In Türkiye a sworn translator, yeminli tercüman, is a person who has taken an oath before a notary and for whom that notary has drawn up a record of the oath, the yemin zaptı; the wording of the oath itself was not read in a primary source in this site’s survey. The title is used like a professional qualification, but no central register or state licence behind it was found in this site’s survey; what stands behind it is an oath record kept at one particular notary’s office. That fact sets the limits of the term.
Where the oath is taken and where the record stays
The oath is taken at a notary’s office. Article 96 of the Regulation on the Notaries Law sets the check: the notary has to be satisfied, beyond any doubt, that the translator knows the language, by seeing a diploma or other documents or by other means, and the record states the translator’s name, addresses, education, languages, the basis of the notary’s conviction, the form of the oath and the date. The records are kept on a special card at the notary’s office, and article 56 lists that card among those every office must keep. The translator then signs translations, and the notary certifies the signature under them. The Nilüfer District Governor’s Office describes this link when it writes that the translation is certified at the notary’s office where the oath record is kept. Article 96 adds that a notary may not have a translation made by anyone whose oath record is not on that office’s card, so each office works from its own card. How a notary checks the signature against the record is not described there, and no provision giving a record at one office effect at another was found. Consolidated Circular 23 of the Union of Turkish Notaries (TNB) ties the oath to the notary in the same way: a newly appointed notary has the translators sworn again, even those already sworn before the previous notary. The same circular states that translation is, as a rule, entrusted to a sworn translator, and that a notary’s own translation is the exception.
A person swears, an office cannot
An oath is a promise given by a natural person; a company or a translation office cannot swear. “Sworn translation office” is not a legal status but shorthand for an office that works with sworn translators. No separate state-issued “sworn translator certificate” was found in this site’s survey; the proof that a translator is sworn is the oath record in their name, held at the notary. A claim by an office to be “sworn” in its own right has no basis; the accurate statement names the translator who made the translation and the notary where that translator is sworn. The TNB circular says the same about signing: a translation office or a company cannot make a translation, so the translation is signed by the translator who made it, not by the office.
“The office’s oath record” on district pages
The apostille page of the Nilüfer District Governor’s Office speaks of “the oath record of the translation office or of the translator”. The wording does not mean the office took an oath; it is shorthand for where the records of the office’s translators are kept. When the governor’s office apostilles a notarised translation, what it certifies is the notary’s signature and capacity, as the Onikişubat District Governor’s Office writes; the translator is not the subject of the apostille.
Three French words and Germany’s vereidigter Übersetzer
The French official pages use three words, each in its own context. Page F1400 of service-public.fr asks that a translation to be apostilled be made by a traducteur assermenté; page F1402 asks that a foreign public document be accompanied by a French translation made by a traducteur habilité; page F12956 defines the traducteur agréé as a judicial expert entered on the lists of the cours d’appel and of the Cour de cassation. For translations made abroad, F12956 adds that the consulate’s website lists the translators approved by the local authorities and that the consulate certifies the translator’s signature. The Embassy of France in Türkiye keeps no such list of its own: its translators page, updated on 4 September 2026, says it offers no translation service and links to the website of the Association des Traducteurs en Turquie. Whether a Turkish notarial oath record carries the same weight as a French list entry was not established in this site’s survey; a receiving French office should be asked. The German missions in Türkiye ask for translations by a vereidigter Übersetzer and do not say where the translation has to be made.
Sworn translation and notarised translation are two steps
Signing a translation as a sworn translator and having it certified by a notary are two separate acts, and the notarial certification is the door into the apostille chain. Whether a receiving office takes a translation without the notary’s certificate is that office’s decision; keeping the two acts apart tells the holder which one the office actually asked for.