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user:Maberk I'm a strong beleiver of using Gdansk instead of Danzig, if we call it Danzig, Aachen could be referred to as "Aix-la-Chapelle" wich is the French name or "Aquisgran", the Sapnish name. Gzornenplatz insists on calling Danzig a former German language name. What is the current name of Gdansk in German then? [[User:Halibutt| Halibu tt]] 18:11, Oct 12, 2004 (UTC)
This should be repeated at the Naming Issues discussion, but I'm in a hurry... I'm of the opinion that the phrase "former xxxx name" does not *have* to be intrepreted so tightly to judge that it says anything about a current name. In other words, if I state that "One is a number", it doesn't mean that "two" isn't also a number. (I realize this isn't the best comparison, but my point is that those who balk at using "former" wouldn't have to loosen up too much to agree that it's use doesn't have to be interpreted so tightly.) As for the "the current name", I think that is not really answerable, there are two "current German names", depending on the context, the preference of the speaker, and the audience. So those who think there is only one correct "current German name" have agendas, and are closed minded, as far as I'm concerned. Some groups of Americans would insist that using "Cologne" in English is wrong, that it's rude to not use the native name. Bwood 22:22, 12 Oct 2004 (UTC)
What prompted the provocative change from "Free City of Danzig" to "Free City of Gdansk" and all the related changes in the history section? Gdansk Research Society is equally bad as an English title. -- Henrygb 01:12, 14 Oct 2004 (UTC)
"Less common" doesn't mean "former". More than one third entries show DANZIG! That's not former. Space Cadet 18:34, 23 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Which shows that there are only some 12% of webmasters who use the name Gdansk or Gdańsk independently, while the rest uses either both names or Danzig exclusively. A simple search ( [1] and [2]) shows that it's still either Danzig or at best both names are current German names and none of them is "former". [[User:Halibutt| Halibu tt]] 01:11, Oct 24, 2004 (UTC)
--[[User:Halibutt| Halibu tt]] 01:11, Oct 24, 2004 (UTC)
If you want to exclude "Danzig (Gdansk), Polen" and vice versa, then do so:
"danzig polen" -"gdansk danzig polen" site:de 4,800 "gdansk polen" -"danzig gdansk polen" site:de 5,970
Exclusion of one term from the entire page serves no purpose. Gzornenplatz 01:17, Oct 24, 2004 (UTC)
Instead of arguing around in circles like this, why not try to come up with something acceptable to all. I changed to "formerly known by the German name Danzig". Is that acceptable to everyone? john k 03:26, 24 Oct 2004 (UTC)
I've also changed the history section to refer to the city as Danzig between 1308 and 1945, which seems the clearest and simplest way to handle this. If someone changes this, I will not revert back without further discussion. john k 03:36, 24 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Szopen, my feeling is that in other articles, we should use "Danzig (Gdansk)" for discussions in the 1454-1793 period - but there's no point in using parentheses in this article, since it's obvious that we have both names. At any rate, I would suggest that "Danzig" is probably the most frequently used name in the 1454-1793 period although it's hard to say. But this certainly seems more plausible than switching to "Danzig" in 1793, which implies a stark change when there wasn't really one. But, as I said, I won't object to someone switching it until we can discuss it further. BTW, I've reverted back to my version, because the user who changed it a) did not note any rationale in his edit summary; b) just blanket reverted my changes, even though many of them were copy edits, &c. john k 15:42, 24 Oct 2004 (UTC)
@ Gzorenplatz: so the Name is not used in German anymore and the locals just dont know it ... lol ... funny! really ;O) ... specially as the website http://www.gdansk.pl/de/ is written in excellent German and even more in the case of Danzig the german press is using the name Danig more then Gdansk [5] .. and there is a reason why the cities have a german name; how many germans speak polish? (as far as i know you dont) ... most cities of Poland no German could speak the name at all .. how would you say Warszawa ... or even better what about Szczecin instead of Stettin? ... but so far i have the impression that you just know that everybody with a differnt oppinion is wrong .. because you are right ... think about this ... and stop thinking that someone uses the german name wants to have this cities "back" for Germany --> that´s bullshit ... Sicherlich 10:54, 25 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Ja, natürlich. Space Cadet 13:45, 25 Oct 2004 (UTC)
`:Like a merry-go-round... You say you proved that the Germans call those cities with their Polish names. So far you haven't convince anyone but yourself, but you still state that you've proved that right and deny to accept the arguments of others. I'm afraid no compromise with you is possible (I proposed it several times, on Talk:Pila, for instance, even when I was sure that your version is wrong and a compromise would only blur the reality. Yet - I tried to reach some terms with you - to no effect. I'm also afraid that we are left with only two options. Either block all the articles and wait until the Naming issues thingie is polished out or revert your changes 'til the end of time. The latter is not an option for me, but if you insist... [[User:Halibutt| Halibu tt]] 21:18, Oct 25, 2004 (UTC)
Coming into this mess again, I'm not really sure that anybody has proved anything. What seems to be the case is that German-speakers will in different contexts use either "Gdansk" or "Danzig". Danzig is, obviously, a German form of the name, and it seems to still be used to some extent. At the same time, Gzornenplatz has at least demonstrated that Gdansk is also used fairly frequently in German. I think the real problem here is that it's simply not all that important what the present-day German name of the city is. The reason "Danzig" is an important name is because Germans used to inhabit the city, and it was called "Danzig" at that time. My compromise was meant to elide the question of what the German name is now, by pointing out the important fact that this used to be the principal name of the city. john k 15:44, 26 Oct 2004 (UTC)
“The city is also often known, especially in historical contexts, by the name Danzig.”
Still wrong!
This is a very awkward and convoluted way of indicating, but not quite saying, that prior to the defeat of Germany in 1945 and the transfer of territories to Poland, the city was CALLED Danzig. To say that it was “known as” Danzig “in historical contexts” sounds very much like unctuous Soviet-era propaganda, and an attempt to disguise the basic reality that the city used to be inhabited by Germans. The city WAS Danzig prior to ’45. Had you asked people who lived there at the time (like Günter Grass), they would have said they lived in DANZIG. Yes, they would have known the Polish name for the city, but they wouldn’t have said they lived in Gdansk – unless they were among the small (4 percent) Polish minority.
All this subterfuge and linguistic gymnastics could be avoided very simply by saying “(formerly Danzig)” and then recounting what happened in the history section.
Also, there is no editorial reason to put “Danzig” in italics. We’re not introducing a foreign word into an English account; it’s simply what the city’s name was.
“Due to the city's German heritage the name Danzig is still used but in the international community this name was more commonly used before WWII.”
Also wrong!
The name Danzig is not used in the international community anymore to refer to the presently existing city of Gdansk. Any British or American traveler who was going to Poland would say he was including Gdansk on his itinerary, if that were the case. Also, Western media do not use Danzig when talking about current events. Stories from the city, which occur occasionally, are datelined: GDANSK, Poland — …. (I speak as a newspaper editor.)
The only common use of the name Danzig is when writing about or discussing history. Yes, the Germans still use it, but even that practice is eroding, as it should.
To say that Danzig was “more commonly” used before WWII is another smokescreen. It was universally used – except in Poland and other Slavic countries. At Versailles, the talk was about Danzig, and it was still about Danzig at Yalta and Potsdam. The process by which Danzig, emptied of Germans, was transformed into Gdansk, inhabited by Poles, took a few years, so it took the international community a while to adopt the new name. (Ditto Wroclaw, Szczecin, etc., etc.) But that isn’t the point. The point is that THE NAME OF THE CITY WAS CHANGED FROM DANZIG TO GDANSK IN 1945! (On March 31, to be exact.)
User:sca 19nov04
The Gdansk/Danzig situation is obviously not analagous to Munich/München because München did not change its ethnicity in 1945, like the city in question changed from German Danzig to Polish Gdansk. If you lived in München in 1939 you called your city München, and today if you live there you still call it München. If you lived in the city in question in 1939 you called it Danzig, but if you live there now you call it Gdansk. (We must apologize to our Polish friends for not having the accent marks for the proper Polish representation of Gdansk. Please excuse us Anglos for our ill treatment of the Polish language.)
The English version of the capital of Bavaria is the way it is because a) there is no U-umlaut sound in English, and b) we apparently got it from the French Muniche. Similar explanations hold for English versions of various cities in Germany, Poland, Czech Rep., Bulgaria, Russia, etc. By contrast, English speakers who referred to the city in question before 1945 as Danzig were not calling it Danzig because that was an anglicisized version of Gdansk, but because Danzig was the name of the city which, like Berlin, was German and was pronouncible in its then-German form by English speakers. Gdansk is more difficult for English speakers to pronounce than Danzig, but that doesn't mean that Danzig is the "English" form of Gdansk;Danzig is not the current name of the city in English.
In all of this it is impossible to avoid the distinct impression that our Polish friends keep holding out for these circumlocutions about pre-1945 Danzig not because of any interest in presenting history truthfully, but because they harbor a reluctance to admit to themselves that the city in question (like various others) was ethnically German before the border changes of 1945. This is -- forgive me -- childish.
