''Mutatis mutandis'' is a Medieval Latin phrase meaning "with things changed that should be changed" or "once the necessary changes have been made". It remains unnaturalized 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 '; () 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". A statement ...

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

mathematics Mathematics is an area of knowledge that includes the topics of numbers, formulas and related structures, shapes and the spaces in which they are contained, and quantities and their changes. These topics are represented in modern mathematics ...

, linguistics and

philosophy Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Some ...

. In particular, in logic, it is encountered when discussing

counterfactuals Counterfactual conditionals (also ''subjunctive'' or ''X-marked'') are conditional sentences which discuss what would have been true under different circumstances, e.g. "If Peter believed in ghosts, he would be afraid to be here." Counterfactual ...

, 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—does not appear in surviving

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

. It is Medieval Latin''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), contains its first use in England on January 20, 1270, at Pedes Finium, 54 Hen. III, Salop. Both words are participles of the Latin verb ' ('to move; to change; to exchange'). ' is its

perfect Perfect commonly refers to: * Perfection, completeness, excellence * Perfect (grammar), a grammatical category in some languages Perfect may also refer to: Film * Perfect (1985 film), ''Perfect'' (1985 film), a romantic drama * Perfect (2018 f ...

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 ...

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 ; sometimes abbreviated ) is a grammatical case for nouns, pronouns, and adjectives in the grammars of various languages; it is sometimes used to express motion away from something, among other uses. T ...

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. Adverbial phrases can be divi ...

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. It has the same shape as an apostrophe or single closing quotation mark () in many typefaces, but it differs from them in being placed on the baseline ...

s or in some other fashion. The nearest English equivalent to an ablative absolute is the

nominative absolute In English grammar, a nominative absolute is a free-standing (absolute) part of a sentence that describes the main subject and verb. It consists of a noun in the common case or a pronoun in the nominative case joined with a predicate that does n ...

, so that a literal translation will either use the nominative case ("those things which need to be changed having been changed") or a

preposition Prepositions and postpositions, together called adpositions (or broadly, in traditional grammar, simply prepositions), are a class of words used to express spatial or temporal relations (''in'', ''under'', ''towards'', ''before'') or mark various ...

("with the things needing 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 subordinate clause, dependent clause, subclause, or embedded clause is a clause that is embedded within a complex sentence. For instance, in the English sentence "I know that Bette is a dolphin", the clause "that Bette is a dolphin" occurs as t ...

("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 A. Scheindlin (; born 1946) is an American attorney and jurist who served as a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. Early life and education Scheindlin was born in Washing ...

, judge for the Southern District of

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

, 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 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, '' 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 and homoromantic men may also dually identify as gay, and a number of young gay men also identify as queer. Historically, gay men have been referred to by a number of different terms, including ' ...

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 ''HJ (Iran) and HT (Cameroon) v Secretary of State for the Home Department'' 2010_Judgments_of_the_Supreme_Court_of_the_United_Kingdom.html" ;"title="/nowiki> 2010.html" ;"title="2010 Judgments of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom">2010">2 ...

'', British Supreme Court, 2010

Other languages

The phrase appears in other European languages as well. A passage of

Marcel Proust Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust (; ; 10 July 1871 – 18 November 1922) was a French novelist, critic, and essayist who wrote the monumental novel ''In Search of Lost Time'' (''À la recherche du temps perdu''; with the previous Eng ...

's '' Remembrance of Things Past'' 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, family, and obligations. A jurisdiction that has a civil code generally also has a code of civil procedure. In some jurisdictions with a civil code, a number of the core ar ...

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 The X-Mansion or Xavier Institute is the common name for a mansion and research institute appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The mansion is depicted as the private estate of Charles Francis Xavier, a character in X-Me ...

from the X-Men Marvel Comics.

References