''Mutatis mutandis'' is a

Medieval Latin Medieval Latin was the form of Literary Latin used in Roman Catholic Church, Roman Catholic Western Europe during the Middle Ages. It was also the administrative language in the former Western Roman Empire, Roman Provinces of Mauretania, Numidi ...

phrase meaning "with things changed that should be changed" or "once the necessary changes have been made", literally: having been changed, going to be changed. It continues to be seen as a foreign-origin phrase (and thus, unnaturalized, meaning not integrated as part of native vocabulary) in English and is therefore usually italicized in writing. It is used in many countries to acknowledge that a comparison being made requires certain obvious alterations, which are left unstated. It is not to be confused with the similar ''

ceteris paribus ' (also spelled ') (Classical ) is a Latin phrase, meaning "other things equal"; some other English translations of the phrase are "all other things being equal", "other things held constant", "all else unchanged", and "all else being equal". ...

'', which excludes any changes other than those explicitly mentioned. ''Mutatis mutandis'' is still used in

law Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior, with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been variously described as a science and as the ar ...

economics Economics () is a behavioral science that studies the Production (economics), production, distribution (economics), distribution, and Consumption (economics), consumption of goods and services. Economics focuses on the behaviour and interac ...

mathematics Mathematics is a field of study that discovers and organizes methods, Mathematical theory, theories and theorems that are developed and Mathematical proof, proved for the needs of empirical sciences and mathematics itself. There are many ar ...

linguistics Linguistics is the scientific study of language. The areas of linguistic analysis are syntax (rules governing the structure of sentences), semantics (meaning), Morphology (linguistics), morphology (structure of words), phonetics (speech sounds ...

and

philosophy Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

. In particular, in

logic Logic is the study of correct reasoning. It includes both formal and informal logic. Formal logic is the study of deductively valid inferences or logical truths. It examines how conclusions follow from premises based on the structure o ...

, it is encountered when discussing counterfactuals, as a shorthand for all the initial and derived changes which have been previously discussed.

Latin

The phrase '—now sometimes written ' to show

vowel length In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived or actual length (phonetics), duration of a vowel sound when pronounced. Vowels perceived as shorter are often called short vowels and those perceived as longer called long vowels. On one hand, many ...

—does not appear in surviving

classical literature Classics, also classical studies or Ancient Greek and Roman studies, is the study of classical antiquity. In the Western world, ''classics'' traditionally refers to the study of Ancient Greek and Roman literature and their original languages, ...

. It is

''Oxford English Dictionary'', 3rd ed. 'mutatis mutandis, ''adv. Oxford University Press (Oxford), 2003. in origin and the Feet of fines, kept at

The National Archives (United Kingdom) The National Archives (TNA; ) is a non-ministerial government department, non-ministerial department of the Government of the United Kingdom. Its parent department is the Department for Culture, Media and Sport of the United Kingdom, United K ...

, contains its first use in England on January 20, 1270, at Pedes Finium, 54 Hen. III, Salop. Both words are

participle In linguistics, a participle (; abbr. ) is a nonfinite verb form that has some of the characteristics and functions of both verbs and adjectives. More narrowly, ''participle'' has been defined as "a word derived from a verb and used as an adject ...

s of the

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

verb A verb is a word that generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual description of English, the basic f ...

' ('to move; to change; to exchange'). ' is its perfect passive participle ('changed; having been changed'). ' is its gerundive, which functions both as a

future The future is the time after the past and present. Its arrival is considered inevitable due to the existence of time and the laws of physics. Due to the apparent nature of reality and the unavoidability of the future, everything that currently ex ...

passive participle ('to be changed; going to be changed') and as a verbal adjective or noun expressing necessity ('needing to be changed; things needing to be changed'). The phrase is an ablative absolute, using the

ablative case In grammar, the ablative case (pronounced ; list of glossing abbreviations, abbreviated ) is a grammatical case for nouns, pronouns, and adjectives in the grammars of various languages. It is used to indicate motion away from something, make ...

to show that the clause is grammatically independent ('absolute' literally meaning 'dissolved' or 'separated') from the rest of the sentence.

English

''Mutatis mutandis'' was first borrowed into English in the 16th century, but continues to be italicized as a foreign phrase. Although many similar

adverbial phrase In linguistics, an ''adverbial phrase'' ("AdvP") is a multi-word expression operating adverbially: its syntactic function is to modify other expressions, including verbs, adjectives, adverbs, adverbials, and sentences. Some grammars use the ...

s are treated as part of the sentence, ''mutatis mutandis'' is usually set apart by

comma The comma is a punctuation mark that appears in several variants in different languages. Some typefaces render it as a small line, slightly curved or straight, but inclined from the vertical; others give it the appearance of a miniature fille ...

s or in some other fashion. The nearest English equivalent to an ablative absolute is the nominative absolute, so that a literal translation will either use the

nominative case In grammar, the nominative case ( abbreviated ), subjective case, straight case, or upright case is one of the grammatical cases of a noun or other part of speech, which generally marks the subject of a verb, or (in Latin and formal variants ...

