Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Poland

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a question

i was reading the articles about Wrocław and Lwów and i have a question: why does the Wrocław article use the name Breslau for the period the city was part of Germany while the other article uses Lviv all the time? Loosmark (talk) 19:07, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Read Vilnius, it's a masterpiece.Xx236 (talk) 07:30, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Sadly, the answer is related to modern day nationalist sentiments in various countries. The more nationalistic editors, the more likely WP:NCGN is going to be disregarded. Do note that that doesn't imply all or even majority of editors from a given country are nationalistic - but that at some point somebody rewrote an article to remove all "foreign" names they found "offensive". PS. Loosmark, have you tried asking this question at the German and Ukrainian noticeboards? I'd be interested in hearing the answers of those respective wikicommunities. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 18:13, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

I have asked several times when the name Vilnius was registered for the first time, no answer yet. Xx236 (talk) 08:22, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Piotrus i asked the question on projectUkraine but nobody cared to asnwer so they probably aren't interested. Loosmark (talk) 00:52, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Expulsion of Germans after World War II

Alleged expulsions from pre-war Poland.Xx236 (talk) 11:34, 3 March 2009 (UTC) "many ethnic Germans were forced to leave or murdered throughout the 1920s and 1930s" - from History of German settlement in Eastern Europe. It seems that Hitler was right murdering the racilaly lower Poles. Is this a Nazipedia?Xx236 (talk) 11:50, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Remove the idiocy and/or tag the articles or sections with {{npov}} and like. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 18:08, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

"Expulsion" articles are frequently edited by anonimous contributors, rather German but sometimes also Polish.

Post WWI migrations should be described, maybe in a specific article. It was an exchange of population between Poland and Germany, I don't know the numbers. Poland accepted also refugees from Russia, of many nationalities. Xx236 (talk) 07:13, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

The word Expulsion as German nationalistic POV

The word Expulsion is a translation of German "Vertreibung". Usage of different words to name the same processes is POV, supported by the German state. It breakes basic rules of this Wikipedia.Xx236 (talk) 09:51, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

As you have been asked (repeatedly), could you please do the basic courtesy of presenting a suggestion for altering a specific part of a named article?

"Usage of different words to name the same processes is POV" - not true, in general. Knepflerle (talk) 13:04, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

"Usage of different words to name the same processes is POV" - not true? Excuse me? This Wikipedia is a project. If we use emotionally loaded words ("expulsion"), Soviet propaganda ("repatriation") and academically neutral to describe three comparable subjects, we create three realities, not one project. The same is with Far right and Nationalism - some parties are far right the other nationalistic, without any explanation. Any rational project demands that basic notions should be defined and used. If the basis is rotten, the whole biulding will collaps. Xx236 (talk) 14:18, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

What is suitable for an article or series of articles depends on the sources, issues and scholarly English usage. This is why posting cryptic general comments when you have a specific problem with an article helps noone - it almost impossible to help you unless you are clear.

So once more, help us to help you: which articles are the problem? Names please. What instances of which words are the problem? What do you suggest we should do? What sources would you like to use? Knepflerle (talk) 21:14, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

"Usage of different words to name the same processes is POV" I'll have to agree with Xx236, it can be POV if those different words suggest different judgements. But he draws the wrong conclusions. If there were expulsions of Poles, they ought to be named expulsions too, instead of introducing the same euphemisms he complains about into other articles. Anorak2 (talk) 10:04, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree, doing so can be a way of forcing a non-neutral POV, of that I am fully aware and in this particular case that could be what is happening. But to say that in general, no matter what the subject, we require absolute uniformity in wording across en.wp in order to ensure neutral POV is exaggeration. More valuable is to report what wording is used where, by whom and in which context and let the reader draw their own conclusions. This is why it is important to make clear exactly which parts of which articles are the problem - which still hasn't been done. Knepflerle (talk) 11:46, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

I think the underlying issue is Talk:Repatriation_of_Poles#Move proposal. But I can only guess. Skäpperöd (talk) 16:12, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

The whole issue of expulsions versus repatriations is a grey area in postwar history. For example, those Polish citizens who found themselves living within the new borders of the Soviet Union (after the gulags, massacres of Poles in Volhynia and other calamities) were at first considered by Stalin as locals and routinely refused the right to migrate to new Poland. A lot of them went to great lengths to have their Polish nationality recognized by the Russians, especially on their journey from Siberia. But, were the Poles expelled from Kresy as well via official repatriation of Poles? Most of them were, regardless of will. By the same token, I don’t think most Germans wished to remain in Poland once Polish borders shifted westward. They must have desired to live among their own people for sure. --Poeticbent talk 19:37, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

All articles about deportations of Germans use the word "Expulsion". Articles about deportations of Poles use the word "Repatriation". "Repatriation" is generally nice thing, isn't it? The idea of Vertreibung/Expulsion was created around 1950 in Western Germany. Xx236 (talk) 09:20, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

In cases where Poles were indeed expulsed and the corresponding articles use euphemisms to describe this fact, you ought to address this as POV in the articles affected. However such an imbalance is no justification to introduce the same kind of POV into other articles. The idea of Vertreibung/Expulsion was created around 1950 in Western Germany. That sounds plausible, but doesn't make it wrong. It's natural that the people affected by such an action are the first to complain publicly. Since the East German regime suppressed any public complaints by refugees living there, it was left to those living in West Germany to do so. As sympathy for Germany was low among other coutries at the time, you wouldn't expect support from abroad for such complaints. But even that doesn't make them wrong. Anorak2 (talk) 10:01, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

