We translate civil register extracts, certificates of no criminal record and of citizenship, diplomas and supplements, Central Register extracts, court decisions, powers of attorney, sports contracts and medical documents from Macedonian into Georgian and from Georgian into Macedonian. The translation is certified by a Georgian notary, who confirms the authenticity of the signature of a translator registered for Macedonian. A standard personal document is ready in 1 working day, and a notarised translation of a document received during working hours can be done as an express order in 1-2 hours. North Macedonia and Georgia are both parties to the Apostille Convention and there are no resident embassies between the two countries, so the only route for a document is an apostille in the issuing country plus a notarised translation, and consular legalization is not needed in either direction. Send us a scan of the document online or bring it to our office at 115 Davit Aghmashenebeli Avenue; before translating we ask for a copy of the Latin-script passport entry, so that the names match the passport.
The Macedonian alphabet, names and surnames
Macedonian Cyrillic has 31 letters, and several of them exist only in Macedonian or have a different value in other Slavic alphabets: Ѓ (soft g), Ќ (soft k), Ѕ (dz), Џ (j), Љ and Њ (soft l and n, shared with Serbian). Someone reading with Russian logic takes Ѓ for g, Ќ for k and Ѕ for the Latin S, and the name Ѓорѓи or the surname Ќосев gets transcribed wrongly. Macedonian has no Й, Щ, Ъ, Ы, Ь, Э, Ю, Я, so a text typed on a Russian keyboard is spotted at once.
The Latin entry in a Macedonian passport follows the official transliteration (Ѓ - Gj, Ќ - Kj, Ѕ - Dz, Џ - Dj, Ж - Zh, Ч - Ch, Ш - Sh, Ц - C), and a Georgian residence card, bank and the Public Registry rely on exactly that entry. We build the Georgian transcription from it: Ѓорѓи (Gjorgji) becomes Giorgi, Ќосев (Kjosev) Kiosevi. Names of Greek and Slavic origin (Ѓорѓи, Кирил, Методиј) tempt one to use the familiar Georgian form, but the transcription follows the passport, not tradition. Changing the transcription after certification means certifying the whole document again.
Macedonian surnames change with gender: Стојановски and Стојановска, Петров and Петрова, Ѓорѓиев and Ѓорѓиева. The surnames of members of one family stay in their different forms in the translation, without being made uniform, and we add a note to the translation of a marriage certificate that these are gender variants of one surname. In the opposite direction, the Macedonian alphabet cannot render the Georgian sounds gh, q, ts', ch' and kh exactly (gh often becomes Г, q К, kh Х), so we agree the Cyrillic form of a Georgian name with the client's international passport and keep it throughout the package.
Macedonia or North Macedonia: the date decides
Since February 2019, after the Prespa Agreement took effect, the country's official name has been the Republic of North Macedonia. On a birth certificate, diploma or court decision issued earlier, and on the seals too, the name Република Македонија appears, and this is not corrected in the translation: a notarised translation reproduces the original, and in the translator's note we state that the issuing state is today the Republic of North Macedonia. This note is enough for a Georgian authority, so that two names in one package raise no question. The name of the language, Macedonian, stayed unchanged.
Why a Bulgarian or Serbian translator will not do
Macedonian, Bulgarian and Serbian are mutually intelligible in conversation, and clients are often offered a translator of a similar language. For an official document this is unusable: a Georgian notary registers a translator for a specific language, and a translator registered for Bulgarian or Serbian cannot sign the translation of a Macedonian document. The linguistic difference is real too: Macedonian has no cases, has three definite articles (-от, -ов, -он), its verb has a category of witnessed and non-witnessed past that separates direct and indirect information in court testimony, and there are many false friends: година is only year, право means both law and straight, збор is word, брак is marriage. With us a Macedonian translation is done by a translator registered for Macedonian and edited by a specialist in Balkan languages.