("things changed which are to be changed") or a

preposition Adpositions are a part of speech, class of words used to express spatial or temporal relations (''in, under, towards, behind, ago'', etc.) or mark various thematic relations, semantic roles (''of, for''). The most common adpositions are prepositi ...

("with the things to be changed having been changed"). More often, the idea is expressed more tersely ("with the necessary changes") or using subordinating conjunctions and a

dependent clause A dependent clause, also known as a subordinate clause, subclause or embedded clause, is a certain type of clause that juxtaposes an independent clause within a complex sentence. For instance, in the sentence "I know Bette is a dolphin", the claus ...

("once the necessary adjustments are made"). The phrase has a technical meaning in

where it is sometimes used to signal that a proof can be more generally applied to other certain cases after making some, presumably obvious, changes. It serves a similar purpose to the more common phrase, " without loss of generality" (WLOG). The legal use of the term is somewhat specialized. As glossed by

Shira Scheindlin Shira Ann Scheindlin (; née Joffe; born August 16, 1946) is an American attorney and jurist who served as a United States federal judge, United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. She ...

, judge for the Southern District of New York, for a 1998 case: "This Latin phrase simply means that the necessary changes in details, such as names and places, will be made but everything else will remain the same." In the wake of the Plain English movements, some countries attempted to replace their law codes'

legal Latin A number of Latin terms are used in law, legal terminology and legal maxims. This is a partial list of these terms, which are wholly or substantially drawn from Latin, or anglicized Law Latin. __TOC__ Common law Civil law Ecclesia ...

with English equivalents.

Examples

* "I believe the soul in Paradise must enjoy something nearer to a perpetual vigorous adulthood than to any other state we know. At least that is my hope. Not that Paradise could disappoint, but I believe Boughton is right to enjoy the imagination of heaven as the best pleasure of this world. I don't see how he can be entirely wrong, approaching it that way. I certainly don't mind the thought of your mother finding me a strong young man. There is neither male nor female, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but, ''mutatis mutandis'', it would be a fine thing. That ''mutandis''! Such a burden on one word!"—

Marilynne Robinson Marilynne Summers Robinson (born November 26, 1943) is an American novelist and essayist. Across her writing career, Robinson has received numerous awards, including the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2005, National Humanities Medal in 2012, and th ...

, '' Gilead''. *"To illustrate the point with trivial stereotypical examples from British society: just as male heterosexuals are free to enjoy themselves playing rugby, drinking beer and talking about girls with their mates, so male homosexuals are to be free to enjoy themselves going to Kylie concerts, drinking exotically coloured cocktails and talking about boys with their straight female mates. ''Mutatis mutandis''—and in many cases the adaptations would obviously be great—the same must apply to other societies. In other words,

gay men Gay men are male homosexuals. Some bisexual men, bisexual and homoromantic men may dually identify as ''gay'' and a number of gay men also identify as ''queer''. Historic terminology for gay men has included ''Sexual inversion (sexology), in ...

are to be as free as their straight equivalents in the society concerned to live their lives in the way that is natural to them as gay men, without the fear of persecution."— Lord Rodger of Earlsferry, '' HJ and HT v Home Secretary'', British Supreme Court, 2010

Other languages

The phrase appears in other European languages as well. A passage of Marcel Proust's '' À la recherche du temps perdu'' includes "...j'ai le fils d'un de mes amis qui, mutatis mutandis, est comme vous..." ("A friend of mine has a son whose case, ''mutatis mutandis'', is very much like yours.") The German Ministry of Justice, similar to the Plain English advocates above, now eschews its use. Their official English translation of the

Civil Code A civil code is a codification of private law relating to property law, property, family law, family, and law of obligations, obligations. A jurisdiction that has a civil code generally also has a code of civil procedure. In some jurisdiction ...

now reads:

"Section 27 (Appointment of and management by the board). ...(3) The management by the board is governed by the provisions on mandate in sections 664 to 670 ''with the necessary modifications.''"

In popular culture

The phrase is used as the motto of Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters from the

X-Men The X-Men are a superhero team in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by writer/editor Stan Lee and artist/co-plotter Jack Kirby, the team first appeared in Uncanny X-Men, ''The X-Men'' #1 (September 1963). Although initial ...

Marvel Comics Marvel Comics is a New York City–based comic book publishing, publisher, a property of the Walt Disney Company since December 31, 2009, and a subsidiary of Disney Publishing Worldwide since March 2023. Marvel was founded in 1939 by Martin G ...

References