The problem is discussed here, unfortunately in Polish, some quotes in German: [1] Xx236 (talk) 08:57, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

My summary: "Vertreibung" is a moral opinion but not a name of historical event.Xx236 (talk) 09:03, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

If Russian/Polish forces/authorities ordered Germans to leave, and used force to make them leave (and orthodox history seems to say that these things happened on a large scale), then expulsion seems to be a perfectly accurate and neutral word to describe it. The same would apply to the expulsion of Poles from Kresy. Repatriation implies (to me) sending someone back to a home country they left, and so is misleading in a situation where it's the borders that had moved rather than the people.--Kotniski (talk) 09:14, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

You aren't obviously right. Read the quoted text - the German idea of Vertreibung includes the whole process since evacuation, the hard phase being only one part of it. The same you can call the 20 century WWII or Poland - Warsaw. The "Expulsion" includes economical emigration from Poland. The next step will be to call any illegal immigrants "expelled". Any Nazi criminal who served in Poland killing and torturing was "expelled". What a kind of language do you impose? Who give you the authority to destroy the language outside of Germany? You can only create your local "customs" of this type. [[Xx236 (talk) 10:29, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Regardless of whether "expulsion" is a translation of Vertreibung, I still think it is an accurate English word to desribe the subject of the article.--Kotniski (talk) 10:31, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

"Expulsion" includes thousands of liberated German POWs travelling from Siberia to Western Germany around 1953 and German workers kept in Poland till 1970. It's not exactly what the English word means.Xx236 (talk) 10:47, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

That's my view, too. Maybe you can comment on Talk:Repatriation_of_Poles#Move proposal, and give the discussion there a new try? Skäpperöd (talk) 09:18, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

sending someone back to a home country they left, and so is misleading in a situation where it's the borders that had moved rather than the people.

Fritz Ries-a German industrialists, born in Saarbrücken; lived n Germany till 1939. Sent to Poland to oversee slave labour and production. Has expellee status, based on the fact that during his work there he took home as administrator of the works. So was he driven from his country or the place he lived for centuries ? Why does Germany have law that allows people like him to gain expellee status(it comes with many benefits from the state btw) and why don't they change it ? How many people like Fritz do exist beside him with the status of expellee ? --Molobo (talk) 18:39, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

The problem with "Expulsion" is that the word is used as an equivalent of German "Vertreibung" and "Vertreibung" is a mixture of Flight, Expulsion, War Crimes, US/UK bombings and economical migration of 1970ties. Xx236 (talk) 07:37, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

The post-1950 migrations to Germany are usually not termed expulsion/Vertreibung, although the respective German laws ruling social and financial aid for expellees (Lastenausgleichsgesetz, Bundesvertriebenengesetz) applied also to these migrations. I would however not assign the label "economic migration" to all of these, economy was one reason, perhaps the only one for some, but there were a lot of other, primarily political and cultural reasons, that caused these people to emigrate. Nevertheless, these people (though able to apply for expellee status based on the above mentioned laws) were not counted as expellees outside the application of these laws - expellee status in terms of the above mentioned laws was assigned to more than 18 million people (I don't have the exact figure here now, but I am pretty sure it was >18). Skäpperöd (talk) 09:13, 9 March 2009 (UTC) PS: The distinction between "real" expellees and expellees in terms of the above mentioned specific German laws IS made in Germany, in usage as well as in statistics. Skäpperöd (talk) 13:18, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

A need for cooperation

We have reached an impasse in the negotiations on the issues of politically charged terminology originating from the Cold War era, making the corresponding articles written about comparable subjects seem like they don’t relate to each other. The only question is whether a balance can be found between conflicting policy guidelines discussed here by both German and Polish editors, namely, WP:V and WP:NC.

The issues revolve around the migration of Poles and Germans after World War II, euphemistically called “repatriations” and/or “expulsions” and/or “deportations” and/or “flight” and/or “displacement” depending on which side of the fence the sources originate from. In the process, we created conflicting realities within one project, all of them inflammatory and misleading. The only legally correct term for these events in my opinion is population transfers, as per definition of international law, and in accordance with academically neutral language applicable to all cases. Unfortunately, editors inspired by emotive eloquence of writers and historians from across the Iron Curtain disagree on many particulars, so I’m not sure if all of us can see the writing on the wall.

Liberated German and Polish POWs travelling from Siberia to new Poland and to new Western Germany were encountering similar challenges along the way, to a differing degree of course. A lot of them went to great lengths to have their nationality recognized by the Russians, who routinely refused them the right to migrate back to their countries of origin (with already redrawn borders). Stalin considered many of them as his subjects, while, at the same time, conducting massive operations across central Europe in accordance with the provisions of Yalta Agreement. The Americans, the French and the British were not around to significantly influence the process of forced resettlement, which was a source of much tragedy and distress for civilian Germans from Pomerania and Silesia as well as the civilian Poles from Kresy, Volhynia and Podolia. The similarities are striking, not only in terms of how it must have felt for many of them, but also, how the Wikipedia articles about the affected cities and towns are presented. We all know that there's no going back.

