Talk:Belgium

Folklore

Your affirmation "A major non-official holiday is the Saint-Nicolas (Sint Nicholas in English) Day, a festivity for children in Belgium and also for students" is not correct. Saint Nicholas Day is also celebrated for students in all University towns in Belgium. Many drivers stuck in the traffic would confirm it was because of the Sint Nicholas students's procession in Brussels. Eva. 23March2010

PS: ridiculous comments about Belgium once again among other stupid comments from French and other Wikipedians about other items and articles!

Is it the outcome of Wikipedia's idealistic project about which I wasted my time attending a MOOC course on the French platform FUN early this year ?? See at https://www.fun-mooc.fr/courses/WMFr/86001/session01/info.

Now I am telling you frankly after +/- 6 months personal experience: I found out all those VAIN, FUTILE 'guerres d'édition'/ 'edit warring' (such nice words!!): the black side of Wikipedia!

Matter of EGOS only !

HOW DISAPPOINTING!

Read: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Edit_warring & https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikip%C3%A9dia:Guerre_d%27%C3%A9dition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Lamest_edit_wars & https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikip%C3%A9dia:Guerres_d%27%C3%A9dition_les_plus_futiles.

Actually most of them are completely VAIN (EN) / FUTILES (FR)! Just a matter of common sense ~~

Joel Robert

please change ((Joel Robert)) to ((Joël Robert)) 2601:541:4580:8500:1982:9A7D:E969:91F1 (talk) 15:39, 19 January 2021 (UTC)

 Done EN-Jungwon 15:59, 19 January 2021 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 3 March 2021

The Great Mosque of Brussels is not the Islamic **and** Cultural Center of Belgium, it is the Islamic Cultural Center of Belgium. Please delete and. 50.34.197.13 (talk) 22:51, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

Do you have a reference available for that? Looking on Great Mosque of Brussels, I find a link to salam.centreislamique.be, which names it "Centre Islamique et Culturel de Belgique" (fr) and "Islamitisch en Cultureel Centrum van België vzw" (nl). So while I agree it sounds unlikely, it appears that it is actually correct as is. --David Edgar (talk) 23:23, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

According to that website ( http://salam.centreislamique.be ), the organization called "Centre Islamique et Culturel de Belgique"/"Islamitisch en Cultureel Centrum van België" (which translates as "Islamic and Cultural Center of Belgium") is in the process of being dissolved, so it seems more than desirable to remove the information that the Great Mosque of Brussels "is the seat of the Islamic and Cultural Center of Belgium" from the Wikipedia page. It no longer is. The organization with that name doesn't exist any more (or will soon no longer exist). --Francis Schonken (talk) 22:03, 8 March 2021 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 8 March 2021

Add following missing information to Infobox: iso3166code = BE 2003:C9:5707:EB00:F0E7:9A0F:E70:26D (talk) 20:17, 8 March 2021 (UTC)

 Already done LOMRJYO_{(About × contribs)} 22:36, 8 March 2021 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 10 May 2021

Change 82st to 82nd in population 2601:843:C202:3B10:DDA1:CBF2:D942:1A1D (talk) 02:44, 10 May 2021 (UTC)

 Done Bsoyka (talk · contribs) 05:44, 10 May 2021 (UTC)

Belgica VS belgium

Isn't Belgium derived from Belgica (instead of Belgium being a Latin word)? Pieter Lootens (talk) 16:24, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

I think this is correct. I presume you mean in the context of Caesar supposedly using the word? If no-one objects here soon, I'll replace it. —Brigade Piron (talk) 16:44, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

Caesar said: https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.02.0002:book=8:chapter=46&highlight=belgio%2Cbelgium : his confectis rebus ad legiones in Belgium se recipit hibernatque Nemetocennae. It is one form of the word. Modern borrowing from Latin are often not in nominative case. --Andrew Lancaster (talk) 17:21, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

Sorry, that is badly explained. Belgium is the nominative form as well. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Belgium#Latin Belgica, from which we have many of our modern Romance words, derives from an adjective as in Gallia Belgica, or a form of Belgicus. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Belgica#Latin https://fr.wiktionary.org/wiki/Belgique#%C3%89tymologie https://fr.wiktionary.org/wiki/Belgicus#la --Andrew Lancaster (talk) 10:16, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 21 May 2021

Between 1888 and 1908, Leopold II, king of Belgium, perpetrated one of the largest massacres in human history in Congo Free State, his private estate (and not a colony of Belgium at that time) causing the deaths of an estimated five to fifteen million Congolese people, during the production of massive amounts of rubber and ivory.[19]

those numbers are propaganda. If you do real research you will find that most scholars have acknowledged that there is no way to know how much the reign of Leopold 2 was damaging for the population of the Congo Free State. Putting those numbers in the summary of the English page of Belgium is just trying to dirt the country with unreliable numbers. I nevertheless agree that the reign of Leopold 2 in the Congo Free State was bloody and affected greatly the local population but those number are nowhere close to the reality. Moreover the big majority of victims were due to sickness that arrived with Europeans and to whom Africans weren't immunized, this sickness influenced the harvest and then influenced the natality. Saying "...Belgium, perpetrated one of the largest massacres in human history... during the production of massive amounts of rubber and ivory." is just wrong. Of course there were brutality and a lot of victims... but few hundreds then few thousands of Europeans can't kill 15 million of people and expect more production of them in same time... 212.161.79.68 (talk) 08:37, 21 May 2021 (UTC)

What published sources can you cite for this?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 09:15, 21 May 2021 (UTC)

 Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 11:10, 21 May 2021 (UTC)

Karel Van Noppen and not Karen Van Noppen

Just a tiny typo in the name Karel Van Noppen (in the section "Independent Belgium"). I'd correct it myself but the page is protected. The name links to a page with the correct name, Karel.