Talk:Caernarfon

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Why is an English encyclopedia using Welsh spelling? Do the Welsh undertake to adopt English spellings? This is nonsense. Avalon 10:45, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

"Caernarfon" is the official spelling in English, and has been since about 1970. -- Arwel 12:14, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

I simply reject the notion that "official" or any other version of English has to adapt itself to the names other languages use for things, including cities. Beijing, Chennai, & Caernarfon are examples of English twisting itself inside out so as not to cause offence. English speakers however, do not take offence at the French calling London - Londres. It's nonsense.

Ah, but since Wales and England are both parts of the UK, and the official UK name for the place is "Caernarfon", that's a little bit different: "Caernarfon" is the right way to spell it, anything else is wrong. On the other hand, there is no official EU name for London, so if the French want to call it something else, it's their prerogative, even if it is technically wrong. Finally (and this goes for the London/Londres thing as well), it's just a matter of courtesy to call someone (or some place) by the name they've chosen for themselves. As you've posted anonymously, I don't know your name, but let's say it's "John". If I just arbitrarily decided to call you "Juan" (a translation) or "Johnny" (a nickname) instead of "John", mightn't you consider that a little rude? —Ryan McDaniel 18:53, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Currently the aricle says "(the Welsh spelling is now always used in preference to the anglicised forms, "Caernarvon" or "Carnarvon")". A quick google search will reveal that some people are using Caernarvon or Carnarvon for up-to-date stuff like booking holidays, posting their photos to the web etc (and yes I have checked that these links are not refering to places in the USA or Australia). Accordingly I have changed the wording to "(the Welsh spelling is sometimes used in preference to the anglicised forms, "Caernarvon" or "Carnarvon")". Greenshed 00:31, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Rather than revert the edit I've replaced it with "(the original Welsh spelling is now almost always used in preference to the anglicised forms, "Caernarvon" or "Carnarvon")". To say "sometimes used" implies that it is the exception rather than the norm; that is certainly not the case in Wales, just the opposite. Caernarfon is a Welsh town with a Welsh name and that Welsh name's Welsh spelling is now the official name; why is that so hard for some people to accept? Enaidmawr 01:14, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

I have to dispute the claim that "Carnarvon" is ever used to spell the name of the Welsh town contemporaneously. A Google search for "Carnarvon" shows up just over 2 million pages. Excluding "Australia" and "South Africa" bring it down to just over 600,000. An examination shows that the first few pages relate either to the aristocratic title, historic records from the nineteenth century, other residual pages relating to places in Australia and South Africa, various "HMS Carnarvon"s, Carnarvon Primary School, Nottinghamshire, a Carnarvon family, etc. Quite simply, anybody who nowadays spells the name of the Welsh town as "Carnarvon" is just plain wrong. -- Arwel (talk) 01:55, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, I should like to say that I dispute that the spelling "Caernarfon" is "ever" used by anyone who is not(a)Welsh or (b) some sort of bureaucrat to whom UK officialese is more important that the English language. But of course, my basis for saying that would probably not stand much scrutiny - how about you? I do believe that several people have missed the point - the dispute is not a) how Welsh people spell it, or b) how some faceless UK bureaucrat decided the "official" placename should be spelled - it's how the word is spelled in the English language by most users of the language. That's what Wikipedia should use - and that's why, when I search for Rome or Venice or Moscow, I get what I expect from an English language encyclopaedia (although, oddly, Leghorn results in a redirect to Livorno). And, no, I don't accept that at some time around 1970 (or any other time) I suddenly became just plain "wrong" to continue to use the spelling I used before that date. 139.163.138.14 02:40, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Red dot

This article has a wonky red dot. Could someone sort it out? If you work out how, the Bangor, Wales article has a similar problem SP-KP 18:28, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

Looks fine to me in Firefox 1.5, Opera 8.5, Safari 2.0 and IE 6.0. Owain 19:21, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

Both are misplaced for me, too -- it appears just below the center of the title of the article, nowhere near the map. Mozilla 1.1 on Yellow Dog Linux on a Macintosh laptop. Same for Bangor, Wales. -- Mareklug ^talk 00:03, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Capital

We should probably mention Caernarfon's (lapsed) claims to be capital of Wales - according to this 1955 times article I'm reading it had made a formal claim in 1951. Morwen - Talk 11:56, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Twin Town

The twin town of Caernarfon is Landernau. Landernau is situated in Brittany, France.