I would like to propose that the articles dealing with these matters were re-examined for neutrality and renamed, so they can fit into the same category within the postwar history of Europe and world. We can start with two corresponding subjects, i.e. the Resettlement of Poles after World War II, and the Resettlement of Germans after World War II, as they are two parts of one area of postwar history. Please express your opinion. --Poeticbent talk 22:10, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

• Note: This debate has been included in the Talk:Repatriation of Poles. --Poeticbent talk 22:10, 6 March 2009 (UTC)
• Note: This debate has been included in the Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Germany. --Poeticbent talk 22:10, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I like the word "resettlement". It's neutral enough and broad enough for both sets of articles. Another alternative would be "Forced migration", per article on Human migration. I do think that current "evacuation and expulsion" as in "World War II evacuation and expulsion" is too cumbersome and incorrect; there was some voluntary migration, repatriation, deportation, and so on. A neutral, general title is best for all of those articles.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 18:10, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

• Note: This debate has been listed at the Talk:Expulsion_of_Germans_after_World_War_II. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 18:12, 8 March 2009 (UTC)(UTC)

Agree, the proposal of Poeticbent is logical and follows accepted international law standards. The post-war events were not WW2 expulsions but population transfers. Resettlement is a good choice. I agree also that those articles need carefull review, right now they are based on series of unreliable sources rather then on honest scholary books, and full of personal opinions. They also lack much information that is presented in scholary works(for example works by Ingo Haar or Detlef Brandes from Germany).--Molobo (talk) 18:24, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

The idea to call this a "resettlement" is not new. "Resettlement" (German: Umsiedlung) was the label chosen and used for the expulsions by the East German Communists, just like the closely related term "repatriation" was the term used by the Polish Communists. These guys were not that famous for neutrality and truth. So I strongly disagree. If it was an expulsion, it ought to be called an expulsion. Skäpperöd (talk) 19:04, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

So Fritz Ries was expelled ? And please use sources and scholary material instead of your own opinions.

Population transfer is the movement of a large group of people from one region to another by state policy or international authority, most frequently on the basis of ethnicity or religion. Banishment or exile is a similar process, but is forcibly applied to individuals and groups.

Often the affected population is transferred by force to a distant region, perhaps not suited to their way of life, causing them substantial harm. In addition, the loss of all immovable property and, when forced, the loss of substantial amounts of movable property, is implied.

Population exchange is the transfer of two populations in opposite directions at about the same time

From Population transfer article.--Molobo (talk) 19:12, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

From your requesting scholary sources for post-war basics, I can only assume you are not familiar at all with the issue. For a start, the Communists in Poland coordinated the "repatriation" by a "Bureau for Repatriation" headed by Wladyslaw Gomulka, its Communist East German counterpart was "Zentralverwaltung für deutsche Umsiedler", "Bureau for German re-settlers". See also Michael Schwartz, Vertriebe und "Umsiedlerpolitik": Integrationskonflikte in den deutschen Nachkriegsgesellschaften und die Assimilationsstrategien in der SBZ/DDR 1945 - 1961. München 2004, p.3: "In der SBZ/DDR wurde offiziell der Terminus "Umsiedler" verwendet". I know this is not the best source to present to a Polish speaker, but if you do some research, you will find plenty of material on this. Skäpperöd (talk) 19:46, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

In my experience, resettlement when used in discussing this topic in English does not have the same connotations and associated meanings as Umsiedlung has in the German literature. It's hard to give hard evidence to justify this (other than personal Sprachgefühl), but I have the impression it is a neutral alternative in English. Knepflerle (talk) 00:02, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

As to terminology used, I don't see that as anything strange that the post-war governments which were internationally reckognised used terms applicable to international law.Since you are so educated in those matters perhaps you will be willing to explain to me upon what basis Fritz Ries sent to Nazi Occupied Poland and responsible for overseeing Jewish slave labour was granted the Expellee status after the war ? If you don't know not a problem, I will reasearch it on my own. --Molobo (talk) 19:57, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Regarding the term "resettlement", it sounds good to me, I'd say yes to it. How about placing the proper adjective "involuntary" in front of it? Any objections (with a logical basis)? "Involuntary resettlement." Surely no one thinks they were voluntarily resettled. Dr. Dan (talk) 01:17, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

I also object to "involuntary resettlement", since an expulsion is a special form of this. "Involuntary resettlement" would e.g. apply to the resettlement of the Baltic Germans to Warthegau - though they were forced to leave their homeland by the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, most of them was assigned a definite area they would be resettled in, the resettlement was well organized, and most people were able to take their moveable belongings with them. With the late and post-WWI expulsion of Germans, situation was very much different. Not only in the early "wild" stage, but also in the post-Potsdam stage. People were basicaally dumped across the new border, dead or alive, without anything but some clothes (yes, the lucky ones had a suitcase, too). Those not expelled immediately were outlawed, subject to atrocities of all kind, their property was declared "post-German", confiscated and looted; in any case they had to work for the "new masters", either on their former land or gouped in brigades distributed somewhere else, or in detention camps, or as deportees far away. This was not just an involuntary resettlement. Let's spare that phrase for situations like the involuntary resettlement of village populations by local governments to make way for coal mining or an autobahn. Skäpperöd (talk) 09:53, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

