摘要
英国商人小斯当东1810年首次将《大清律例》系统地译为英文,是为中文法律典籍英译之嚆始。法典英译的早期动机归于在华外国商人考察中国法律、社会、营商环境和保障侨民利益的实际需求,具有功利主义与实用主义取向,与钟威廉一百多年后重译《大清律例》的校正动机有根本差异,与庄为斯翻译《唐律疏议》的比较法学术研究和姜永琳翻译《大明律》以填补中国主要封建法典英译空白的动机也完全不同。翻译动机直接作用于译者的体例编排、词汇选用等层面,且不同翻译的动机作用下的译本也不尽相同。主要封建法典的翻译史构建和翻译动机对译本的影响等讨论,对法律史研究和汉籍翻译史研究具有拓深意义。
This paper offers a historical survey of English translations of the codes of pre-modern Chinese dynasties,looking closely into what had motivated the undertaking of these projects.Our study finds that it is George Thomas Staunton who initiated the practice of rendering pre-modern Chinese legal codes with his 1810 full-text rendition of the Qing Code.His motives for the undertaking were primarily utilitarian and practical,out of the actual needs of foreign merchants in China to know about Chinese laws,observe local customs,evaluate business environment,and safeguard their own interests.While these motives were shared by other early translators of Chinese laws,the motivation became diversified when William Jones retranslated the Qing Code into English over a hundred years later so as to improve on Staunton's imprecise version.This trend toward motivational diversification continues and is also observable in the two cases involving the English translation of the Tang Code and the Ming Code by Wallace Johnson and Jiang Yonglin respectively.Both did so to fill in the gap in English versions of major Chinese dynastic codes and thus to serve the academic interest of comparative law.The changing motivation affects the style and wording of the translations concerned in various ways.A detailed examination of how different motives tend to impact this undertaking differently throws some unique light not just on the development of foreign translations of Chinese classics,but on legal historiography as well.
作者
屈文生
万立
QU Wensheng;WAN Li(East China University of Political Science and Law,Shanghai,China)
出处
《中国翻译》
CSSCI
北大核心
2019年第1期51-59,190,共10页
Chinese Translators Journal
关键词
法典英译动机
大清律例
唐律疏议
大明律
legal translation
motivation
the Qing Code
the Tang Code
the Ming Code
