Finepost · Notes
The notes
Every entry is a translator's note on where the German choice makes a decision your English original never made. 220 notes so far, growing daily.
acquis
gemeinschaftlicher Besitzstand
The acquis, French acquis communautaire, is the whole body of Union law in force, rendered gemeinschaftlicher Besitzstand or Besitzstand der Union and often kept as acquis. It binds all Member States, and an acceding State must take it over in full. It is a corpus of law, not the everyday Besitzstand of acquired individual rights.
Law
acquittal
Freispruch
Freispruch is the right word, § 260 StPO, but a German acquittal carries an internal split English law blurs, aus tatsächlichen Gründen where the act was not proven and aus rechtlichen Gründen where the proven act was not an offence, and its finality is looser, a Freispruch can be reopened against the accused on the narrow grounds of § 362 StPO.
Law
act
Gesetz
Gesetz where the Act is a statute, Handlung where the act is conduct, Tun oder Unterlassen in the doublet. Akte and Akt are the traps, one is a file, the other belongs to the theatre, and the syllable carries law only inside compounds like the Verwaltungsakt, § 35 VwVfG.
Law
administrative act
●
Verwaltungsakt
Verwaltungsakt, but the German word is a legal test rather than a description: a Behörde regulating a single case in public law with direct effect outside the administration, § 35 Satz 1 VwVfG. Whether a measure meets that test decides which remedy exists and when the file closes for good, so the label carries weight the English phrase does not.
Law
adoption
●
Annahme als Kind
Annahme als Kind, decreed by the Familiengericht, § 1752 BGB, not an agreement between the parties. Adopting a minor severs the ties to the birth family, § 1755 BGB; adopting an adult, § 1767 BGB, is a far weaker act that usually leaves those ties in place, § 1770 BGB.
Law
affidavit
●
eidesstattliche Versicherung
Eidesstattliche Versicherung for the nearest German instrument, § 294 ZPO, but it is a false friend, the common-law affidavit is sworn evidence usable as proof, while the eidesstattliche Versicherung reaches only Glaubhaftmachung, a lower standard for interim and summary matters, and a false one is a crime, § 156 StGB. Affidavit rendered as full sworn testimony overstates what the German instrument can do.
Law
agent
Vertreter
Vertreter for the person who acts for another, Handelsvertreter, § 84 HGB, for the commercial agent, and Agent for spies and pop stars. The doctrine underneath does not cross either, German agency is open-faced, § 164 BGB, whoever hides the principal binds himself, the undisclosed principal of English law has no German seat.
Law
appeal
Berufung
Berufung against the judgment, Revision on the law alone, Beschwerde against a Beschluss, the German ladder splits what English climbs with one word. Appell is a speech, not a remedy, and das Urteil appellieren is a verb German procedure does not own.
Law
arbitration
●
Schiedsverfahren
Schiedsverfahren for arbitration, and the stakes sit in the word, der Schiedsspruch binds like a final judgment, § 1055 ZPO, and the Schiedsvereinbarung ousts the state courts, § 1032 ZPO. Schlichtung is conciliation, as a rule a proposal, so an arbitration clause translated as Schlichtungsklausel may have bargained away the binding force it was written for.
Law
articles of association
●
Gesellschaftsvertrag
Gesellschaftsvertrag for a GmbH, Satzung for an AG, and a notary for both, § 2 Abs. 1 GmbHG and § 23 Abs. 1 AktG. Satzung also passes for a GmbH, the reverse does not, the form requirement reaches the amendment as well, and an AG constitution cannot be drafted as freely as English articles, § 23 Abs. 5 AktG.
Law
assault
●
Körperverletzung
Körperverletzung for assault where harm is actually done, § 223 StGB, but the German offence needs a physical element the English assault does not, körperliche Misshandlung or damage to health, so the pure threat that is already an assault in England, causing someone to expect immediate force, is not Körperverletzung at all but at most Bedrohung, § 241 StGB, or Nötigung, § 240 StGB. German law also draws no assault-battery line, the harm, not the apprehension, is the offence.
Law
assignment
●
Abtretung
Abtretung moves claims and nothing else, § 398 BGB. The moment an English assignment clause covers rights and obligations, German needs more machinery, duties pass only by Schuldübernahme with the creditor’s approval, the whole contract only by Vertragsübernahme with everyone at the table.
Law
bail
Haftverschonung
Haftverschonung for release from remand, die Kaution for the security deposit, and the two are not the same act, § 116 StPO suspends the arrest warrant against conditions of which a Sicherheitsleistung is only one, § 116a StPO. Auf Kaution freigelassen imports a money-centred bail system German remand law does not share.
Law
bankruptcy
Insolvenz
Insolvenz, one word for the one modern procedure. Konkurs, the machine’s frequent offer, has been dead law since 1999, and a German text that says Konkursverfahren dates itself. The English split between corporate insolvency and personal bankruptcy has no German mirror, the InsO runs both.
Law
basic law
Grundgesetz
Grundgesetz is the name of the German constitution, and Basic Law is its official English rendering. It is called Grundgesetz, not Verfassung, for historical reasons, yet its constitutional adjectives run on verfassungs-, so constitutional means verfassungsrechtlich and unconstitutional means verfassungswidrig, not the Grundgesetz stem.
Law
beneficial owner
●
wirtschaftlich Berechtigter
Three German words for one English one, and the context decides. wirtschaftlich Berechtigter for the anti-money-laundering register, § 3 GwG; wirtschaftlicher Eigentümer for tax attribution, § 39 AO; and behind a trust only a Treugeber with a claim, since German law has no equitable ownership.
Law
board
Vorstand
Board splits in two before it translates, German stock corporations run two-tier, Vorstand leads, § 76 AktG, Aufsichtsrat supervises, § 111 AktG, and § 105 AktG keeps the rooms separate. The one-tier board of directors exists here only in the SE as Verwaltungsrat, everywhere else that word is Switzerland leaking through.
Law
breach of contract
Pflichtverletzung
Pflichtverletzung, the word § 280 Abs. 1 BGB pleads with, Vertragsverletzung where prose wants the contract in the word, Vertragsbruch in headlines, not in commercial drafting. And the vocabulary is the smaller half, English breach carries liability by itself, the German claim adds Vertretenmüssen, presumed against the debtor but open to rebuttal.
Law
bribery
Bestechung
Bestechung for bribery, § 334 StGB, but German law splits what the single English word holds together, Bestechung is the active side, giving the bribe, while taking it is Bestechlichkeit, § 332 StGB, and a lower tier, Vorteilsgewährung and Vorteilsannahme, § 333 StGB and § 331 StGB, catches an advantage even without a specific wrongful act. Bribery in the private sector is its own offence again, § 299 StGB, so the reflex Bestechung names only one corner of the field.
Law
by-law
Satzung
In administrative law a by-law is a Satzung, autonomous law made by a self-governing public body, for municipalities on the basis of the self-government guarantee of Art. 28 Abs. 2 GG. Unlike a Rechtsverordnung it needs no specific statutory authorisation, because the power to make it flows from the body’s own autonomy.
Law
capital allowances
Absetzung für Abnutzung
Capital allowances and Absetzung für Abnutzung both let a business write off the cost of assets against tax, but they are not the same system. UK capital allowances run on statutory pools and rates, an annual investment allowance and writing-down allowances. German AfA, § 7 EStG, spreads the cost evenly over the asset’s useful life set by official tables. Rendering one as the other imports rules that do not carry across.
Law
capital gains tax
●
Veräußerungsgewinn
There is no single German capital gains tax. The gain is a Veräußerungsgewinn, but how it is taxed depends on what was sold: securities under the flat Abgeltungsteuer, § 32d EStG; other private assets only within the holding periods of § 23 EStG; business assets as ordinary income.
Law
capital increase
●
Kapitalerhöhung
Kapitalerhöhung is the right word and the cheap part. In a GmbH the increase amends the constitution, so it takes three quarters of the votes cast and a notary, §§ 53, 55 GmbHG; in an AG the existing shareholders’ Bezugsrecht can be taken away only inside the increase resolution itself and only with three quarters of the capital represented, § 186 Abs. 3 AktG.
Law
causation
Kausalität
Kausalität for causation, but German law runs it through more filters than the English but-for and remoteness pair. The factual test is the Äquivalenztheorie, conditio sine qua non, then the Adäquanztheorie strips out wholly atypical courses, and the Schutzzweck der Norm asks whether the harm is one the breached rule was meant to prevent. German law also splits the enquiry, haftungsbegründende Kausalität to the injury, haftungsausfüllende to the loss.
Law
caution
●
Verwarnung
Caution is two different things and neither is safe as a single German word. The out-of-court disposal an offender accepts, admitting the offence and putting it onto a record, has no exact German twin, an Einstellung gegen Auflagen, § 153a StPO, needs no admission and is no conviction, while the Verwarnung mit Strafvorbehalt, § 59 StGB, is a conviction with the penalty reserved. To caution a suspect, by contrast, is the rights warning before questioning, the Belehrung of § 136 StPO. Rendering one as the other swaps a disposal for a procedural safeguard.