Notarised translation into and from Macedonian
Two systems: the court translator and the Georgian notary
In North Macedonia an official translation is made by a permanent court translator (постојан судски преведувач), appointed by the Ministry of Justice for a specific language and holding their own seal; a notary (нотар) there certifies signatures, copies and transactions, not translations. In Georgia there is no court-translator status: the notary confirms the authenticity of the translator's signature, not the content of the translation. The two systems do not recognise each other automatically. A document translated under the seal of a Macedonian court translator is not accepted by a Georgian authority without Georgian notarisation, although it can serve as the basis for our translation. A Georgian notarised translation is accepted in North Macedonia together with the apostilled original, though some authorities require an additional certification by a local court translator, who checks our finished text instead of translating it again.
At certification the notary checks the translator's registration for Macedonian, binds the copy of the original with the translation, numbers the pages and puts the certification note with the register number on the last page, stating the source and target languages; this fact can be verified in the Notary Chamber's electronic register. One document often goes to several authorities in Georgia, and an authority keeps the certified copy in its file, so certify as many copies from the start as you have recipients.
The apostille in North Macedonia: courts and the Ministry of Justice
North Macedonia is a party to the Apostille Convention as a successor of Yugoslavia, and Georgia has been since 2007. According to the Hague Conference, the competent apostille authorities in North Macedonia are the Ministry of Justice and the first-instance basic courts (основен суд), a Yugoslav tradition that often surprises clients. A birth register extract, a citizenship certificate, a notarial act, a diploma and a court decision are often apostilled at a basic court, and we confirm the specific authority with the Macedonian side in advance. If a Macedonian document lacks an apostille, it can only be added in North Macedonia: adding an apostille to a Macedonian document in Georgia is impossible.
The apostille on a Georgian document
A Georgian original receives its apostille from the Public Service Development Agency (applications are also accepted at the Public Service Hall). The sequence is always the same: first the apostille is placed on the original, then the document is translated into Macedonian including the apostille, and finally the notary certifies the authenticity of the translator's signature. In Georgia no apostille is placed on the notarised translation itself: under the Agency's list, the notarial certification of a translation or of a copy cannot be apostilled. Nor can an identity document or its copy be apostilled (the exception is a copy of a Georgian passport certified by the issuing authority), nor a driving licence or a certificate from a private company, except medical and educational institutions. If the recipient requires a translation certified with an apostille, the alternative is the Agency's own service, which translates a document subject to apostille itself and certifies that translation with an apostille, or a local court translator. The document route and the apostille page will help you plan.
Bilingual and Yugoslav-era documents
Under the 2019 law on languages, Albanian is used as a second official language in North Macedonia, and authorities of some municipalities of Tetovo, Gostivar, Kičevo, Struga and Skopje issue documents on Macedonian-Albanian forms, while diplomas of South East European University in Tetovo are trilingual. The Albanian part is a separate language and needs a separate registration: one translator with both registrations, or two translators with two signatures in one package, and both source languages appear in the certification note (on Albanian, see our Albanian language page). Documents issued before 1991 may be on Serbo-Croatian forms with entries in Macedonian, and in that case both languages are clearly marked in the translation.
EMBG, seals and electronic extracts
Most Macedonian documents carry the 13-digit unique citizen number ЕМБГ (единствен матичен број на граѓанинот), whose first seven digits are the date of birth. We carry this number, the passport number, the register entry number and the form series over unchanged and explain the abbreviation in Georgian, and the editor compares the translation with the original character by character before it goes to the notary. Seals are often bilingual or show the old name, and we translate the outer ring and centre of the seal and the marginal notes. A Central Register extract and some certificates are issued with an electronic signature and no seal; in the translation we state the electronic signature data and the verification link, so that a Georgian authority does not see the missing seal as a defect.