User:sca 19nov04
please, there is no question the polish and official name is Gdańsk .. i dont want to deny this at all! (And as i personally speak some polish i as well can pronounce the polish names correct - the most german can´t that´s why we have a German name - and thats why you have it in english as well ;o) ) ... Sicherlich 08:06, 20 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Well, moje przyjaciel, how about this: Gdansk (prior to 1945: Danzig) blah blah blah and then explain in the history section what happened in 1945. ??? The fundamental historical reality is that some 10 million Germans lived in Danzig, Silesia, Pomerania and East Prussia before the war and that nearly all of them were either killed or expelled in 1945-49 -- and that they were replaced by Polish people (except in N. East Prussia).
The reason it is important not to obscure this history with a linguistic smokescreen that makes it sound as if these areas were sort of like Alsace-Lorraine, with mixed populations that could have gone with either country, is that this was a huge instance in recent, modern history of ethnic cleansing and forced migration, which supposedly were proscribed by international law and certainly were contrary to the principle of self-determination supposedly held sacred by every civilized country, most of all the U.S.A. I repeat: This history is today still not generally known in America.
Another reason for "formerly Danzig" is that all atlases published in English prior to the late '40s showed the city as Danzig -- again, not because Danzig was the "English" version of Gdansk but because it was the city's own name for itself and the name by which most of the world knew it.
User:sca 20nov04
Alas, I am not enough of a scholar to authoritatively critique the history section. Exactly when the city became predominantly ethnically German is a question I can't speak to with certainty. However, I can say that the history section as currently written seems to me -- based on what I have read about the Teutonic Order and related topics -- to be written entirely from a Polish point of view. My general impression is that the city's German character dates from much earlier than 1795, and probably goes back to the late Middle Ages. I feel quite sure that saying or implying that the city was ethnically German only from 1795 to 1945 is not accurate.
LATER INSERTION:
The Polish-American historian Oscar Halecki, in "A History of Poland" (1992), in discussing relations between the Order and the Polish Crown in the decades following the First Peace of Thorn, writes that in 1457:
"The German element predominated in the Prussian League, which was particularly enranged against the Order, and the town of Danzig, in which the majority of the population was at this epoch already German...."
User:sca 5dec04
I notice several other things about the history section: There is no mention of Danzig's membership in the Hanseatic League, a predominantly German organization, or of the extensive trade that moved through Danzig via the League to western Europe and Britain. And regarding the Order's conquest in 1308, it sounds funny to say the city was "demolished" and then to say "this led to the city's decline." It's a little like saying someone was killed and this led to his serious illness. "Demolished" probably is too strong a word, but I don't know the details of the 1308 incident. Also, the part on the battle of Grunwald in 1410 should include "(German: Tannenberg)" since it's generally known in the West as the (first) battle of Tannenberg. You could throw in "(Lithuanian: Zalgiris)" too, if you wanted to.
The section about what happened in '45 and thereafter is not too bad at this point, but I think it should contain this sentence: "All German names for streets, buildings and localities were replaced with Polish names, except one: Westerplatte, where the Germans started the war in 1939." You could go on to mention the bombardment by the battleship Schleswig-Holstein of the Polish Post Office, just as a matter of historical interest, but it's not necessary.
Regarding your last statement, esteemed Halibutt, I think it would be a serious mistake not to mention the German name in the beginning. The city's identity as Danzig is a living memory for countless people around the world. "Danzig" was famous as the bone of contention between Germany and Poland after Versailles, and as Hitler's primary pretext for attacking Poland in '39. "Danzig" appeared in thousands of U.S. and British newspaper headlines in the interwar period, and was instantly understood by readers as denoting more than just a city on the Baltic.
User:sca 21nov04
On a quick search of the New York Times archives between 1918 and 1950, I got 14,760 hits for "Danzig," nearly all of them articles, and 119 for "Gdansk," most of which were shipping notices, not articles.
User:sca 22nov04
A few thoughts. First, and least important: Isn't Grunwald just as much a German name as Tannenberg? It certainly looks more German than Polish to me. At any rate, as to the name, I've frequently said that I'd very strongly prefer "formerly Danzig." The problem with giving a starting date is that it's totally unclear. I continue to think that (1308-1945:Danzig) would make a lot more sense than starting in 1793. But this seems vaguely inaccurate to me as well. From 1308-1945 the city was predominantly German. Throughout this time the German inhabitants called it something akin to "Danzig." But I'm uncertain whether that means that the city can be said to have been named Danzig for that precise period. On the other hand, starting at 1793 seems equally problematic, if not more so, since this implies that there was a forcible name change at the time of the Prussian annexation, which was not the case. "Formerly Danzig" seems to me to be nicely ambiguous without being misleading. The vicissitudes and specifics can and should be discussed in the article, but I fail to see what is so inaccurate about "formerly Danzig" that it cannot be used. The city was called Danzig for some (somewhat indeterminate) period before 1945. It is no longer called that today, except sometimes in German (which should, ultimately, be irrelevant to this article - there is no reason to go into fits about what Germans call it today, because it is not a city in which Germans live anymore). The fact that Poles have always called it Danzig seems irrelevant to me. I ask again my hypothetical question about the French annexing Trier after WWII. Let's say that after World War II the German city of Trier and its hinterland was annexed by the French. The German inhabitants are expelled, and replaced by French people, who call the city "Treves," the name by which it has been known in French for centuries. Furthermore, one might argue, the city was originally named Augusta Treverorum in Latin, so that the French name is closer to the original name than the German. So, the French claim, the city was a Gallic/Latin city, which was forcibly conquered by the Germans in the 5th century, and is now being returned to its rightful rulers and name. Thus, our hypothetical French wikipedia editor claims, it would be incorrect to say the city was "formerly Trier," because it ignores the fact that French people have always called it Treves, and that once, long ago, it was part of the Roman Empire, and the Romans called it something that sounded more like "Treves" than it did like "Trier." Would you support such a line of reasoning?
On another note, I've noticed that all references to the city in the history section have, without discussion, once again been changed to call it "Gdansk," including the absurd "Free City of Gdansk" stuff. Although there's never been a clear consensus on this, I think it has been agreed that at least for the 19th and 1st half of the 20th century it should be called "Danzig" in the history section. Until we iron out a real consensus (which, of course, seems a bit unlikely at the moment), we should stick with this way of doing it. john k 06:04, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I agree with John, whose view seems eminently reasonable. His analogy to a hypotethically Frenchified Trier is enitrely apt.
Regarding Tanneberg and Grunwald, they were two nearby villages, according to a book I read called "Tannenberg 1410: Disaster for the Teutonic Knights," by Stephen Turnbull. Tannenberg today is called Stebark in by the Poles. I believe 'bark' is a Polish transliteration of 'berg,' but I'm not sure.
I have debated at length with one of our Polish editors regarding the Polish view of city names in the context of the territorial changes and population expulsions of 1945. In the end one must conclude that Polish people of whatever political stripe tend to be acutely myopic on this issue. To argue that the city was not generally known by its German name for all the centuries it was inhabited (primarily) by Germans, simply because it was founded by Poles (or perhaps, West Slavs) a millenium ago, and because the Poles always have referred to it by its Polish name or some variant thereof, does not strike them as illogical, even though it does not correspond to historical reality. This seems to be the case even though, of course, they may be in general very congenial people in other ways.
I believe the English version of this article should be edited by neither Poles nor Germans, but by native English speakers with a strong background in the relevant historical periods. Failing that, I advise anyone who is interested in this topic to study the history books, not Wikipedia. Wiki is a noble experiment in the marketplace of ideas, but one which is intrinsically flawed by the absence of qualified, disinterested gatekeepers.
User:sca 24nov04
Merkwurdig. Dziwny.
I do think it's important that the English entry convey the historical story accurately, because so few Americans, at least -- and perhaps Britons, too -- know the history. In the U.S., the politically correct view of everything associated with WWII and the Germans of that era is, they were bad, and everything bad that happened to them (like Dresden, etc.) was justified. This simplistic view is prevalent not, of course, among scholars, but among the general populace, even those who are (like me) liberal politically and committed to human rights for all.
The PC view in the past always has been to assign to Poland all the virtues of the oppressed victim, which of course in a large sense is correct. But that has meant that the "recovered territories" myth fostered by Stalin et al has been uncritically accepted in the West, even to the point where thoroughly German territories acquired by Poland in '45 are now sometimes described as having been part of "occupied Poland" during the war. I saw an instance of this recently on a History Channel program about "The Great Escape."
It's interesting that the attitude of the Russians about the Kaliningrad Oblast is entirely different (I've been there). The Russkis make no bones about it having been German, and indeed are in a way still proud of this fact. Why? Because they won. They beat the Germans and took it from them. The Poles, on the other hand, had no voice in the "two steps left" territorial lurch of '45, unless you credit the Lublin Poles (Stalin's lackeys) as having been representative, which I don't.