Law
charge
Belastung
Belastung for the encumbrance, Anklage for the criminal charge, Gebühr or Entgelt for the price, and the floating charge for none of them, it has no German twin. Outside the ship and aircraft registers German law grants no non-possessory register charge over movables, § 1205 BGB wants the pledge handed over, so practice answers with Sicherungsübereignung and global assignment.
Law
Charter
●
Grundrechtecharta
In Union law the Charter is the Charter of Fundamental Rights, the Grundrechtecharta, which since Lisbon has the same legal value as the Treaties, Art. 6 Abs. 1 EUV. It binds the Member States only when they are implementing Union law, Art. 51 Abs. 1 GRCh, not across all national law, and it is not the ECHR or the European Social Charter.
Law
claim
Anspruch
Anspruch for the right, Forderung for its obligational species, Behauptung only for the assertion. § 194 Abs. 1 BGB defines the Anspruch as the right to demand action or forbearance, and German legal reasoning runs on it, every claim stands or falls with its Anspruchsgrundlage.
Law
co-determination
Mitbestimmung
Mitbestimmung, the participation of employees in company decisions, on two levels: at company level, worker representatives sit on the supervisory board, and at establishment level, participation runs through the works council. The board-level form has no counterpart in the UK single-tier board.
Law
collective agreement
●
Tarifvertrag
Tarifvertrag for a collective agreement, but the binding force is the opposite of the English default. A UK collective agreement is presumed not legally enforceable, s. 179 TULRCA 1992, and takes effect only through the individual contract, while a Tarifvertrag applies unmittelbar und zwingend to the employment relationships of the tariff-bound, § 4 Abs. 1 TVG, like a statute.
Law
company
Gesellschaft
Gesellschaft for the legal person, Firma only for its name, § 17 HGB, Unternehmen for the business as such. Colloquial German blurs all three and machine output follows, but legal German keeps them apart, and the name is not harmless, whoever continues the Firma can inherit the old debts, § 25 HGB.
Law
compensation
Entschädigung
Compensation routes four ways in German, Vergütung when work is paid, § 611a Abs. 2 BGB, Abfindung when employment ends, Schadensersatz when damage is repaired, Entschädigung for the special-sacrifice cases, expropriation first among them, Art. 14 Abs. 3 GG. The reflex Entschädigung is right in exactly one of the four.
Law
condition
●
Bedingung
Bedingung for a future uncertain event a legal effect hangs on, aufschiebend or auflösend, § 158 BGB, but the English condition also means an essential contract term whose breach lets the other side terminate, and German has no condition-and-warranty ranking of terms, breach severity routes through Pflichtverletzung, § 323 BGB, instead. Condition covers two ideas German keeps apart.
Law
conferral
begrenzte Einzelermächtigung
The principle of conferral is the Grundsatz der begrenzten Einzelermächtigung, Art. 5 Abs. 2 EUV: the Union acts only within the competences the Member States have conferred on it in the Treaties, and every competence not conferred stays with the Member States, so the Union has no Kompetenz-Kompetenz to widen its own powers.
Law
consent
Zustimmung
Zustimmung as the umbrella, and German time-stamps the species, prior consent is die Einwilligung, § 183 BGB, approval after the act die Genehmigung, § 184 BGB, reaching back to day one. Data protection and medicine insist on Einwilligung by name, so user consent as Nutzerzustimmung misses the statute’s own vocabulary.
Law
constitutional complaint
●
Verfassungsbeschwerde
Verfassungsbeschwerde, the individual complaint to the Bundesverfassungsgericht that anyone may bring over a rights violation by public power, Art. 93 Abs. 1 Nr. 4a GG, but only after exhausting the ordinary courts and within a short deadline, and it can even challenge a statute.
Law
constructive trust
●
Bereicherungsanspruch
No German equivalent, and the gap has a price. Equity imposes a constructive trust as a proprietary remedy that gives priority in insolvency; German law offers a personal claim, § 812 BGB, that ranks as an ordinary insolvency claim unless a right to separate the asset exists.
Law
conveyance
●
Auflassung
Auflassung for the conveyance of land, the dingliche Einigung § 925 BGB, but it is only half the transfer, land moves by Auflassung plus Eintragung in the Grundbuch, § 873 BGB, and the Trennungsprinzip keeps this dingliche step apart from the Kaufvertrag, § 311b BGB. So a conveyance is not one act but two. Beförderung is the machine’s howler, that is transport.
Law
conviction
Verurteilung
Verurteilung translates conviction, but English keeps conviction, the finding of guilt, and sentence, the penalty, as separate stages, while German pronounces both together in one Urteil, the Schuldspruch and the Strafausspruch, § 260 IV StPO. And a spent conviction is not erased, German law never deletes the entry but limits its use, Tilgung and a Verwertungsverbot under § 51 BZRG.
Law
copyright
Urheberrecht
Urheberrecht for the right, Nutzungsrechte for everything the market actually trades, because the German Stammrecht cannot be assigned among the living, § 29 Abs. 1 UrhG. Assigns all copyright translated word for word describes a transaction German law does not offer, the working clause grants ausschließliche Nutzungsrechte.
Law
corporation tax
●
Körperschaftsteuer
Körperschaftsteuer is right but partial: at fifteen per cent to 2027 and falling to ten from 2032, § 23 KStG, it is only one layer of the German corporate burden, which adds the Solidaritätszuschlag and the municipal Gewerbesteuer to roughly thirty per cent. It falls on Körperschaften, § 1 KStG; a partnership is taxed transparently unless it opts in, § 1a KStG.
Law
costs
Prozesskosten
Prozesskosten, and the system answers the English questions in advance, the loser pays, § 91 ZPO, in shares on partial success, § 92 ZPO, and only up to the statutory fee tables, § 91 Abs. 2 ZPO, so recovery is calculable and capped. Die Kosten folgen dem Ereignis is the machine translating a proverb nobody here uses.
Law
court order
Beschluss
Beschluss for the court order, § 329 ZPO, Anordnung where the court directs a step, and never Bestellung, that word buys office supplies. German decisions come in three forms, Urteil, Beschluss, Verfügung, and which one arrived decides which attack lies, the Beschwerde of § 567 ZPO belongs to Beschlüsse.
Law
covenant
Verpflichtung
Verpflichtung or Zusage for a contractual covenant, and Financial Covenants stay English in German loan practice, but never Bund, that is the biblical or federal word, so a covenant rendered as Bund has signed a testament, not a term sheet. Real-property covenants have no clean German twin, the nearest are the Dienstbarkeit and the Reallast, §§ 1018, 1105 BGB.
Law
creditor
Gläubiger
Gläubiger for creditor, but in insolvency the single English word splits into ranks that recover very differently, the ordinary Insolvenzgläubiger sharing only the Quote, § 38 InsO, the Massegläubiger of the estate paid first and in full, § 55 InsO, and the nachrangige Gläubiger, § 39 InsO, including shareholder loans, paid only if anything is left. Secured and proprietary claimants sit outside this line, with Absonderung and Aussonderung rights of their own.
Law
custody
Sorgerecht
Sorgerecht for the children, Gewahrsam for detention, Verwahrung for safekeeping, three drawers for one English word. And the family drawer splits again, English custody and access are German Sorge und Umgang, § 1626 and § 1684 BGB, two institutes the machine collapses into one.
Law
damages
Schadensersatz
Schadensersatz, the claim, not Schäden, the harm. English marks the remedy with nothing but the plural, German gives it a word of its own, and a rendering that says Schäden turns the money claim back into the injury.
Law
deed
Deed
No German instrument answers to it, so the honest rendering keeps Deed and explains, German practice does. Urkunde says only document, Tat says an act of heroism, and the work a deed does in England, binding a promise by form alone, is done in Germany by the notarielle Beurkundung.
Law
defamation
üble Nachrede
Üble Nachrede for the core of defamation, § 186 StGB, but the German frame is different in two ways, reputation carries a criminal dimension English defamation lacks, §§ 185 to 187 StGB, and the civil claim runs through the allgemeines Persönlichkeitsrecht, not a tort of defamation, § 823 Abs. 1 BGB with Art. 2 Abs. 1, Art. 1 Abs. 1 GG. And German law draws no libel-slander line, the form of the statement does not change the offence.
Law
default
●
Verzug
Verzug is narrower than default and arrives with conditions attached, § 286 BGB wants a due claim, usually a Mahnung, and a debtor at fault, § 286 Abs. 4 BGB. English default triggers on the miss alone, so the reflex rendering quietly postpones every remedy until the German prerequisites are met.
Law
defendant
Beklagter
Beklagter in the civil action, Angeklagter only in the criminal dock. English uses defendant across the divide, German never does, and a machine that writes Angeklagter in a contract dispute has, in one word, accused the counterparty of a crime.
Law
direct effect
●
unmittelbare Wirkung
unmittelbare Wirkung, the doctrine that an individual can rely on a provision of EU law before a national court, if it is clear, precise and unconditional. It is not the same as direct applicability, and for directives it runs only against the state, not between private parties.
Law
directive
●
Richtlinie
Richtlinie, not Direktive, and it works unlike a regulation: it binds each member state as to the result but leaves the form to them, so it must be transposed, Art. 288 TFEU, and even after the deadline it can be relied on only against the state, not between private parties.
