1 Introduction

The purpose of the paper is to focus on the problem of translation of legal terminology in the renowned Polish poem entitled “Master Thaddeus, or the Last Foray in Lithuania: A Nobility’s Tale of the Years 1811–1812, in Twelve Books of Verse” by Adam Mickiewicz [6]. The book belongs to the genre of alexandrines. It is one of the best known pieces of Polish literature abroad. It has been translated into English several times and into Korean once. The translation of the work into any language requires not only excellent skills in terms of rendering intralingual meanings characterising alexandrines, but also referential and pragmatic ones as the plot of the poem is equally important as its form. Mickiewicz [6] in fact used terminology from several languages for special purposes such as the language of law, the language of hunting or the culinary language. He also very frequently resorted to already obsolete terminology which makes the task of translators even more difficult. The fact that the poem was written in the first half of the nineteenth century additionally impacts the difficulty of the task of translating the work into other languages. It is mostly due to the fact that after almost 200 years the terminology used by the author sometimes is no longer in use or we observe the shift in the meaning of some terms which may affect the process of translation—a negative interference of the modern Polish language on the interpretation of the meanings of terms. The analysis is limited to the criminal law terminology and its translation into English and Korean. In order to determine whether the translation of legal terminology is more difficult now due to the dimension of archaization of terminology, two English versions of the poem were juxtaposed, that is to say the translation by Biggs [1] and by MacKenzie [5] rendered approximately 50 years and 150 year respectively after the poem was published.

2 “Master Thaddeus, or the Last Foray in Lithuania” in a Nutshell

Mickiewicz was very disappointed with the political situation in Europe and the conflicts and feuds within the Polish immigrant society after the failed November uprising of the Kingdom of Poland in 1830. Nevertheless, Master Thaddeus was written with the hope of regaining the independence of the motherland Lithuania-Poland and returning to his own independent motherland in the future. Mickiewicz himself said that he would write a poem/lyric detailing the daily life of the rural nobles who kept the old Polish traditions and customs [7 p. 169], cf. also Krzyżanowski [3] as well as Witkowska and Przybylski [15]. Master Thaddeus [6] is the story of two Polish aristocrat families. It depicts the lives of the Polish aristocrats living in Lithuania during the time Napoleon’s army marched against Russia. Therefore, the element of the Polish-Lithuanian Union (Unia Personalna) in the work has a very important meaning. In Master Thaddeus, Mickiewicz [6] portrayed the country he misses in an idyllic style, based on the lives of local nobles who keep the old traditions and customs of Poland. Therefore, he described in detail the daily life of them; farm work in the fields, feasting, hunting, plays, conflict, laws, foray, and beautiful nature etc. Through it, the strengths, weaknesses and customs of early nineteenth century Polish society were portrayed realistically and artistically by appropriately mixing the tragic and the comedic aspects of life. The plot takes place in Soplicowo, the farmhouse of a wealthy aristocrat Judge Soplica located in the Nowogrod district of Lithuania. Soplicowo is also a place where Polish traditions and customs and the existing feudal order are maintained, but are gradually being replaced by new modern ones. In the end, the symbolic transformation occurs when the main hero, Thaddeus, gives freedom and land to the serfs after being engaged to Zosia.

In the work Master Thaddeus, three main themes are properly intertwined with each other: a dispute between two noble families over a crumbling castle, a love story, and the historical situation in Poland at the time.

The plot of the work begins with the resentment between two noble families—Soplica and Horeszko. Jacek Soplica, the brother of the Judge Soplica, and father of the main character Thaddeus was once a famous swashbuckler in the area. When the aristocrat Stolnik Horeszko rejected Jacek’s proposal to marry his only daughter Ewa, Jacek was desperate, his self-esteem was broken, and as a result he accidentally killed Stolnik. But it happened at the time when Stolnik was fighting to defend the castle against an invasion by Russian troops, so the murderer was branded a traitor to the nation by the patriotic Poles. After leaving his homeland, he walked the path of penance as a monk, soldier, and Napoleon’s envoy/emissary. Years later, he returns to Soplicowo as a Benedictine monk, and no one recognizes him. Jacek now seeks to end the long-standing dispute between the two families of Horeszko and Soplica by marrying his son Thaddeus and Stolnik’s granddaughter Zosia.

