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A Canadian Classic of Legal Latin Updated

Mayrand, Albert. Dictionnaire de maximes et locutions latines utilisées en droit, 4e édition mise à jour par Máirtín Mac Aodha, Les éditions Yvon Blais, Cowansville (Québec), 2007, 671 pp, ISBN 978-2-89635-016-2

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Notes

  1. In this regard, it is worth mentioning that an Estonian author, Ristikivi, has recently published a doctoral thesis examining, inter alia, the growing use of Latin expressions in Estonian legal literature [23].

  2. A survey of the history and present use of Latin maxims and locutions in modern legal languages is given in English in [14, pp. 125–158] and [17, pp. 253–265]. Corresponding presentations in other major languages can be found in [10–13, 15, 16, 18].

  3. ‘By a curious reversion, Latin locutions and maxims crossed the Atlantic Ocean, coming from England, and they were introduced in the civil law of Quebec bringing with them notions of common law’. See [19, p. VIII]. Two other Canadian specialists, Wallace Schwab and Roch Pagé, also refer to this phenomenon in their own dictionary of legal Latin [26, pp. 7–8].

  4. See in more detail [14, pp. 140–146].

  5. The use of this latter source (cases) is explained by the fact that in countries of English and French legal culture Latin quotations may be found in court decisions as well as in legal literature. This is also true of many other countries, like Poland and Italy. In some others, e.g., in Scandinavia, Latin expressions are not found in court decisions.

  6. ‘It is sometimes used to indicate the generality of a legal rule or of a manner of proceeding’.

  7. In a comparative study, our research team counted the number of Latin maxims and locutions in leading dictionaries of various countries (this number is not always given in the relevant dictionaries themselves, notably in the case of general law dictionaries which include Latin maxims and locutions). In the English linguistic zone, Black’s Law Dictionary [7] (1990 edition) contains more Latin than any other common-law dictionary: approximately 8,000 maxims and locutions (Jowitts [8] occupies the second position with approximately 4,600 Latin maxims and locutions). In the Spanish linguistic zone, the two dictionaries of Guillermo Cabanellas [4, 5] contain, together, even more Latin: approximately 9,600 maxims and locutions. The corresponding dictionaries in other linguistic zones are normally more succinct if historical dictionaries are excluded (Sondel [27], focusing on Polish legal history, includes more than 100,000 entries). See in more detail Mattila [10, p. 728, note 41, and p. 730].

  8. Roland and Boyer [24, 25] are good examples of this.

  9. Schwab and Pagé [26], a second Canadian dictionary, is also based on a study of court decisions.

  10. A comparison of various dictionaries shows that this is rare but not unprecedented. Bruss [3], for instance, gives the basic forms of the Latin verbs used in the maxims and locutions included in his dictionary.

  11. Many examples may be mentioned from various countries: Anners and Unnerfors [1], Pieńkos [22] and Xavier [32] (which partly has the nature of a Latin textbook).

  12. Schwab and Pagé [26] (as well as the 1986 edition and the online edition) also gives the authentic Latin form ab intestato, but this form, along with the English-influenced form ab instestate, is only mentioned as one of the variants of the expression, without any explanation that ab intestato is the only genuine Latin phrase.

  13. Merminod [20] states that “l’expression ab intestat est grammaticalement incorrecte”, but the expression is so firmly established in French legal circles that it is better to speak of a term of Latin origin which has been adapted to the French language.

  14. In some dictionaries of legal Latin, introductory essays may be comprehensive, even if this is quite rare. As an example, one could mention Temnov [28], in which the main text of the dictionary is preceded by a 60-page historical essay entitled “Sonorous Jurisprudence” (Звучащая юриспруденция) and focusing on Antiquity. Correspondingly, Sondel [27] gives a 20-page description of the history of legal Latin which includes the use of Latin by medieval and later Polish jurists.

  15. See in more detail [14, pp. 136–139] and [18, pp. 26–29].

  16. Schwab and Pagé [26, pp. 11–14] is based on such research. A good example of the systematic use of electronic case-law banks, outside of Canada, comes from Poland [30, pp. 10–11] and [31, pp. 21–24], briefly described in English in [14, pp. 143–144].

  17. See in more detail Tiersma [29, pp. 53–55].

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  1. Faculty of Law, University of Lapland, PL 122, 96101, Rovaniemi, Finland

    Heikki E. S. Mattila

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Correspondence to Heikki E. S. Mattila.

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The language of the present review has been checked by Mr. Michael Hurd of the University of Lapland, to whom the author expresses his warmest thanks.

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Mattila, H.E.S. A Canadian Classic of Legal Latin Updated. Int J Semiot Law 22, 467–475 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11196-009-9127-3

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