Law
director
Geschäftsführer
Geschäftsführer in a GmbH, Vorstandsmitglied in an AG, Aufsichtsratsmitglied where the director supervises rather than manages. Direktor, the machine’s offer, is a courtesy title in German business and no organ at all, and the two-tier system behind the words has no single English mirror.
Law
discharge
Erlöschen
Erlöschen when an obligation is discharged, § 362 BGB by performance, Entlastung when a board is discharged, § 120 AktG, Restschuldbefreiung when a bankrupt is discharged, § 301 InsO, and Einstellung when proceedings are. Entladung is the machine’s offer and belongs to cargo and batteries, so a discharged director rendered as entladen has been unplugged.
Law
discovery
Urkundenvorlegung
Urkundenvorlegung for the narrow judge-ordered production German law allows, § 142 ZPO, but the English or American discovery has no German equivalent, German civil procedure runs on the Beibringungsgrundsatz, each side brings its own evidence and there is no pre-trial duty to hand the opponent one’s documents. Discovery translated as a German procedure invents one the ZPO does not run.
Law
discretion
●
Ermessen
Ermessen only where the statute leaves the authority a choice about what to do, § 40 VwVfG, and there the court checks the choice for error instead of remaking it, § 114 Satz 1 VwGO. Where the open wording sits in the conditions instead, German law calls it an unbestimmter Rechtsbegriff and the court reviews it in full as a rule, so the wrong word states the wrong standard of review.
Law
dismissal
Klageabweisung
Klageabweisung when the claim fails, and the grammar is graded, abgewiesen als unbegründet closes the dispute, § 322 ZPO, als unzulässig binds only as to the defect, while appeals are zurückgewiesen or verworfen, § 522 ZPO. Entlassen is what happens to employees, die Klage wurde entlassen reads like the writ lost its job.
Law
dismissal protection
●
Kündigungsschutz
Kündigungsschutz, the statutory protection of the KSchG, but it works differently from UK unfair dismissal in the way that matters most: where it applies, a dismissal that is not socially justified does not take effect and the employment simply continues, so the primary outcome is keeping the job, not a compensation award.
Law
dividend
Dividende
Dividende for the corporate distribution of profit, § 58 AktG, but the dividend a creditor receives in an insolvency is die Insolvenzquote, § 196 InsO, not a Dividende at all. And a dividend is not automatic, it needs the Gewinnverwendungsbeschluss, § 174 AktG, so the German word turns on whether profit is shared or an estate is distributed.
Law
divorce
Scheidung
Scheidung translates divorce, but German divorce runs on one ground only, the Zerrüttung of § 1565 BGB, and it almost always demands a year of living apart first, the Trennungsjahr, after which breakdown is irrebuttably presumed, § 1566 BGB. There is no fault and no fast route, and the pension consequences are decided in the same proceeding.
Law
duty of care
Verkehrssicherungspflicht
Verkehrssicherungspflicht for the safety duty that does the work of a duty of care in German delict, because there is no general duty of care at all, § 823 Abs. 1 BGB protects only an enumerated list of interests and leaves pure economic loss out. A Verkehrssicherungspflicht arises where you create or control a source of danger, and the reflex Sorgfaltspflicht names the standard of care, not the duty that founds liability.
Law
easement
Dienstbarkeit
Dienstbarkeit, a limited real right to use another’s land or to stop them doing something on it. An English easement is tied to a benefited plot, so it maps to a Grunddienstbarkeit, § 1018 BGB; a right for a named person instead is a beschränkte persönliche Dienstbarkeit, § 1090 BGB, a distinction that decides whether the right runs with the land.
Law
employee
Arbeitnehmer
Arbeitnehmer is the legal status, defined in § 611a BGB, Mitarbeiter is HR prose that covers freelancers too, and Angestellter is yesterday’s category surviving in conversation. Behind the word sits the system the at-will instinct misses, dismissal protection after six months, § 1 KSchG, in all but small firms, § 23 KSchG.
Law
enforcement
Zwangsvollstreckung
Zwangsvollstreckung for enforcing a civil judgment, Vollstreckbarerklärung for making a foreign one enforceable, and Durchsetzung for the general act of enforcing a right. The system needs a Titel, a Klausel and Zustellung before anything moves, § 750 ZPO, so to enforce is never a single step in German procedure.
Law
engagement
Verlöbnis
Verlöbnis is the right word, and it is more than the social state English suggests. You still cannot sue to force the marriage, § 1297 BGB, but breaking it off can cost damages, § 1298 BGB, and the engagement gifts can be reclaimed if the wedding does not happen, § 1301 BGB.
Law
entire agreement
vollständige Vereinbarung
Vollständige Vereinbarung in the sentence, Vollständigkeitsklausel as the clause’s German name. And the promise travels smaller than it looks, § 305b BGB lets individually agreed terms outrank standard ones, so the boilerplate cannot lock the door the English drafter thinks it locks.
Law
equality
●
Gleichheitssatz
The German word depends on the setting. The constitutional principle is the Gleichheitssatz, Art. 3 GG, which binds the state; equal treatment between private parties is Gleichbehandlung, governed by the AGG; equality of the sexes is Gleichberechtigung. And the Gleichheitssatz binds public power, not private parties directly.
Law
equity
Equity
No German word holds it. Where equity names the second English system of law, keep the English word, German comparative writing does. Eigenkapital is right only for the capital sense, and Billigkeit, the reflex, reduces a body of law to a feeling for fairness.
Law
escrow
Treuhandkonto
Treuhandkonto for the account, Notaranderkonto where a notary holds the stakes, Escrow kept in brackets where the English mechanics matter. Hinterlegung is the false friend with a statute behind it, §§ 372 ff. BGB, a debtor’s one-sided deposit at a public office, not a closing tool.
Law
estate
Nachlass
Nachlass for the deceased’s estate, Immobilie for real estate, Insolvenzmasse when insolvency speaks, and Anwesen only for country houses. The system behind Nachlass is the surprise, § 1922 BGB moves the whole estate to the heirs at the moment of death, no probate stage, no personal representative.
Law
estoppel
Verwirkung
No single German doctrine. The work the English estoppels do is scattered across § 242 BGB: venire contra factum proprium for blowing hot and cold, and Verwirkung, its special case, where a right sleeps too long and the other side has come to rely on it.
Law
evidence
Beweis
Beweis for the proof, Beweismittel for the instruments, and German procedure runs the instruments as a closed canon in the Strengbeweis. Evidenz, the machine’s modern reflex, means self-evidence and study grades, and the hearsay objection the English reader reaches for does not exist, § 286 ZPO lets the judge weigh freely.
Law
execution
Unterzeichnung
Unterzeichnung when the contract is being signed, Vollstreckung when a judgment is being enforced, and never Ausführung for the signing, that word means performance. Execution wears three hats in English, and the machine reliably grabs the wrong one for the signature block.
Law
expropriation
●
Enteignung
Expropriation, in the UK compulsory purchase, is Enteignung, the targeted deprivation of a concrete property position for the public good, Art. 14 Abs. 3 GG. It is lawful only by or under a statute that itself regulates the kind and extent of compensation, the Junktimklausel; without such a clause the expropriating law is unconstitutional.
Law
federalism
Bundesstaat
Bundesstaat, a genuine federal state, Art. 20 Abs. 1 GG, in which the Länder have their own constitutionally entrenched existence and law-making powers, Art. 70 GG, and share in federal legislation through the Bundesrat. It is not the same as UK devolution, where Westminster stays sovereign.
Law
fiduciary duty
Treuepflicht
Treuepflicht, the corporate duty of loyalty, with the Sorgfaltspflicht of § 93 AktG and § 43 GmbHG as its statutory sibling for care. Treuhänderische Pflicht is the reflex rendering and points at trust administration, a German corporate lawyer reads it and reaches for the English original.
Law
fine
Geldbuße
Geldbuße for the administrative and regulatory fine, Geldstrafe for the criminal one, and the line is load-bearing, Germany to date has no corporate criminal law, so a Geldstrafe gegen das Unternehmen describes a sanction the system cannot impose, the company’s fine is die Verbandsgeldbuße, § 30 OWiG.
Law
fixed-term contract
●
befristeter Arbeitsvertrag
Befristeter Arbeitsvertrag, a contract limited in time under the TzBfG. The German rules are strict: without an objective reason a fixed term is capped, and if the limitation is invalid, for instance for want of an objective reason, of the written form, or of the time cap, the contract does not simply end but becomes permanent.
Law
fixture
●
wesentlicher Bestandteil
Wesentlicher Bestandteil for a fixture that becomes part of the land, § 94 BGB, and being an essential part it cannot be separately owned, § 93 BGB, so title follows the land. But a thing attached only temporarily stays movable as a Scheinbestandteil, § 95 BGB, the tenant’s fixture that does not pass. Vorrichtung, a device, is the machine’s miss.
Law
forbearance
Stundung
Stundung when a creditor grants time, Stillhalten for a standstill, Nachsicht for indulgence in the everyday sense, and forbearance as consideration has no German role at all, § 311 Abs. 1 BGB needs none. Unterlassung is the wrong drawer, that is forbearance in the sense of simply not acting, a different institution.