The twists and turns of love of Thaddeus, who loves Zosia but seems to be in love with her patron Telimena through his own mistake, and eventually becomes engaged to Zosia, are also important and interesting theme in the work.

The most important figure in the historical theme is Jacek Soplica. He prepares for an uprising in Lithuania for an impending war with Russia on the orders of the Duchy of Warsaw. But it was a private dispute between the two families of Horeszko and Soplica that made his plans thwarted. A distant relative of the Horeszko family, the Count, at the instigation of Gerwazy swearing revenge on Jacek for killing his master Stolnik, breaks the contract for the castle and launches a looting attack on the Soplica family. However, the private dispute between the two noble families is stopped by the intervention of the Russian army, and now the two families unite to fight their common enemy, the Russian army. Eventually Jacek Soplica, fatally wounded in the battle, is forgiven by Gerwazy and dies with the hope that the liberation of his homeland is near when he hears that the war with Russia has begun.

Thaddeus and Zosia hold an engagement ceremony, give freedom and land to their peasants. With Zosia’s full consent, Thaddeus joins Napoleon’s army and fights in the war against Russia, in which the Poles have put great hopes. Thus, the work Master Thaddeus ends with an atmosphere full of confidence and longing for the victory of Napoleon’s army and the liberation of Poland.

3 Research Materials and Methods

The research material has been composed of the Polish version of Adam Mickiewicz’s epic poem “Master Thaddeus, or the Last Foray in Lithuania: A Nobility’s Tale of the Years 1811–1812, in Twelve Books of Verse” [6], its translation into English by Biggs [1] and McKenzie (1990) and into Korean by Byung-kwon Cheong (Book 1, 2, 3), Kyong-geun Oh (Book 4, 5, 6), Jiwon Lee (Book 7, 8, 9), Seong-eun Choi (Book 10, 11, 12) [2]. The authors resorted a qualitative analysis of both translations in general focused on rendering referential and pragmatic meanings, to some extent ignoring the problem of conveying intralingual meanings which undeniably influenced the choice of some translation techniques.

The referential meaning is understood here as the relation binding the sign (the term) and its referent. Thus, the referential meaning binds the element of reality with the sign, or as Nida and Taber [10] put it the referential meaning focuses on “the words as symbols which refer to objects, events, abstracts, relations” [10, p. 56]. The pragmatic meaning, in turn, is the relation between the sign and its users and perceives “[…] the words as prompters of reactions of the participants in communication” [10, p. 56].

The main research methods applied included the analysis of parallel texts that is to say the Polish original of the poem and its translations into two above-mentioned languages. Additionally, the authors resorted to the analysis of pertinent literature on specialised terminology in the alexandrine under scrutiny (especially Lizisowa [4]).

In order to compare the terminology (comparative law method), first the terms referring to criminal law crimes and penalties were extracted from the alexandrine. Second, their meanings were established on the basis of the interpretations of the Third Lithuanian Statute [4, 13]. Next, the equivalents used by English and Korean translators were identified. Their meanings were established on the basis of pertinent literature, including dictionaries [16, 17]. Finally, the meanings of source language terms and target language terms were juxtaposed and compared to find out whether the translations were accurate.

4 Findings and Discussion

Criminal law is the branch of law which deals with crimes, offences and penalties that are meted out for them. Adam Mickiewicz came from Lithuania and was well versed with the law binding in the territory before the Russian annexation. There are numerous references to the legal system binding in the territory prior to the partition of Poland between Russia, Prussia and Austria. Mickiewicz describes laws imposed by Lithuanian statutes. As far as Lithuanian law is concerned there are three important pieces of legislation from the pre-annexation period that is to say the first, second and third Lithuanian statutes [13]. The legal background plays an important role delineating old, sometimes no longer acceptable and practised laws and legally sanctioned customs. Some of them are used to describe Polish gentry’s mentality and obscurantism. Poles are depicted as impulsive people easily resorting to violence, who frequently breach laws.

The terminology selected for the analysis belongs to criminal law and encompassed 6 types of crimes and 5 types of penalties.