User:sca 25nov04
Yes, but that part of East Prussia was never inhabited by Poles. Northeastern East Prussia had a Lithuanian minority, and once in a while in Lithuania (I've been there, too) you encounter a reference to it as "Lithuania Minor." The first books printed in Lithuanian, as I understand it, were printed in Konigsberg. And of course, Memel/Klaipeda went back and forth.
"Justify" is not quite the right word regarding the other territories, since the uprooting of 10 million human beings (and killing of 1.5 million of them) in the 20th century can scarcely be justified by any medieval background.
User:sca 25nov04
Recently, I have spent a few hours in Frankfurt airport waiting for a connecting flight and I noticed how they pronounced the city name during announcement of the flight to Gdańsk. In German version they said "Danzig", while in English they said "Gdansk". Poszwa 02:14, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)
i have removed some of the lists from this article and given them their own articles. this makes the Gdansk article less bulky and confusing. i will continue to help this article become more clear. Kingturtle 22:34, 29 Dec 2004 (UTC)
i have removed these images temporarily until this page becomes better organized:
sincerely, Kingturtle 22:03, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)
This is the English language Wikipedia, isn't it? In english, the name is Gdansk, not something undisplayable. 172.169.21.14 22:21, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Actually it's not an acute accent, but kreska, a diacritical symbol similar to acute accent. Polish language does not use any accents. Kreska is used for palatalization of consonants and not for accenting the vowels. The article on acute accent contains wrong information, I have to correct it some day. As far as the use of Polish diacriticals on English Wikipedia - we use other non-English diacriticals, English newspapers and Encyclopedias use "ń" all the time - so what's the problem? Space Cadet 03:46, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Anyway, Nohat...! Google kreska diacritic and learn more about the difference between the accute accent and kreska. Sheesh. Space Cadet 21:22, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)
The continuing effort of an editor of this entry – who I suspect is not a native English speaker – to suppress those aspects of this story that are less than complimentary to Poland constitute a gross distortion of history and an attempt to present half-truths to the English-speaking world for purely nationalistic reasons.
In particular, I condemn:
This has been going on for a long time. I can assure whoever is perpetrating these distortions that this effort to obscure the true history of this part of the world in 1945-49 is doomed. Ultimately, truth will prevail. Sca 21:43, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)
-- Halibu tt 22:25, Jan 10, 2005 (UTC)
Halibutt! Isn't it past your bedtime yet?
Why repeat them here? Because it's an unusual, almost unique aspect of the city's history (in the modern context) and one that helps to explain (and document) its complex history.
It's not a matter of annexation and re-annexation -- it's a matter of the city's popultion being forcibly changed -- "cleansed" of Germans and replaced by Poles.
When the city was under the suzerainty of the Polish crown, prior to the partitions of Poland, its population even then was predominantly German. Haven't your read the history? Yes, the city "belonged to Poland" politically, but it hadn't been ethnically Polish since the 14th century. Your attempts to obscure this fact and foster the idea of "returning" a German city "to Poland" constitute an oblique falsification of history. One doesn't "return" a city to a country by removing, in one way or another, nearly all its inhabitants and replacing them by others.
There was no "denazification" of then-Danzig; there was only degermanization. Nazis and non-Nazis alike were either killed or expelled. It's a fact, and you know it! You also should be rational enough to realize that not all Germans were Nazis. But even if they had all been Nazis, they still wouldn't have been "denazified" by being expelled -- they would simply have been expelled (or killed).
PS: There is no such thing in English as an "equation mark."
Sca 23:00, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Another Polish nationalist heard from. Very amusing.
Sca 23:33, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Of course there were Nazis in Danzig -- among them, the infamous Albert Forster. The Nazis were old Danzig's tragedy, as anyone who has read Grass's first two novels knows.
My point was that no distinction was made in 1945-46 between Nazis and non-Nazis; all Germans were expelled. The expulsions fell on people due to their ethnicity, not their politics. Therefore, the expulsion of Danzig's residents (those who survived) was not denazification, it was degermanization, i.e. ethnic cleansing.
I never have argued that what the Germans did to the Poles, Jews and others during the Nazi period was justified in any way, shape or form. It was despicable and horrible beyond words. But as I've said elsewhere, two wrongs – Hitler's and Stalin's – didn't make a right.
There is a basic fallacy to the nationalist-Polish argument that the expulsions -- and killings -- of the Germans were justified because for the heinous crimes of Nazi Germany. A rationale human being knows that all human beings remain human beings no matter what their nationality. Being deprived of one's property, homeland, liberty and even life hurts just as much whether you are Polish, German, Jewish, Moslem, white, black, etc. ad infinitum.
Beyond moralizing, what happened happened; you can't keep on drawing a veil over it by writing bland histories of a savage period.
Secondly, from a historical and cultural viewpoint, the former German cities that today are Polish cities as a result of expulsions and annexations represent, in many cases, something previously unknown in European history: Cities that (thanks to painstaking Polish restoration) present in part the outward appearance of their former selves, but which are inhabited by different populations, ethnically and culturally. In the long history of European wars, cities and provinces often changed hands politically, becoming the property of this or that dynasty or empire, but never were their populations completely emptied and replaced by ethnically different populations overnight, in historical terms.
The German residents of the former German imperial city of Strassburg (today: Strasbourg), for example, gradually became oriented to France over a period of centuries, and still their language is spoken in that city today. No one speaks German in Gdansk anymore, outside of tourists and academics. The same may be said of Wroclaw, the former Breslau, Szczecin, the former Stettin, and many smaller places.
No one who finds this reality troubling should blame Poland. It was done by Stalin and the Soviets and their Polish-Communist proteges, and was possible as a direct result of Nazi Germany's aggression against Poland. But it did happen, just as surely (and on a larger human scale) as European-Americans expelled the native Americans from their ancestral homelands a century earlier. Neither was pretty.
I believe this entire debate hinges on a basic human weakness: The inability to keep two opposing but true ideas in focus at the same time. Yes, the Germans were the villains vis a vis Poland in World War II, but yes, Poles and Russians also committed crimes against Germans at its end and afterewards.
No country is blameless. America incinerated hundreds of thousands of civilians in World War II, perhaps millions in Vietnam (productivity!), and recently tortured prisoners in Iraq. It's all part of the savagery of war, a central feature of which is the "otherization" of the "enemy."
I just wish Poles would stop pretending they acquired the Oder-Neisse territories as some kind of "right," and would acknowledge it for what it was: Power politics of the harshest kind, imposed from without.
Sca 19:50, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)
PS: Here's a question for you Polish nationalists: Would it have been better, after WWII, if Poland had kept her borders of 1937 -- in other words, if everything had returned to the status quo ante bellum (including Germany's borders)? Or was 1945's territorial "compensation" in fact a good deal for Poland?
Sca 20:10, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)
The only "right" solution I can think of is: ante partitionis (1766) borders in the East and post bellum 1945 borders in the West and North. Any other type of borders would always have to be injust, ahistorical and unnatural. Space Cadet 00:50, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)
-- Halibu tt 03:42, Jan 12, 2005 (UTC)
Playing the armchair historian here -- one solution that might have been more satisfactory to most of those concerned (but not to Stalin!) might have been to give Poland all of East Prussia, and Danzig, but not Silesia and Pomerania. Although this still would have been unjust in terms of the human rights of the German East Prussians and Danzigers, it would have been less severe for Germany overall and would have left at least one of the established borders intact. It also would have eliminated once and for all the geographic anomaly of East Prussia, which in the form of Kaliningrad persists to this day.
In my view, the problem with Poland's prewar borders was Wilno (today: Vilnius). But I don't know enough about the history of that city to know to what extent it was Polish before all the uprootings of the war. I can tell you from experience that today it is very, very Lithuanian, with a sprinkling of Russians (I married one).
It's a crying shame what the Soviets did to old Königsberg (today: Kaliningrad). It's probably the ugliest place in Europe -- and one of the most polluted. It had been a jewel. Going from Kaliningrad to Lithuania is like going from night to day.
Sca 22:30, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Population of Wilno Area, 1939
Poles | 321 700 | |
Jews | 107 600 | |
Belarusians | 75 200 | |
Lithuanians | 31 300 | |
Russians | 9 000 | |
Total | 544 800 |
Source: 1939 Lithuanian census
Well, Wilno was as Polish as Danzig was German. There was a bigger percentage of Poles in Wilno before WWII than in Poznań, Katowice or Łódź. According to the Lithuanian census of 1939 (not to mention the earlier Central Lithuanian census of 1919, Polish censae of 1921 and 1931 and the German census of 1916, that are of course disputed by the Lithuanian historians) the whole Wilno area that was annexed by Lithuania had some 60% of Poles while the city itself was predominantly Polish (I don't remember the exact data, something like 20% Jews, 70% Poles, 9% Belarusians and less than 1% of Lithuanians; I'll check that if you're interested). The number of Lithuanians living in "Vilnius" in 1931 was 1 579 - some 0,8% of the population.
