Talk:Mainz

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WikiProject Echo has identified Mainz as a foreign language featured article. You may be able to improve this article with information from the Chinese or German language Wikipedias.

This page has been cited as a source by a media organization. The citation is in: Pamela Schehl. "Schinke enjoys time at Utica High School", Mount Vernon News, June 27, 2005. (details)

I'm fascinated to learn that the Polish for Mainz is Moguncja, but does it have much to do with this article, or indeed with the distinctly Rheinland, nowhere-near-Poland-whatsoever, character of the city? And how does the Gdansk vote affect this at all? Alai 16:28, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)

The Gdansk vote says specifically, that the cross-naming affects any place that has a shared Polish-German history. In this case, there has been a large Polish diaspora there in the 19th century, also there were Polish troops stationed there during the Napoleonic Wars. The city was German, the troops were Polish - so the history is shared.

BTW, you might want to question this interpretation at Talk:Gdansk/Vote/discussion Halibutt 16:47, Jun 5, 2005 (UTC)

Also see Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard#Halibutt. -- Chris 73 Talk 16:48, Jun 5, 2005 (UTC)

As to the rationale: for instance, in 1631 the town was occupied by Polish and Swedish forces. As to the name being mentioned in English language sources - google is your friend. Notify me on my talk page if you need any book sources as well. Halibutt 18:13, Jun 5, 2005 (UTC)

Google mainly uses the name Mainz, so I don't accept Google as a reference that primarily uses the Polish name. Can you be more specific? Eugene van der Pijll 18:15, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Halibutt, this is a completely unreasonable argument. French troops occupied most of Poland under Napoleon - how would you feel is from French editor concluded that that was enough of a historical connection to add French names to all Polish pages? There are Polish people living in almost every major city in the entire world - is that enough of a Polish connection to require that we add the Polish names for those cities to all those articles? Etc, etc, etc. Noel (talk) 18:36, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Quite. The above search turns up around 200 hits, and they're exceptionally low-grade stuff. I'd like not merely book sources, but considerably more notable and authorative sources than [1], in either medium. Alai 18:26, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)

But that link, http://www.moguncja.hotelsbedbreakfast.inn26.com/, is interesting, in that it is an international site, and it uses the Polish name. Oh, but wait: it uses the name Mainz as well. And http://www.mainz.hotelsbedbreakfast.inn26.com/ also exists, and uses "Mainz" twice, and "Moguncja" 0 times. Which makes "Mainz" the most common name there. Ah well... Eugene van der Pijll 18:31, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)

This is a clearly specious interpretation of Talk:Gdansk/Vote. Halibutt, you should be ashamed of yourself - this is really childish. I am happy to revisit that particular result of the poll to make it more specific, but this is absurd. john k 19:00, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Childish? I bet you could try to offend me in a more sophisticated way. Anyway, the Talk:Gdansk/Vote ruling does not require any specific kind of source, it simply has to be a English language source, be it a fable, a fairytale, a tourist office ad... here you go then :) Halibutt 07:43, Jun 6, 2005 (UTC)

"It was printed by the Gutenberg from Moguncja, probably in 1454 year." That is not English. Eugene van der Pijll 08:55, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I agree it is not the best English I ever saw, but still it is English. And there is no rule saying that there can be no errors on the source that uses the name. Halibutt 15:05, Jun 6, 2005 (UTC)

I can see value in including variant spellings, of any nationality, of a name (so the entry can be found by Google search, for example)—but listing them all at the front makes the article very hard to read (there could easily be as many entries as ther are languages). Can we not have them at the bottom, like 'see also' sections, etc.? Thans. mfc 14:33, 2005 Jun 6 (UTC)

That would be OK with me. But the name "Mayence" should stay in the first line of the article; not because it's the French name, but because it is an English name for this city. Nowadays a very rare name, but it used to be the most common name, so people could come across the name in older books, newspapers, etc. See for example this google search: "mayence -mainz", only English pages: almost 20,000 hits. Compare with ["moguncja -mainz"]: 31 hits. Eugene van der Pijll 17:28, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)