4.1 Crimes

Six types of crimes are analysed in the paper and they encompass: (1) przechwałki ‘threat, manace’, (2) pojedynkowanie ‘duelling’, (3) grabież ‘plunder, pillage’, (4) the verbs najechać and zajechać ‘to foray’ and the noun zajazd ‘foray’, (5) rozbój ‘banditry, armed robbery’, and finally (6) inkursyja which denotes an ‘attack, assault, raid’.

The term przechwałki used to mean ‘threats, manace’ (Table 1). We find the term in the Third Lithuanian Statute (cf. [13]) and it refers there to various types of threats including the death threats [4, p. 104].

Table 1 Example 1
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The term is misleading nowadays as the verb przechwalać się means to boast, to brag. Therefore, there is a high risk of mistranslation due to the shift in meaning that has occurred from the time of writing the poem or in other words the negative intralingual interference of the modern Polish meaning. Biggs [1] translates the term as ‘insolence’, whereas MacKenzie [5] as ‘threats’. The second translation is more equivalent referentially and pragmatically.

The Polish term przechwałki translated into Korean as ‘비방’ [bibang] ‘slander’, it has different meaning from ‘insolence’ or ‘threats’. Therefore, it is not an accurate translation, and the Korean terms ‘무례’ [murye] ‘offence, despite, rudness, disrespect’ or ‘협박’ [hyeobbag] ‘threat, menace’ can convey the exact meaning of the original text more effectively.

Duels are mentioned several times in the poem. At the time duels were forbidden in Lithuania (cf. [13] and [4]). But in The Duchy of Warsaw also known as Napoleonic Poland, which was a Polish client state of the French Empire duels were not penalized. Therefore the reference is made to the possibility of dueling at the border of Lithuania and the Duchy of Warsaw (Table 2).

Table 2 Example 2
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The English translator conveyed the meaning of the phrase zakaz pojedynkowania ‘ban on duelling’ using the verbs ‘to duel’ and the verb ‘to forbid’ in passive voice [1] or the modal verb ‘can’ in the negative. Both translations convey referential and pragmatic meanings properly.

The Korean translation of ‘zakaz pojedynkowania’ is ‘결투는 금지되어 있다’ [gyeoltuneun geumjidoe-eo itta] ‘duel is forbidden’. It is a combination of the noun ‘결투’ [gyeoltu] ‘duel’ and the verb ‘금지되다’ [geumjidoeda] ‘is forbidden’, which accurately expresses the meaning of the original Polish text.

The next crime which is referred to in the poem is called in Polish grabież ‘plunder, pillage’ (Table 3).

Table 3 Example 3
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The penalties for grabież are provided in the Third Lithuanian Statute [4, 13]. The MacKenzie [5] uses the equivalent ‘plunder’ whereas Biggs [1] ‘robbery’ which are both proper in terms of interlingual, referential and pragmatic meanings.

Polish term grabież is translated into Korean as ‘약탈’ [yaktal] ‘plunder/pillage’, thus it is translated appropriately and aptly conveys the original meaning.

In the fragment below we also find some more legal terminology that belongs to the category of penalties, that is koszta sądowe ‘court costs’. The term was translated into English as ‘costs of lawsuits’ [1] and ‘costs atoning for plunder’ [5]. Both English equivalents convey properly the referential meaning of the Polish verse. The Korean translation of the Polish term koszta sądowe is a combination of two nouns ‘소송’ [sosong] ‘lawsuit’ and ‘비용’ [biyong] ‘costs’, which is also an appropriate and accurate translation.

There are also two verbs najechać and zajechać in the above presented fragment, which are used synonymously here for the purpose of observing the number of syllables in each verse (for Alexandrine it is 13 syllables) which referentially mean ‘to raid, to make a raid, to foray’. Biggs [1] translated them into ‘to invade’ and ‘to harry’ respectively, whereas MacKenzie [5] used the equivalent ‘to make a raid’. Those solutions are proper referential and pragmatic equivalents. Though it should be remembered that the noun zajazd (occurring in Book 7) was translated differently (see example 5 above).

