When I first encountered the word Sale in German, I was irritated, because I thought it had a legal definition in English but not in German, and it left you uncertain as to whether the items on sale were really reduced.
That was probably an oversimplification, and the law has relaxed in Germany at least.

Wikipedia defines Sale as:

Anglizismus für Sonderangebote, insbesondere für den Abverkauf von Saisonware im Saisonschlussverkauf

Die Welt recently had an article “Sale” ist ein nützlicher Proll-Anglizismus (proll = for the hoi polloi (proletariat)). There have been objections to the word, especially by old people, such as the Senioren-Initiative Nürnberg

Die letzten Unterschriftensammlungen zusammen mit dem Verein Deutsche Sprache richteten sich gegen die Umbenennung des „Frankenstadions“ in „Easy Credit Stadion“ und gegen den zunehmenden Gebrauch des Wortes „Sale“ durch den Einzelhandel. Im ersten Fall konnten wir fast 3000 Unterschriften an den Oberbürgermeister unserer Stadt, im zweiten Fall über 4000 Unterschriften an den Einzelhandelsverband übergeben.

Matthias Heine in Die Welt traces the popularity of the word to the reform of competition law in 2004. It filled a gap – it isn’t a Schlussverkauf, nor an Ausverkauf. It is therefore likely to stay with us, unless ousted by the per cent symbol %.

BBC News has a long article by Stephen Evans on The Nazi murder law that still exists. I missed this (thanks, Robin!)

A surviving statute from 1941 means that women who kill their abusive husbands are more likely to be jailed for murder than husbands who beat their wives to death.

According to the German Association of Lawyers, the Nazis decided that a murderer was someone who killed “treacherously” or “sneakily” – “heimtueckisch” is the word in the law and it remains there today.

I did mention this in two 2003 posts, here and here. The 1941 murder definition, which still applies, is based on the mentality of the perpetrator.

The Mordparagraf has been in the news recently, as the minister of justice of Schleswig-Holstein, Anke Spoorendonk (a Dane – there is a Danish party in that Land which is permitted to sit even if it doesn’t pass the five-per-cent hurdle), is campaigning to have the statute changed. Die Zeit:

70 Jahre lang galt in Deutschland die nüchterne Definition des Reichsstrafgesetzbuches von 1871, nach der Mord “die Tödtung mit Überlegung” sei. Aber seit weiteren 70 Jahren gilt die moralisch-charakterliche Definition des NS-Staates, nach der “Mörder” ist, wer “aus niedrigen Beweggründen” töte.

There is no definition of murder, only of the murderer.

Both the BBC and Die Zeit refer to the Marianne Bachmeier case as one where a woman was likely to be found guilty of murder because shooting the killer of her daughter in court behind his back was heimtückisch (deceitful?) – and say that women who kill abusive husbands are more likely to be convicted of murder than men who kill their wives. But I can’t see how Bachmeier would not have been convicted of murder in England – does anyone disagree? She took the gun to the courtroom, shot at the man and then said she hoped he was dead. The defence of provocation would not apply, because so much time had passed since the death.

Heimtücke ist das Mordmerkmal der Schwachen. Wenn Frauen Männer töten, geschieht das deutlich seltener in offener Konfrontation als in der umgekehrten Konstellation.

But in the common law too, there has been criticism of the way women cannot usually rely on the defence of provocation. Sharon Byrd, well-known to translators for her books on legal language and her editing of the Romain dictionary, has written on the subject: Putative Self-Defense and Rules of Imputation. In Defense of the Battered Woman
. (That’s not the Sharon Byrd wanted in connection with the fatal stabbing of her husband).

The English definition of murder is also pretty weird, is still case law from some centuries ago, but has been shaped by the courts in their continuing redefinition of malice aforethought, which sounds as if it applied only to planned killings, but certainly applies to killings in the heat of the moment too – intention is required, not planning. And the German courts have shaped Paragraph 211 too.

Zwar ist der subjektive Ermessensspielraum der Richter längst durch eine Vielzahl von Regelbeispielen eingeschränkt. Aber warum sollte das Problem nur eingeschränkt und nicht behoben werden? In der Fachwelt herrscht Einigkeit, dass der Mord-Paragraf als Täterstrafrecht mit dem tatbestandsorientierten Rechtssystem der Bundesrepublik kaum zu vereinbaren ist.

The Zeit article also looks to Swiss law (also with a definition based on the perpetrator, which dates from 1942 but goes back to 19th-century ideas), and Austrian law, which solves the problem more elegantly. It apparently defines murder as every kind of intentional killing, but allows a wide range of punishments. The only criticism is that the word murder is used for a wide range of homicide offences.