You seem to forget, that Poles were removed to make room for the "well organised" resettlement, some of them killed. BTW - some ethnic Germans weren't happy in occupied Poland, some of them were imprisoned by the Nazis, so maybe not so "well organised"? Xx236 (talk) 11:53, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

No, I haven't forgot that. The resettlement of the Baltic Germans was just an example to illustrate an in my view appropriate use of the term "involuntary resettlement", and I did not use that term in regard to the preceeding events concerning the Poles. Neither do I question that the Baltic Germans were subject to the same measures the Nazis applied to all other Germans, too. Btw, Nazi propaganda dubbed this "Heim ins Reich", literally "Back home to the Reich", resembling the term "repatriation" later used by Polish Communist propaganda. At least some parallels are striking here, most obviously that neither the Baltic Germans nor the Kresy Poles originated in the Third Reich or Communist Poland, respectively, and that the territory termed "home" or "patria" was only recently gained and we know what happened to the previous population of these territories, which of course were also labeled with propaganda names like "Recovered Territories" to make them look like they really were old integral parts of the "patria". But despite these parallels, the way the Baltic Germans were resettled differed from the way the Kresy Poles were treated, the latter in many cases were not allowed to take any substantial belongings with them, and once arrived in their supposed homeland, they were often enough dropped by the train with their bundle in the middle of nowhere and had to compete with earlier arrived Central Poles for the houses left or about to be left by the Germans, so overall they were much more ill-treated than the Baltic Germans, many of whom arrived to newly built villages. Of course, as always, there were exceptions. Skäpperöd (talk) 13:18, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

"newly built villages" - where exactly? Xx236 (talk) 15:31, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

[2] Skäpperöd (talk) 16:23, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

You are using Nazi propaganda - a picture taken in undefined place at undefined day with a caption accusing Poles of burning houses. Are you a Nazi or rather naive?Xx236 (talk) 07:38, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps we should hold a RM straw poll, with people voting on more then one new name? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 17:33, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Discussion about naming conventions

Some people are challenging our (OK, my) recently established naming guideline for Polish placse/people. Please join the discussion at WT:MOSPOL.--Kotniski (talk) 07:17, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Translation request

I have just (nearly) completed a total overhaul of Wikipedia's translation system. Previously, there was a very complicated method of posting translation requests. Now there are simply tags, such as {{Expand Polish}}, that can be placed on stub articles (or longer articles if appropriate). I have tried to review all previous translation requests. Many translation requests were very old and no longer seemed needed, because the English Wikipedia article had developed in the meantime. Other translation requests were fixed by adding tags to existing English-language articles. Other articles I generally could create stubs myself that I could add the tags to. But Wikipedia:Translation/Stanisław Jan Skarżyński I didn't think I could do well enough to withstand deletion. Hopefully people here can create a stub for this, and tag it with {{Expand Polish}}, so that translation can take place later. If you are interested in checking out other articles in need of translation (the ones that are properly tagged already), see Category:Articles needing translation from Polish Wikipedia. Calliopejen1 (talk) 15:21, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

I will stub this article. Thanks for the update on translation reform. Perhaps when a translation tag is added, it should be reflected at WP:AA? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 18:42, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Privislinsky Krai

Please see my comments at Talk:Vistula land#Name and purpose. This article needs attention, and I am honestly not sure what to do with it... was it even an official Krai? Please comment there, if you can. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 16:48, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

PS. Disagreement about the scope of relevant articles unfortunately gave rise to an edit war on the following articles: Congress Poland, Vistula land, Administrative division of Congress Poland and Privislinsky Krai. Please comment and help stabilize the issue! --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 23:59, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Let me list the issues of contention, as I understand them:

• what is the proper name for the Vistula land/Privislinsky Krai article?
• further, should the above two articles be separate or merged? If separate, why?
• what should the article(s) on Vistula land/Privislinsky Krai focus on? Congress Poland is a simple article about a former state. What should the Vistula land/Privislinsky Krai be about? About a former state that succeeded Congress Poland? About a semi-official and perhaps derogatory name used for it? About a former subdivision of the Russian Empire? In which article should the post-1867 history of the Kongersówka be described? Please note that currently, the Vistula land/Privislinsky Krai article describes how Congress Poland increasingly lost autonomy and how it was transformed into a regular Krai...
• was Congress Poland officially replaced in 1867 by the Vistula land/Privislinsky Krai?
• should post-1867 details be split of Administrative division of Congress Poland into a new article?

I hope this summarizes the questions and unclear issues that lead to this debate. I hope we can solve it here to everybody's satisfaction. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 00:07, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Here's the main points:

• Vistula land is a post-1867 unofficial name for the area that pre-1867 was unofficially called Congress Poland
• The official name for Congress Poland is Kingdom of Poland
• As a result of the January Uprising the Russian Tsar enacted a set of reforms in 1867. The goal of the reforms was to prevent further uprisings in the future by stamping out all traces of Polish culture (language, customs, religion, etc.).
• The new name for the area was Privislinsky Krai.