Law
foreclosure
●
Zwangsversteigerung
Zwangsversteigerung for the forced sale by which a German lender realises a Grundpfandrecht, § 15 ZVG, but strict foreclosure, the lender simply keeping the property, has no German equivalent, § 1149 BGB forbids the lender to agree in advance to take the property instead of selling it. So foreclosure is a court-run auction, not a taking, and Zwangsvollstreckung is too broad, that is enforcement in general.
Law
fraud
Betrug
Betrug for criminal fraud, § 263 StGB, but the German offence is a tight causal chain the broad English word does not carry, a Täuschung must produce an Irrtum, the victim must make a Vermögensverfügung, and a Vermögensschaden must follow, all of it, or the completed offence is not made out. English fraud is complete on the dishonest representation alone, and the civil deceit an English lawyer also calls fraud is arglistige Täuschung, § 123 BGB, not Betrug at all.
Law
free movement
Grundfreiheiten
Which German term depends on what moves. The market freedoms together are the Grundfreiheiten; free movement of persons is Freizügigkeit; goods, services and capital each have their own name. And Grundfreiheiten are not Grundrechte.
Law
freedom of expression
●
Meinungsfreiheit
Meinungsfreiheit, Art. 5 Abs. 1 GG, but it is not the near-absolute freedom of the US model. It carries express limits, the Schrankentrias of Art. 5 Abs. 2, so hate speech and knowingly false factual claims are not protected; and Art. 5 bundles several freedoms, of which Meinungsfreiheit is only one.
Law
freehold
Volleigentum
Volleigentum is the nearest rendering, but the fit is loose. English land law has no ownership as such, only estates held ultimately of the Crown; freehold, the fee simple absolute in possession, is the strongest of them and comes closest to full German Eigentum, § 903 BGB, without being the same structure.
Law
frustration
Störung der Geschäftsgrundlage
Störung der Geschäftsgrundlage, § 313 BGB, or Unmöglichkeit, § 275 BGB, depending on which half of the English doctrine is in play. Frustration as a German word is a feeling, not a doctrine, and the machine writes it anyway.
Law
fundamental rights
Grundrechte
Grundrechte, and they bite harder than UK human rights: they bind all three branches as directly applicable law, Art. 1 Abs. 3 GG, a statute infringing them can be struck down by the Bundesverfassungsgericht, and some of them are open only to German citizens.
Law
gift tax
●
Schenkungsteuer
Schenkungsteuer, and unlike the UK, Germany taxes lifetime gifts as a matter of course. Every freigebige Zuwendung is charged, § 7 ErbStG, and gifts from the same person are added up over a rolling ten years, § 14 ErbStG, so the allowance refreshes only every decade.
Law
good faith
Treu und Glauben
Treu und Glauben for the standard of conduct, guter Glaube for the state of mind. English good faith covers both, German keeps two institutions apart, and the machine reaches for the belief where the text meant the behaviour.
Law
governing law
anwendbares Recht
Anwendbares Recht, and the object of the choice is a Rechtsordnung, not its statutes. Governed by the laws of England reads unterliegt englischem Recht, never den Gesetzen Englands, a legal order includes its case law, and the Gesetze version quietly shrinks it.
Law
gross misconduct
●
wichtiger Grund
Wichtiger Grund for the gross misconduct that justifies summary dismissal, § 626 Abs. 1 BGB, but the German version runs on a clock the English term hides, § 626 Abs. 2 BGB gives the employer two weeks from learning the facts to dismiss, and after that only ordinary notice remains. Grober Fehler or schweres Fehlverhalten describes the conduct but names no legal ground.
Law
guarantee
●
Bürgschaft
Bürgschaft if the promisor stands behind someone else’s debt and falls with it, Garantie if the promise is meant to stand on its own. Machine output says Garantie almost without exception, and the German word strips the guarantor of form, accessoriness and the debtor’s defences in one move.
Law
guardian
Betreuer
Betreuer for the adult, Vormund for the minor, and the line is thirty years old, adult guardianship died in 1992, die Betreuung replaced it, since 2023 in §§ 1814 ff. BGB. Der Vormund der Mutter files the grandmother as a child, and the lasting power of attorney is die Vorsorgevollmacht, § 1820 BGB, built precisely to keep the Betreuer away.
Law
guilty plea
●
Geständnis
A guilty plea has no true German counterpart. The English plea is dispositive, once entered the defendant stands convicted and no trial follows, and it fixes the sentence discount. A German Geständnis is only evidence the court must still weigh, § 261 StPO and § 244 II StPO, and it ends nothing on its own, the nearest procedural device is the Verständigung, § 257c StPO.
Law
hearing
mündliche Verhandlung
Mündliche Verhandlung for the court hearing, der Termin for the date itself, Anhörung only where someone is being heard rather than the case being tried, § 28 VwVfG, Art. 103 GG. The machine’s Anhörung moves the lawsuit into an administrative corridor.
Law
human dignity
●
Menschenwürde
Menschenwürde, and in German law it is absolute: Art. 1 Abs. 1 GG places it beyond balancing, the Ewigkeitsklausel of Art. 79 Abs. 3 GG puts it beyond amendment, and a measure that violates it cannot be justified by any competing interest.
Law
income tax
●
Einkommensteuer
Einkommensteuer, but only for natural persons, § 1 EStG; a company’s income tax is Körperschaftsteuer, § 1 KStG, and the wage-withholding that an English reader calls PAYE is Lohnsteuer, § 38 EStG, not a separate tax but income tax collected at source.
Law
incorporation
●
Gründung
Gründung for the process, Eintragung for the moment it works. Before entry in the Handelsregister the GmbH does not exist as such, § 11 Abs. 1 GmbHG, and whoever acts in its name before then is personally and jointly liable, § 11 Abs. 2 GmbHG, which is what the suffix i. G. in a signature block is warning about.
Law
indemnity
●
Freistellung
Freistellung, the claim to be kept clear of a liability before it is paid. Entschädigung, the reflex rendering, quietly moves the trigger from exposure to loss, the client is reimbursed after the damage instead of shielded from the claim.
Law
indictment
Anklageschrift
Anklageschrift is the right word for the document, § 200 StPO, but it sits inside a stage English procedure has no equivalent for, the Zwischenverfahren, in which the court examines the charge and must positively admit it by an Eröffnungsbeschluss, § 203 StPO, before any trial. The Anklageschrift does not open the trial by itself, and it is not the act of charging.
Law
infringement
Schutzrechtsverletzung
Schutzrechtsverletzung for the infringement of a patent, trademark or copyright, but the English word stops at the wrong done while German attaches a remedy the claimant shapes, damages by threefold calculation, § 97 Abs. 2 UrhG and its siblings, the claimant choosing the actual loss, the infringer’s profit, or a reasonable royalty. So an infringement is not just a Verletzung but a menu of ways to be paid, plus Unterlassung and Auskunft.
Law
infringement procedure
●
Vertragsverletzungsverfahren
Vertragsverletzungsverfahren, Art. 258 AEUV: the Commission’s action against a Member State for breaching a Treaty obligation. A pre-litigation stage, a letter of formal notice then a reasoned opinion, precedes a referral to the Court of Justice. The infringement here is a State’s breach of Union law, not an intellectual-property infringement.
Law
inheritance tax
●
Erbschaftsteuer
Erbschaftsteuer, but built the other way round from the UK tax: it taxes each acquirer on what they receive, not the estate as a whole, and the rate and the tax-free amount turn on the relationship, § 15 and § 16 ErbStG, not a single nil-rate band.
Law
injunction
einstweilige Verfügung
Einstweilige Verfügung for the interim order, §§ 935, 940 ZPO, Unterlassungsanspruch and Unterlassungsurteil where the injunction is final. German splits the remedy into a substantive claim and a fast procedure, and the machine’s habit of making everything einstweilig turns permanent orders provisional.
Law
interest
Zinsen
Zinsen when money earns money, ein Recht or eine Beteiligung when the interest is proprietary, Interesse only for concern. And the money sense carries a German wall the English clause never sees, § 248 BGB voids compound interest agreed in advance, narrow statutory exceptions aside.
Law
joint and several liability
gesamtschuldnerische Haftung
Gesamtschuldnerische Haftung, one German institution for the English doublet, each debtor liable for the whole and the creditor chooses, § 421 BGB. Translating joint and several piecewise, gemeinsam und einzeln, produces a formula no German statute knows.
Law
judgment
Urteil
Urteil, and the anatomy decides where things live, § 313 ZPO, the operative order in the Tenor, the reasons in the Entscheidungsgründe. Default judgment is das Versäumnisurteil, § 331 ZPO, attacked by Einspruch, § 338 ZPO, and the machine’s Verzugsurteil confuses missing the hearing with missing a payment.
Law
judicial review
●
Anfechtungsklage
Anfechtungsklage to have the decision set aside, Verpflichtungsklage to force the one the authority refused, Normenkontrolle to attack the rule behind it. German law has no single procedure of that name, so the English term names nothing until the Klageart is chosen, and the court that hears it does not stop at quashing, it can order the authority to issue the decision it refused, § 113 Abs. 5 VwGO, where an English court would ordinarily quash and send the matter back.
