English translation: there were no children to the marriage
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16:00 Jan 12, 2012
German to English translations [PRO] Law/Patents - Certificates, Diplomas, Licenses, CVs
German term or phrase:entstammen
Sentence from an Austrian divorce decree: "Der Ehe entstammen keine Kinder." My first though is to translate this as: "No children were born of this union." On the other hand, what if the couple had adoptive children? Then you can't say "born", can you? Does anyone have a good idea on how to cover this eventuality?
Explanation: Please see reference section and discussion (thanks, Mary, for asking me to post this).
A couple of examples, from the UK and the US
FACTS: The Crossley case, in 2008, involved a very short marriage of only 14 months duration between two very wealthy individuals. The husband was worth between £45-60 million and the wife, in her own right, worth about £18 million. There were no children to the marriage. Both parties had entered into a prenuptial agreement prior to the marriage and each of them had taken independent legal advice. http://www.prenuptialagreementsuk.co.uk/ukcases-prenuptial-a...
Facts. The parties married in July of 1968 and separated in September of 1968. There were no children to the marriage. In October, the wife filed a verified complaint for divorce on the ground of extreme cruelty. http://www.casebriefs.com/blog/law/family-law/family-law-key...
Alison, thanks again for the wonderfully researched reference.
And thanks to everyone else für die rege Diskussion!! 4 KudoZ points were awarded for this answer
as another native EN-speaker. "Without issue" relating to marriage and used in Court orders etc. can only mean one things - that there were no children born of the mariiage.
but I still disagree with you. "Marriage without issue"/ "the marriage was without issue" is a fixed phrase meaning a marriage which did not produce any children, and is therefore unambiguous in this context. It has nothing to do with disputes on legal guardianship, financial problems, or anything of that nature, although these could be an issue in divorce proceedings. You see, I do not deny that issue can mean a problem or point of contention, but my point is that it would never be understood in that way in the phrase "the marriage was without issue".
Just to play devil's advocate, if "entstammen" is, as you say, the more genealogical term, then according to Horst Huber's comment on your reference entry "without issue" would be the best answer here, because he describes it as the word for genealogy.
I do not contradict to "issue", but would highlight the ambiguity of this term on the one hand and that abstammen/entstammen is more a genealogical term than others like "kinderlos", "ohne Kinder" or "ohne Nachkommen" (for which ‘without issue’ can be used, meaning that there is no dispute on legal guardianship [and/or financial problems]) on the other hand.
To summarise: I have never claimed that issue is a standard translation of entstammen (not abstammen) - nor have I cast any doubt on your ability to understand your own language. I have merely stated my opinion, as a native speaker of English, that this is a standard rendition of this phrase in English that has nothing to do with marital issues/ problems or having issues/ problems (a phrase, you might note, which is frequently expressed in the plural - another difference). I apologise if you feel you were being personally attacked, but if you state so categorically that another person's answer is wrong you must be sure you are in the right, and I felt it my duty to point out for the asker's benefit - which, after all, is why we are here - that issue should not be dismissed so lightly.
I disagree that your references prove marriage without issue to mean anything other than without children - the reference citing accepting a divorce without issue is an entirely diffferent case!
My point is that you cannot argue that issue only means to have problems as you state - look at the grammar alone. As a verb issue in English means, and I am quoting from the Chambers English dictionary here: vi. to go, flow or come out; to proceed, as from a source; to spring; to be produced; to come to a point in facct or law (law); to turn out, result, terminate - not one of those meanings is to have problems. Furthermore issue meaning to proceed as from a source suggests one could easily say no children issued from the marriage, which would exactly match the original German construction! However, as a competent native speaker of German I recognise that this is no longer common usage and prefer to change to the more common use and a standard phrase for expressing the meaning of the German, which uses issue as a noun meaning - and again I quote from the dictionary - fruits of the body, children. Then again I could prefer issueless, meaning (dictionary again) childless!
descendants pl. die Nachkommenschaft
issue [law] die Nachkommenschaft
offspring [biol.] die Nachkommenschaft
posterity die Nachkommenschaft
progeny die Nachkommenschaft
succession die Nachkommenschaft http://dict.leo.org/ende?lp=ende&lang=de&searchLoc=0&cmpType...
Please consider that do not talk about „Nachkommenschaft“, but about „Abstammung/entstammen” (what is the inverse direction)
Please consider the following entries in "Collins German Dictionary, 280.000 entries on 816 pages), too:
- abstammen vi sep no ptp to be descendend (von from); (Ling) to be derived (von from).
Abstammung f descent; (Abkunft auch ) origin, extraction; (Ling) origin, derivation,
ehelicher/unehelicher ~ (Jur) of ligitimate/illegitimat birth;
französischer ~ of French extraction or descent
entstammen vi aux sein +dat to stem or come from; einer Familie auch to be descended from (fig auch) to originate in or from
If you read all of my references, you will find that "without issue" is not targeted to "no children", but to problems.
By the way, we do not have to translate "problemlose Scheidung", but "keine Kinder entstammen dieser Ehe". And this is quite different. It deals with the question, whether the couple has children or not.
You may consent that I can well distinguish between "Abstammung" and "Nachkommenschaft" (see next discussion entry)
There is a difference between issue and issues, at least in terms of marriage. Issue would mean offspring, whilst issues definitely refers to problems. A marriage without issue would mean a childless marriage and may be a good or bad thing depending on the situation or your point of view. A marriage without issues on the other hand is what everybody hopes for when they get married, but few, if any, have enjoyed!
No matter what different meanings "issue" may have, it does not mean "descend from somebody", but to have problems (of any kind). If the couple has children or money, they have problems in either case.
The translation workplace 
peer agreement (net): +3