You don't have to list them all, only the French (by common sense) and Polish (by Talk:Gdansk rule. Whay exactly not? Why exactly is it against the rules? Halibutt 02:39, Jun 9, 2005 (UTC)

How, again, did Mainz "share a history" with Poland? Quit it, quit it, quit it. john k 02:54, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Being occupied by Polish forces twice in its history is not enough? Perhaps for you, gbut not for the Talk:Gdansk/Vote. Halibutt 03:05, Jun 9, 2005 (UTC)

Polish forces? No, that is not enough, especially since in neither case were those Polish forces national forces. Once again, you are clearly purposefully ignoring the clear intent of the vote in order to make a point. Just stop it and do something constructive. What on earth is the point of arguing a position you don't actually agree with? john k 03:14, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Holy Mary mother of God, John, just listen to yourself. What else do you need? If I post you a pic of Polish WWII troops entering the city under a Polish flag you'll ask me for an ethnic composition of the regiment chart? And then you'll call the number of ethnic Poles within the unit too small?

And what difference would it make for the letter of the voting results? I understand that your point of view is that I should provide a zillion of books that use the name and a proof that there was an army with more than 80% of Poles and flying the Polish banner there, but this is clearly absurd. And more importantly, this is not needed by the voting results.

If you don't like the voting results - change them. Or ask the ArbCom to change it. But do not change it yourself by demanding that some articles you like be applied the rules and others not. Who exactly gave you this right? Halibutt 03:26, Jun 9, 2005 (UTC)

Another link, if the previous ones were not enough: [2], [3] Halibutt

Halibutt, the fact that the Polish army on the western front entered the city at the end of World War II is simply absurd as a reason for putting the Polish name in. The basic fact is that everybody except you does not understand "shared history" to mean "at some point there was somebody Polish in this city." This includes those of us who agree with you that the current rule is too vague. "Sharing a history" was clearly meant to mean cities which have, at different points in history, been inhabited by both Poles and Germans, or which have been under the political control of both Poland and Germany or a German state, not any German city that a Pole has set foot in at some point in recorded history. This is how everybody else has interpreted it, and this is how you intepreted it until a few days ago. So please quit with this nonsense, which, so far as I can tell, is supported by nobody except you. john k 03:38, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

But this is incredibly pointless. The basic fact is that what is clearly an overwhelming majority do not believe that your interpretation of the vote is correct and that you have consistently and repeatedly failed to even acknowledge that this is a possible response to what you are doing. Let me say it again: Everybody else who has weighed in on this does not agree with you interpretation of what "shared history" means. As such, no matter what you think "shared history" means (and I assume you do not even really think it means this, but are just engaging in absurdity because you're irritated by how this has been applied on Polish pages - something which, I will again note, I agree with you about), you cannot continue to assert your interpretation as though it is undisputed fact. So, again I say stop it! stop it! stop it! All you are doing is making people less sympathetic to anything you say in the future on the subject. john k 03:42, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

There already exists a page for lists of alternate city names: List of European cities with alternative names. DirectorStratton 18:52, Jun 6, 2005 (UTC)--

Nevertheless, I thought the information on List of European cities with alternative names should also be included here; it is information about the city that might be useful -- if for noone else, at least for Poles who want to know where their name of the city comes from (apparently from the Latin name). So I added a new section. But as I said above: no other names in the first line but Mainz and Mayence, as these are (also) the English names. Eugene van der Pijll 21:58, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I would like to change the following sentence in the article:

The reparations were not paid and Germany preferred to wreck its economy through inflation than to pay them.

This sentence is grammatically wrong and has a content that is controversial to say the least. I would not leave it there without a good citation. I disagree that Germany let its economy go down on purpose to avoid paying reparations. Seems like a very weird statement to me. Instead a note that the reparations where not fully payed and the claims where abandoned after WWII would be in order. Maybe one should mention the worldwide economical crisis in the 20s in that context ...