According to the Soviet census of 1959 the percentage of Poles in the area of Vilna ('though not in the city itself anymore) was 80,3%. By 1989 the percentage dropped to 63,5%. So, all in all, neither the city nor its area was a big problem before WWII. It was a problem in international relations (or rather lack of such) until 1938, but barely anyone living in the city cared.
Finally, before one starts crying over what the Soviets did to Königsberg, one should think for a minute or two over what the Germans themselves did to their city - by starting the war with the entire world and destroying countless other cities without mercy. But all this discussion is OT here and I believe we should move it to somewhere else. What do you say? Halibu tt 10:20, Jan 14, 2005 (UTC)
Yes, yes, we know all that, Halibutt; we know the Germans started the war and did everything else they did. That doesn't need to be repeated everytime something related to WWII comes up.
According to what I've read, Königsberg already was heavily damaged, and parts of it virtually destroyed, by a big R.A.F. bombing attack in 1944 -- in August, if I remember right. Thousands of civilians were burned to death. By the time the Soviets finally conquered the place in April 1945, massed Red Army artillery had done the rest.
The "crying shame" I alluded to refers to the ugliness of what the Soviets built there. Have you seen photos of Europe's ugliest building -- the never-finished House of the Soviets, built on the site of the royal castle, the ruins of which were blown up on Brezhnev's personal orders? And that building is just the most conspicuous of a whole lot of Soviet-style architectural atrocities in Kaliningrad. The only things charming in Kaliningrad are the few leftovers of old Königsberg, such as the recently restored cathedral.
By the way, from what I have read, the Red Army purposely burned down much of Danzig AFTER they conquered it. You have to wonder why. Didn't the army know they were going to give it to Poland?
Sca 20:44, 14 Jan 2005 (UTC)
What happened to the vote at Talk:Gdansk/Naming convention? Last edit on October 2004. Is this still voted on or has a consensus been found? -- Chris 73 Talk 05:54, Jan 19, 2005 (UTC)
It is not that simple. Before 1793, Danzig/Gdansk was indeed part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. But the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was not a state in the way that modern Poland is. Within that polity, Danzig/Gdansk was a largely self-governing city, and it was inhabited almost entirely by Germans (at least, from the 14th century it was). Calling it "Gdansk" because it was part of the PLC is anachronistic - it assumes/implies that current models of the nation-state applied in the eighteenth century. Which they certainly did not. john k 02:55, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Halibutt, I'm not sure I understand. However, I will state that we ought really to follow English usage, and not worry so much about what the city was called by its inhabitants, or by the Sejm. In English usage, the city is normally called "Danzig" when it is being discussed in historical contexts before 1945. The fact that from the 14th to the 20th century, the city was largely to entirely inhabited by German-speakers, simply shows that this common English usage has some rational basis in the actual conditions of the city, making the decision to switch in 1945 sensible and easy to explain (on the other hand, as we've discussed before, the English name used for a city like Lviv is a lot harder to figure out in any clear way). At any rate, English never uses "Nieuw Amsterdam." In any case, the Dutch-descended inhabitants of New York, who were never so numerous as you seem to think, as far as I am aware, did not call the city Nieuw Amsterdam after 1664 (since, after all, that was no longer its name, in a sense more like the Königsberg/Kaliningrad situation than the Gdansk/Danzig one), and, whatever their ancestry, were largely speaking English well before the American revolutionary wars. By the way, the current naming rules that Emax is insisting on for Gdansk would result in New Orleans being "Nouvelle-Orléans" before 1763, "Novo Orleans" (or whatever the Spanish is) from 1763 to 1803, and then New Orleans from 1803 on.
At any rate, the situation of European colonial cities in North America remains quite different from ancient German trading cities on the Polish coast in the same time period, and I'm not sure the comparison is worthwhile. And, again, our touchstone should be English usage. If English usage is totally confused, as it sometimes is (for Lviv/Lvov/Lwow/Lemberg, or perhaps for Poznan/Posen), we kind of have to cut through the bullshit and come up with a way to do it. But for Gdansk, the English usage situation is (reasonably) clear - Danzig before 1945, Gdansk after it, with only the very earliest centuries confused. I will add that I am not discussing English usage before 1945 by contemporaries. Obviously there are numerous cities that were called by different names in English at one point. In the 19th century, "Ofen" seems to have been used most commonly for Buda, or "Ratisbon" for Regensburg. But no contemporary history would call Buda Ofen, or call Regensburg Ratisbon, even if it is discussing those periods when people would have used those names in English. I am discussing the way contemporary historians refer to the place when discussing it in earlier times. Danzig is, as far as I can tell, far more common. Given that the change in the ethnic composition of the city in 1945 makes this shift sensible, I think we should name it in this way. john k 22:03, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Alright, the editing dispute seems to have come down to the question of what to call the city between 1308 and 1793? Can we perhaps work on coming to an agreement on this? I'll lay out the case for using Danzig:
1) English language sources generally use Danzig when referring to the city at this time. General use textbooks like John Elliott's Europe Divided 1559-1598, Geoffrey Parker's Europe in Crisis 1598-1648, William Doyle's The Old European Order 1660-1800, McKay and Scott's The Rise of the Great Powers 1648-1815, Jeremy Black's The Rise of the European Powers 1679-1793, and so forth, all refer to the city as "Danzig". A JSTOR search shows a limited number of references to the city as "Gdansk" - only 61 articles total mention "Gdansk", and many of those are references to the city since 1945. There are, on the other hand, 552 articles which mention "Danzig", and many of them are discussing the eighteenth century and earlier. [this is a JSTOR search of articles in the 56 journals that are classified as historical. john k 08:38, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)]
2) This English usage makes sense. The city was primarily a linguistically German city from the early 14th century on. Since 1945 it has been a linguistically Polish city. It makes sense to make the name switch only in 1945, because this corresponds to a major shift in the city that did not occur in 1454 or 1793.
3) These two factors alone should be sufficient to make the case. Now, one might argue perfectly rationally that it would make perfect sense to just call the city "Gdansk" throughout, or to complicatedly switch it depending on whether or not it was under Polish or German sovereignty. But only one usage has the support of common English usage, and that is using "Danzig" for the city for the entire 1308-1945 period. If it was common in English to use "Gdansk" for its whole history, or for its history before 1793, it would make sense for wikipedia to do that as well, whatever its inhabitants may or may not have called it. But that is not how it is done. "Danzig" is the main name used for this period, and Wikipedia should follow that usage.
A final point:
4) The question of whether Danzig is the current German name is completely irrelevant to the English wikipedia. Since 1945, the city has not been a German city. As such, the name that Germans call the city today is of as much interest as what the Romanians call Warsaw - that is to say, it is not of interest at all. The reason the name Danzig is important is because it is the name the city was called when it was inhabited by Germans, not because it is the name Germans do (or do not) call it today.
I look forward to a healthy debate on this question. john k 06:07, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I would strongly support doing this for Danzig (Gdansk). For post 1945, I don't think it's necessary - the city is now Gdansk. I would not object strongly either way, though. john k 08:38, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
It may be of note to see what contemporary Englishmen called the city. The astronomer Johannes Hevelius (Jan Hewelke) was a resident of the city, and was in regular correspondence with the Royal Society of London. Looking through his letters published in the Philosophical Transactions I find ...