Why a Macedonian translation is returned
In work done elsewhere we most often see: the signature of a Bulgarian or Serbian translator, which the notary or the authority did not accept; the letters Ѓ, Ќ, Ѕ, Џ transcribed with Russian logic; the state's name corrected instead of explained in a note; the Albanian part left out; a Macedonian court translator's translation submitted without Georgian certification; the apostille fields left untranslated. Each of these can be fixed without translating from scratch: we establish the reason for the rejection, correct that part and certify again, and if the original lacks an apostille, we explain in writing what you need to bring from North Macedonia.
Translation in both directions
From Macedonian into Georgian
Citizens of North Macedonia enter Georgia without a visa, but residence, marriage, study, employment, a sports contract or registering a company require a notarised Georgian translation. What comes most often: birth, marriage and death register extracts (извод од матичната книга), a citizenship certificate (уверение за државјанство), a certificate of no criminal record (уверение за неосудуваност), a diploma with supplement (додаток на диплома), a Central Register extract (тековна состојба), a power of attorney (полномошно) and medical certificates. Yugoslav administrative vocabulary (извод is an extract, уверение a certificate, решение a decision or ruling, правосилност entry into legal force) takes the Georgian equivalent in the form established in Georgian legislation. In this direction the translation is done by a native Georgian translator.
From Georgian into Macedonian: Macedonian or English
The state authorities of North Macedonia require official documents in Macedonian, and an English translation is not automatically accepted in civil registry, residence, nostrification, Central Register and court procedures. English is enough for international university programmes, private companies and some banks. Georgian realities (the Public Service Hall, the Public Registry, the Public Service Development Agency) are translated descriptively or with a Macedonian functional equivalent, and Georgian case constructions are rendered with prepositions in Macedonian. In this direction the translation is done by a native Macedonian translator, and a Georgian editor checks that the legal nuances of the original have been understood correctly.
Dates, currency and addresses
A Macedonian document writes dates in the day.month.year format, often with the word година after the year (12.05.2019 година), which in translation is simply year. The currency is the denar (MKD, ден.), the euro also appears in contracts, and we keep amounts without conversion. An address includes the street (ул.), boulevard (бул.) and municipality (општина), and Skopje is divided into several municipalities whose names are part of the address; we keep the original form and add a Georgian transcription in brackets.
Typical scenarios: residence, marriage, study, a child
For a residence permit, a Macedonian citizen submits notarised translations of the passport, a certificate of no criminal record and a document proving the grounds to the Agency; the criminal record certificate comes from a basic court or the Ministry of Internal Affairs. For marriage in Georgia, the Public Service Hall requires a certificate that the person is not married (уверение за слободна брачна состојба), with an apostille and a notarised translation, and the Georgian marriage certificate is then apostilled and translated into Macedonian for the register of North Macedonia. The Macedonian university grading scale is 5-10 (5 is a fail) and the school scale 1-5, and we add an explanatory note to the diploma translation for diploma recognition; recognition of a Georgian diploma in North Macedonia (нострификација) is handled by the Ministry of Education and Science. A parent's consent for a child to travel (согласност) is drawn up at a notary in North Macedonia, apostilled at a basic court and translated into Georgian, with the identity of the accompanying person, the period and the countries carried over unchanged.
Legal and medical translation
The legal system and companies
The law of North Macedonia belongs to the continental tradition: the Law on Obligations (Закон за облигационите односи) is the successor of the Yugoslav law of 1978, the Law on Trade Companies (Закон за трговските друштва) is adapted to European directives, the notariat has been private since 1998, and enforcement is carried out by private enforcement agents (извршители). ДОО is an LLC, ДООЕЛ a single-member LLC, АД a joint-stock company, ТП a sole trader. The Central Register (Централен регистар) is at the same time the business register and the register of pledges, leasing and annual accounts, and this is explained in the translation. To register a subsidiary of a ДОО or ДООЕЛ in Georgia, the Public Registry requires notarised translations of the Central Register extract, the founding act and the document confirming the director's powers; we keep the company name in transliteration and explain the legal form in brackets. Details: extract from the registry.
