Marriage Certificate Translation

A certified marriage certificate translation is a complete rendering of the whole certificate into the target language, delivered with a signed certificate of translation accuracy. Nothing is summarized and nothing is left out, including the registry numbers, the marginal notes, and every seal and stamp on the page. With Eagle Translate the certified service is $24.95 for a page of up to 250 words and comes back in 2 to 3 business days.

What is actually printed on a marriage certificate

A marriage record is short but dense. One sheet usually carries more than twenty separate pieces of information, and a certified translation has to account for all of them.

• The full legal name of each spouse, with any birth or maiden name recorded separately from a married name
• The date and place of birth of each spouse
• The names of the parents of both spouses, often four more names with their own spellings
• The date of the marriage and the exact place, usually a municipality and a civil registry office rather than a church or a venue
• The names of the witnesses and the name and title of the registrar or officiant
• The registration reference, which in most European records is a set of numbers such as volume, page and entry, or book, folio and act
• The date the copy in your hand was issued, which is not the same as the date of the marriage
• Marginal annotations, which can record a later divorce, a death, a legal name change, or a correction to the original entry
• Seals, embossed stamps, security printing, revenue stamps, barcodes, verification codes and signatures

That last line is the one people underestimate. A stamp is content. If the translation does not show it, the translation is not complete.

What a certified marriage certificate translation must show

A complete translation follows the layout of the original closely enough that a reader who does not speak the source language can hold the two side by side and match them line for line. Text that cannot be read is marked as illegible rather than guessed at. Items that are not text, such as stamps, seals, signatures and codes, are described in brackets at the position where they appear, for example [round seal of the Civil Registry of Seville] or [handwritten signature].

Every certified order from Eagle Translate arrives as one PDF. The first page is a Certificate of Translation Accuracy naming the source file, the document type, the language pair, the order reference, the ATA membership number, the date of certification, and the translator who approved and signed it, alongside an approval stamp. A QR code on that page leads to a public record that you or the recipient can check at any time. Our guide on how to check if a certified translation is genuine walks through that step. The translation itself follows on the same letterhead.

What the document is called in each language we work in

We translate between English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Dutch and Turkish, in every direction. Knowing the name of your record helps you confirm you are sending the right one.

• Spanish. Certificado de Matrimonio, or a Certificación Literal de Matrimonio from the Registro Civil, carrying tomo, página and número references
• French. Acte de mariage or Extrait d'acte de mariage from the mairie. The livret de famille is a different booklet and is not a substitute
• German. Eheurkunde or Heiratsurkunde from the Standesamt, with a register number
• Italian. Estratto per riassunto dall'atto di matrimonio, or a Certificato di Matrimonio, issued by the Comune
• Portuguese. Certidão de Casamento, from a Conservatória do Registo Civil in Portugal or a cartório in Brazil
• Dutch. Huwelijksakte, or an Uittreksel uit de huwelijksakte, from the gemeente
• Turkish. Evlenme Kayıt Örneği, or the international family record book known as the Uluslararası Aile Cüzdanı, issued through the Nüfus Müdürlüğü

Every pair between those eight languages is listed on the languages page.

Five things that commonly go wrong

Only one side is scanned. Marginal annotations, apostilles and second stamps are often printed on the reverse. If you do not send it, it cannot be translated, and a recipient comparing the copy against the translation will see the gap.

A short extract is sent when a literal full copy was asked for. An extract and a full literal copy are two different documents from the same registry. A perfect translation of the wrong document is still the wrong document.

Names do not match the passport. A spelling on a civil record can differ from the spelling on a passport, particularly with accents and with Turkish characters such as İ, ş, ğ and ç. The translation reproduces what the source says. If the two differ, say so before the work starts so the translator can handle the transliteration consistently and the difference does not read as an error.

Dates read as ambiguous. A date written 03/07/1998 means March or July depending on where it was issued. A careful translation resolves it rather than copying the digits across.

The certificate itself is too old. Some recipients require a civil record issued within a recent window. Translating an old copy does not refresh it. Check the instruction you were given before you order.

What it costs and how long it takes

There are three service levels, all priced at a flat rate per page, where a page is up to 250 words. Standard is $19.95 a page and takes 3 to 5 business days. Certified is $24.95 a page and takes 2 to 3 business days. Premium is $39.95 a page, is translated ahead of other work, and returns in 1 to 2 business days. Standard is professional translation without a certificate, so if a registrar, court, university or immigration authority is going to read it, choose Certified or Premium. The full comparison is on the services page.

Most single sheet marriage certificates measure as one page. A literal full copy that lists both sets of parents and several marginal notes can measure as two. The price is measured from your real document and shown to you before you pay, so there is no estimate to argue with afterwards. Orders run up to 50 pages, and above that you can reach us through contact.

Before you upload

Scan the whole sheet, front and back, at 300 dpi or better and save it as a PDF, since PDF is the upload format. Include the apostille if one is attached, because it is a separate document with its own text and seal. Do not crop, redact or straighten anything out of the frame. Payment is by card, and the four steps from upload to delivery are set out on how it works.

If a recipient later returns the translation, read our guide on what to do when a translation is rejected before you reorder anything, because most rejections are not about the translation at all.

Start your marriage certificate translation

Upload the certificate, pick the pair, and see the real price before you pay. You can begin at start an order.