New Article Structure:

• Congress Poland should correctly named Kingdom of Poland (1815-1867). It should contain information from the time period of 1815 (post-Duchy of Warsaw) up to the point of the Reforms of 1867. The penultimate statement of the article would link to Privislinsky Krai

• Vistula land, et.al. should point to Privislinsky Krai. This article should contain information from the 1867 to 1915 time period. It should include the discussion of russification. The penultimate statement of the article would link to Ober Ost and Kingdom of Poland (1916-1918)

• The existence of separate Administrative Division articles is questionable. There are enough changes during 1815-1867 to warrant a separate article Administrative Divisions of the Kingdom of Poland (1815-1867), but during the 1867-1916 period the configuration is mostly stable with few wholesale changes.

Ajh1492 (talk) 13:04, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

So we agree that Vistula land and Privislinsky Krai should be merged. The current article on Vistula land has a longer history and should be the one PK is merged to; then a WP:RM can be started on its talk and we can decide on a proper name. Same procedure (RM) should be used for Congress Poland. I suggest keeping administrative division in the current article on Administrative division of Congress Poland and moving it to Administrative division of Congress Poland and Privislinsky Krai or Administrative division of Congress Poland and Vistula land or whatever the name of that article after RM will be. Agreed? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 18:03, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Sources, please

The whole discussing erupted for the sole reason that neither of wikipedias has valid reliable references that "Privislinski Krai" was the official name of the entity. Failure to follow this basic wikipedia policy leads to waste of other people time. If there is a difference of opinions, reiterations you your opinion is useless, unless you provide independent proof of what you are saying. Piotrus has valid concerns, since in Russia the term "Krai" was user rather liberally. - 7-bubёn >t 17:03, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Sources

• [Poland] Polish Academy of Sciences, Institute of Geographical and Spatial Organization, p.539, [3]
  • [Polish] Mimo wprowadzenia oficjalnej nazwy Kraj Przywiślański terminy Królestwo Polskie, Królestwo Kongresowe lub w skrócie Kongresówka były nadal używane, zarówno w języku potocznym jak i w niektórych publikacjach.
  • [English] Despite the official name Kraj Przywiślański terms such as, Kingdom of Poland, Congress Poland, or in short Kongresówka were still in use, both in everyday language and in some publications.

• [Germany] Rudolf Jaworski/Christian Lübke/Michael G. Müller (Hrsg.), Eine kleine Geschichte Polens. Frankfurt/Main 2000, S. 269.
  • (Original German) - Der westliche Teil der vom russischen Reich besetzten Territorien der ehemaligen polnisch-litauischen Adelsrepublik trug in den Jahren 1815-1864 die amtliche Titulatur Königreich Polen (Carstvo Pol’skoe) und hieß nach 1864 offiziell Weichselland (Privislinskij kraj). Nach der Niederschlagung des polnischen Januaraufstandes von 1863 vermieden die zarischen Behören jeden Hinweis auf die polnische Staatstradition. Vgl. dazu u.a. Rudolf Jaworski, Das geteilte Polen (1795-1918),

• [Netherlands] gnatius Adversus Valentinianos?: Chronologische und theologiegeschichtliche Studien zu den Briefen des Ignatius von Antiochien, By Thomas Lechner, Published by BRILL, 1999, ISBN 9004115056, 9789004115057, 370 pages
  • p. 491

• [Austria] Alpen-Adria-Universität Klagenfurt, Enzyklopädie des europäischen Ostens (EEO) [Encyclopedia of Eastern Europe]
  • http://eeo.uni-klu.ac.at/index.php/Polen_(Land)

• [Slovakia] Virtuálne informačné centrum podpory slovensko-poľských malých a stredných podnikov.
  • http://vicentrum.sk/index.php?article=86

• [German] Alltagsgeschichte der unteren Schichten im russischen Reich (1861-1914): kommentierte Bibliographie zeitgenössischer Titel und Bericht über die Forschung, By Angela Rustemeyer, Diana Siebert, Published by Franz Steiner Verlag, 1997, ISBN 351506866X, 9783515068666, 279 pages

• [French] Il existe un dossier sur ces plaintes issues du kraj de la Vistule (kraj privislinskij), soit de l’ancien Royaume de Pologne : RGIA, f. 1290, op. 10, d. 70. Un article à propos de l’enregistrement des uniates a paru dans Sankt-Peterburgskie vedomosti, 302, 1896

• [German] Stadt und Öffentlichkeit in Ostmitteleuropa, 1900-1939: Beiträge zur Entstehung moderner Urbanität zwischen Berlin, Charkiv, Tallinn und Triest, By Andreas R. Hofmann, Anna Veronika Wendland, Geisteswissenschaftliches Zentrum Geschichte und Kultur Ostmitteleuropas, Contributor Andreas R. Hofmann, Anna Veronika Wendland, Published by Franz Steiner Verlag, 2002, ISBN 3515079378, 9783515079372, 308 pages

• [Austria] DEUTSCHUNTERRICHT FÜR ERWACHSENE IN DER ALTAIREGION/ WESTSIBIRIEN IM KONTEXT VON INTEGRATION UND AUSSIEDLUNG
  • http://elib.ub.uni-osnabrueck.de/publications/diss/E-Diss617_thesis.pdf

• Popular references in Polish
  • Blogs ... [4]

