Date: 10 Oct 2001 16:36:49 +0200 From: Dag-Erling Smorgrav <des@ofug.org> To: tlambert2@mindspring.com Cc: Unhappy Adobe Customer <bsd_appliance@yahoo.com>, freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: SSSCA? Message-ID: <xzpg08rh88u.fsf@flood.ping.uio.no> In-Reply-To: <3BC410E4.ACF8074B@mindspring.com> References: <20011008193423.77229.qmail@web11901.mail.yahoo.com> <3BC34784.4D56D9DF@mindspring.com> <xzplmikcop2.fsf@flood.ping.uio.no> <3BC404A6.89276494@mindspring.com> <xzphet7dgra.fsf@flood.ping.uio.no> <3BC410E4.ACF8074B@mindspring.com>
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Terry Lambert <tlambert2@mindspring.com> writes:
> I think that you lose something in the translation from Latin
> to German to English.
There is no German involved here. My primary language is French, but
I speak English well enough to have passed for a native in both the UK
and the US.
> In colloquial usage for legal purposes,
I would hardly refer to a term that is actually used (twice) in the US
constitution as "colloquial".
Article I, Section 9, third alinea: "No Bill of Attainder or ex post
facto Law shall be passed."
Article I, Section 10, first alinea: "No State shall [pass any] ex
post facto Law"
> "Ex pos facto" refers to a law enacted after the fact not being
Once again, neither "i pos facto" nor "ex pos facto" have any meaning.
The expression you are thinking of is "ex post facto".
> applicable to an act which was not a crime before the law was
> enacted, and which occurred before it was enacted.
>
> A literal translation from my Latin dictionary is:
>
> ex = (prep. + abl.) out of, from within, from / on account of
> post = (+ acc.) after, behind
> factum = deed, accomplishment, work, act, achievement
>
> == on account of after accomplishment
No, in this sense it's "fact", not "accomplishment". The most direct
English translation of "factum" is probably "deed", as "factum" means
literally "something that has been done". The English word "fact"
itself is a bastardization of either "factum" or the French equivalent
"fait" (which itself is derived from the same root as "factum") but is
most commonly used to mean "datum" or "truth".
Although "ex post facto" is the accepted spelling today, it is
actually a bastardization of "ex postfacto", where "postfacto" is the
ablative of "postfactum", a composite word (from "post" and "factum",
obviously) meaning "something that is done later".
"I pos facto", on the other hand, doesn't mean anything at all. It
probably stems from your confusing "ex post facto" with "ipso facto"
("consequently" or "in and of itself") which is probably a contraction
of "ex ipso facto" meaning "due to this very fact" or "due to the fact
itself".
DES
--
Dag-Erling Smorgrav - des@ofug.org
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