Terminology Resources in the Context of a Major Translation Project

The project consisting in the translation into Polish of Community legislation is run by the Office of the Committee for European Integration. It concerns ca. 60 thousand pages (as published in the Official Journal of the European Communities) and it is due to end by mid 2003. The quality of legal translations is the most important factor and a particular approach is adopted in order to ensure terminology consistency and legal correctness of these texts. The project comprises several stages – translation of primary legislation followed by the translation of secondary legislation and finally the translation of case law. Having in mind how important terminology consistency is, not only within one text but also within the whole project, the necessity for the elaboration of common terminology resources became clear. The project team has as its disposal a terminology bank and various specialised thematic collections of terms. The main repository of terms comprises general European vocabulary and is accessible to all free-lance translators.