• Polish Newspapers
  • Rzeczpospolita Polska's Archive . . . [5]
  • Gazeta Wyborcza's Portal . . . [6]

• [Poland] [Catalog of the exhibition at the Museum Zamojskim, Zamość 2001]

• [Poland] Interia.pl History Portal

• Not that the other WP's can be used as sources, but for the sake of completeness . . .
  • PL:WP ... Kraj_Przywiślański, Historia_Polski_(1831-1914)
  • SK:WP . . . Poľsko

Ajh1492 (talk) 19:02, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

• • • That's a good start. Could we have some English or Polish refs for that? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 18:03, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

The problem is that a lot of the English sources are contaminated by EN:WP Ajh1492 (talk) 18:27, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

• • • • That's why instead of websites we should use books and academic articles, try Google Print and Google Scholar searches.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 18:40, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Polish sources are up, including a definitive quote from the Polish Academy of Sciences, Institute of Geographical and Spatial Organization -

• Despite the official name Kraj Przywiślański terms such as, Kingdom of Poland, Congress Poland, or in short Kongresówka were still in use, both in everyday language and in some publications.

Ajh1492 (talk) 19:02, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Please note my message in the previous section. I did some checking on Polish encyclopedias:

• Interia POWSTANIE STYCZNIOWE: "po upadku powstania zlikwidowano ostatnie elementy autonomii Królestwa Pol. (łącznie z nazwą), przekształcając je w "Kraj Przywiślański" i rozpoczęto zdecydowaną rusyfikację;"
• Interia POLSKA. HISTORIA. ODZYSKANIE NIEPODLEGŁOŚCI: "zniesienie resztek odrębności Kongresówki przemianowanej na Kraj Przywiślański"
• INTERIA KRÓLESTWO POLSKIE , Kongresówka, Królestwo Kongresowe: "1864, po upadku powstania styczniowego, została ostatecznie zlikwidowana wszelka autonomia; wprowadzono generał-gubernatorów, a nazwę K.P. zastąpiono określeniem Kraj Przywiślański." but also "Mimo zniszczeń dokonanych 1915 przez" - confusing, did or didn't the Congress Kingdom exist in 1915?
• PWN Królestwo Polskie, Królestwo Kongresowe,: "1915–18 pod okupacją niem. i austro-węgierską; K.P. przestało istnieć po powstaniu II RP (XI 1918)." - so quite clear that Congress Poland existed till 1918
• WIEM Królestwo Polskie: "Królestwo Polskie po powstaniu styczniowym: Nazwę Królestwa Polskiego zastąpiła, w urzędowej terminologii, nazwa Kraj Przywiślański." but also "Po rewolucji 1905-1907 w Królestwie Polskim ..." and "W latach 1914-1916 Królestwo Polskie stało się...".

So while it indeed appears that the name Vistula Krai (or a variant) was official, sources are confused on whether Congress Poland was indeed replaced in 1864 by the Vistula Land... --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 16:29, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm going with the Polish Academy of Sciences. It (Kingdom of Poland) ceased to exist after the Reforms of 1867. Congress Poland was only ever an unofficial name for the area.

Ajh1492 (talk) 22:14, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

I am adding a infobox with a note clarifying that sources are unclear two articles on Congress Poland and Vistula land. I am open to having a WP:RM discussion about their proper names. Please note that the all sources cited give the year 1864, not 1867, as they year of possible change from CP to VL; please also read my comment above from 18:03, 12 March 2009. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 17:33, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Polands last queen?

Was Elżbieta Szydłowska married to king Stanisław August Poniatowski? And if so, why was she not a queen? Was it a morganatic marriage, and if so, why? --85.226.44.201 (talk) 17:48, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

It appears it was a morganatic marriage. I wonder if we should add her to List of Polish consorts? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 22:16, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps she could be added, if it is a list of consorts; she was a consort, even if she was not a queen. But why was it a morganatic marriage? Is she not very known in Polish history?--85.226.44.201 (talk) 08:42, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Her and his article give different dates for the wedding; 1783 and 1789. Perhaps her article need attending to? Is it correct that it was a morganatic marriage, and that she was not a queen? Andif so, why was this? --85.226.44.201 (talk) 08:46, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

We need to find reliable source to verify that info, perhaps you could help and look for them? Google Print is a good source. When you find the correct info, be bold and correct the errors, citing your sources. Also, please consider registering. Thanks, --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 16:31, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Polish culture during World War II

FYI.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 05:08, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Demographic estimates of the German exodus from Eastern Europe

The article quotes literally Erika Steibach's accusations toward Poland. I believe that the table should be removed from the article.Xx236 (talk) 10:53, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

That's a good question to take to WP:RSN.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 20:39, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

History of Kołobrzeg

"German population which was left in Kolberg was expulsed or murdered by soviet and polnish forces after the victory." - the statement has been rewritten several times since 2006, but no source about murders linked.Xx236 (talk) 13:53, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Do tell us if you've fixed the problem, as I see you did. And do tell us what do you want others to do, since you've removed the unreferenced dubious statement anyway...? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 20:33, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Geographic locations bot

I run a bot that adds geographic coordinates to articles by matching their names and categories to information in the U.S. government's public domain NGA GNIS database of places.

