Where does the quotation "Rem acu tegisti" come from and what does it mean?

Hello.

The phrase is "Rem acu tetigisti."

It means "you have touched it with a needle."  As, it's similar to the
expression "you have hit the nail on the head."

The phrase is commonly attributed to the comedy "Rudens" by Plautus
(254-184 BC), an ancient Roman dramatist.

source:  Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable
'Acu tetigisti  You have hit the nail on the head. (Lit., you have
touched it with a needle.) Plautus (Rudens, v, 2, 19) says, "Rem acu
tetigisti;"'
http://www.bootlegbooks.com/Reference/PhraseAndFable/data/11.html

A check of Rudens, Act V, Scene 2, line 19 verifies that a version of
the phrase does indeed appear in the play:

"Tetigisti acu."
source:  Rudens, V, 2, 19, hosted by persues.tufts.edu
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.02.0046&query=scene%3D%2328

The phrase "rem acu tetigisti" also appears in a 1528 work by theologian Erasmus.  

See:
"VRSVS : Rem acu tetigisti."
in ERASMVS DE RECTA LATINI GRAECIQVE SERMONIS PRONVNTIATIONE DIALOGVS MD.XXVIII.
http://big.chez.com/asklepios/erasmus/pronuntiatione.htm

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Despites its ancient origins, "Rem acu tetigisti" appears to owe some
of its modern popularity to the butler Jeeves in the bestselling
novels by PG Wodehouse (1881-1975).
See the results of this Google search:
"rem acu" jeeves
://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=ISO-8859-1&q=%22rem+acu%22+jeeves+&btnG=Search
And google groups:
http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=ISO-8859-1&q=%22rem+acu%22+jeeves&btnG=Search

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search strategy:
"rem acu"
"rem acu" plautus
"rem acu" erasmus

I hope this helps.

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Clarification of Answer by juggler-ga on 21 Jun 2004 21:41 PDT

Sorry for that typo:

"Despite its ancient..."

Incredibly wonderful scholarship.  Thank you.

Thank you very much for the tip.
-juggler

Thanks for a great answer, Juggler! A lesser Researcher might have
missed the Wodehouse connection, which is (I think) the key to the
continuing popularity of the utterance "Rem acu tetigisti." I am
certain that this Latin phrase would have lapsed into obscurity if not
for the estimable Jeeves.

I associate "Rem acu tetigisti" so strongly with Wodehouse that I
wasn't even aware that it came from Plautus. Somehow I assumed that
Wodehouse had made it up.