Court acts, powers of attorney and real estate
The court system has three tiers: the basic court (основен суд), the court of appeal (апелационен суд) and the Supreme Court (Врховен суд). In the translation of a court decision we keep the full name of the court, the case number in the Macedonian format (П.бр., К.бр.), the note of entry into force (правосилност) and the exact wording of the operative part; the terms тужба (claim), тужител (claimant), тужен (defendant), пресуда (judgment) and жалба (appeal) are chosen according to Georgian procedural legislation. Translating решение uniformly as decision is a mistake: depending on context it is a ruling, an order or an administrative act. An order of a private enforcement agent does not correspond to the Georgian enforcement bureau and is explained in the translation. A Georgian power of attorney for North Macedonia is first apostilled and then translated into Macedonian, and we draft the text from the start so that the specific list of powers matches local practice. Ownership of real estate in North Macedonia is confirmed by the cadastre agency with a property sheet (имотен лист), which is translated with the functional equivalent of a Public Registry extract, keeping the original term.
Sports contracts
Transfers of Georgian and Macedonian athletes between the two countries are the most frequent category of legal translation. A contract covers remuneration, bonuses, image rights, the agent's commission, transfer compensation, solidarity contributions and the dispute resolution body. The terms of international federations read the same in both languages, but national federation rules differ, so we keep the original term and add the Georgian equivalent. The Georgian federation requires the Georgian version and the Macedonian one the Macedonian version, and deadlines are limited by the transfer window, so we prepare the documents for both directions in parallel, with one transcription.
Medical documents and FZOM
Healthcare in North Macedonia is built on compulsory insurance managed by the Health Insurance Fund (Фонд за здравствено осигурување, ФЗОМ), and the patient has a family doctor (матичен лекар). The document formats follow the Yugoslav tradition: the discharge letter (отпусно писмо), which corresponds to the Georgian discharge summary and not to a release letter, the specialist report (специјалистички извештај), the doctor's certificate (лекарско уверение) and the vaccination card. North Macedonia uses ICD-10, as Georgia does, and we keep the codes unchanged, write medicines by their international non-proprietary names, and the translation is read by an editor with medical training. The report and invoices of a Macedonian patient treated at a Georgian clinic are translated into Macedonian for the FZOM, with exact correspondence of procedure names; reimbursement of treatment abroad has to be agreed with the fund in advance. The Macedonian vaccination schedule differs from the Georgian one in several items, so for a kindergarten or school we translate vaccine names with Georgian equivalents, keeping the originals.
Simultaneous and consecutive interpreting
When Macedonian and when English
Business delegations, academic staff and the younger generation of North Macedonia speak English fluently, and at a conference or a university visit an English interpreter is often enough. A Macedonian interpreter is essential when a procedure requires the party's native language (court, notary, Public Service Hall, residence interview), when a participant prefers Macedonian (athletes, the older generation) and in family, medical or sensitive negotiations. A Serbian or Bulgarian interpreter will not do for an official procedure, because from Georgian they interpret into Serbian or Bulgarian. An Albanian-speaking Macedonian citizen, for whom Macedonian is a second language, may need an Albanian interpreter in an official procedure, and in that case we send one.
At a notary and in court
A Georgian notary must make sure that a foreign party understands the content of the transaction. Buying a flat, founding a company, issuing a power of attorney, a marriage contract or a consent for a child to travel with the participation of a Macedonian citizen requires an interpreter, and the interpreter's signature becomes part of the act. If the party clearly speaks English, the notary also accepts English, and the choice belongs to the party. In court the interpreter is warned of liability for a false interpretation and conveys what is said word for word, without softening.
Simultaneous, consecutive and remote
At a business meeting, in a club office or at a clinic the consecutive format works, and for one or two Macedonian-speaking participants whispered interpreting or a portable system. The simultaneous format is used at large forums and at European integration, church and cultural events; two interpreters in a booth take turns every 20-30 minutes, an English channel is almost always needed, and in a relay scheme the other booths use the English or Georgian channel of the Macedonian booth. Macedonian simultaneous interpreters are few in Georgia, so where needed we connect an interpreter remotely from Skopje, on a separate Zoom language channel or an RSI platform. Skopje is two hours behind Tbilisi in summer and three in winter, and we take this into account when planning an online meeting.