Law
jurisdiction
Zuständigkeit
Zuständigkeit, or the agreed Gerichtsstand, when a contract says which court may hear the case. Gerichtsbarkeit is the sovereignty word, Rechtsordnung the place word, and the engine’s favourite, Gerichtsbarkeit, answers a question the clause never asked.
Law
last will
Testament
Testament, and the German form rules break the English habit twice, the private will must be handwritten from the first word to the signature, § 2247 BGB, or notarial, § 2232 BGB, typed and witnessed earns nothing as a German-form will, § 125 BGB. Der Wille is volition, the document is das Testament.
Law
lease
Mietvertrag
Mietvertrag for use, Pachtvertrag where the tenant also takes the fruits, § 581 BGB, the running restaurant, the farm, the business. Leasing stays Leasing for the finance product, and the English leasehold, ownership sliced by time, has no German twin, the distant cousin is the Erbbaurecht.
Law
leasehold
●
Erbbaurecht
A leasehold is a time-limited estate in land that reverts to the freeholder when it ends, so it is not ownership. A long leasehold comes closest to the German Erbbaurecht, a hereditary building right; a short one is closer to a lease, a Miet- or Pachtverhältnis. Rendering it as Eigentum is the mistake to avoid.
Law
liability
Haftung
Haftung for the exposure, Verbindlichkeiten for the debts, and the plural is the tell, English liabilities are almost always Verbindlichkeiten, not Haftungen. § 13 Abs. 2 GmbHG uses both correctly in one sentence, for the company’s Verbindlichkeiten only the company’s assets haften.
Law
lien
●
Pfandrecht
Two German rights hide under the one English word. Pfandrecht, the security interest that lets the holder sell, Zurückbehaltungsrecht, the defence that only lets him keep. Machine output says Pfandrecht by reflex, and the upgrade matters most on the day of insolvency.
Law
limitation period
Verjährungsfrist
Verjährungsfrist, and the German clock runs on its own rules, three years as the default, § 195 BGB, starting only at the end of the year, § 199 BGB, and paused by mere negotiations, § 203 BGB. Statut, the tempting half of statute of limitations, is taken, in German it means governing law or a company’s constitution.
Law
liquidated damages
●
Vertragsstrafe
Vertragsstrafe if the clause exerts pressure on performance, pauschalierter Schadensersatz if it merely fixes the expected loss. German law enforces both, the void English penalty has no German twin.
Law
liquidation
Liquidation
Liquidation or Abwicklung for winding up a solvent company, the GmbH liquidiert, § 66 GmbHG, the AG wickelt ab, § 264 AktG, with a Sperrjahr before assets are distributed, § 73 GmbHG. But insolvency liquidation is something else, die Verwertung or Zerschlagung of the estate, § 159 InsO, so a solvent wind-down and an insolvent break-up must not share a word.
Law
loan
Darlehen
Darlehen, § 488 BGB, and the word leihen is a trap with a definition inside, the German Leihe of § 598 BGB is gratuitous by statute, so an interest-bearing facility rendered as Leihvertrag names a contract that cannot legally charge the interest it contains.
Law
maintenance
Unterhalt
Unterhalt in the family file, Wartung in the server room, and the machine swaps the rooms, Wartungspflichten for maintenance obligations reads like someone servicing the ex-spouse. Behind Unterhalt sits the 2008 principle English spousal-maintenance instincts miss, § 1569 BGB, after divorce each spouse provides for themselves, claims are the scoped exception.
Law
manslaughter
●
Totschlag
Totschlag for manslaughter looks right but often is not, because Totschlag is intentional killing, § 212 StGB, the killing of a person with Vorsatz but without the qualifying features of Mord, § 211 StGB. English manslaughter is precisely the killing that lacks that intent, or has it only with a partial defence, so involuntary manslaughter, killing without intent, is not Totschlag at all but fahrlässige Tötung, § 222 StGB, or, where the fatal act was an assault, Körperverletzung mit Todesfolge, § 227 StGB, both far below Totschlag.
Law
marriage
●
Ehe
Ehe is the word, but a German marriage is made only before the Standesbeamten, § 1310 BGB; a purely religious ceremony has no legal effect at all. Since 2017 the Ehe is open to same-sex couples, § 1353 BGB, and no new eingetragene Lebenspartnerschaft can be created.
Law
matrimonial home
Ehewohnung
Ehewohnung is the right word, but German law protects and allocates the matrimonial home through its own route. During separation a spouse can be required to leave it to the other to avoid an unbillige Härte, § 1361b BGB, and on divorce the court can allocate it, including transferring a tenancy, § 1568a BGB. There is no registrable home right as in England, but the protection is real.
Law
matrimonial property
●
Zugewinngemeinschaft
Zugewinngemeinschaft is the default German regime, but it is not community of property. The spouses keep their assets separate throughout the marriage, § 1363 BGB, and only the gain each made is equalised when it ends, half the difference as a money claim, § 1378 BGB. So English talk of matrimonial property to be divided, and any rendering as community of property, misreads what German law does.
Law
meeting
Versammlung
Versammlung when the owners meet, Gesellschafterversammlung, Hauptversammlung, Sitzung when an organ does, Vorstandssitzung, Aufsichtsratssitzung, § 110 AktG. Das Treffen is coffee, and the working verbs serve both rooms, einberufen, abhalten, stattfinden, the split sits in who is in the room.
Law
merger
Verschmelzung
Verschmelzung in the transaction documents, §§ 2 ff. UmwG, Fusion in merger control and headlines. The UmwG word carries the mechanics the English reader needs to see, universal succession on registration, § 20 UmwG, assets and debts crossing in one stroke and the transferring entity ceasing to exist.
Law
misrepresentation
●
arglistige Täuschung
German law splits what English keeps whole. Arglistige Täuschung, § 123 BGB, only where the maker lied knowingly, everything below that threshold runs as a breach of pre-contractual duty, culpa in contrahendo, with damages instead of avoidance.
Law
moratorium
Vollstreckungsverbot
Vollstreckungsverbot for the enforcement freeze an English moratorium creates, § 89 InsO, but the German freeze sits in more than one place, individual creditors are barred from enforcing into the Masse once insolvency opens, § 89 InsO, a court can stay enforcement in the run-up, § 21 InsO, and a company not yet insolvent can obtain a free-standing Stabilisierungsanordnung under the StaRUG, §§ 49 ff. StaRUG. The bare Moratorium the machine offers names none of these, and Zahlungsaufschub is mere deferral, not the creditor stay.
Law
mortgage
Grundschuld
Grundschuld is what the German market writes, Hypothek is what the dictionary says. The English mortgage is accessory by instinct, the German practice instrument is not, § 1191 BGB, it hangs on a Sicherungsvertrag instead of on the loan, and the machine’s Hypothek describes a security German banks stopped drafting a generation ago.
Law
negligence
Fahrlässigkeit
Fahrlässigkeit for the grade of fault, objectively measured, § 276 Abs. 2 BGB. But negligence also names a tort, and there the twin ends, German law has no Fahrlässigkeitsklage, the claim runs on § 823 BGB and its list of protected interests, with pure economic loss standing outside the door.
Law
notarisation
●
notarielle Beurkundung
Notariell beurkundet or notariell beglaubigt, and the gap between the two words is § 125 BGB, nullity. Beurkundung is the full ceremony, content, advice and record, § 128 BGB, § 17 BeurkG, Beglaubigung merely certifies a signature, § 129 BGB, and the machine reaches for the smaller word where the deal needs the larger one.
Law
notice
Mitteilung
Mitteilung for the communication, Kündigungsfrist for the period, Kenntnis for what someone is on notice of. And the mechanics matter more than the noun, German notices work on receipt, § 130 BGB, dispatch achieves nothing by itself, so the Notices clause is the parties’ answer to the Zugangsrisiko, not boilerplate.
Law
notice period
Kündigungsfrist
Kündigungsfrist, the period before an ordinary dismissal takes effect, § 622 BGB. It is a different word from notice in the sense of the notification itself, and it is asymmetric: the employer’s period lengthens with the employee’s years of service, while the employee’s own period stays at the basic length.
Law
novation
●
Novation
Novation or Schuldumschaffung for replacing an obligation with a new one, but German has no special novation doctrine, it is an ordinary Aufhebung plus Neubegründung by agreement, § 311 Abs. 1 BGB, and the real trap is security, accessory rights die with the old obligation, § 1252 BGB, where an Abtretung or Vertragsübernahme would carry them along.
Law
nuisance
Immission
Immission for a private nuisance in German neighbour law, § 906 BGB, but the concept is a threshold, an owner must tolerate an interference that is immaterial, or is ortsüblich and cannot reasonably be prevented, § 906 BGB, and only beyond it does a claim arise, removed or restrained by the Abwehranspruch, § 1004 BGB. Belästigung, an annoyance, is the machine’s miss, too weak for the property standard.
Law
objection
●
Widerspruch
Widerspruch against a Verwaltungsakt, filed with the issuing authority within one month, § 70 Abs. 1 VwGO. Einspruch is the objection word of the tax procedure, Einwendung the word for objecting to a project in a participation procedure, § 73 Abs. 4 VwVfG, and only the first two stop a Verwaltungsakt becoming binding.