Das österreichische Modell hat aus Soyers Sicht lediglich den Nachteil, “dass bei uns alles Mord heißt”. Warum also nicht von “vorsätzlicher Tötung” als gemeinsamem Grundtatbestand ausgehen? “Das Wort ‘Mord’ sollte man tatsächlich streichen”, sagt der Hamburger Kriminologe Klaus Sessar, und stattdessen lediglich zwischen fahrlässiger und vorsätzlicher Tötung unterscheiden. Der weit gefasste Strafrahmen des österreichischen Mord-Paragrafen erlaubt Strafen, die der jeweiligen Schuld und Tag angemessen sind, vor allem aber verzichtet er auf den Automatismus lebenslanger Haft.

I intended to leave this topic (see recent entry) but now see that the Burns Night festivities in Fürth took place later than I thought. Photos of the event.

Das Bühnenprogramm bot den Zuschauern jede Menge Abwechslung. Jenni Heron sang zum Beispiel Lieder von George Burns.

It’s a long time since I’ve thought about George Burns, who died in 1996. Apparently he was born Nathan Birnbaum, not a very Scottish name.

But I do remember Jenni Heron, not only as a member of Nuremberg’s Scottish Vorzeigefamilie, but as a member of the cast of one of the wonderful musicals put on by the US forces when they were still in Fürth and the base had the biggest military court outside the USA and a small theatre called Stage 13 in Building 13 (all now demolished or converted into flats). One missed the exciting murder trials and the singing and dancing in a small and cavernous theatre.

Some kind of successor to Stage 13 apparently exists, albeit with a British spelling, presenting pantomimes: Theatre 13. And there have been English-language carol services in Erlangen featuring the unfortunately named choir SING A-MOLL.

Last week the suffix -gate was chosen as the German Anglicism of the Year 2013. Unusually, this award recognizes the positive contribution of anglicisms to the German language. -gate has been around a long time, even in German, but was particularly common last year.

I seem to have missed Mopsgate (puggate). And this despite the fact that I recently saw two women and six pugs on the corner. This was explained when I traced a pug breeder to a nearby road. Trevor kindly found a collection of German pug quotations for me.

The story is the disappearance of a 6-kilo gold-painted stone figure of a pug from a monument to Loriot, the stage name of Vicco von Bülow, who famously said that life without a pug is possible, but meaningless. The pug figure was placed on a stele by unknown persons, so it was not physically attached nor part of the original monument. It may have been blown off and shattered.

Stuttgart sucht also weiter einen Mops aus Stein, 27 Zentimeter groß und sechs Kilo schwer. Die Polizei kennt den Fall, hat aber nur so lange ermittelt, bis feststand, dass die Figur nicht zum Denkmal gehört. „Das wäre ja dann ein besonders schwerer Fall von Diebstahl“, sagte ein Sprecher. Es liege keine Anzeige vor. „Keine Beschädigten, keine Beschuldigten, keine Straftat – so ist das bei der Polizei.“

There is a lot of literature about pugs in German, not just by Jandl. I remember from Boris Godunov ein Mops kam in die Küche und stahl dem Koch ein Ei, but I am indebted to Trevor for the other link. And apparently Queen Victoria had multiple pugs (why did the Queen descend to corgis?)

I have to admit I have sometimes thought Franconians were like Scots because they are equally dour. (I’m allowed to say this for reasons of ancestry).

It feels a bit odd, though, to read of a gentleman from Fürth who is fixated on a kilt. And not a sensible kilt with tool pockets but a thing out of tartan. Martha (his surname) seems to equate the English with the Bavarians and regard them as enemies.

Martha ist überzeugt, „dass wir Franken die Schotten Bayerns sind“. Schotten und Engländer würden sich hassen, Bayern und Franken sich auch nicht unbedingt liebhaben, argumentiert er.

He bought his kilt from Andreas Hertl, another Fürth scotophile.

It’s not surprising, then, that there’s at least one Franconian tartan.

August 1997. Designed by (or for?) the Highland Circle – a group of Malt Whisky drinkers in Franconia, Germany. Sample in Scottish Tartans Authority’s Johnston Collection and Lochcarron swatch. Scottish Tartans Society notes say designed by members of the Highland Circle and produced by Hugh MacPherson of Edinburgh. Blue & green lightened to show sett.

There are even Catalan tartans.

On 6 January there was actually a lawyers’ strike protesting against cuts in criminal legal aid.

For some reason I had missed this wonderful song by a practising barrister: The Ballad of Legal Aid. Watch and listen!

But the topic is a popular one in music, as shown by this clip promoting legal aid in Bangla Desh (the Bengali term is ‘legal aid’, and ‘hotline number’ can also be heard).

Thanks to Trevor