and so forth. Most of these are from the 1670s. It seems that when they wrote in English, at least this particular group of Englishmen wrote something akin to Danzig. When they wrote in Latin, they wrote whatever something beginning with Gedan... Shimmin 18:57, Feb 11, 2005 (UTC)
Interesting point - but I think not of particular relevance. A similar study would, for instance, show that Regensburg was being called something like "Ratisbon", and Mainz as something like "Mayence". john k 19:56, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Eh, anybody? john k 05:17, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I'll add that I'm sick of arguing about this, and even sicker of how whenever a serious attempt is made to come to some kind of agreement, nobody seems to be interested and we just all retreat into a stagnant truce for a few months until somebody comes along to stir the pot again. There's no reason we can't come to some resolution of this that is sensible and generally acceptable. But it's not going to happen if nobody makes any effort. john k 05:19, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)
A vote will have no validity if certain users are determined to ignore its results. Despite an overwhelming talk page majority in favor of using Danzig rather than Gdansk for 1793-1945 period, until a few days ago Emax and Space Cadet were repeatedly reverting to a version that uses the nonsensical Free City of Gdansk formulation. john k 05:49, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)
JOhn, you are not the one who is sick over the whole issue. I have enough of that too. The discussion is going in circles and the same arguments are used and used again and again. I think that right now is agreement to using Gdansk post 1945, and pre 1308, Danzig after partitions, and the only problem is year 1308-1790s. I once proposed including the link (as template or something) to article explaining the controversies about status of Gdansk and Royal Prussia. But this oculd be too much: So we could agree for Gdansk (Danzig) or Danzig (Gdansk) in articles about the period. In Biographical articles of German persons it would be Danzig (Gdansk) and then Danzig. In Polish it would be Gdansk (Danzig) and then Gdansk. In controversial we would sacrifice the virgin and wait for enlightenment. In history articles we could toss a coin, or something.. The issue is burning our forces and makes me feel tired... Szopen 08:04, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)
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user:Maberk I'm a strong beleiver of using Gdansk instead of Danzig, if we call it Danzig, Aachen could be referred to as "Aix-la-Chapelle" wich is the French name or "Aquisgran", the Sapnish name. Gzornenplatz insists on calling Danzig a former German language name. What is the current name of Gdansk in German then? [[User:Halibutt| Halibu tt]] 18:11, Oct 12, 2004 (UTC)
This should be repeated at the Naming Issues discussion, but I'm in a hurry... I'm of the opinion that the phrase "former xxxx name" does not *have* to be intrepreted so tightly to judge that it says anything about a current name. In other words, if I state that "One is a number", it doesn't mean that "two" isn't also a number. (I realize this isn't the best comparison, but my point is that those who balk at using "former" wouldn't have to loosen up too much to agree that it's use doesn't have to be interpreted so tightly.) As for the "the current name", I think that is not really answerable, there are two "current German names", depending on the context, the preference of the speaker, and the audience. So those who think there is only one correct "current German name" have agendas, and are closed minded, as far as I'm concerned. Some groups of Americans would insist that using "Cologne" in English is wrong, that it's rude to not use the native name. Bwood 22:22, 12 Oct 2004 (UTC)
What prompted the provocative change from "Free City of Danzig" to "Free City of Gdansk" and all the related changes in the history section? Gdansk Research Society is equally bad as an English title. -- Henrygb 01:12, 14 Oct 2004 (UTC)
"Less common" doesn't mean "former". More than one third entries show DANZIG! That's not former. Space Cadet 18:34, 23 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Which shows that there are only some 12% of webmasters who use the name Gdansk or Gdańsk independently, while the rest uses either both names or Danzig exclusively. A simple search ( [1] and [2]) shows that it's still either Danzig or at best both names are current German names and none of them is "former". [[User:Halibutt| Halibu tt]] 01:11, Oct 24, 2004 (UTC)
--[[User:Halibutt| Halibu tt]] 01:11, Oct 24, 2004 (UTC)
If you want to exclude "Danzig (Gdansk), Polen" and vice versa, then do so:
"danzig polen" -"gdansk danzig polen" site:de 4,800 "gdansk polen" -"danzig gdansk polen" site:de 5,970
Exclusion of one term from the entire page serves no purpose. Gzornenplatz 01:17, Oct 24, 2004 (UTC)
Instead of arguing around in circles like this, why not try to come up with something acceptable to all. I changed to "formerly known by the German name Danzig". Is that acceptable to everyone? john k 03:26, 24 Oct 2004 (UTC)
I've also changed the history section to refer to the city as Danzig between 1308 and 1945, which seems the clearest and simplest way to handle this. If someone changes this, I will not revert back without further discussion. john k 03:36, 24 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Szopen, my feeling is that in other articles, we should use "Danzig (Gdansk)" for discussions in the 1454-1793 period - but there's no point in using parentheses in this article, since it's obvious that we have both names. At any rate, I would suggest that "Danzig" is probably the most frequently used name in the 1454-1793 period although it's hard to say. But this certainly seems more plausible than switching to "Danzig" in 1793, which implies a stark change when there wasn't really one. But, as I said, I won't object to someone switching it until we can discuss it further. BTW, I've reverted back to my version, because the user who changed it a) did not note any rationale in his edit summary; b) just blanket reverted my changes, even though many of them were copy edits, &c. john k 15:42, 24 Oct 2004 (UTC)
@ Gzorenplatz: so the Name is not used in German anymore and the locals just dont know it ... lol ... funny! really ;O) ... specially as the website http://www.gdansk.pl/de/ is written in excellent German and even more in the case of Danzig the german press is using the name Danig more then Gdansk [5] .. and there is a reason why the cities have a german name; how many germans speak polish? (as far as i know you dont) ... most cities of Poland no German could speak the name at all .. how would you say Warszawa ... or even better what about Szczecin instead of Stettin? ... but so far i have the impression that you just know that everybody with a differnt oppinion is wrong .. because you are right ... think about this ... and stop thinking that someone uses the german name wants to have this cities "back" for Germany --> that´s bullshit ... Sicherlich 10:54, 25 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Ja, natürlich. Space Cadet 13:45, 25 Oct 2004 (UTC)
`:Like a merry-go-round... You say you proved that the Germans call those cities with their Polish names. So far you haven't convince anyone but yourself, but you still state that you've proved that right and deny to accept the arguments of others. I'm afraid no compromise with you is possible (I proposed it several times, on Talk:Pila, for instance, even when I was sure that your version is wrong and a compromise would only blur the reality. Yet - I tried to reach some terms with you - to no effect. I'm also afraid that we are left with only two options. Either block all the articles and wait until the Naming issues thingie is polished out or revert your changes 'til the end of time. The latter is not an option for me, but if you insist... [[User:Halibutt| Halibu tt]] 21:18, Oct 25, 2004 (UTC)
Coming into this mess again, I'm not really sure that anybody has proved anything. What seems to be the case is that German-speakers will in different contexts use either "Gdansk" or "Danzig". Danzig is, obviously, a German form of the name, and it seems to still be used to some extent. At the same time, Gzornenplatz has at least demonstrated that Gdansk is also used fairly frequently in German. I think the real problem here is that it's simply not all that important what the present-day German name of the city is. The reason "Danzig" is an important name is because Germans used to inhabit the city, and it was called "Danzig" at that time. My compromise was meant to elide the question of what the German name is now, by pointing out the important fact that this used to be the principal name of the city. john k 15:44, 26 Oct 2004 (UTC)
“The city is also often known, especially in historical contexts, by the name Danzig.”
Still wrong!
This is a very awkward and convoluted way of indicating, but not quite saying, that prior to the defeat of Germany in 1945 and the transfer of territories to Poland, the city was CALLED Danzig. To say that it was “known as” Danzig “in historical contexts” sounds very much like unctuous Soviet-era propaganda, and an attempt to disguise the basic reality that the city used to be inhabited by Germans. The city WAS Danzig prior to ’45. Had you asked people who lived there at the time (like Günter Grass), they would have said they lived in DANZIG. Yes, they would have known the Polish name for the city, but they wouldn’t have said they lived in Gdansk – unless they were among the small (4 percent) Polish minority.
All this subterfuge and linguistic gymnastics could be avoided very simply by saying “(formerly Danzig)” and then recounting what happened in the history section.
Also, there is no editorial reason to put “Danzig” in italics. We’re not introducing a foreign word into an English account; it’s simply what the city’s name was.
“Due to the city's German heritage the name Danzig is still used but in the international community this name was more commonly used before WWII.”
Also wrong!
The name Danzig is not used in the international community anymore to refer to the presently existing city of Gdansk. Any British or American traveler who was going to Poland would say he was including Gdansk on his itinerary, if that were the case. Also, Western media do not use Danzig when talking about current events. Stories from the city, which occur occasionally, are datelined: GDANSK, Poland — …. (I speak as a newspaper editor.)
The only common use of the name Danzig is when writing about or discussing history. Yes, the Germans still use it, but even that practice is eroding, as it should.
To say that Danzig was “more commonly” used before WWII is another smokescreen. It was universally used – except in Poland and other Slavic countries. At Versailles, the talk was about Danzig, and it was still about Danzig at Yalta and Potsdam. The process by which Danzig, emptied of Germans, was transformed into Gdansk, inhabited by Poles, took a few years, so it took the international community a while to adopt the new name. (Ditto Wroclaw, Szczecin, etc., etc.) But that isn’t the point. The point is that THE NAME OF THE CITY WAS CHANGED FROM DANZIG TO GDANSK IN 1945! (On March 31, to be exact.)
User:sca 19nov04
The Gdansk/Danzig situation is obviously not analagous to Munich/München because München did not change its ethnicity in 1945, like the city in question changed from German Danzig to Polish Gdansk. If you lived in München in 1939 you called your city München, and today if you live there you still call it München. If you lived in the city in question in 1939 you called it Danzig, but if you live there now you call it Gdansk. (We must apologize to our Polish friends for not having the accent marks for the proper Polish representation of Gdansk. Please excuse us Anglos for our ill treatment of the Polish language.)
The English version of the capital of Bavaria is the way it is because a) there is no U-umlaut sound in English, and b) we apparently got it from the French Muniche. Similar explanations hold for English versions of various cities in Germany, Poland, Czech Rep., Bulgaria, Russia, etc. By contrast, English speakers who referred to the city in question before 1945 as Danzig were not calling it Danzig because that was an anglicisized version of Gdansk, but because Danzig was the name of the city which, like Berlin, was German and was pronouncible in its then-German form by English speakers. Gdansk is more difficult for English speakers to pronounce than Danzig, but that doesn't mean that Danzig is the "English" form of Gdansk;Danzig is not the current name of the city in English.
In all of this it is impossible to avoid the distinct impression that our Polish friends keep holding out for these circumlocutions about pre-1945 Danzig not because of any interest in presenting history truthfully, but because they harbor a reluctance to admit to themselves that the city in question (like various others) was ethnically German before the border changes of 1945. This is -- forgive me -- childish.
