Talk:Romania

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Good article Romania was a nominee for Geography and places good article, but did not meet the good article criteria at the time. There are suggestions below for improving the article. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.
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Contents

[edit] Referitor la numărul românilor din afară

Pentru cine se ocupă de pagina asta, se aminteşte la un moment dat că e nevoie de citare privind numărul românilor din afara graniţelor ţării (aproximativ 2 milioane). Am găsit o oarece sursă aici: www.hetco.de/diaspora-romana.htm. Sper să fie inclusă în articol.

A, şi am mai găsit aici cifra de 12 milioane: http://www.larg.de/Stiri/Stiati%20ca%20suntem%2012%20milioane%20de%20romani%20in%20afara%20granitelor%20Romaniei.htm. (e saitul Ligii Asociaţiilor Româno-Germane din Germania). Diferenţa e cam mare. Înclin să cred spre ultima, totuşi.

[edit] Romanian Flag

National HEROES : Andi & Adelina !! :) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.103.232.37 (talk) 20:23, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Nu ati vrea sa punem negru in locul albastrului?? Vad ca deja toate le faceti pe dos. Nicaieri nu am vazut ca steagul tarii mele sa arate in asa hal. Vreu sa vad exact si de unde ai scos voi bleu-marin-ul, ala ie drapelul Chad, nu al Romaniei. Hai go ahead si arati sursele unde zice ca steagul ieste asa daca sunteti asa de corecti. ComUSSR 9 October 2007

I posted here: Talk:Flag_of_Romania#Flag_colors nobody responded. -- AdrianTM 05:56, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
Ok...the only words i got were "Nu = no; asa = like this; drapelul = flag; Romaniei = Romanian?; etc"...seriously use English when communicating on English Wikipedia talk pages...it makes it easier for all of us who edit the English-language Wikipedia...anyways...using the very very limited Romanian I know and my knowledge of the French language, I am guessing that ComUSSR is complaining about the flag using the shades of Blue, Yellow and Red that Chad uses and not the actual shades that Romania uses, and he wants it corrected?...am I on the money? nattang 06:13, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
Yep, I should have translated, but it sounds like a rant rather than an argument so I passed... simple, he/she says that the flag colors are wrong, I posted a link to my comment about the issue. -- AdrianTM 06:28, 10 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes I requested the change of the currently wrong Romanian flag. And I think Im right. Go wherever you want on any site and I guarentee you that this isn't the Romanian official flag. Thanks Adrian. You should change it right now. We'll see what others will say. ComUSSR October 10th, 2007

I asked User:AdiJapan the user who created that flag for permission, we can wait to see what he has to say. Thanks. -- AdrianTM 19:55, 10 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm definitely not an expert in conversion from Pantone into RGB, but as far as I know there is no unique widely acceptable conversion table. So in my opinion we shouldn't try to use by all means the numbers that are currently listed in the article, since they might be wrong. I would rather try to use RGB colours that look more like what we all know our flag looks like. An to be honest, the 'Flag_of_Romania.svg' (darker version) looks a lot more like the real flag than the 'Romanian_flag.svg' (lighter version). This second version (the lighter one) is just too light. For all three colours. In conclusion, I would stick to the old version. Alexrap 08:58, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Then we need consistence in that article, probably the numbers are wrong (I used the numbers provided in article) -- AdrianTM 12:29, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
Yes, I agree with that. Someone with more experience in these issues should probably take care of it. Alexrap 13:35, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

What's happening then? At the moment an unregistred user changed the image in this article (linking to the file with the new ligher version). Shall we keep this new image or we should rather use the previous one? (I would go for the second option) Any comments? Alexrap 11:15, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

I created that file based on the numbers in the article, but I don't necessarily advocate using it -- I have limited knowledge in this field, I will let other people decide, I do advocate for consistency between numbers and colors of the flag. -- AdrianTM 11:31, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] GA failed

I am sorry to say that this article still needs a lot of work to get it up to GA standard