The two Polish verbs najechać and zajechać are translated into Korean as ‘쳐들어가서 빼앗다’ [chyeodeureo-gaseo ppaeatta] ‘to raid and take/plunder it’. It is a combination of two verbs ‘쳐들어가다’ [chyeodeureogada] ‘to invade/raid’ and ‘빼앗다’ [ppaeatta] ‘to plunder/deprive/take’. The terms najechać and zajechać used in the original text specifically mean the term zajazd, and not just an attack on a castle, but taking the castle over through an attack. Therefore, in this case, it can be said that the Korean translation is more appropriate than the English translation ‘to invade/harry’ or ‘to make a raid’.

The fragment in the Table 4 above also informs about the prohibition of armed robbery, invading borders of someone’s property and depriving someone of the property which in general may be considered as an illegal invasion of the house of the gentry, called in Polish zajazd [4] and in English foray. That type of crime used to be known in various European countries. MacKenzie [5] resorts to equivalent such as ‘to fight’. Biggs [1] translated zajazd as ‘foray fought’, which is referentially and pragmatically correct. But in case of the translation by MacKenzie [5] again the equivalents convey the referential meaning but not the pragmatic one. At the same time the title of book 8 which is zajazd is translated into English as ‘foray’ [5, p.332] which must be considered a correct equivalent in respect to all three types of meanings that is to say intralingual, referential and pragmatic.

Table 4 Example 4
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The term rozbój which is the name of the crime (‘banditry, armed robbery’) was translated by Biggs [1] as ‘murder’ and by MacKenzie [5] as ‘lawless fight’. Although the equivalents are partial they still convey the meaning sufficiently taking into account the specificity of poetry translation and providing equivalence at the level of intralingual meanings.

The Polish term zajazd was simply transliterated into Korean as ‘자야즈드’ [zayazd]. But because the footnote properly explained ‘무력을 통한 분쟁해결’ [muryeogeul tonghan bunjaenghaegyeol] ‘dispute resolution through force’ or ‘무력을 동원한 분쟁해결’ [muryeogeul dongwonhan bunjaenghaegyeol] ‘dispute resolution using force’, there is no problem for readers to understand the exotic transliteration correctly. The term rozbój is properly translated into Korean as ‘강도짓’ [gangdojit] ‘banditry/robbery’, so it is a more accurate translation than the English translation ‘murder’ [1] or ‘lawless fight’ [5].

The next term referring to crimes and offences is inkursyja (Table 5) which denotes an ‘attack, assault, raid’.

Table 5 Example 5
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Biggs [1] translated the term into a borrowing from Latin via Old French ‘incursion’ which entered the English language about fifteenth century and which denoted a hostile attack (https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=incursion). The equivalent is pragmatically and referentially correct. What is more, it has the same etymology as the Polish term. The second English translator used the equivalent ‘a raid’ [5] which is pragmatically and referentially correct and enables to achieve a proper rhyme and rhythm of the verse. It should be stressed here that the Polish term of the crime under scrutiny is archaic. The modern Polish term used in law could be napad.

The term inkursyja is translated into Korean as ‘가택침입’ [gataekchimip], which literally means a ‘house breaking’. It’s a combination of the two nous ‘가택’ [gataek] ‘house’ and ‘침입’ [chimip] ‘invasion/incursion’. But it is a Korean legal term meaning ‘housebreaking/forcible entry/trespass on another’s premises’. Although this Korean translation may seem superficially inappropriate, it should be noted that it is quite appropriate in a practical sense given the specific context described in the work. Inkursja is a prelude to something else. It in fact precedes the full-scale physical collision between the heroes of the story: the Count was formally invited to the feast in the castle, but Gerwazy, who was not invited, broke into the castle and started making a fuss.

4.2 Penalties

Penalties selected for the analysis encompass: (1) sekwestr ‘confiscation’, (2) koszta sądowe ‘court costs’, (3) turma ‘prison’, (4) nawiązka ‘a fine imposed on the perpetrator of an offence at the request of the victim’, and finally (5) infamia ‘infamy, slander, calumny’.

One of the penalties the name of which is used by Mickiewicz [8] in his alexandrine is sekwestr, which is a forfeit of goods for political crimes. That penalty was imposed on Poles under the Third Lithuanian Statute (cf. [13] and Lizisowa [4]). The term is used directly once in the poem in book 1 (cf. Table 6), but the penalty in fact is referred to also in other fragments of the poem when referring to the plight of citizens under the Russian annexation (cf. Table 7).

