Complex translations at the imperial court in Constantinople: The Graeco-Latin imperial treaties with Venice from the Late Byzantine period

Abstract

The bilingual-Latin-Greek-documents from the Byzantine imperial chancery provide insight into the work on translating texts with many technical terms in Constantinople. A unique source on translation studies are the treaties between the Byzantine emperor and Venice under the Palaiologan dynasty most of which are preserved in original form in the State Archive of Venice. This study outlines the problems these documents pose in their development and critically discusses the commonly held view on original Greek texts and respective Latin translations. Reflecting the process of negotiating a treaty, the translation runs from Latin to Greek at least in some cases. However, the ultimate result, a bilingual contract, depends on several parameters, so the vocabulary, grammar and any prior contracts and repeated phrases or sentences in each document need to be analysed; furthermore, one must determine whether a phrase originally came from Latin or Greek. The bilingual treaty resulting from a very complex process is termed here ?complex translation?. This article approaches the problem through two case studies. It will be pivotal for further studies to compare the wording of the treaty items with the preceding ones. To facilitate a diachronic overview, the study ends with two lists of the addressed issues.