Abstract Semiotics can give a great contribution to translation theories and practices, even if, as Gorlée said, “semiotics and translation theory have until recently virtually ignored each other’s existence” (1994: 10). This article however didn’t resume semiotics contributions to translation studies. Rather I tried to epitomize and match only some of those that are the greatest contributions in this field. In fact, Fabbri’s, Eco’s and particularly Peirce’s approaches “try to say us” that translation is not “saying the same thing”. So, if translation is never the original, semiotics – particularly Peirce’s semiotics – helps us to consider that Babel is not a loss – but a resource –, and that in translating it is not important what is lost, but what is changing languages and cultures. semiótica (semiotics), traducción (translation), signo (sign), transformación (transformation).