Table 6 Example 6
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Table 7 Example 7
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The author uses also circumvent descriptions: ‘dobra, które na skarb carski zabierano’ (cf. Table 7 below) which is a synonymous description of the penalty of sekwestr.

Translating the term sekwestr into English Biggs [1] applies the technique of direct assimilated borrowing, whereas MacKenzie [5] resorts to over-generalization which may be interpreted in a variety of ways. It should be stressed here that Biggs [1] conveys the referential meaning correctly as the verb ‘to sequester’ means ‘to seize by authority, to confiscate’ and that meaning dates back to early sixteenth century (cf. https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=sequester). In translation of verse 941 Biggs [1] replaces a circumvent description of Mickiewicz [8] with verb “to confiscate’ which again properly conveys the referential meaning. The compound noun ‘government decrees’ used by MacKenzie [5] may be understood as excessive taxes, limitations in usage, and many others. The translation of verse 941 is also correct as the noun ‘plunder’ refers to taking away movable property. What is more, it contains a pragmatic load of using force for the purpose of taking away, so it in fact means taking movable goods forcibly, by pillage or applying open force (cf. https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=plunder). Thus, the translation by MacKenzie [5] conveys the meaning of the target text significantly in referential and pragmatic terms.

The Polish term sekwestr is translated into Korean as ‘몰수’ [molsu] ‘confiscation’. Unlike the English translation in which the phrase sekwestrami rządu is simply ranslated as “by government decrees”, it is very appropriate to add a more specific explanation in the Korean translation that here “the government means the Russian government” e.g. in a footnote. However, the Korean readers of the poem do not get the information that the property was confiscated by the Russian government for any specific reason, and that the penalty was imposed on Poles and Lithuanians under Russian occupation.

The phrase Dobra, które na skarb carski zabierano is translated into Korean as ‘러시아 황제의 재정을 위해 몰수된 재산’ [reosia hwangje-ui jaejeong-eul wihae molsudoen jaesan] ‘property confiscated for the finances of the Russian emperor’. This is almost identical to the English translation ‘goods confiscated to the treasury of the Czar’. However, it can be misinterpreted as the meaning conveyed informs that the emperor confiscated the property to increase his wealth rather than that he confiscated the property as an official penalty.

Another penalty whose name appears in the poem is called nawiązka (Table 8 below). It was a financial penalty, a fine imposed on the perpetrator of an offence at the request of the victim (present in the Third Lithuanian Statute in Books 11–13 [13], cf. also Lizisowa [4].Footnote 1

Table 8 Example 8
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It was a relatively mild penalty for minor offences or misdemeanours. The name of the penalty is still used in the modern Polish legal system. Therefore, the translators should not have problems finding out the proper meaning of the term denoting a sort of discretionary damages awarded to the victim. Biggs [1] and MacKenzie [5] both resorted to the technique of descriptive equivalents ‘to pay full compensation’ and ‘to pay the penalty’ respectively which convey the meaning and at the same time make the translation of the verse equivalent not only referentially but also intralingually.

The Polish term nawiązka is properly translated into Korean as ‘벌금’ [beolgeum] ‘fine’. But by adding the adjective ‘많은’ [maneun] ‘much’ before the noun, it gives the meaning that the damage should be compensated greatly. However, since the term nawiązka in the original Polish text means relatively light punishment for criminal acts, it is difficult to say that the Korean translation is an appropriate translation of it in a practical sense. This error occurred because the Korean translator did not properly grasp the exact meaning of the original text.

We may encounter one more term referring to the system of penalties which is in fact a borrowing from Russian. The term in question is turma (Table 9) and it used to denote a Tsar prison.

Table 9 Example 9
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To be exact it is a direct transliterated borrowing from Russian тюpьмa /tyur'ma/. At the times of communism the term was still in use and referred to harsh Soviet prisons. It may be found in various Polish language dictionaries so its meaning is easy to decipher. The English translators translated the noun turma into ‘prison’ preserving the referential meaning but losing the pragmatic one. It must be stressed here that in such instances it is usually not possible to find equivalents that would be absolutely synonymous also in terms of etymology despite postulates of some theorists such as Nabokov[9].Footnote 2 The loss of some meaning is inevitable and unavoidable especially when dealing with terminology having pragmatic meanings heavily burdened with local history and when translating a foreign masterpiece one needs to accept that its ideal version may not be attainable.