Law
officer
leitender Angestellter
Leitende Angestellte for the officer tier below the board, § 5 Abs. 3 BetrVG, Organmitglieder where officer means the governing body itself, Beauftragte where the officer guards a function, and Offiziere only in uniform. D and O survives untranslated, the deductible rule of § 93 Abs. 2 Satz 3 AktG is built around the imported term.
Law
pain and suffering
Schmerzensgeld
Schmerzensgeld is the institution, § 253 Abs. 2 BGB, and behind it stands a gate English tort thinking does not expect, § 253 Abs. 1 BGB pays money for non-pecuniary loss only where a statute says so. Schmerz und Leiden is the machine’s word-for-word offer, a symptom list where German law has a term of art.
Law
partnership
Personengesellschaft
Personengesellschaft as the genus, OHG for the general partnership, KG for the limited one, and hands off Partnerschaft, German law gave that word to a specific vehicle for the liberal professions, the PartG. A trading partnership rendered as Partnerschaft has been filed under the wrong statute.
Law
passing off
unlauterer Wettbewerb
There is no German passing off, the common-law tort has no single equivalent, so it is reconstructed, unlauterer Wettbewerb under the UWG for the misrepresentation and Verkehrsgeltung under the MarkenG for the unregistered sign. Herkunftstäuschung, § 4 Nr. 3 UWG, is the closest to the classic case of confusing customers about origin. A literal Ausgeben als is machine nonsense.
Law
paternity
●
Vaterschaft
Vaterschaft arises by one of three routes, § 1592 BGB: marriage to the mother at the birth, acknowledgement, or a court finding. Acknowledgement needs the mother’s consent, § 1595 BGB, and a challenge must come within two years of learning the doubts, § 1600b BGB.
Law
pension sharing
●
Versorgungsausgleich
Versorgungsausgleich is the German counterpart, but it is not the discretionary pension order English law knows. On divorce the court splits every pension right the spouses built up during the marriage in half, automatically and of its own motion, § 1587 BGB and § 1 VersAusglG, as a compulsory part of the divorce itself for all but the shortest marriages, § 137 FamFG. There is usually nothing to apply for and little to argue.
Law
performance
Erfüllung
Leistung for what is owed, § 241 BGB, Erfüllung when performing it extinguishes the obligation, § 362 BGB, Durchführung for carrying the contract out. Aufführung is the stage and Performance the HR review, and a contract whose performance arrives as Aufführung has been sent to the theatre.
Law
permit
Erlaubnis / Genehmigung
A permit is an Erlaubnis or Genehmigung, an authority’s act lifting a statutory prohibition. The decisive question is the type of prohibition: a präventives Verbot mit Erlaubnisvorbehalt gives a bound permit that must be granted once the conditions are met, while a repressives Verbot mit Befreiungsvorbehalt gives only a discretionary exemption.
Law
planning permission
Baugenehmigung
Baugenehmigung is the right word and the wrong expectation: German building consent is a bound decision, to be granted where no public law provision the authority has to examine stands in the way, so a compliant applicant has a claim to it rather than a case to argue. Bauvorbescheid for the advance ruling, and in some cases no consent is issued at all.
Law
pleading
Schriftsatz
Schriftsatz for the written pleading exchanged between the parties, the Klageschrift opening the case, § 253 ZPO, but the German pleading standard differs, the Substantiierungslast demands specific factual assertions, § 138 ZPO, not the outline of English notice pleading. Pleading rendered without the substantiation duty understates what a German Schriftsatz must actually contain.
Law
possession
Besitz
Besitz is the fact, Eigentum the right, and German keeps them strictly apart while wiring them together, § 854 BGB makes possession physical control, §§ 858 ff. BGB protect it without asking about title, and § 1006 BGB presumes the possessor of a movable is its owner. Vacant possession, meanwhile, is a promise about emptiness, not a kind of Besitz.
Law
pre-emption right
●
Vorkaufsrecht
Vorkaufsrecht, a right to step into a sale the owner makes to a third party. Whether it binds that third party depends on the kind: a dingliches Vorkaufsrecht registered in the Grundbuch, § 1094 BGB, does; a merely contractual, schuldrechtliches one, § 463 BGB, gives only a claim against the seller. There are statutory ones too.
Law
preference
●
Insolvenzanfechtung
Insolvenzanfechtung for setting a preference aside, §§ 129 ff. InsO, but the German action is wider than the English preference and runs on different clocks, the preference proper is the Deckungsanfechtung of § 130 and § 131 InsO, reaching back three months, while an intent to disadvantage creditors, § 133 InsO, reaches back four years or more. And the test differs, English law asks about a desire to prefer, German law about the creditor’s knowledge of Zahlungsunfähigkeit or of the debtor’s intent.
Law
preliminary reference
Vorabentscheidungsersuchen
Vorabentscheidungsersuchen, a national court’s request to the Court of Justice on a question of EU law, Art. 267 TFEU. It is a reference, not an appeal: the Court answers the point of EU law and the national court then decides the case, and a last-instance court must refer.
Law
prenuptial agreement
●
Ehevertrag
Ehevertrag is the right word, but a German prenuptial agreement is a different creature from the English one. It must be notarised to exist at all, § 1410 BGB, and once validly made it binds, § 1408 BGB, subject only to a content review that can strike a grossly one-sided bargain as sittenwidrig, § 138 BGB. The English prenup is not automatically binding and is only a factor the court weighs.
Law
primacy
●
Anwendungsvorrang
Anwendungsvorrang, but note the German word is precise: EU law takes application priority, so a conflicting national rule is set aside in the case, not declared void. And in Germany the priority is not unconditional, the Bundesverfassungsgericht reserving ultra-vires and identity review.
Law
privilege
Zeugnisverweigerungsrecht
Zeugnisverweigerungsrecht for the right to refuse testimony that carries legal professional privilege, § 53 StPO, § 383 ZPO, backed by a Beschlagnahmeverbot for the lawyer’s papers, § 97 StPO. But there is no unified privilege in German law and no discovery for one to operate in, so the concept fragments into specific refusal rights, and the false friend Privileg is a special entitlement, not this.
Law
proof of debt
Forderungsanmeldung
Forderungsanmeldung for proving a debt in the insolvency, § 174 InsO, but the German procedure is more formal and its effect stronger, the creditor registers the claim in writing with the Insolvenzverwalter, it enters the Insolvenztabelle, § 175 InsO, and is examined at the Prüfungstermin, where an unchallenged registered claim gains the force of a final judgment, § 178 Abs. 3 InsO. A disputed claim must then be pursued by a Feststellungsklage, § 179 InsO, not simply re-argued.
Law
property
Vermögen
Vermögen when property is the asset pool, Sache when it is a thing, Eigentum when it names the right, and the German gate sits in § 90 BGB, Sachen are corporeal objects only, so rights, claims and data are property in English and no Sache in German, they move by assignment, never by conveyance.
Law
property tax
Grundsteuer
Grundsteuer for the annual municipal tax on land and buildings, not the one-off Grunderwerbsteuer on buying them. It was rebuilt from 1 January 2025 after the old values were struck down, and the base now differs from Land to Land.
Law
proportionality
●
Verhältnismäßigkeit
Verhältnismäßigkeit, but a mandatory four-step test that governs every German state measure touching a right, not a contested ground of review. Legitimate aim, suitable, necessary and reasonable, in that fixed order, and the necessity step often decides the case.
Law
prosecutor
Staatsanwalt
Staatsanwalt for the public prosecutor, die Staatsanwaltschaft for the office, and the role is not the adversary English drafting assumes, § 160 Abs. 2 StPO binds it to gather exonerating evidence too, and the Legalitätsprinzip of § 152 Abs. 2 StPO removes the discretion whether to charge at all. Ankläger alone is a role, not the institution.
Law
provision
Bestimmung
Bestimmung for the clause, and hands off the identical twin, die deutsche Provision is a commission, § 87 HGB, while Rückstellung, the accounting sense, § 249 HGB, waits one register away. Die Provisionen dieses Vertrages is sales pay, not boilerplate.
Law
proxy
●
Vollmacht
Vollmacht for the proxy authority to vote, Stimmrechtsvertreter for the person who holds it, and by proxy is durch Bevollmächtigten, § 134 Abs. 3 AktG in Textform. Proxy is not the general Stellvertreter of everyday agency, it is the meeting-specific voting authority, so Stellvertreter for a proxy card misses the shareholders’-meeting setting and the statutory form.
Law
real estate transfer tax
●
Grunderwerbsteuer
Grunderwerbsteuer, a one-off tax on acquiring German land, triggered by the purchase contract rather than the register entry, § 1 GrEStG. The rate is set by each Land and runs from 3.5 to 6.5 per cent, and share deals can trigger it too.
Law
receiver
Zwangsverwalter
Zwangsverwalter for the receiver appointed over real property, § 152 ZVG, but the English receiver more broadly has no German equivalent, the private receiver of a floating-charge holder cannot exist where there is no floating charge. Empfänger is the machine’s howler, that is a recipient, not an officeholder, so a receiver over the assets becomes someone who received them.