User:sca 19nov04
please, there is no question the polish and official name is Gdańsk .. i dont want to deny this at all! (And as i personally speak some polish i as well can pronounce the polish names correct - the most german can´t that´s why we have a German name - and thats why you have it in english as well ;o) ) ... Sicherlich 08:06, 20 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Well, moje przyjaciel, how about this: Gdansk (prior to 1945: Danzig) blah blah blah and then explain in the history section what happened in 1945. ??? The fundamental historical reality is that some 10 million Germans lived in Danzig, Silesia, Pomerania and East Prussia before the war and that nearly all of them were either killed or expelled in 1945-49 -- and that they were replaced by Polish people (except in N. East Prussia).
The reason it is important not to obscure this history with a linguistic smokescreen that makes it sound as if these areas were sort of like Alsace-Lorraine, with mixed populations that could have gone with either country, is that this was a huge instance in recent, modern history of ethnic cleansing and forced migration, which supposedly were proscribed by international law and certainly were contrary to the principle of self-determination supposedly held sacred by every civilized country, most of all the U.S.A. I repeat: This history is today still not generally known in America.
Another reason for "formerly Danzig" is that all atlases published in English prior to the late '40s showed the city as Danzig -- again, not because Danzig was the "English" version of Gdansk but because it was the city's own name for itself and the name by which most of the world knew it.
User:sca 20nov04
Alas, I am not enough of a scholar to authoritatively critique the history section. Exactly when the city became predominantly ethnically German is a question I can't speak to with certainty. However, I can say that the history section as currently written seems to me -- based on what I have read about the Teutonic Order and related topics -- to be written entirely from a Polish point of view. My general impression is that the city's German character dates from much earlier than 1795, and probably goes back to the late Middle Ages. I feel quite sure that saying or implying that the city was ethnically German only from 1795 to 1945 is not accurate.
LATER INSERTION:
The Polish-American historian Oscar Halecki, in "A History of Poland" (1992), in discussing relations between the Order and the Polish Crown in the decades following the First Peace of Thorn, writes that in 1457:
"The German element predominated in the Prussian League, which was particularly enranged against the Order, and the town of Danzig, in which the majority of the population was at this epoch already German...."
User:sca 5dec04
I notice several other things about the history section: There is no mention of Danzig's membership in the Hanseatic League, a predominantly German organization, or of the extensive trade that moved through Danzig via the League to western Europe and Britain. And regarding the Order's conquest in 1308, it sounds funny to say the city was "demolished" and then to say "this led to the city's decline." It's a little like saying someone was killed and this led to his serious illness. "Demolished" probably is too strong a word, but I don't know the details of the 1308 incident. Also, the part on the battle of Grunwald in 1410 should include "(German: Tannenberg)" since it's generally known in the West as the (first) battle of Tannenberg. You could throw in "(Lithuanian: Zalgiris)" too, if you wanted to.
The section about what happened in '45 and thereafter is not too bad at this point, but I think it should contain this sentence: "All German names for streets, buildings and localities were replaced with Polish names, except one: Westerplatte, where the Germans started the war in 1939." You could go on to mention the bombardment by the battleship Schleswig-Holstein of the Polish Post Office, just as a matter of historical interest, but it's not necessary.
Regarding your last statement, esteemed Halibutt, I think it would be a serious mistake not to mention the German name in the beginning. The city's identity as Danzig is a living memory for countless people around the world. "Danzig" was famous as the bone of contention between Germany and Poland after Versailles, and as Hitler's primary pretext for attacking Poland in '39. "Danzig" appeared in thousands of U.S. and British newspaper headlines in the interwar period, and was instantly understood by readers as denoting more than just a city on the Baltic.
User:sca 21nov04
On a quick search of the New York Times archives between 1918 and 1950, I got 14,760 hits for "Danzig," nearly all of them articles, and 119 for "Gdansk," most of which were shipping notices, not articles.
User:sca 22nov04
A few thoughts. First, and least important: Isn't Grunwald just as much a German name as Tannenberg? It certainly looks more German than Polish to me. At any rate, as to the name, I've frequently said that I'd very strongly prefer "formerly Danzig." The problem with giving a starting date is that it's totally unclear. I continue to think that (1308-1945:Danzig) would make a lot more sense than starting in 1793. But this seems vaguely inaccurate to me as well. From 1308-1945 the city was predominantly German. Throughout this time the German inhabitants called it something akin to "Danzig." But I'm uncertain whether that means that the city can be said to have been named Danzig for that precise period. On the other hand, starting at 1793 seems equally problematic, if not more so, since this implies that there was a forcible name change at the time of the Prussian annexation, which was not the case. "Formerly Danzig" seems to me to be nicely ambiguous without being misleading. The vicissitudes and specifics can and should be discussed in the article, but I fail to see what is so inaccurate about "formerly Danzig" that it cannot be used. The city was called Danzig for some (somewhat indeterminate) period before 1945. It is no longer called that today, except sometimes in German (which should, ultimately, be irrelevant to this article - there is no reason to go into fits about what Germans call it today, because it is not a city in which Germans live anymore). The fact that Poles have always called it Danzig seems irrelevant to me. I ask again my hypothetical question about the French annexing Trier after WWII. Let's say that after World War II the German city of Trier and its hinterland was annexed by the French. The German inhabitants are expelled, and replaced by French people, who call the city "Treves," the name by which it has been known in French for centuries. Furthermore, one might argue, the city was originally named Augusta Treverorum in Latin, so that the French name is closer to the original name than the German. So, the French claim, the city was a Gallic/Latin city, which was forcibly conquered by the Germans in the 5th century, and is now being returned to its rightful rulers and name. Thus, our hypothetical French wikipedia editor claims, it would be incorrect to say the city was "formerly Trier," because it ignores the fact that French people have always called it Treves, and that once, long ago, it was part of the Roman Empire, and the Romans called it something that sounded more like "Treves" than it did like "Trier." Would you support such a line of reasoning?
On another note, I've noticed that all references to the city in the history section have, without discussion, once again been changed to call it "Gdansk," including the absurd "Free City of Gdansk" stuff. Although there's never been a clear consensus on this, I think it has been agreed that at least for the 19th and 1st half of the 20th century it should be called "Danzig" in the history section. Until we iron out a real consensus (which, of course, seems a bit unlikely at the moment), we should stick with this way of doing it. john k 06:04, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I agree with John, whose view seems eminently reasonable. His analogy to a hypotethically Frenchified Trier is enitrely apt.
Regarding Tanneberg and Grunwald, they were two nearby villages, according to a book I read called "Tannenberg 1410: Disaster for the Teutonic Knights," by Stephen Turnbull. Tannenberg today is called Stebark in by the Poles. I believe 'bark' is a Polish transliteration of 'berg,' but I'm not sure.
I have debated at length with one of our Polish editors regarding the Polish view of city names in the context of the territorial changes and population expulsions of 1945. In the end one must conclude that Polish people of whatever political stripe tend to be acutely myopic on this issue. To argue that the city was not generally known by its German name for all the centuries it was inhabited (primarily) by Germans, simply because it was founded by Poles (or perhaps, West Slavs) a millenium ago, and because the Poles always have referred to it by its Polish name or some variant thereof, does not strike them as illogical, even though it does not correspond to historical reality. This seems to be the case even though, of course, they may be in general very congenial people in other ways.
I believe the English version of this article should be edited by neither Poles nor Germans, but by native English speakers with a strong background in the relevant historical periods. Failing that, I advise anyone who is interested in this topic to study the history books, not Wikipedia. Wiki is a noble experiment in the marketplace of ideas, but one which is intrinsically flawed by the absence of qualified, disinterested gatekeepers.
User:sca 24nov04
Merkwurdig. Dziwny.
I do think it's important that the English entry convey the historical story accurately, because so few Americans, at least -- and perhaps Britons, too -- know the history. In the U.S., the politically correct view of everything associated with WWII and the Germans of that era is, they were bad, and everything bad that happened to them (like Dresden, etc.) was justified. This simplistic view is prevalent not, of course, among scholars, but among the general populace, even those who are (like me) liberal politically and committed to human rights for all.
The PC view in the past always has been to assign to Poland all the virtues of the oppressed victim, which of course in a large sense is correct. But that has meant that the "recovered territories" myth fostered by Stalin et al has been uncritically accepted in the West, even to the point where thoroughly German territories acquired by Poland in '45 are now sometimes described as having been part of "occupied Poland" during the war. I saw an instance of this recently on a History Channel program about "The Great Escape."
It's interesting that the attitude of the Russians about the Kaliningrad Oblast is entirely different (I've been there). The Russkis make no bones about it having been German, and indeed are in a way still proud of this fact. Why? Because they won. They beat the Germans and took it from them. The Poles, on the other hand, had no voice in the "two steps left" territorial lurch of '45, unless you credit the Lublin Poles (Stalin's lackeys) as having been representative, which I don't.
