术语对特定学科的发展起着重要作用，但国内术语翻译经常出现一名多译，甚至还出现了“伪同义词”的状况，这种似“是”而“非”的现象势必导致学科概念不清，不仅造成读者的曲解与误解，而且为学者研究带来困难。民俗学领域译作中也同样存在着术语翻译混乱的情况。 本次翻译项目Strange But True（《奇妙真相》）是一部民俗学著作，其中含义相互关联的关键术语“rite”、“ritual”、“ceremony”、“ceremonial”出现近二百次之多。国内其他民俗学译作主要有“仪式”、“仪礼”、“礼仪”、“礼节”几种译文，这些貌似含义相近的译名彼此之间的意义实际上大有不同，大多数译者习焉不查，不加区别地随意使用，不仅为读者的理解带来困难，而且导致学术研究愈加混乱。 鉴于此，本文以该英汉翻译项目的四个关键词为例，通过追溯“rite”、“ritual”、“ceremony”、“ceremonial”核心术语及其汉译名在中西方语境里的内涵意义与实际应用范畴，从词源爬梳切入，梳理呈现每个关键词的演变历程及多重意义，从而为这些词分别确立相对合理的译名：“ritual”作为上层概念，译为“仪礼”、“礼仪”、“仪式”，“rite”译为“礼仪”，“ceremony”与“ceremonial”译为“仪式”。本文旨在通过分析这几个关键词，为其确立合理的译名，希冀理清译名混乱的情况，以期为类似的翻译问题提供参考。

The terminology is essential for the development of a particular discipline. However, it is common at home that one term with multiple translations and even "pseudo-synonyms" have often occurred, and that may lead to unclear concepts of certain subject, which brings not only misinterpretations and misunderstandings to readers, but also difficulties to scholars. The confusion of term translation also occurs in the field of folklore. Strange but True is a folklore book and in it the key terms with correlative meanings "rite", "ritual", "ceremony" and "ceremonial" appear for nearly two hundred times. In other folklore translation works at home, there are mainly four types of translations "仪式", "仪礼", "礼仪" and "礼节". Those terms with seemingly similar meanings actually have very different connotations. Most translators do not take care to differentiate but use them indiscriminately, which surely results in further confusion. In view of this, this paper takes the four key terms as a case study and by tracing the origins, multiple meanings, connotations, evolution and practical applications of "rite", "ritual", "ceremony" and "ceremonial", "仪式", "仪礼", "礼仪" and "礼节" respectively in Chinese and western contexts, the author aims to present relatively reasonable translations for them: "ritual" as the upper concept, translated as "仪礼", "礼仪" and "仪式", "rite" as "礼仪", "ceremony" and "ceremonial" as "仪式". By analyzing these terms and specifying their translations, this paper expects to eliminate the confusion of their translations in order to provide some references for the similar term translation in the future.