Law
redundancy
●
betriebsbedingte Kündigung
Betriebsbedingte Kündigung for redundancy, but the German version takes the choice of person out of the employer’s hands, § 1 Abs. 3 KSchG forces a Sozialauswahl among comparable employees by tenure, age, maintenance duties and disability, and a wrong selection makes the dismissal void. Redundanz is not the legal word, it is a false friend from engineering and IT.
Law
regulation
Verordnung
Verordnung when the regulation is the instrument, EU regulations officially so, Art. 288 AEUV, Rechtsverordnung at national level, Art. 80 GG. Regulierung is the activity, not the act, and die Regulierung 2016/679 cites a process where the lawyer needed a norm.
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remedy
Rechtsbehelf
Rechtsbehelf, the umbrella for what a party can do about a breach, Anspruch where one enforceable claim is meant. Never Rechtsmittel, that German word exists and is taken, it names the appeal against a judgment, and the false friend moves the sentence from contract law into the courtroom.
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rescission
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Anfechtung
Anfechtung, the attack on a contract flawed at its making, mistake, deceit or duress, void from the very beginning under § 142 Abs. 1 BGB. Rücktritt is the breach exit and unwinds only from now on, and the engines reach for it, moving the defect from the contract’s birth to its performance.
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resolution
Beschluss
Beschluss for the corporate act, gefasst, nicht verabschiedet, Streitbeilegung where the resolution resolves disputes. Resolution as a German word belongs to the UN corridor, and the substance behind Beschluss surprises twice, defective resolutions split into void and merely challengeable, §§ 241, 243 AktG, and the challenge window is one month, § 246 AktG.
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restrictive covenant
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nachvertragliches Wettbewerbsverbot
Nachvertragliches Wettbewerbsverbot for a post-termination restrictive covenant, and the trap is that it costs the employer money to bind at all, § 74 Abs. 2 HGB requires a Karenzentschädigung of at least half the last pay for each year of the restraint. Draft the covenant the English way, with no compensation clause, and on the prevailing view it is void, the employee simply free to compete.
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revocation
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Rücknahme / Widerruf
German splits what English calls revocation into two acts with different consequences: Rücknahme, § 48 VwVfG, for an unlawful administrative act, to which the authority may give retroactive or prospective effect, ex tunc or ex nunc, at its discretion; and Widerruf, § 49 VwVfG, for a lawful administrative act, which as a rule takes effect only for the future, ex nunc. The umbrella term for both is Aufhebung.
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royalty
Lizenzgebühr
Lizenzgebühr for a royalty paid to use a licensed right, but for an author the figure is not the last word, § 32 UrhG gives an unwaivable claim to angemessene Vergütung and § 32a lets the author demand more when the work turns out a success, so a royalty agreed too low can be topped up by law. Gebühr alone is too generic, that is a fee or charge of any kind.
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rule of law
Rechtsstaat
Rechtsstaat, and it carries more than the English rule of law: a substantive constitutional principle, Art. 20 Abs. 3 GG, from which proportionality, legal certainty, protection of legitimate expectations and a guaranteed route to the courts all flow.
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securities
Wertpapiere
Wertpapiere when securities are instruments, § 2 WpHG, Sicherheiten when security is collateral, and the plural crossing is the classic wreck, transferable securities arriving as übertragbare Sicherheiten. § 232 BGB shows both worlds meeting in one sentence, security can be provided by depositing Wertpapiere.
Law
sentence
Strafe
Strafe for the criminal sentence, das Strafmaß for its measure, das Urteil for the judgment that pronounces it, and der Satz for a sentence of words. Suspended sentence is die Strafaussetzung zur Bewährung, § 56 StGB, a suspension of a fixed term, not the open-ended probation English readers picture.
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separation of powers
Gewaltenteilung
Gewaltenteilung, the division of state power into legislature, executive and judiciary, Art. 20 Abs. 2 GG. But the German version is deliberately not strict: the executive stems from the parliament and the branches interlock, a Gewaltenverschränkung, so it is checks and balances rather than a wall between the powers.
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service of process
Zustellung
Zustellung, the formal delivery that starts clocks and binds courts, §§ 166 ff. ZPO. Service in this sense has nothing to do with Dienstleistungen, and the process agent the English clause appoints is in German a Zustellungsbevollmächtigter.
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set-off
Aufrechnung
Aufrechnung, the unilateral set-off of §§ 387 ff. BGB, declared, not agreed, and striking backwards, § 389 BGB extinguishes both claims from the moment they first faced each other. Verrechnung is the bookkeeping cousin, the agreed netting of a running account.
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settlement
Vergleich
Vergleich, and the German word has an entrance test, § 779 BGB wants gegenseitiges Nachgeben, no mutual concessions, no Vergleich. In full and final settlement is Abgeltungs-German, zur Abgeltung sämtlicher Ansprüche, and a court-recorded Vergleich is itself an enforcement title, § 794 ZPO.
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severability clause
salvatorische Klausel
Salvatorische Klausel, the fixed German name with a century of drafting practice behind it. Coinages like Trennbarkeitsklausel exist only in translations, and the clause works against a German default the English reader should know, § 139 BGB presumes that part-invalid means all-invalid.
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shall
ist verpflichtet
German contracts state duties in the present tense, der Verkäufer liefert, or say ist verpflichtet outright. Soll, the machine’s reflex for shall, sits a register below muss, in German legal usage a Soll rule is the rule with built-in exceptions, and every hard English duty comes out one notch weaker.
Law
share capital
Stammkapital
Stammkapital in a GmbH, § 5 GmbHG, Grundkapital in an AG, § 7 AktG, the Rechtsform names its own capital, and Aktienkapital is the Swiss word wandering north in machine output. Behind the naming sits the system, capital maintenance, § 30 GmbHG, § 57 AktG, a payout wall the distributable-reserves instinct underestimates.
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shareholder
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Gesellschafter
Gesellschafter in a GmbH, Aktionär in an AG. And in a GmbH the harder question is who counts as one: towards the company that is only the person entered in the Gesellschafterliste held at the Handelsregister, § 16 Abs. 1 GmbHG, whatever the share purchase agreement says.
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shares
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Geschäftsanteile
Geschäftsanteile in a GmbH, Aktien only in an AG, and the machine says Aktien for every share. The word carries a form cliff, transferring Geschäftsanteile takes a notary, § 15 Abs. 3 GmbHG, even the promise to transfer does, Abs. 4, while Aktien change hands without notarial form.
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signature
Unterschrift
Unterschrift on paper, elektronische Signatur on screen, and only the qualified grade replaces statutory written form, § 126a BGB. Elektronische Unterschrift is the blend the statutes never use, and some written-form rules refuse even the qualified signature, the employment termination of § 623 BGB among them.
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specific performance
Erfüllung
Erfüllung, and note the inversion, what English law grants as an exceptional, discretionary remedy is the German default. § 241 Abs. 1 BGB makes performance the primary claim, so German has no marked word for it, routine rights do not get special names.
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state liability
Staatshaftung / Amtshaftung
State liability for wrongful official conduct is Staatshaftung, and its core claim is Amtshaftung, § 839 BGB with Art. 34 GG. § 839 states the personal liability of the official for a culpable breach of a third-protecting official duty; Art. 34 GG transfers that liability to the state, and opens the ordinary courts.
Law
stock
Aktien
Aktien when stock is capital, Stammaktien for common, Vorzugsaktien for preferred, § 139 AktG letting the preference drop the vote, Vorräte when stock is inventory, § 266 Abs. 2 HGB. The machine picks by mood, and a stock transfer restriction lands on the warehouse gate as easily as on the share register.
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strict liability
Gefährdungshaftung
Gefährdungshaftung for strict liability, liability without fault, but German law has no general strict-liability principle, no Rylands v Fletcher, it exists only where a statute creates it, § 7 StVG for vehicles, § 1 ProdHaftG for products, § 833 BGB for animals, and several of those carry Haftungshöchstbeträge, caps that fault-based liability does not. Verschuldensunabhängige Haftung is the descriptive term, right but wider than any single Tatbestand.
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strike
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Streik
Streik, the collective withdrawal of labour, but there is no express right to strike in Germany: it is judge-made law flowing from the freedom of association, Art. 9 Abs. 3 GG, and it is lawful only under strict conditions, so a strike outside them exposes those taking part to dismissal and the union to damages.
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subrogation
Forderungsübergang
Forderungsübergang, the claim passing by operation of law, cessio legis. German has the mechanism all over its statutes, § 86 VVG for the insurer, § 774 BGB for the surety, what it does not have is the imported word Subrogation, which names no German norm.
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subsidiarity
Subsidiarität
Subsidiarität, Art. 5 Abs. 3 EUV: in areas that are not within the Union’s exclusive competence, the Union acts only if and so far as the objective cannot be sufficiently achieved by the Member States and can be better achieved at Union level. It governs the exercise of a competence, not whether one exists.
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subsidiary
Tochtergesellschaft
Tochtergesellschaft is the ordinary word and carries no statutory test. German law asks instead whether the company is abhängig, § 17 AktG, whether it belongs to a Konzern, § 18 AktG, and above all whether a Beherrschungsvertrag is in place, § 291 Abs. 1 AktG for an AG or KGaA and by analogy for a dependent GmbH, because that one turns control into a duty to make good every annual loss, § 302 Abs. 1 AktG.