User:sca 25nov04
Yes, but that part of East Prussia was never inhabited by Poles. Northeastern East Prussia had a Lithuanian minority, and once in a while in Lithuania (I've been there, too) you encounter a reference to it as "Lithuania Minor." The first books printed in Lithuanian, as I understand it, were printed in Konigsberg. And of course, Memel/Klaipeda went back and forth.
"Justify" is not quite the right word regarding the other territories, since the uprooting of 10 million human beings (and killing of 1.5 million of them) in the 20th century can scarcely be justified by any medieval background.
User:sca 25nov04
Recently, I have spent a few hours in Frankfurt airport waiting for a connecting flight and I noticed how they pronounced the city name during announcement of the flight to Gdańsk. In German version they said "Danzig", while in English they said "Gdansk". Poszwa 02:14, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)
i have removed some of the lists from this article and given them their own articles. this makes the Gdansk article less bulky and confusing. i will continue to help this article become more clear. Kingturtle 22:34, 29 Dec 2004 (UTC)
i have removed these images temporarily until this page becomes better organized:
sincerely, Kingturtle 22:03, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)
This is the English language Wikipedia, isn't it? In english, the name is Gdansk, not something undisplayable. 172.169.21.14 22:21, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Actually it's not an acute accent, but kreska, a diacritical symbol similar to acute accent. Polish language does not use any accents. Kreska is used for palatalization of consonants and not for accenting the vowels. The article on acute accent contains wrong information, I have to correct it some day. As far as the use of Polish diacriticals on English Wikipedia - we use other non-English diacriticals, English newspapers and Encyclopedias use "ń" all the time - so what's the problem? Space Cadet 03:46, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Anyway, Nohat...! Google kreska diacritic and learn more about the difference between the accute accent and kreska. Sheesh. Space Cadet 21:22, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)
The continuing effort of an editor of this entry – who I suspect is not a native English speaker – to suppress those aspects of this story that are less than complimentary to Poland constitute a gross distortion of history and an attempt to present half-truths to the English-speaking world for purely nationalistic reasons.
In particular, I condemn:
This has been going on for a long time. I can assure whoever is perpetrating these distortions that this effort to obscure the true history of this part of the world in 1945-49 is doomed. Ultimately, truth will prevail. Sca 21:43, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)
-- Halibu tt 22:25, Jan 10, 2005 (UTC)
Halibutt! Isn't it past your bedtime yet?
Why repeat them here? Because it's an unusual, almost unique aspect of the city's history (in the modern context) and one that helps to explain (and document) its complex history.
It's not a matter of annexation and re-annexation -- it's a matter of the city's popultion being forcibly changed -- "cleansed" of Germans and replaced by Poles.
When the city was under the suzerainty of the Polish crown, prior to the partitions of Poland, its population even then was predominantly German. Haven't your read the history? Yes, the city "belonged to Poland" politically, but it hadn't been ethnically Polish since the 14th century. Your attempts to obscure this fact and foster the idea of "returning" a German city "to Poland" constitute an oblique falsification of history. One doesn't "return" a city to a country by removing, in one way or another, nearly all its inhabitants and replacing them by others.
There was no "denazification" of then-Danzig; there was only degermanization. Nazis and non-Nazis alike were either killed or expelled. It's a fact, and you know it! You also should be rational enough to realize that not all Germans were Nazis. But even if they had all been Nazis, they still wouldn't have been "denazified" by being expelled -- they would simply have been expelled (or killed).
PS: There is no such thing in English as an "equation mark."
Sca 23:00, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Another Polish nationalist heard from. Very amusing.
Sca 23:33, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Of course there were Nazis in Danzig -- among them, the infamous Albert Forster. The Nazis were old Danzig's tragedy, as anyone who has read Grass's first two novels knows.
My point was that no distinction was made in 1945-46 between Nazis and non-Nazis; all Germans were expelled. The expulsions fell on people due to their ethnicity, not their politics. Therefore, the expulsion of Danzig's residents (those who survived) was not denazification, it was degermanization, i.e. ethnic cleansing.
I never have argued that what the Germans did to the Poles, Jews and others during the Nazi period was justified in any way, shape or form. It was despicable and horrible beyond words. But as I've said elsewhere, two wrongs – Hitler's and Stalin's – didn't make a right.
There is a basic fallacy to the nationalist-Polish argument that the expulsions -- and killings -- of the Germans were justified because for the heinous crimes of Nazi Germany. A rationale human being knows that all human beings remain human beings no matter what their nationality. Being deprived of one's property, homeland, liberty and even life hurts just as much whether you are Polish, German, Jewish, Moslem, white, black, etc. ad infinitum.
Beyond moralizing, what happened happened; you can't keep on drawing a veil over it by writing bland histories of a savage period.
Secondly, from a historical and cultural viewpoint, the former German cities that today are Polish cities as a result of expulsions and annexations represent, in many cases, something previously unknown in European history: Cities that (thanks to painstaking Polish restoration) present in part the outward appearance of their former selves, but which are inhabited by different populations, ethnically and culturally. In the long history of European wars, cities and provinces often changed hands politically, becoming the property of this or that dynasty or empire, but never were their populations completely emptied and replaced by ethnically different populations overnight, in historical terms.
The German residents of the former German imperial city of Strassburg (today: Strasbourg), for example, gradually became oriented to France over a period of centuries, and still their language is spoken in that city today. No one speaks German in Gdansk anymore, outside of tourists and academics. The same may be said of Wroclaw, the former Breslau, Szczecin, the former Stettin, and many smaller places.
No one who finds this reality troubling should blame Poland. It was done by Stalin and the Soviets and their Polish-Communist proteges, and was possible as a direct result of Nazi Germany's aggression against Poland. But it did happen, just as surely (and on a larger human scale) as European-Americans expelled the native Americans from their ancestral homelands a century earlier. Neither was pretty.
I believe this entire debate hinges on a basic human weakness: The inability to keep two opposing but true ideas in focus at the same time. Yes, the Germans were the villains vis a vis Poland in World War II, but yes, Poles and Russians also committed crimes against Germans at its end and afterewards.
No country is blameless. America incinerated hundreds of thousands of civilians in World War II, perhaps millions in Vietnam (productivity!), and recently tortured prisoners in Iraq. It's all part of the savagery of war, a central feature of which is the "otherization" of the "enemy."
I just wish Poles would stop pretending they acquired the Oder-Neisse territories as some kind of "right," and would acknowledge it for what it was: Power politics of the harshest kind, imposed from without.
Sca 19:50, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)
PS: Here's a question for you Polish nationalists: Would it have been better, after WWII, if Poland had kept her borders of 1937 -- in other words, if everything had returned to the status quo ante bellum (including Germany's borders)? Or was 1945's territorial "compensation" in fact a good deal for Poland?
Sca 20:10, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)
The only "right" solution I can think of is: ante partitionis (1766) borders in the East and post bellum 1945 borders in the West and North. Any other type of borders would always have to be injust, ahistorical and unnatural. Space Cadet 00:50, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)
-- Halibu tt 03:42, Jan 12, 2005 (UTC)
Playing the armchair historian here -- one solution that might have been more satisfactory to most of those concerned (but not to Stalin!) might have been to give Poland all of East Prussia, and Danzig, but not Silesia and Pomerania. Although this still would have been unjust in terms of the human rights of the German East Prussians and Danzigers, it would have been less severe for Germany overall and would have left at least one of the established borders intact. It also would have eliminated once and for all the geographic anomaly of East Prussia, which in the form of Kaliningrad persists to this day.
In my view, the problem with Poland's prewar borders was Wilno (today: Vilnius). But I don't know enough about the history of that city to know to what extent it was Polish before all the uprootings of the war. I can tell you from experience that today it is very, very Lithuanian, with a sprinkling of Russians (I married one).
It's a crying shame what the Soviets did to old Königsberg (today: Kaliningrad). It's probably the ugliest place in Europe -- and one of the most polluted. It had been a jewel. Going from Kaliningrad to Lithuania is like going from night to day.
Sca 22:30, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Population of Wilno Area, 1939
Poles | 321 700 | |
Jews | 107 600 | |
Belarusians | 75 200 | |
Lithuanians | 31 300 | |
Russians | 9 000 | |
Total | 544 800 |
Source: 1939 Lithuanian census
Well, Wilno was as Polish as Danzig was German. There was a bigger percentage of Poles in Wilno before WWII than in Poznań, Katowice or Łódź. According to the Lithuanian census of 1939 (not to mention the earlier Central Lithuanian census of 1919, Polish censae of 1921 and 1931 and the German census of 1916, that are of course disputed by the Lithuanian historians) the whole Wilno area that was annexed by Lithuania had some 60% of Poles while the city itself was predominantly Polish (I don't remember the exact data, something like 20% Jews, 70% Poles, 9% Belarusians and less than 1% of Lithuanians; I'll check that if you're interested). The number of Lithuanians living in "Vilnius" in 1931 was 1 579 - some 0,8% of the population.
