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n’avaient jamais été adressés -v- n’ont sans doute pas été adressés
English translation: homoeoteleutic error??
12:37 Dec 28, 2005
French to English translations [PRO] Law/Patents - Law (general)
French term or phrase:n’avaient jamais été adressés -v- n’ont sans doute pas été adressés
Excuse me for going over the word limit on this one, but this whole paragraph has got me mightily confused. To give you a bit of context, this is referring to service of various documents by a bailiff on a bank. Some of the documents were supposed to pre-date the other documents by five working days, but in the event they were all served on the same day, although this seems to suggest that some of them were 'back-dated'.
"Dans l’espèce, la fraude et l’abus manifeste sont caractérisés, d’une part, par la notification par huissier de courriers antidatés, lesquels n’avaient jamais été adressés auparavant et n’ont sans doute pas été adressés auparavant et n’ont sans doute pas été rédigés à la date qui y est mentionnée, pour tenter de faire croire à la Banque que les conditions stipulées par les garanties appelées avaient été préalablement respectées."
What on earth is the difference between 'n’avaient jamais été adressés auparavant' and 'n’ont sans doute pas été adressés auparavant'????? Or did the person drafting this just get carried away and start writing nonsense?
Absolutely spot on, typist's error (mine, en l'occurrence), so I do feel like a fool, although on the plus side, I've learned 2 new words! 4 KudoZ points were awarded for this answer
Still, the US version is "eo" not "oe". What does "pinguid" mean as an insult: overweight, having a greasy complexion, having an unctuous personality...?
You have to let me stick to my Webster's spelling - it's one letter less! Pinguid is simply one of my favourite words, and I use it as a random way of testing whether a dictionary is suitable or not. It's also a very useful word as not many people know what it means, so it makes a handy baffling insult.
Although I will just add one more thing (like the detective Columbo!), this time relevant to my question. I went back to the original faxed document, which I had re-typed in Word in order to be able to use my CAT tool, and lo and behold - it IS a typing mistake - MINE. So my most sincere apologies to everyone for wasting your time. I think a suitable punishment would be making me type 'I must not make homoeteleutic mistakes' a hundred times, don't you?
Well, for one thing, I did actually mis-type them the first time, and for another, I got the definitions from Webster's Third New International Dictionary, which is a US dictionary (and which I bought rather than a UK-published dictionary for two reasons (1) because none of the UK dictionaries in the bookshop contained the words 'pinguid' and (2) because the Webster's was much, much cheaper, even though it was much, much bigger and heavier). We don't have spelling bees in the UK either (although I think I read that they're starting to introduce them), I just wondered whether you were a champion speller in your time. Anyway, we'd better stop this general chatting, before someone reports us for mis-use of the 'add note' and 'ask asker' functions!!
In answer to your question, no. I don't think they even existed in my day. Maybe you are older, or the Pommy education system is more backward. Note, I didn't say the spellings with "e" rather than "oe" were wrong. To me, however, they are US spellings.
Fair enough...let's make that 'homoeteleutic' and 'homoeteleuton', then. After all, if we're going to learn new words, we may as well learn how to spell them, too. Tell me, Richard, did you go in for spelling bees as a child?
And in case anyone's wondering, 'homeoteuletic' means 'due to homeoteutelon' and 'homeoteutelon' means 'an occurrence in writing of the same or similar endings near together (as in neighbouring clauses or lines) whether happening by chance or done for rhythmical effect (- is a frequent cause of omissions in copying)'. So even if we haven't got to the bottom of what my text is getting at, at least most of us have learned a new word!
The more I read it, the more I think Alex may be right and that it is simply a typist's error. After all, is it stylistically likely to find 'et n�ont sans doute pas �t�...et n�ont sans doute pas �t�' repeated like that? Wouldn't it be more likely for the sentence to have been meant to read, "lesquels n�avaient jamais �t� adress�s auparavant et n�ont sans doute pas �t� r�dig�s � la date qui y est mentionn�e"? I'm tempted to translate this exactly as it is written, with a footnote to the effect that the repetition here seems to indicate a typing error.
Indeed - just to emphasise I wasn't suggesting you should use "received", merely that this is the the interpretation that makes most sense :-) (to me anyway!). At this stage, I'm not sure you can do anything but put what it says...:-(
It would make more sense if it just said something along the lines of (as Charlie suggested), "which had never been RECEIVED, and were likely never SENT, nor even drafted on the date shown". But I have to translate what it says, not what I'd like it to say.
C�est alors que, sans en avoir inform� pr�alablement aucun de ses co-contractants ni la Banque, par actes d�huissier en date du XX d�cembre 200X, XXX a notifi� � la banque sa demande de paiement de la somme de XXX,XXX,XXX US$
.....
Dans l�esp�ce, la fraude et l�abus manifeste sont caract�ris�s, d�une part, par la notification par huissier de courriers antidat�s, lesquels n�avaient jamais �t� adress�s auparavant et n�ont sans doute pas �t� adress�s auparavant et n�ont sans doute pas �t� r�dig�s � la date qui y est mentionn�e, pour tenter de faire croire � la Banque que les conditions stipul�es par les garanties appel�es avaient �t� pr�alablement respect�es. Et, d�autre part, par le fait que cette man�uvre a �t� r�alis�e pour obtenir le paiement de sommes dont l�appelante sait pertinemment ne pouvoir lui �tre dues.
Just to try to clarify things, three documents are involved. A 'preavis', which is supposed to pre-date the other documents by 5 working days. Then, the actual request for payment under the guarantee, which is to be accompanied by a certificate stating in what way(s) the other party is in default. In actual fact, it appears that whatever documents were served all arrived on the same day, although the 'preavis' may have been back-dated, to make it appear that it had been issued 5 days previously. This bit is not entirely clear.
Alternatively, I wonder whether anything else in the text indicates that they can be sure that they weren't sent further back in the past (the pluperfect bit) but can only level a "probably" accusation as regards the more recent past...
Well, my first reaction was that perhaps the first "adress�s" should perhaps be interpreted as "received", i.e that can be sure that they never received them, but can only state that they feel that they *probably* weren't sent.
Charlie: Do YOU? And if so, will you tell me what it is? Richard: Hello! I think it might just be your browser. Although I did put quite a few question marks into my question, to indicate my high level of mystification.
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peer agreement (net): -1