Booking and preparation
Book a simultaneous event three to four weeks ahead, and an interpreter for a notary or court a few days ahead; the minimum booking for a short visit is one hour. The interpreter needs the programme, a list of participants with their language preference (Macedonian, English, Albanian), and presentations and draft contracts at least three to four days in advance. From these materials we prepare a glossary in Macedonian, English and Georgian. At church events and for pilgrim groups the interpreter knows Church Slavonic and liturgical vocabulary, which must match Georgian church terminology exactly.
Official sources
- Public Service Development Agency: apostille and legalization: which Georgian documents can be apostilled, which cannot, and the processing times
- Hague Conference: Apostille Convention contracting parties: the current list of countries: apostille or consular legalization
- Hague Conference: the competent apostille authorities of North Macedonia (the Ministry of Justice and the first-instance courts)
Frequently asked questions
Can a Bulgarian or Serbian translator translate a Macedonian document?
Not for an official document. A Georgian notary registers a translator for a specific language, and the translation of a Macedonian document must be signed by a translator registered for Macedonian.
My birth certificate bears the name Republic of Macedonia. Is this a problem?
No. The document is translated with the name it bears, and in the translator's note we state that since 2019 the issuing state has been the Republic of North Macedonia.
Does a Macedonian document need embassy legalization?
No, both countries are parties to the Apostille Convention. In North Macedonia the apostille is placed by a basic court or the Ministry of Justice, and that is enough, so the absence of a resident embassy is not a problem.
A Macedonian court translator has already translated my document. Will it be accepted in Georgia?
Not without Georgian notarisation. Georgian authorities require a translation certified by a Georgian notary, while the Macedonian court translation can serve as the basis for our translation and save time.
Does North Macedonia accept a translation certified by a Georgian notary?
Yes, if the Georgian original carries an apostille and the translation also covers the text of the apostille. Some authorities require an additional certification by a local court translator, who uses our translation as the basis.
Can an apostille be placed on my notarised translation?
No, in Georgia the notarial certification of a translation cannot be apostilled. The apostille goes on the Georgian original before translation, and if the recipient requires a translation certified with an apostille, the Agency certifies its own translation with an apostille.
My document is bilingual, Macedonian and Albanian. Are both parts translated?
Yes, from both languages. The Albanian part is certified by a translator registered for Albanian, or by one translator with both registrations, and both source languages appear in the certification note.
Is a Georgian document in English enough for an authority of North Macedonia?
In state procedures, as a rule, no: the civil registry, residence, nostrification and the courts require Macedonian. English is enough for international university programmes and private companies.
I have a Yugoslav-era document on a Serbo-Croatian form. How is it translated?
The form text from Serbian and the entries from Macedonian, with both languages stated in the certification note. In the note we give the name of the issuing state at the time.
Can you prepare a sports transfer package urgently?
Yes, if the documents reach us before the last days of the transfer window. We prepare the contract, the medical report and the federation certificates in both directions in parallel, with one terminology and one transcription.
Is an interpreter required at a notary with a Macedonian citizen?
Yes, if the party does not know Georgian. The notary must make sure that the party understands the content, and the interpreter signs the act; if the party clearly speaks English, an English interpreter is also possible.
How long does a Macedonian translation take?
A standard personal document takes 1 working day, and a notarised translation of a document received during working hours can be done as an express order in 1-2 hours. A contract or a diploma supplement takes several days depending on volume, and the apostille on a Georgian original follows the Agency's processing times.
Upload a scan of your Macedonian document and a copy of your passport, or call us: we will check what the recipient needs, fix the transcription of the names and prepare the translation with notarisation, for collection at our Tbilisi office, by courier within Georgia or by international post to North Macedonia.