Charles Davis Dec 30, 2018:

@Eliza "I don\'t think we as translators can change the numbers used": I agree; that's my point. But that's what you're proposing: bis, ter, quarter... is one system and 1, 2, 3... is another.

"I don't see why it would matter whether people think 389-6 was the sixth one added after 389": it matters because the point of a reference is to enable people to look it up, and if they do, will find that there is no Article 389-6. They will then have to guess which article the reference "389-6" refers to. One assumption would that "6" corresponds to "sixiès", although that is inconsistent, because it means there is no Article 389-1 (why would that number have been skipped in the 1, 2, 3 system?). Another is that the translator who had seen fit to change the numbers had applied the chosen system in a consistent manner, and that you can identify 389-6 by counting the sixth article after 389. Why not put the original number and make it easy? What does it matter if it looks unfamiliar to people with no experience of int. law?

"That's their business": this makes it sound like an eccentricity, but it's the norm in many countries and in international conventions (inc. EN versions).

Eliza Hall Dec 30, 2018:

@Charles In response to this --

"The first article added after Article 389 of the Algerian Penal Code is 389 bis. Is this to be translated as 389-1 or 389-2? The numbers in the two systems are out of sync. If you translate 389 sixiès as 389-6, or indeed 389-six, people might quite reasonably assume you mean the sixth article added after 389"

--I don't think we as translators can change the numbers used, and also, I don't see why it would matter whether people think 389-6 was the sixth one added after 389. That has no practical effect on anything. The rare legal researcher who cares about legislative history can see just by looking at the code these articles appear in that -6 wasn't the sixth, and they can consult parliamentary records to see how the code came to be what it is.

If Algeria wants to call its statutes, essentially, Art. 389, Art. 389-2, Art. 389-3, etc., that's their business. They're effectively just saying there is no "Art. 389-0"; the first one is the first, and the others are numbered consecutively to that.

Charles Davis Dec 28, 2018:

II References really must not be ambiguous, and there is no need to create this difficulty. All you have to do is to use the numbering of the statute in question. And this, as I say, is standard practice, notably in treaties and international conventions (perhaps not in the US; I don’t know). For example:

“Articles 6 bis, 6 ter, 6 quater, 6 sexies and 6 septies shall apply to marks thus registered”
United Nations, Treaty Series 2250 I: 40097-40105 Annex A, 354
https://books.google.es/books?id=2jDFbCMbDuwC&pg=PA354

“D. Article 44 sexies reading as follows shall be inserted after article 44 quinquies:
"The Netherlands and Belgian Governments may by mutual agreement adjust the amounts of the additional charges referred to in article 44. […]"”
United Nations, Treaty Series, vol. 686, 329.
https://treaties.un.org/doc/Publication/UNTS/Volume 686/v686...

And if it makes some bored lawyer think of sex, well, a little light entertainment is welcome now and then, even if it’s a bit infantile.

Of course you’re welcome to do otherwise! All I’m saying is that I wouldn’t, and don’t, and personally I don’t think it’s a good idea.

Charles Davis Dec 28, 2018:

@Eliza Well, that works as long as everyone involved knows and uses the same punctuation conventions. But I'm not sure you can necessarily count on that in all countries in which the translation might be received.

A more serious potential difficulty, I think, is that we would have to decide whether Article 389 sixiès is to be translated as 389-5 or 389-6, given that although "sixiès" means "six times", this is in fact the fifth added article, not the sixth. The first article added after Article 389 of the Monaco Penal, which you cited for comparison, is 389-1. The first article added after Article 389 of the Algerian Penal Code is 389 bis. Is this to be translated as 389-1 or 389-2? The numbers in the two systems are out of sync. If you translate 389 sixiès as 389-6, or indeed 389-six, people might quite reasonably assume you mean the sixth article added after 389 (as in Monaco), which is Article 389 septiès in the Algerian code (and any other statute that uses this system). Conversely, if you call it 389-5, as you logically should, you can bet some people will think you mean 389 quinquiès, or at least suspect that you might mean that.

Continued in next post

Eliza Hall Dec 28, 2018:

@Charles Davis As a lawyer, I wouldn't read Art. 389-6 (or -six or -sixth) as part of Art. 389. There's a difference between Art. 389(6), which refers to the sixth paragraph of Art. 389, and Art. 389-6, which is a different article than Art. 389-5 or Art. 389.