The matching rule is:

• if the Wikipedia article can be identified as a geographic location in a particular country
• if Wikipedia has only one place of that name in that country (ignoring any subnational region qualifier)
• if GNIS has only one place of that name in that country (ignoring any subnational region qualifier)
• if the country and feature type of that particular Wikipedia article and GNIS entry agree
• ...and a number of other heuristic checks against false positives, too lengthy to go into here, are satisfied

then an article is geocoded with the matching GNIS coordinates.

However, I haven't been running it on Polish locations, because of the very high level of name reuse, and both Wikipedia and GNIS' spotty coverage of Polish places was leading to false positives, where only one of a large number of places with the same name would have been created on Wikipedia, and GNIS would also only have one entry, but the two would not actually correspond.

Since then, tens of thousands of new articles on Polish places have been added to Wikipedia, and I think it may be worth revisiting automatic geocoding on places in Poland. If the false positive problem has gone away, it should be possible to geocode around 3,000 articles in a single run, just based on the heuristics above.

Can anyone tell me how complete the en: Wikipedia coverage of Polish places is, or where to get a database of Polish placenames so I can generate lists of names that correspond to multiple places, even if GNIS and Wikipedia do not have all of them, or -- best of all -- whether there is any suitable public domain data available for the location of these Polish place articles? -- The Anome (talk) 15:25, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Our resident expert User:Kotniski should be replying to you soon, I hope - you may live him a note on the talk page; he is the one responsible for adding most new Polish locations to en wiki with his Kotbot... --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 15:55, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes, the process of adding the Polish location articles is almost complete (just half of one province to go). It should be completed in a couple of weeks' time. As you note, there are a lot of duplicate names. I think we would have to develop an appropriate algorithm. For example, we can generate a table of all the village names that we have, and the known coordinates for places in the districts in which they lie. That way even if a name is not unique, we can hope to assign a given set of coordinates to the right place of that name, by comparing it with known coordinates for neighbouring places. There will still be occasional ambiguities to be resolved manually, but I think most of them should be handled automatically once we get the algorithm right.--Kotniski (talk) 11:34, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

That's exactly the sort of thing I have in mind. I propose starting with the easy cases of articles where there is only one place of that name in all of Poland (which I have already, but haven't yet run), then moving to articles where there is only one place of that name in a particular province (which GNIS at first glance appears to code correctly, but I haven't yet cross-checked for validity). Unique-per-district places will almost certainly have to be dealt with in the way you describe.

As a matter of interest, can anyone tell me why Poland in particular shows this very high level of name reuse? The nearest comparisons I can find are Japan, Canada and the United States, but even they show considerably lower levels of name reuse. Canada and the U.S. I can understand, because of the tendency of new colonists to re-use names from their old country, classical cultures, or allusive names like "Hope". I don't understand the reason for the high name reuse level in Japan, a country with, like Poland, an ancient culture of its own. Fortunately, the U.S. has easily accessible public domain geodata tagged by name/state/county, but Japan and Canada are still off-limits for my bot for now. -- The Anome (talk) 12:29, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Do you have statistics for the level of reuse? I wouldn't have expected Poland to have particularly more or less reuse than other countries - maybe it's just that we've created many more articles for Poland (and there would tend to be a higher rate of repetition among minor villages than among the better-known towns which most countries' WP articles are about).--Kotniski (talk) 12:08, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Featured article review

I have nominated Battle of Warsaw (1920) for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Novickas (talk) 16:56, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Britain stood alone against the Axis in 1940

There is a current discussion over at Talk:United Kingdom over who stood alongside Britain in 1940 against the Axis. There is a dispute over the need of the word "unoccupied" in the sentence: At one stage in 1940, amid the Battle of Britain, it was the only unoccupied nation in Europe fighting the Axis. At issue is whether the forces of occupied nations such as Poland, Norway, the Netherlands, etc. should be acknowledged, or whether Britain was the only nation in Europe fighting the Axis at that point in time. The discussion is at Talk:United Kingdom#At one stage in 1940, amid the Battle of Britain, it stood alone against the Axis.. Regards, --Skeezix1000 (talk) 16:49, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Article alerts

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Thanks. — Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 09:34, 15 March, 2009 (UTC)

Centre Against Expulsions

The article contains German nationalistic POV.Xx236 (talk) 13:17, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

WP:SOFIXIT I think is the relevant policy here.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 17:23, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm not able to fix tens of anti-Polish articles so I'm looking for help.Xx236 (talk) 07:33, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Then please be more clear: elaborate on the POV issues here, link the relevant discussion sections on talk of that article... if you make it easier for others to understand the root of the problem, and easier for them to join the discussion and/or fix the problem, they are more likely to help you. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 20:30, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Władysław Szpilman

The article was vandalised on March the 1st. I have resored the removed part but the article still needs references.Xx236 (talk) 13:55, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for taking care of the vandalism. The article is tagged with {{Unreferenced}}. Hundreds of thousands of articles need referencing, unfortunately. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 19:11, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Sandomierz Voivodeship (1939)

A topic largely unknown, in 1939 Polish government planned creation a new voivodeship, with the capital in Sandomierz. I am planning to DYK this article, help is appreciated. Please see Sandomierz Voivodeship (1939). Tymek (talk) 17:50, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

Gminas without geocoordinates

I've just added {{coord missing}} to another 65 gmina articles, by using CatScan to identify the last few which lack both {{coord}} or {{coord missing}}.

