REMARKS ON THE EVOLUTION OF THE HUNGARIAN LEGAL LANGUAGE (Adalekok a magyar jogi szaknyelv kialakulasanak tortenetehez)

The evolution of professional languages is a long process, sometimes taking centuries. Isolated attempts can be seen in 17-18th century dictionaries, both in Hungary and in other Central European countries, but organized work that proactively interfered with the evolution of language only started in the 19th century, especially in its second half. By this time, neologistic movements had born crystallized results, enabling experts to focus on practical details like the definition of general legal and administrative terms in Hungarian. German had a major influence on the emergence of the legal terminology of specialized areas. The appearance of Hungarian legal terms exhibits three patterns: (1) direct, internal patterns; (2) the adaptation of foreign - primarily Latin - terms; and (3) loan translation. Today's linguistically and conceptually adequate legal terminology was standardized in the 20th century, with the publication of legal encyclopaedias in which definitions were also provided