Idiosyncrasies of German patent translation — part 2

German patent texts are typically characterised by long, intricate sentences packed with technical details. The German language’s system of gender and cases in particular makes the meaning of nested clauses a lot easier to follow and less ambiguous than would be the case with equivalent sentence structure in English.

When translating German patents into English, it is important to ensure that ambiguity is not introduced into the English by rigidly following German sentence structure.

Relative pronouns

In English, relative pronouns (e.g. “which” and “that”) commonly immediately follow the noun or noun clause to which they refer.

With a German sentence like “An der Stirnseite des Gefäßes ist ein Rohr angeordnet, das sich in Richtung des Anlagenauslasses erstreckt”, to use the relative pronoun “which” as a translation of “das” might introduce ambiguity in an English translation: “A tube is arranged on the end face of the vessel, which extends in the direction of the system outlet”. The “which extends” could be misconstrued as referring to “the vessel” rather than the “tube”. In this case, it would be clearer to replace the relative pronoun with the conjunction “and”: “A tube is arranged on the end face of the vessel and extends in the direction of the system outlet”. When translating German patents into English, skill and discernment are needed in knowing when and how a different word order and/or structure is/are required.

In the context of relative pronouns, German’s use of commas to demarcate clauses also means that it is not always immediately apparent when a relative clause is a defining or non-defining relative clause. However, the placement of commas in English is particularly significant since the absence of a comma before a “which” relative clause will signify a defining clause. An understanding of the broader context is essential here to correctly differentiate between defining and non-defining clauses when translating German patents into English. An encompassing view and understanding of the invention by referring to the description, claims and drawings is paramount.

Active/passive voice

German patents heavily rely on passive voice to maintain an objective and formal tone (e.g. “Es wird gezeigt, dass…” = “It is shown that…”), whereas English patents tend to favour a more direct active voice in most cases where possible, often for the sake of readability. The main exception to intentionally rendering passive sentences of the German text as active constructions would most certainly be in the case of patent claims, where there is often less leeway in changing the structure of sentences. The structure of claims has often been chosen deliberately and for legally significant reasons.

As a result of the combination of the passive voice and seemingly ‘superfluous’ relative clauses, the meaning in English can get particularly convoluted if a literal translation is followed. This might be case in sentences using a word form like “durchströmbar” (e.g. “Das System ist mit Kühlmittel durchströmbar, das … zugeführt wird” – “Coolant can flow through the system and is fed …”; the German reads literally as “The system is flowed through by coolant, which is fed […]). In this case, a kind of passive construction in the German is translated with the active voice in the English translation and without the use of a relative clause since the “coolant” is the subject of both clauses.