Talk:Zealand

New Zealand

The nation of New Zealand gains it's name from this island. When the Island was discovered by a Dutch explorer, it was named after the Dutch Province of Zeeland. However, the English mistakenly thought it had been named after Zealand, and referred to it as New Zealand.

I'd very much like to see a reference for this, because every other reference I have seen explicitly contradicts this - Zeeland was the name which inspired New Zealand, not Sjaelland. Zealand is/was the English translation of the Dutch province of Zeeland. --kudz75 01:42, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I think that there are nothing that will stop you from removing it (and the notice in the disambig line), and adding a note about that New Zealand was not named after the island, also adding a note in the edit summary to check the talk page. If there is anyone out there that comes up with any evidence, take a discussion about it. -- Elisson | Talk 13:32, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I think it is enough that the disambiguation text at the start refer to the accepted explanations.--Per Abrahamsen 20:42, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

"However, the Dutch state Zeeland was named after Danish merchants who traded with the Dutch." - That's ridiculous Zeeland means "land of the sea" and does not in any way refer to the Danes. I remove this statement. MaartenVidal 21:16, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

And "Sjælland" means the exact same thing. You're right; there is no conncection. --dllu 11:15, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Groningish

an excerpt from the article:

When the Pacific Ocean island was discovered by Groningish explorer Abel Tasman...

What does Groningish mean? Best solution would be to wiki-link it... but the word is completely strange to me. -- Fudoreaper 07:39, July 30, 2005 (UTC)

I suspect it means that he came from the city or province of Groningen... But I've never seen the word either... --Thf1977 12:12, 30 July 2005 (UTC)

Changed to Groninger Theodore W. 09:36, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

Okay, cool. But how does that help us understand the meaning? groninger is still a red-link. -- Fudoreaper 00:02:09, 2005-08-06 (UTC)

Should be linked to Groningen (province)Theodore W. 06:27, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

Thanks, Theodore W. I updated the link just now, works perfectly. -- Fudoreaper 18:32:03, 2005-08-12 (UTC)

Souls and seals

I have deleted this remark under etymology:

"In ancient Danish seal (sæl) and "soul" (sjæl) are very closely related words, as seals were thought to be souls of lost seamen."

The two words are unrelated (cf. Niels Åge Nielsen, Dansk etymologisk ordbog, 1990, s.vv. sæl and sjæl). 192.38.32.3 14:49, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

You're right, as mentioned above "Sjælland" simply means "Land of/by the Sea", just like Zeeland in Netherland. --dllu 11:15, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Not necessarily. Den Store Danske Encyklopædi explains the etymology thus

Sjælland, (ca 950 Selund, af glda *sial 'fure' eller dyrebetegnelsen sæl og afledningsendelsen -und) ...

that is, the first part might mean "furrow" or "seal", the marine mammal. I have also seen the "sea" etymology in other respectable sources, though (but note that the Danish cognate of "sea", "sø", means "lake"). If there is to be any etymological information in the article, the main point should be to state that the origin of the name is uncertain ("contested" would be too strong, I think). At least everybody seems to agree that the first component was not originally homonymous with sjæl "soul". –Henning Makholm 01:39, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

Seal and steal

I've read a passage of old norse mythology giving another explanation to the name. In this story, a god in disguise of a man with two oxes come to the king of present Mälaren Valley-area and asks for some land. The king agrees that he will be given the amount of land he with his oxes can plough in one day. His oxes having supernatural powers, he manages to plough the whole of the area today being the lake Mälaren. After having ploughed the land, he dug it free and attached it to his oxes and made them swim out in the Baltic sea. All the way down to outside of the coast of Scania he made them pull the stolen land. Hence the lake Mälaren and the island Sjælland, "steal-land", from the word for steal, today "stjæle". Can anyone confirm or present evidence against? Yenx 20:24, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Mythology

I don't think the text of the norse mythology is correct. If I remember correctly this story is only Swedish mythology, and in fact written during the middle ages as fake norse mythology. The same stories that claims Odin to by a swedish king.

The Gefion myth is as much an "authentic" myth as any other. Of course it wasn't written down until the Middle Ages, but neither were any other Norse myths. There is no evidence that the form in which we know it today was any more or less "fabricated" than any other myths. --dllu 11:15, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

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Greenland

Shold there not also say, that technically it is Greenland that is the bigges island of Danmark. Since it is considet Greenland is an island, and a part of Danmark?

Greenland is technically part of the monarchy, but it is self governing and not a part of Denmark proper. I don't think you will find many Danes who consider Greenland a Danish island (let alone Greenlanders!). --dllu 11:15, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Now that really really wrong. Every dane thinks of Greenland as a danish isle. Just like every dane think Sjaelland a danish island.

