Legal Jargon: Same As It Ever Was

30 November 2010

As part of my learning medieval Latin, I’ve just started reading some legal depositions from thirteenth-century Venice. Now I’m used to Latin homiletics, hagiography, Biblical commentary, and poetry, but this was my first excursion into legal lingo. I was shocked at how modern it seemed. It could have come from a modern police blotter or out of the mouth of a police officer on the TV show Cops. Here’s an example from a deposition taken on 8 April 1290:

Florencius filius predicti Dominici, iuratus mandata domini potestatis et dicere veritatem et sacramento requisitus, dixit quod, die mercurii nunc elapso, ipse, cum uno alio qui vocatur Dainesius, laborabat audivit quemdam rumorem in curtivo dictarum dominarum; ad quem rumorem venit et vidit dictum Galvanum cum uno cultello a pane in manu euendo versus unam mulierem que est soror istius Florencii, ut dicit, et uxor ipsius Galvani. Quod cum videsset dictum Galvanum facientum insultum contra dictam suam sororem, ipse Florencius ivit versus dictum Galvanum et cepit ipsum, et ipse Galvanus ipsum Florencium et, sic tenendo se ad invicem, dictus Florencius percussit ipsum Galvanum cum pugno seu manu in faciem, taliter quod sanguis exivit. Interrogatus si aliqui alii precusserunt ipsum Galvanum, respondit non quod credat. De presentibus interrogatus, respondit quod plures fuerunt presentes, set non cognoscit eos. Aliud nescit.

Condempnatus in LX solidis et expensis curie. Solvit.

(Florencius, son of the aforementioned Dominicus, sworn as the mandates of the lord Podesta (civil magistrate) and to tell the truth and asked by oath, said that, on the Wednesday now passed, he, with one other named Dainesius, was working in the vineyard of the nuns of the aforesaid Saint Mary and, while they were working he heard certain shouting in the courtyard of the said nuns; he went to that shouting and he saw the aforesaid Galvanus with a bread knife in hand going toward a woman who is the sister of that Florencius, as he says, and the wife of that Galvanus. When he had seen the aforesaid Galvanus making an assault on his aforesaid sister, that Florencius went toward the aforesaid Galvanus and seized him, and that Galvanus seized that Florencius, thus holding each other, the aforesaid Florencius struck that Galvanus with his fist or hand in the face, such that blood discharged. Asked if some other struck that Galvanus, he responded that he believes not. Asked about the circumstances, he responded that many were present, but he did not know them. He knows nothing else.

Sentenced to sixty shillings and court expenses. He paid.)

I’m not the greatest at Latin, but this isn’t complex stuff, and it’s nearly a word-for-word translation. I haven’t massaged this at all to make it read like a modern deposition. Since our legal traditions are rooted in medieval Latin, it shouldn’t be a surprise that this legal mode of writing seems so normal to us some seven hundred years later. But I’ve never encountered anything this old that sounds so modern before.

(Edit: minor corrections to the translation)

New OED Interface

30 November 2010

The new OED online interface is up and running (sort of). My first impression is that I like it, a lot. But I’m having problems with speed (it’s crawling) and there are pages that refuse to load. I presume that this is due to unusually high traffic or other technical glitches that will be swiftly fixed. A more detailed review will be forthcoming.

The old interface will be available into 2011 to help ease the transition.

A Way With Words Podcast

30 November 2010

I usually don’t do this, but I’m going to ask for money. Not for me, but for the producers of the A Way With Words podcast. If you’re not familiar with it, you should be. Grant Barrett and Martha Barnette produce a weekly radio show and podcast on language that is fun, informative, and professional. It’s one of the highlights of my week. (I listen to quite a few podcasts—they’re great when commuting or walking the dog—and I can say that of all the shows I listen to, A Way With Words has, without a doubt, the highest production values.) The show used to be produced by a PBS radio station, but due to funding cuts at the stations is now an independent production, so they need to raise money just as if they were a public radio station.

So if you’re in a position to part with a few dollars, please click on the link to find out how. If you’re not, start listening to the show and then give it a review in iTunes or whatever podcasting service you use so that others can more easily find it. 

Spelling Reform Silliness

30 November 2010

Linguist Dennis Baron has a post on the OUP Blog on why efforts at spelling reform are just plain futile, and silly. I have mixed feelings about linking to this. While Dr. Baron is quite right, the efforts of organizations like the English Spelling Society don’t have a hope in hell of actually succeeding. They’re a bunch of harmless cranks. Spilling more ink on the subject of spelling reform just gives them legitimacy. Then again, Dennis’s tone is spot on. Derision is a good cure for cranks.

Reading for Style

28 November 2010

John McIntyre, a copy editor at the Baltimore Sun, is one of the most insightful commentators on good language writing today. He hits another one out of the park with this post about the absurd maxim, “When you meet an adverb, kill it.” He does a close reading of a Nabokov passage that rips that maxim to shreds. Money quote:

Maxims can only carry you a little way forward. What you need to do is study why low-grade prose (easily found if you subscribe to a daily newspaper or have access to the Internet) never gets aloft, and why first-rate prose soars. That is when you will begin to get somewhere yourself.

Those who dispense style advice in bite-sized chunks really ought to read more. They will quickly see that almost all of their advice is exactly the opposite of how great writers write.