to Euclid).
    – Sven Yargs
    Commented Dec 31, 2023 at 4:39
  • To be clear, no English translation exists and so I was inquiring if that's why quotation marks were added.
    – Typothalamus
    Commented Dec 31, 2023 at 9:18

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