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surrogacy
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Leihmutterschaft
Leihmutterschaft is prohibited in Germany: the doctor who performs it is criminally liable, § 1 Abs. 1 Nr. 7 ESchG, and mediating it is an offence, § 13c AdVermiG. Under § 1591 BGB the woman who gives birth is the legal mother, so the intended mother must adopt.
Law
tax assessment
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Steuerbescheid
Steuerbescheid is the German tax assessment, but it is a formal administrative act, § 155 AO, not a running figure to negotiate. It must be challenged by Einspruch within one month, § 347 and § 355 AO, and if that month passes it becomes bestandskräftig, binding and hard to reopen. Treating a Steuerbescheid as a soft English-style assessment can cost the client the right to object.
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tax avoidance
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Steuervermeidung
Steuervermeidung, or the more neutral Steuergestaltung, and it is legal: never Steuerhinterziehung, which is the crime, § 370 AO. The limit is § 42 AO, where an abusive arrangement is recharacterised as the appropriate one, though the abuse itself is not a crime, and cross-border schemes must still be reported, § 138d AO.
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tax evasion
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Steuerhinterziehung
Steuerhinterziehung is the right word for tax evasion, the criminal offence of § 370 AO, but the line it draws matters. English tax avoidance, the lawful arranging of affairs to pay less, is not Steuerhinterziehung, it is Steuergestaltung, lawful unless it becomes an abuse caught by § 42 AO. Rendering avoidance as Steuerhinterziehung turns lawful planning into a crime.
Law
tax return
Steuererklärung
Steuererklärung is the tax return, but the German return sits in a different process. The taxpayer declares, § 149 and § 150 AO, and the Finanzamt then assesses and issues a Steuerbescheid. The ordinary annual return is not a self-assessment in the English sense, the figure is fixed by the authority, not by the filer, so a translated tax return can suggest a control over the outcome the German taxpayer does not have.
Law
tenancy in common
Miteigentum
Miteigentum nach Bruchteilen for a tenancy in common, § 1008 BGB, each co-owner holding a distinct share they can sell or charge on their own, § 747 BGB. But joint tenancy, co-ownership with the right of survivorship, has no German equivalent, a Bruchteil does not accrue to the others on death, it passes to the heirs. Mietgemeinschaft, a shared tenancy, is the machine’s howler, that confuses co-ownership with a lease.
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termination
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Kündigung
One English exit, three German doors. Kündigung ends a continuing contract for the future, Rücktritt unwinds an exchange back to the start, Aufhebung ends it by mutual agreement, and which door the translation picks decides what happens to everything already performed.
Law
theft
Diebstahl
Diebstahl for theft, § 242 StGB, but the German offence turns on Wegnahme, breaking someone’s possession and taking the thing away, which the broad English appropriation does not require. Where the offender already held the property lawfully and then kept or sold it, English law still calls it theft but German law calls it Unterschlagung, § 246 StGB, so the reflex Diebstahl points at the wrong offence for anything not physically taken.
Law
time is of the essence
Fixgeschäft
Fixgeschäft is the German frame the clause is reaching for, timely performance made essential with an immediate exit attached, § 323 Abs. 2 Nr. 2 BGB, § 376 HGB between merchants. The word-for-word rendering, die Zeit ist von wesentlicher Bedeutung, is a proverb, not a clause.
Law
title
Eigentum
Eigentum for ownership, Rechtsinhaberschaft where the right is not a thing, never Titel. The German Titel exists and means something else, the instrument a judgment is enforced from, so the false friend does not merely miss, it points at the wrong branch of law.
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tort
unerlaubte Handlung
Unerlaubte Handlung for the tort, das Deliktsrecht for the field, and there is no general tort of negligence, German liability rests on three narrow pillars, § 823 Abs. 1 BGB for enumerated rights, § 823 Abs. 2 BGB for breach of a protective statute, § 826 BGB for intentional immoral harm. Delikt is the word, Tort an anglicism that says nothing to a German court.
Law
tracing
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dingliche Surrogation
No general German equivalent. Equity lets a claimant trace value into substitute assets and claim them proprietarily; German law follows value only in narrow statutory pockets, dingliche Surrogation, §§ 2019, 2111 BGB, and Ersatzaussonderung for identifiable proceeds, § 48 InsO.
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trade secret
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Geschäftsgeheimnis
Geschäftsgeheimnis for a trade secret, now under the GeschGehG of 2019, and the sting is § 2 GeschGehG, information counts as a Geschäftsgeheimnis only if it is protected by angemessene Geheimhaltungsmaßnahmen, reasonable secrecy measures, so a secret left unguarded is no secret in law. Handelsgeheimnis is the machine’s literal miss, and reverse engineering is now generally allowed, § 3 GeschGehG.
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trade tax
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Gewerbesteuer
Gewerbesteuer has no real English counterpart, and trade tax is the label of convenience. It is a municipal tax on business profits levied by the local authority, § 1 GewStG, at a rate the municipality sets itself, the Hebesatz, § 16 GewStG, so it varies from town to town and is charged on top of income or corporation tax. A business that plans only for the taxes it knows will understate its German burden.
Law
trademark
Marke
Marke for a trademark under the MarkenG, but machine output reaches for Warenzeichen, the term German law dropped in 1995, and a modern German lawyer reads it as a generation out of date. A Marke need not even be registered, § 4 MarkenG protects it through registration, through Verkehrsgeltung, or through notoriety. Handelsmarke, a retailer’s own brand, is the wrong sense entirely.
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trust
Treuhand
No German institution matches the trust, so every rendering is a decision. Treuhand is the working equivalent for function, but it carries none of the split ownership, and in German practice the honest choice is often to keep the English word.
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trustee
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Treuhänder
Treuhänder for the everyday holder, but the role-word shifts with the setting: Testamentsvollstrecker for a trustee under a will, §§ 2197 ff. BGB, Verwalter for an administering office. And none of them holds title the way a trustee does, German law has no split ownership.
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VAT
Umsatzsteuer
Umsatzsteuer is the statutory name, § 1 UStG; Mehrwertsteuer is the same tax in everyday and invoice usage, not a different one. Two things an English reader trips on: the recoverable input side is Vorsteuer, § 15 UStG, and American sales tax is not VAT at all.
Law
vicarious liability
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Geschäftsherrenhaftung
Geschäftsherrenhaftung for vicarious liability, § 831 BGB, but the German version is not strict, § 831 Abs. 1 Satz 2 lets the principal escape by proving careful selection and supervision of the Verrichtungsgehilfe, the Exkulpationsbeweis English law does not allow. So a claim that would be watertight against an employer in England can fail in delict, and claimants often reach instead for § 278 BGB in contract, where no such escape exists.
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void
nichtig
Nichtig for void, anfechtbar for voidable, and a third state English has no name for, schwebend unwirksam, the deal hanging until someone ratifies, §§ 108, 177 BGB. Ungültig is the layman’s word and annullierbar the machine’s, neither carries the doctrine.
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warranty
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Gewährleistung
Gewährleistung for the statutory liability for defects, Garantie only where someone promises more on top. The wrong pick turns a routine clause into strict liability.
Law
whereas
Präambel
Präambel is where the recitals go, German contracts open with Vorbemerkung or Präambel and do not head their recitals with a conjunction. Wohingegen is what the machine writes, a mid-sentence contrast word, and a contract that begins WOHINGEGEN has translated the typography and lost the genre.
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withholding tax
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Quellensteuer
Quellensteuer names the mechanism, not a tax: German law withholds through Kapitalertragsteuer on capital income, § 43 EStG, Lohnsteuer on wages, § 38 EStG, and the Abzugsteuer on certain payments to non-residents, § 50a EStG. In German, Quellensteuer often means the foreign tax to be credited, so the word alone leaves the specific tax open.
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without prejudice
unbeschadet
Two phrases share one skin. Without prejudice to a right is unbeschadet, and the machine usually gets that right. Without prejudice on a settlement letter is an evidentiary privilege, and German law has no equivalent, ohne Präjudiz is a gesture, not a shield.
Law
witness
Zeuge
Zeuge for the person, and the English habit of witnessed signatures has no home in German contract form, § 126 BGB runs on signatures and notaries, not on attestation. In witness whereof is Zu Urkund dessen, and the machine’s Zeugnis-versions close the contract like a school report.
Law
works council
Betriebsrat
Betriebsrat for a works council, but the German body is a different order of power, § 87 BetrVG gives it genuine Mitbestimmung, the employer cannot set working time or pay systems against it, and § 102 BetrVG makes a dismissal void where the Betriebsrat was not consulted first. The English works council, an information-and-consultation body, understates all of that.
Law
wrongful trading
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Insolvenzverschleppung
Insolvenzverschleppung for the director’s failure that English law frames as wrongful trading, § 15a InsO, but the mechanisms differ sharply, German law imposes a hard duty to file for insolvency, at the latest three weeks after Zahlungsunfähigkeit or six weeks after Überschuldung, and missing that deadline is a crime, § 15a Abs. 4 InsO, and grounds personal liability to creditors, § 823 Abs. 2 BGB with § 15a InsO. English wrongful trading has no such clock, it asks whether the director carried on with no reasonable prospect of avoiding insolvent liquidation.
Law