- Skadi —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.48.185.54 (talk) 20:49, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

"Every Dane" knows (or really, really ought to know) that "Danish" can be used to refer either to the entire kingdom, or to its Danish-speaking part (i.e. Jutland and islands east thereof). Most Danes would probably not consider either of these usages "wrong" – except for the kind of wrongness inherent in using ambiguous wording in an encyclopedia, in a context that does not clearly resolve the ambiguity. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Henning Makholm (talk • contribs) 23:25, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Added Geobox and named maps

02-Sep-2007: The article "Zealand" was created 6-April-2002, as text-only. After 2.3 years as text, the crude unlabeled pink-red map was added in 2004 (which showed Zealand+Amager merged as one mass). In September 2007, I added the standard "Geobox" plus new labeled maps that show Zealand, in context with other named islands and cities. The separate island Amager now appears as shown separate from Zealand, after 3 years of displaying the merged-islands map. Maps showing several named cities, with kilometer/miles scale, have been used in Wikipedia articles since 2005, as in: "Middletown, New Jersey" (English Wikipedia). -Wikid77 13:21, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Amager is often considered part of Zealand, a large part of it is also artificially constructed to merged it with Copenhagen in a series of harbors, meaning Zealand and Amager are only separated by canals. 87.160.84.75 (talk) 15:18, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

Hight and length of coastal line?

I would like more information about larger islands, provinces or geographical areas. First of all think that elevation over sea level would be a nice indication of what kind of landscapes we are talking about.

• Elevation
• Coast
• Soil
• Climate
• Special biotopics
• Population
• Name in local language/dialect

besides cities which are mentioned for Zealand. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Donald j axel (talk • contribs) 17:49, 12 September 2009 (UTC)

Primary use

I strongly dispute that the primary use for "Zealand" is for the Danish island - it is almost certainly for the Dutch province of Zeeland, or else the term is ambiguous. I think that Zealand ought to be a disambiguation page, and that this article should be moved to Sjaelland. john k (talk) 23:48, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

Øresund Bridge

The article seems to imply that the island of Zealand is directly connected to Sweden by the Øresund Bridge. Perhaps the text should be amended to read "connected to Sweden by the Øresund Bridge via the island of Amager" or something similar to clear up this confusion.128.119.165.217 (talk) 18:38, 20 July 2009 (UTC) and Peberholm/Pepparholm... 85.228.28.99 (talk) 23:29, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

I think it's quite common (and understood) for bridges to make use of available islands; after all, the other bridge mentioned, the Great Belt Bridge, also touches down on an intermediate island (Sprogø). Given the location of the statement in the article's lead paragraph, adding this rather peripheral point (which is more about the bridge than Zealand itself) would, IMHO, be detrimental to the article. I'm not passionate about it, but I really don't think there's much to be confused about, if the reader is confused it doesn't matter, and details are available by following the links to the bridge articles. 71.41.210.146 (talk) 15:09, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

Further reading shows that the island was built as part of the bridge/tunnel project, so although it has been given a name, it is ridiculous to consider it any sort of interruption of the bridge span. 71.41.210.146 (talk) 07:13, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Move?

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: Moved ≈ Chamal ^talk ¤ 11:44, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

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Zealand (Denmark) → Zealand —

• Zealand currently redirects to Zealand (Denmark), so there's no need for the "(Denmark)" 86.182.73.10 (talk) 09:59, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
• Make it a disambig between New Zealand and Zeeland and Sjælland. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 13:10, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
• Disagree with the above and Support the move. Sjælland is also an redirect to Zealand (Denmark), and New Zealand is already linked to. There aren't enough identical cases to require a disambiguation page, and certainly none important enough to warrant making the main page a disambig. 71.41.210.146 (talk) 15:09, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
  • More nuanced view: There is already a Zealand (disambiguation) page, which lists several other possibilities. (I've added a {{disambig}} link to the page already). I wouldn't violently object if Zealand linked there, but none of the other articles are obviously more important than the Denmark one, either; it seems like the oldest and most significant usage which spawned the others, and deserves the base name. I think the situation is similar to (but less extreme than) York, and warrants the same solution. In fact, the latter does not provide a direct dablink to New York. 71.41.210.146 (talk) 22:13, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
• Support per nom and 71.41.210.146. Station1 (talk) 21:57, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
• Support. With a disambiguation page already in place, I see no problem with this move. --Saddhiyama (talk) 22:56, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
• Support per UCN. Flamarande (talk) 21:01, 3 April 2010 (UTC)
• Support per nom. Beagel (talk) 11:13, 4 April 2010 (UTC)
• Support per above. Hayden120 (talk) 11:25, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Sjaelland/Zealand

Should this island be given the primary name as Sjaelland maybe? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.0.222.2 (talk) 05:50, 28 October 2010 (UTC) INDID,NITSKONFUSIN2BUT!! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 163.32.125.141 (talk) 05:14, 24 July 2013 (UTC)

That would be wrong. It is not called Sjaelland in any language. Either go by the Danish name Sjælland or the official english name Zealand. 87.160.84.75 (talk) 15:21, 24 August 2013 (UTC)

TITL=Sjælland!!

AROGANTANGLSAXONPRAKTIS!!

96th or 95th

It says here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_islands_by_area that it is the 95th, rather than 86th largest island.