  • The thing that sticks out the most to me is the lack of refs in the article. Many sections do not have refs. It is ok to not have refs if the daughter article is reffed but in most cases teh daughter articles have no refs
Just to clarify: from your comments bellow, I see only the last ~half of the article (Culture, Government & Sports) suffering from this issue. Is that right? Or your statement was referring to more than the last half?Nergaal (talk) 11:22, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
The last half suffers more than the first half, but the first half still has a few places thin on refs. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 08:04, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
  • On many refs, the full date, author, accessdate, publisher is not recorded. Please record this where applicable
Wasn't full editing of references a FA standard? (a good part of the references do have significant details but stuff like full date and publisher are not allways awailable.)
That's true, but in some cases there was info but it wasn't included. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 08:04, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
also, what is accessdate supposed to show exactly?Nergaal (talk) 11:22, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
The date that you inspected the webref basically. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 08:04, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Y DoneIn the sport section, I find it unusual that you have gone into detail of listing individual players as then it would be very hard to balance and work out which people deserve personal mentions. eg, what about Gabriela Szabo and so forth. In most articles, specific players are not mentioned unless they tower above all others. In any case, it is not necessary to note the clubs that Hagi played fro, that is irrelevant to Roomania at large. Noting ever grand slam winner is not feasible and secondlt the Romanian rugby team is not competitive at all. But anyway, the entire section there is unsourced. ACtually there is nothing about sport culture among the people, it is just a list of a few famous sportspeople
the statement rugby team is probably superficial and borderline snubby. If the information hereby is not well presented then state that and before you go ahead and make statements ilke "it is not competitive at all" it might be wise (at least as and admin) to do a little bit of research before denigrating. I am just going to say that in Rugby union, the country is usually rated atound 15th place.Nergaal (talk) 11:22, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
Well maybe that is because I am from Australia. I just checked the results of the 2007 WC again and losing 85-8 to NZ and then 42-0 to SCO is a sign that they are a weak team. Even if they are a good team on a bad day, conceding 50 points once is what would be expected. In 2003 they lost 90-8 to Australia and 50-3 to Argentina. This shows that they are not causing much problems for a world-class team at all. These scores are about the same as losing 4-0 or 5-0 in a soccer match, which is a lot.
'second tier' IRBNergaal (talk) 14:32, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
Personally I'm for removing the reference to rugby, Romanian team is not good and the sport is not even popular in Romania, I think somebody introduced that because they play (or they like) rugby and wanted to support the sport, but this is pretty much useless and doesn't provide info. -- AdrianTM (talk) 14:58, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
...simiarly, all the references to gymnastics and tennis should be removed since neither of them are actually popular (and not really successful anymore either). Therefore the section 'Sports' should be renamed to 'Football'. Nergaal (talk) 16:54, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
While I appreciate your attempt of humor, ha ha ha, I don't think that Romania is really known for Rugby, but even if temporarily the gymnastic team is not _very_ good (it's still better than 99% of other countries) I still think that many people when they think of Romania they think of Nadia Comaneci and Romanian gymnastic team, but be my guest include info about any sport you wish, that was only my opinion... -- AdrianTM (talk) 17:00, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
That was not my point. IN THE PAST Romania was competitive in both gymnastics and rugby. I agree that in gymnastic (only feminine though) is more competitive than rugby. But in rugby union, it is still only one of the 12 countries that has participated in all of the world cups (which by the way is the only statement about rugby). Anyways Romania is definetily more competitive in rubgy than in tennis (and if you ingnore 2 people, tennis means and meant nothing to Romania). As far as popularity, gymnastics is not even really broadcasted anymore. Leaving all of this aside, I believe that this is an encyclopaedia, where stereotypes should not be propagated, but where facts are presented. Therefore, keeping gymnastics for the sake of stereotypes (see Quintuplets 2000) and not for the sake of encyclopaedic relevance is a bit off. Nergaal (talk) 17:28, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
Well, in case the stereotype is of encyclopedic proportion it should be mentioned, in case of football Romania never reached the success of gymnastics, but I would actually like to see both criteria used: success and popularity, both with references: for example number of gold medals in Olympiads for gymnastics and number of practicants (if we have such a number for football) I don't think that rugby meets any of these two requirements: no medals and not too many paricipants (unless I'm wrong about that) -- AdrianTM (talk) 17:52, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
  • POV like "when the "Golden Generation" was at its best." no sources and describing specific mathces.
  • Foreign relations section is completely unsourced
  • Y DoneCounties section is not sourced
  • Y DoneDitto for politics
  • Y DoneScience is not really part of culture and suffers from teh same type of problem that the sports section does in that it talks about personaliteis rather than the bigger picture, eg, how much is the research budget etc. It mentions an astronaut bbut does not talk about the general space program at large.
  • Y DoneMonuments is again not sourced directly or in teh daughter article
  • Y DoneThe Arts section is again heavily dependent on a list of personalities rathe than discussing the cultural art picture of Romania at large.
  • Y DoneCulture section unsourced
  • Y DoneThe economy section is relatively good
  • History section has undue weight on post CEaucescu. Most of the events in this period were normal electoral transitions, so there is not that much to say in that respect. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 08:08, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

I agree that some of the sections in the last half are geared too much towards specific people rather than general trends. I also agree that some sections in the last half do suffer from underreferrencing. Thanks for the input but seriously, this was a GA review not an FA one.

ps:This is rather simply my curiousity: the GA-review are done by a single person or by a group of people? I am asking this because last time this was GA-reviewed the feedback did notseem to be this overwhelmingly negative.Nergaal (talk) 10:36, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
GA is done by a single person. Unfortunately, I do tend to be one of the harsher markers in GAC. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 08:04, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] left to do