In sum: parentheses designate paragraphs/subparagraphs of statutes ("Art. 389(6)(ii)(c)" for instance -- that designates a particular subparagraph of Art. 389). Hyphens don't; Art. 389-6 is a different article than Art. 389-5.

I do agree that Art. 389 bis shouldn't be translated as Art. 389a. That's ludicrous, even if there is no paragraph (a) in Art. 389 to cause confusion. It's ludicrous because "a" and "bis" are not equivalent -- one is a letter, the other a number, and they're not even of the same order: a is the first letter, while bis is the second number.

I would STRONGLY recommend against translating "sixiès" as "sexies" because of the English word "sexy." Don't do it unless you want everyone reading your translation to get the song "I'm Too Sexy For My Shirt" stuck in their head, or some variation: "I'm Too Sexy For My Statute..." :)

Charles Davis Dec 28, 2018:

@Eliza I think it makes no difference whether you put Article 389-6, Article 389-six, or Article 389-sixth: all of these are misleading because they are very likely to be interpreted as meaning a section or part of Article 389. This is absolutely not what it means. Article 389 sixiès is a different article from Article 389.

Use of bis, ter, etc. for added articles is common practice in a number of countries and occurs quite often in treaties, and it is familiar to those versed in international law. Normal practice is to leave them unchanged, for the very good reason that any change runs a risk of making it more difficult to identify the reference correctly. If you translate "389bis" as "389a", for example (as EU translators used to, at least sometimes), it will be misleading if Article 389 has a section or paragraph (a), and at best confusing if someone looks it up, finds that there is no Article 389a and wonders whether they meant 389 bis.

The only change I would make in this case is to change the French spelling of sixiès to the international and original Latin spelling sexies.

Eliza Hall Dec 28, 2018:

In this particular case, six or sixth This same idea could be represented as "Art. 389-6" (i.e., the sixth numbered provision of Art. 389), and would be represented that way if it were a U.S. law (I don't ever recall seeing U.S. statute numbers spelled out). Adding -1, -2 etc. lets you add new articles between old ones, as Charles Davis said.

This statute in Monaco, for instance, would be cited as Art. 389-6, and if you wanted to specify a paragraph in it (there are two), you would say "Art. 389-6(2)" (or (1)): https://www.legimonaco.mc/305/legismclois.nsf/Code/624BD931C...

But I clicked on the link Charles posted, and even though "Art. 389 sixiès" actually is conceptually the same thing as "389-6," it's spelled out rather than represented numerically in the original, so I would stick with spelling it out in the translation too.

The reason to represent it the same way in both languages is to avoid confusion. If someone reads this in English and then googles something like "Algeria penal code 389-6" to find out more, nothing will come up, and that would be confusing. So I would call it Art. 389-six or Art. 389-sixth. Preferably six because googling that would bring up sixiès

Beatriz Ramírez de Haro Dec 21, 2018:

Charles Thanks very much for posting tins!

Charles Davis Dec 21, 2018:

Here it is; it's part of a whole new section that has been added after Section VI of Part II, Book III, Title II, Chapter III. This new section is called Section VI bis. The eight articles in it are numbered 389 bis to 389 noniès:
https://www.wipo.int/edocs/lexdocs/laws/fr/dz/dz027fr.pdf (p. 116 of file).

Charles Davis Dec 21, 2018:

For the record I'm very glad you found what you needed to know. Since the question has been closed, there's no point in posting an answer, but I thought it might be useful to other users to explain this.

Sixies comes from Latin, and literally means "six times". In Latin it's spelt sexies or sexiens. In French it has a grave accent: sixiès. It is part of the sequence of Latin adverbial numerals, expressing how many times things happen(ed): semel, bis, ter, quater, etc.

These words are used when a new article is added to a statute, in this case the Algerian Penal Code, between two existing articles. Suppose you need to add a new article between existing articles 389 and 390. It would be extremely inconvenient to call it article 390 and renumber the current article 390 as 391, and so on: all existing references to subsequent articles would then become wrong. So you call it article 389 bis. And if you need two new articles between 389 and 390, you call them 389 bis and 389 ter. And so on. Article 389 sexies is the fifth new article added between the original articles 389 and 390.

It is left unchanged in English, as it is part of the number.