The unclear use of a verdedigbaar mistranslation arises from time to time in the English writing of Dutch lawyers. In an earlier post, we looked at this problem in detail. Here we continue by looking at a few examples of mistranslations of verdedigbaar and how to repair them. First example (unclear whether “verdedigbaar” meant as… Read more
“Arguable” is one of those strange and unclear English words that not only have two different meanings, but two meanings that are the opposite of each other. (Other such words include “sanction”, “literally” and “oversight”. ) Example of the unclear use of “arguable” The following sentence could have two different interpretations: ? It is arguable that… Read more
In this post, we look at how verdedigbaar can be properly expressed in English, especially in the phrase “het is verdedigbaar dat“. Example of a statement that a lawyer may wish to hedge When a lawyer discusses a possible position or argument, one problem that arises is that, merely by stating it, the lawyer appears to be… Read more
Many Dutch belastingadviseurs and other legal professionals already seem to know that fiscaal does not really mean “tax”. One cannot help but wonder, therefore, why so many keep using “fiscal” in the sense of “tax” when they know it is wrong. There are a number of poor translations of Dutch legal terms that seem…firmly rooted…. Read more
One issue arising in almost every bit of legal writing is whether the name of the country should be styled as “The Netherlands” or “the Netherlands” in a given context. This is complicated by the fact that sometimes just “Netherlands” is used. The Netherlands is one of those countries whose English name is preceded by… Read more
There is one place where quality does indeed matter: the marketing material and other information placed on a firm’s website or on any online location, including LinkedIn. It surprises me how many mistakes are found online. It is difficult to understand. You would think that Dutch lawyers would recognise that language mistakes made online, at… Read more
One of the English legal words that Dutch professionals tend to overuse and misuse is “fiscal”. Fiscaal is not the same as “fiscal”. “Fiscal” is a “false friend” The Dutch word fiscaal often refers to “tax”. The English equivalent “fiscal” tends to be incorrectly used as the English equivalent. However, English speakers do not use… Read more
The UK Supreme Court recently looked at a syntax issue in McDonald v National Grid Electricity Transmission Plc [2014] 3 WLR 1197, [2014] WLR(D) 439, [2014] UKSC 53 (22 October 2014). The issue was how to interpret a drafted clause that had an introductory phrase and it was not clear what the introductory phrase modified… Read more
How should onverminderd artikel X be translated into English? This is a tricky translation point, perhaps one of the trickiest. How is onverminderd artikel X used in legal Dutch? This is surprisingly difficult to ascertain. Despite its ubiquity, there appears to be no authoritative or universally applicable definition. Indeed, the meaning seems to depend on the… Read more
We recommend formality in legal correspondence. However, it’s getting increasingly difficult to do this when English-speaking lawyers themselves seem more and more to be resorting to informality, especially in e-mails. Basic guideline One of the teaching points is to end correspondence with “Yours sincerely” or a similar phrase when writing to someone by name. “Yours… Read more