With this addition, only roughly 400 of Poland's 2,478 gminas now remain to be geocoded by hand: see this link for the full list. However, if every gmina on this list can be geocoded, it should be possible to use the information derived from this to disambiguate many thousands more Polish place articles -- possibly up to 20,000 -- sufficiently to geocode them automatically from the GNS database. -- The Anome (talk) 14:32, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Those gminas that have coordinates generally have the coordinates of the town or village that is their seat. For many of those that remain, it may be that we have coordinates for some other village in the gmina. So it may not be necessary to have the canonical coordinates (the seat) for each gmina in order to map the GNS data. In fact, that data ought to provide the missing gmina coordinates, so we wouldn't need to do it by hand.--Kotniski (talk) 14:55, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Unfortunately, I've tried a few examples at random by hand, with no useful results. See User:The Anome/Gminas for geocoding for a working set. I could perform a rather fancy ad-hoc global category graph vs. coordinates vs. names analysis to try to resolve both bottom-up and top-down constraints at the same time, but that would be (a) a lot of programming time, and certainly more effort than geocoding 400 articles by hand, and (b) would still potentially generate a lot of bogus data.

The advantage of knowing gmina coordinates is that it greatly simplifies the problem to be solved, and fully encodes all the necessary local knowledge: given the name and gmina, the gmina center can be used as a first guess for the location, and then if there is only one GNS place of that name within a predefined tolerance limit from that center, we can immediately geocode the article with that location. No global analysis, ad-hoc algorithm design, or elaborate calculation is required. -- The Anome (talk) 17:19, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

That's perhaps true, but even the gmina coordinates we have are not necessarily the gmina centre (I suppose in most cases they are, since the seat tends to be near the middle of the gmina, but there's no guarantee - for example the gmina I live in has its seat right at the edge). It seems to me that any coordinates known to be within a given gmina (i.e. the coordinates of any village in that gmina which we happen to know) ought to be about as useful as the canonical seat coordinate. I can probably quite easily generate a list of such coordinates - though I suppose there may still be quite a few gminas for which we don't have any coordinate (although for those it might turn out to be enough to know the powiat seat coordinate to get the gmina seat coordinate from GNS, then work from there...)--Kotniski (talk) 18:03, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree. If you could produce that list, I'd be delighted to take a look at it and see what I can do.

The reason for going for the gminas is that they not only have disambiguating power, but also, for most places, much higher precision that would be necessary for just disambiguation, so we have a chance of catching most of the inevitable errors, even if we simply assume that gminas are approximately circular areas of fixed size. Powiat data is much more likely to suffer from ambiguities about boundary shapes. I've considered using powiat data and the shapes from File:POLSKA woj pow gminy.png to make these unambiguous, but I don't know the projection, and it looks like a lot of work to reverse-engineer the projection from the map itself.

I've also put out a request for help at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Geographical coordinates. -- The Anome (talk) 18:09, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Replied at User talk:The Anome/Gminas for geocoding.--Kotniski (talk) 18:32, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Kriegsverbrechen der alliierten Siegermächte

Kriegsverbrechen der alliierten Siegermächte is a book written by an architect. Its reliability is low. I have asked to discuss the reliablility in Reliable sources/Noticeboard. German Wikipedia quotes the book only once, regarding Bucarest, not Germany.Xx236 (talk) 08:12, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Please provide context - where is this book used? Link to relevant thread on WP:RSN.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 20:29, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Reliability of the book is being discussed in Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard.Xx236 (talk) 12:51, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Can you link the specific section? Thanks.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 12:57, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

w sprawie Barbary Radziwiłłówny

Is there any reference that Barbara Radziwiłł spoke Lithuanian or it's just another assumption of Lithuanian "historians"? It looks like Lithuanian nationalists are at work as one of the users commented article about Barbara Radziwillowna in the German-language wiki. Could you, please provide any link to it or any book title with the page (in English, German, French, Polish, Lithuanian, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Czech, Russian. etc) where prove of her proficiency in Lithuanian can be found? What is the language which is called in the article "White Russian"? And why the Polish name "Nowogrodek" but not Belarusian "Navahradak" is used in the text? This looks idiotically when one sees the name "Vilnius" (which appeared only in the 19th century (see Tomas Venclova "Eseje") in the same article? CityElefant (talk) 13:18, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

I suggest centralize the discussion by replying at Talk:Barbara_Radziwiłł#Lithuanian.3F.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 19:02, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

gen.Sikorski

should this new info http://wiadomosci.onet.pl/1938522,11,item.html be added to the Władysław Sikorski article? Loosmark (talk) 15:45, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Probably, provided it is properly attributed. It is, after all, just another unconfirmed theory.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 19:13, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Centre Against Expulsions article is propaganda

The article is BdV propaganda-the information about the truth that Nazi Germany soldier's daughter is being removed. Information that people removed support for this center is removed. Information about claims of the center is removed.--Gwinndeith (talk) 17:21, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Please link the article in question, and the talk sections with ongoing discussion. Thank you, --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 19:06, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Discussion[7] --Gwinndeith (talk) 23:57, 21 March 2009 (UTC)