According to the Soviet census of 1959 the percentage of Poles in the area of Vilna ('though not in the city itself anymore) was 80,3%. By 1989 the percentage dropped to 63,5%. So, all in all, neither the city nor its area was a big problem before WWII. It was a problem in international relations (or rather lack of such) until 1938, but barely anyone living in the city cared.
Finally, before one starts crying over what the Soviets did to Königsberg, one should think for a minute or two over what the Germans themselves did to their city - by starting the war with the entire world and destroying countless other cities without mercy. But all this discussion is OT here and I believe we should move it to somewhere else. What do you say? Halibu tt 10:20, Jan 14, 2005 (UTC)
Yes, yes, we know all that, Halibutt; we know the Germans started the war and did everything else they did. That doesn't need to be repeated everytime something related to WWII comes up.
According to what I've read, Königsberg already was heavily damaged, and parts of it virtually destroyed, by a big R.A.F. bombing attack in 1944 -- in August, if I remember right. Thousands of civilians were burned to death. By the time the Soviets finally conquered the place in April 1945, massed Red Army artillery had done the rest.
The "crying shame" I alluded to refers to the ugliness of what the Soviets built there. Have you seen photos of Europe's ugliest building -- the never-finished House of the Soviets, built on the site of the royal castle, the ruins of which were blown up on Brezhnev's personal orders? And that building is just the most conspicuous of a whole lot of Soviet-style architectural atrocities in Kaliningrad. The only things charming in Kaliningrad are the few leftovers of old Königsberg, such as the recently restored cathedral.
By the way, from what I have read, the Red Army purposely burned down much of Danzig AFTER they conquered it. You have to wonder why. Didn't the army know they were going to give it to Poland?
Sca 20:44, 14 Jan 2005 (UTC)
What happened to the vote at Talk:Gdansk/Naming convention? Last edit on October 2004. Is this still voted on or has a consensus been found? -- Chris 73 Talk 05:54, Jan 19, 2005 (UTC)
It is not that simple. Before 1793, Danzig/Gdansk was indeed part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. But the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was not a state in the way that modern Poland is. Within that polity, Danzig/Gdansk was a largely self-governing city, and it was inhabited almost entirely by Germans (at least, from the 14th century it was). Calling it "Gdansk" because it was part of the PLC is anachronistic - it assumes/implies that current models of the nation-state applied in the eighteenth century. Which they certainly did not. john k 02:55, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Halibutt, I'm not sure I understand. However, I will state that we ought really to follow English usage, and not worry so much about what the city was called by its inhabitants, or by the Sejm. In English usage, the city is normally called "Danzig" when it is being discussed in historical contexts before 1945. The fact that from the 14th to the 20th century, the city was largely to entirely inhabited by German-speakers, simply shows that this common English usage has some rational basis in the actual conditions of the city, making the decision to switch in 1945 sensible and easy to explain (on the other hand, as we've discussed before, the English name used for a city like Lviv is a lot harder to figure out in any clear way). At any rate, English never uses "Nieuw Amsterdam." In any case, the Dutch-descended inhabitants of New York, who were never so numerous as you seem to think, as far as I am aware, did not call the city Nieuw Amsterdam after 1664 (since, after all, that was no longer its name, in a sense more like the Königsberg/Kaliningrad situation than the Gdansk/Danzig one), and, whatever their ancestry, were largely speaking English well before the American revolutionary wars. By the way, the current naming rules that Emax is insisting on for Gdansk would result in New Orleans being "Nouvelle-Orléans" before 1763, "Novo Orleans" (or whatever the Spanish is) from 1763 to 1803, and then New Orleans from 1803 on.
At any rate, the situation of European colonial cities in North America remains quite different from ancient German trading cities on the Polish coast in the same time period, and I'm not sure the comparison is worthwhile. And, again, our touchstone should be English usage. If English usage is totally confused, as it sometimes is (for Lviv/Lvov/Lwow/Lemberg, or perhaps for Poznan/Posen), we kind of have to cut through the bullshit and come up with a way to do it. But for Gdansk, the English usage situation is (reasonably) clear - Danzig before 1945, Gdansk after it, with only the very earliest centuries confused. I will add that I am not discussing English usage before 1945 by contemporaries. Obviously there are numerous cities that were called by different names in English at one point. In the 19th century, "Ofen" seems to have been used most commonly for Buda, or "Ratisbon" for Regensburg. But no contemporary history would call Buda Ofen, or call Regensburg Ratisbon, even if it is discussing those periods when people would have used those names in English. I am discussing the way contemporary historians refer to the place when discussing it in earlier times. Danzig is, as far as I can tell, far more common. Given that the change in the ethnic composition of the city in 1945 makes this shift sensible, I think we should name it in this way. john k 22:03, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Alright, the editing dispute seems to have come down to the question of what to call the city between 1308 and 1793? Can we perhaps work on coming to an agreement on this? I'll lay out the case for using Danzig:
1) English language sources generally use Danzig when referring to the city at this time. General use textbooks like John Elliott's Europe Divided 1559-1598, Geoffrey Parker's Europe in Crisis 1598-1648, William Doyle's The Old European Order 1660-1800, McKay and Scott's The Rise of the Great Powers 1648-1815, Jeremy Black's The Rise of the European Powers 1679-1793, and so forth, all refer to the city as "Danzig". A JSTOR search shows a limited number of references to the city as "Gdansk" - only 61 articles total mention "Gdansk", and many of those are references to the city since 1945. There are, on the other hand, 552 articles which mention "Danzig", and many of them are discussing the eighteenth century and earlier. [this is a JSTOR search of articles in the 56 journals that are classified as historical. john k 08:38, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)]
2) This English usage makes sense. The city was primarily a linguistically German city from the early 14th century on. Since 1945 it has been a linguistically Polish city. It makes sense to make the name switch only in 1945, because this corresponds to a major shift in the city that did not occur in 1454 or 1793.
3) These two factors alone should be sufficient to make the case. Now, one might argue perfectly rationally that it would make perfect sense to just call the city "Gdansk" throughout, or to complicatedly switch it depending on whether or not it was under Polish or German sovereignty. But only one usage has the support of common English usage, and that is using "Danzig" for the city for the entire 1308-1945 period. If it was common in English to use "Gdansk" for its whole history, or for its history before 1793, it would make sense for wikipedia to do that as well, whatever its inhabitants may or may not have called it. But that is not how it is done. "Danzig" is the main name used for this period, and Wikipedia should follow that usage.
A final point:
4) The question of whether Danzig is the current German name is completely irrelevant to the English wikipedia. Since 1945, the city has not been a German city. As such, the name that Germans call the city today is of as much interest as what the Romanians call Warsaw - that is to say, it is not of interest at all. The reason the name Danzig is important is because it is the name the city was called when it was inhabited by Germans, not because it is the name Germans do (or do not) call it today.
I look forward to a healthy debate on this question. john k 06:07, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I would strongly support doing this for Danzig (Gdansk). For post 1945, I don't think it's necessary - the city is now Gdansk. I would not object strongly either way, though. john k 08:38, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
It may be of note to see what contemporary Englishmen called the city. The astronomer Johannes Hevelius (Jan Hewelke) was a resident of the city, and was in regular correspondence with the Royal Society of London. Looking through his letters published in the Philosophical Transactions I find ...
and so forth. Most of these are from the 1670s. It seems that when they wrote in English, at least this particular group of Englishmen wrote something akin to Danzig. When they wrote in Latin, they wrote whatever something beginning with Gedan... Shimmin 18:57, Feb 11, 2005 (UTC)
Interesting point - but I think not of particular relevance. A similar study would, for instance, show that Regensburg was being called something like "Ratisbon", and Mainz as something like "Mayence". john k 19:56, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Eh, anybody? john k 05:17, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I'll add that I'm sick of arguing about this, and even sicker of how whenever a serious attempt is made to come to some kind of agreement, nobody seems to be interested and we just all retreat into a stagnant truce for a few months until somebody comes along to stir the pot again. There's no reason we can't come to some resolution of this that is sensible and generally acceptable. But it's not going to happen if nobody makes any effort. john k 05:19, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)
A vote will have no validity if certain users are determined to ignore its results. Despite an overwhelming talk page majority in favor of using Danzig rather than Gdansk for 1793-1945 period, until a few days ago Emax and Space Cadet were repeatedly reverting to a version that uses the nonsensical Free City of Gdansk formulation. john k 05:49, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)
JOhn, you are not the one who is sick over the whole issue. I have enough of that too. The discussion is going in circles and the same arguments are used and used again and again. I think that right now is agreement to using Gdansk post 1945, and pre 1308, Danzig after partitions, and the only problem is year 1308-1790s. I once proposed including the link (as template or something) to article explaining the controversies about status of Gdansk and Royal Prussia. But this oculd be too much: So we could agree for Gdansk (Danzig) or Danzig (Gdansk) in articles about the period. In Biographical articles of German persons it would be Danzig (Gdansk) and then Danzig. In Polish it would be Gdansk (Danzig) and then Gdansk. In controversial we would sacrifice the virgin and wait for enlightenment. In history articles we could toss a coin, or something.. The issue is burning our forces and makes me feel tired... Szopen 08:04, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)