The term turma is translated into Korean as ‘감옥’ [gamok] ‘prison’, having the same referential and pragmatic meanings as the English term ‘prison’. Thus, it only means prison, and it does not show the actual meaning it has in the original text, namely, that it is a more difficult, painful, and terrifying one than a normal prison. Therefore, its original meaning can be properly conveyed to the readers only when it is translated as ‘짜르의 감옥’ [jjar-ui gamok] ‘tsar’s prison’.

The last term under scrutiny is the noun infamia (Table 10) which means ‘infamy, slander, calumny’ (cf. [13] and [4]).

Table 10 Example 10
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The noun is an assimilated borrowing from Latin, stemming from the period of the so-called fashion for Latin in the Polish language. It is right now archaic. Nevertheless its meaning may still be found in dictionaries as it is quite frequently encountered in older pieces of literature. Biggs [1], similarly as in the case of incursion, used an assimilated borrowing from Latin, which enriched English via Old French about fifteenth century that is to say the noun ‘infamy’. Again the equivalent is correct in terms of referential, pragmatic (including etymological) and intralingual meanings. The second English translator [5] has resorted to the description having a similar meaning that is to say ‘to wipe the stain from one’s honour’. The second equivalent ‘to gibe falsely’ conveys the contextual meaning of libel and slander.

The Korean translation of the Polish term infamia ‘오명’ [omyeong] means ‘stigma/infamy/dishonour’ and accurately conveys the meaning of the original text.

In the fragment from Tab 3 (under the section titled Crimes) we also find some more legal terminology that belongs to the category of penalties, that is koszta sądowe ‘court costs’. The term was translated into English as ‘costs of lawsuits’ [1] and ‘costs atoning for plunder’ [5]. Both English equivalents convey properly the referential meaning of the Polish verse. The Korean translation of the Polish term koszta sądowe is a combination of two nouns ‘소송’ [sosong] ‘lawsuit’ and ‘비용’ [biyong] ‘costs’, which is also an appropriate and accurate translation.

5 Conclusions

To sum up, legal terminology is system-bound. It is deeply rooted in national custom and mentality. Law is created to solve problems. Criminal law is enacted to punish for condemnable deeds. Mickiewicz [6], well versed in Polish-Lithuanian reality, referred to crimes and penalties for the purpose of portraying Polish mentality, customs and habits. He skillfully referred to the Third Lithuanian Statute [13] and problems Poles had observing the law.

The translators had to face the challenge of conveying the meaning into English and Korean, which was far from being easy. The modern translators apart from the difficulty of translating system-bound terminology had to face the challenge of deciphering the meanings of many already archaic terms. The Third Lithuanian Statute [13] is not available for reference purposes in the modernized script version. Not knowing the Old Polish language in which the document is written, one cannot successfully use that source of information about laws in force in the territory of Lithuania at the period described by Adam Mickiewcz [6].

In general all translators pretty successfully conveyed the approximate meanings of terms denoting criminal law institutions. Though, there have been several mistranslations identified, overall the meaning of the poem is conveyed sufficiently in that respect. The translators applied direct borrowings, descriptive equivalents, functional equivalents [10,11,12] and footnotes to make the meaning of terms understandable for readership in accordance with the skopos theory [14]. The identified errors were usually situations when partial equivalents were applied. There were no instances of nonsense translations or omissions of criminal law terminology under scrutiny.

It should be stressed, however, that the approximate equivalents used by the above-mentioned translators may be considered sufficient in that particular case as we deal with references to law in a piece of literature. The high degree of accuracy is not needed to comprehend the plot. At the same time, the translation skopos in the case of obsolete, repealed legislation for the purpose of analyzing the evolution of legal institutions and law should aim at much higher degree of precision. In such a case the strategy should involve descriptive equivalents explaining in detail the essence of a given legal institution at a particular point in time.