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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by PubliusTacitus (talk | contribs) at 21:05, 20 April 2007 (Reply to likedeeler). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

It is commonly called West Pomerania. (Mecklenburg-West Pomerania gets more than 9000 hits), and sometimes also Hither Pomerania (as opposed presumably to Thither Pomerania) (369 Google hits). Adam 03:51, 14 Nov 2003 (UTC)

To be very precise, Vorpommern is a part of Western Pomerania. However, I changed it from Fore Pomerania (7 hits) to Vorpommern (45,500 google hits, English pages only) -- Nico 04:03, 14 Nov 2003 (UTC)


Searching the entire Google.

West Pomerania: 10,400 [1]

Western Pomerania: 12,300 [2]

Hither Pomerania: 359 [3]

Searching English pages only:

Vorpommern: 45,500 [4]. English name seems to be Vorpommern. -- Nico 04:20, 14 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I agree. This is probably because there is no real English translation for "Vor". Adam

Controversial name change

I wish whoever moved this page had used the proper page moving procedures. The new name, Hither Pomerania, is somewhat problematic. While I generally am a strong supporter of the Use English policy, in this case it seems to have produced a bizarre result. Hither is a reasonable translation of Vor-, but it is also an archaic word that it is hard for a modern English speaker to say with a straight face. Probably for this reason, Hither Pomerania is not a term that is widely used: the commonly accepted English version of Vorpommern, as used by the lander and others, is Western Pomerania. While I appreciate that use of this name would cause disambiguation problems, it is still what this page should be called.--Stonemad GB 11:33, 28 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]


Name prior 1990

I commented out the following sentence as it is wrong:

The postwar Land was reconstituted as Mecklenburg-Vorpommern prior to German reunification in 1990.


In fact the historic names and borders of the states weren't used in East Germany. Instead East Germany was divided into countys (1952-1990; Bezirk) with that part of Vorpommern belonging to "Bezirk Neubrandenburg" and "Bezirk Schwerin". However after 1990 the Land was reconstituted as Mecklenburg-Vorpommern --Splette :) How's my driving? 03:21, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It wasn't wrong at all. Mecklenburg, like the other postwar Länder in East Germany, was indeed abolished in 1952, replaced by Bezirke, and then reconstituted in 1990, with minor border adjustments and the readdition of "Vorpommern" to the name. "Postwar" does not imply that these states were always in existence after the war, and the article did refer to the Bezirke replacing Mecklenburg. I've re-added the sentence with a couple of changes; while the state was indeed reconstituted prior to German reunification, it became a legal entity on that day, so I changed the preposition to "upon".  ProhibitOnions  (T) 04:25, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Ahh perfect. I now understand how the sentence was meant. Its clearer now. Thanks --Splette :) How's my driving? 04:40, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Glad to help. Cheers,  ProhibitOnions  (T) 14:47, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Vorpommern

Looking at google (English!) resulst and using common sense, there should no doubt the article can't stay under "Hither Pomerania". It is odd and, to say the least, nonsense. Vorpommern should be used instead, in my view. Please also look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Mecklenburg-Western_Pomerania for further arguments. Smaller countries, e.g. Denmark, Estonia, Sweden, etc. didn't bother to translate Vorpommern at all, but rather used the German version instead. Bearing in mind that there is no ideal English translation of "Vor" why not follow their lead. Likedeeler 18:03, 9 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

According to the discussion about Mecklenburg-Vorpommern (see here: Talk:Mecklenburg-Vorpommern#Requested_move, I think it would be good to move this article to Vorpommern. Likedeeler 16:38, 19 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I have been working on a rewrite and thought about that, but honestly, this article has a different slant from the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern one, which is primarily about a contemporary place. The history of Pomerania is not hugely important to understanding MVP. This article is primarily a historical article about a place that has been the subject of five centuríes of warfare and is part of a continuum with Wikipedia's Pomerania, Farther Pomerania and Swedish Pomerania articles. There is a context in this article, a pattern of longtime use, of anglicizing all these placenames to make them more comprehensible, and I think that should stay. I'm not 100-per-cent convinced about "Hither", but I don't think imposing "Vorpommern" is appropriate here. So if you don't mind, I'm reverting that part of your changes until we have a wider consensus about what to have as a headword. Tacitus 21:42, 19 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I think the entity described here is the region that is part of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern today. I believe all historical questions should be moved to Pomerania. The place may have been the place of many wars, but so have many other places. Now it is German and forms one of two parts of the state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. There are many current issues like geographical (islands, tourism), economic, cultural (useums, university of Greifswald, hanseatic architecture) features that I would consider more important for people today. I think there should simply be links to Pomerania and Swedish Pomerania in the "history" section and the connections with those as well as the common history should, of course, also be mentioned. But Vorpommern is a contemporary region, a geographical entity defined by its borders to Mecklenburg, Brandenburg and Poland. Don't know if all that makes sense, but I still think the name should be Vorpommern. Moreover, I think "Hither Pomerania" is by far the worst option :-). The numbers also say that "Vorpommern" is most frequently used, that "West(ern) Pomerania" is also widely used but that "Hither Pomerania" is not the most desirable name. Likedeeler 14:51, 20 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, but for us native English-speakers, Pomerania and its transmutations are a familiar term and Vorpommern is a foreign word. It's like asking us to talk about Bavaria in English using the word "Bayern". I agreed to calling the post-1990 state Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, because Pomeranian identity is of small importance in the contexts where Wikipedia treats the state of MVP, and English, like any other language, chooses synonyms according to context and can absorb new synonyms.

However Pomeranian identity is a central issue in describing yesterday's and today's West Pomerania(s). An English-speaker otherwise ignorant of Germany would come to this article with some inkling that Pomerania is a European region, an overlay (or underlay) to the current borders. You might say we have a concept of "Pomeranian-ness" and the first thing the reader wants to know is: how is this Pomerania different from the other Pomeranias? Each of the European languages has its own word for Pomerania and these sub-Pomeranias along the Baltic coast. We can learn new words (like Mecklenburg-Vorpommern) but we would be resistant to being told that we mustn't call Pomerania proper by what we consider to be its proper name.

Contributors to the Wikipedia Germany Project have sensitized us to the idea that when we focus on German topics with a historical perspective to them, we should use traditional placenames, and I think that consensus has to be accepted.

As for the Hither/Western issue, the numbers are only indicative and certainly don't tell us what is desirable. We need to consider which native English-speaking authors authoritative on German matters use the different terms. Here is the start of a poll (additions requested from other Wikipedians):

  • Western Pomerania is the term used by:
    • Richard Bryan Smith, the Liverpool travel writer, in his 1827 book Notes made during a tour in Denmark, Holstein [&c.]
    • James D. Haas in his 1852 translation of Friedrich Kohlrausch's History of Germany
    • William Russell in his 1837 History of Modern Europe
  • Hither Pomerania is the term used in:
    • Encyclopædia Americana (eds. Francis Lieber, Edward Wigglesworth, Thomas Gamaliel Bradford) of 1832
    • the Richard Brookes and John Marshall New Universal Gazetteer of 1832
    • the 1732 General Collection of Treatys (volume II) translation of the Peace of Münster: ...All the hither Pomerania, commonly call'd Vor-Pommeren, together with the Isle of Rugen, included in the Limits wherein they were bounded under the last Dukes of Pomerania....
  • Upper Pomerania is found in:
    • the Guarantee of England of 1719 regarding the Duchy of Stettin and of Upper Pomerania (document in National Archives, Kew)

Tacitus 21:05, 20 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

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