  • The thing that sticks out the most to me is the lack of refs in the article. Many sections do not have refs. It is ok to not have refs if the daughter article is reffed but in most cases teh daughter articles have no refsN Not done
  • On many refs, the full date, author, accessdate, publisher is not recorded. Please record this where applicableN Not done
  • History section has undue weight on post CEaucescu. Most of the events in this period were normal electoral transitions, so there is not that much to say in that respect. N Not done

[edit] This page has had about 45000 hits

during November and is in the top 500 of wiki charts Nergaal (talk) 00:47, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

on 438 place from 500. Treaba buna Nergale.Edgesusedarea (talk) 15:33, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

Treaba buna, indeed.

136,800 views per day in January? Wow! Nergaal (talk) 16:29, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

66,500 views but still in top 500 :) Nergaal (talk) 08:22, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Too long?

I don't think the article is too long. I think the longer, the better! Basketball110 00:59, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

TWSS. Actually, I think it's a bit too long, especially some of its sections. The history section needs to be trimmed quite a bit. Other sections seem fine lengthwise, although some sections (such as tourism) should exist, and others should be merged, for instance geography and administrative units. 21:47, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

Suggestion-Maybe we should turn it's sub-sections into sections. Basketball110 22:01, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Latins

Are Romanians part Latins? They were -- obviously, even the name gives it away, part of the Roman Empire.

I'm Romanian; most of the people there consider themselves Latin. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.59.228.131 (talk) 21:16, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

I think they're culturally Latin in the sense that they descend from a Romanized province. --Venatoreng (talk) 16:46, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

What would their ethinicity be? Latin still? I've checked the Latin Union website and it says so. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.158.70.135 (talk) 02:34, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Da, românii sunt latini. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.200.120.1 (talk) 16:08, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Internet Penetration

The last two paragraphs in the Economy section contain unverified and possibly inaccurate information.

The percentage of computers connected to the internet in the country reaches almost 70% and more than 50% have broadband connections reaching a 4 Mbit/s (megabits per sec) average. From this aspect, Romania is the 10th country in the world with a bigger percentage of people connected to the internet than the USA.

The only reference given is to a poll conducted in Romania. The numbers claimed here are not supported by the numbers in the poll. And according to a more reliable source the second claim about Internet penetration is blatantly wrong. Can somebody please verify these claims, fix them if they are wrong and provide adequate references? Hritcu (talk) 20:45, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree—this sounds like a very dubious claim to me. Note that there is a Category:Broadband Internet access by country, with some 30 countries listed, but Romania is not there (I would imagine it would be, if it would be in the top 10, no?) Also, note the article on Broadband Internet access in Europe, where we only find out that "Broadband internet has been available since 2000" in Romania--no other claims there. Finally, take a look at Communications in Romania#Broadband Internet access: there are all sorts of details there (how current are they? are they reliable -- no source is given), but I can't find a Top 10 claim there, either. All in all, I think the claim, "Romania is the 10th country in the world with a bigger percentage of people connected to the internet than the USA" (which is not even grammatically sound) should be removed from this article, pending serious verification. Turgidson (talk) 22:25, 1 January 2008 (UTC)
Follow-up comment: According to this source, as of July 2006, "Romania was approaching the average European rate of internet use", which hardly sounds to me like Top 10 in the World. Maybe things have changed since, but note that the reference given in this article, "Românaşul High-Tech" (hardly a title inspiring confidence, at least for encyclopedic purposes!) is from February 2006, so — what gives? Turgidson (talk) 22:34, 1 January 2008 (UTC)
I have heared recently something like there are 6-7 millin internet users in Romania.Nergaal (talk) 11:26, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

There were 4.57 million active internet access connections in Romania according to ANRCTI (The National Authority for Communication and IT). See here (it's a PDF general assessment in Romanian, skip to the table on page 67 for details) : [1]. The same report counted 2,33 million broadband connections (registered) in 06/2007. 6-8 million users should be correct, given that many households/companies will share a subscription. --Xanthar (talk) 22:08, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Alternate names

Both Rumania and Roumania redirect here; both have been (recently) used of Romania, and Rumania happens to be my idiolect. I see no reason not to include them, if only as an assurance to the reader that she is in the right place. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:53, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

It may be "imprudent for a foreigner to dogmatize on English usage", especially for "someone whose fluency in English is not that of a native speaker", and is graciously encouraged to "read the English literature, if you can". But yes, it's Romania, not Roumania or Rumania, regardless of what your idiolect says. Next question? -- Turgidson (talk) 19:14, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
It is all three. Roumania is a Gallicism after fr:Roumanie; I say idiolect because I believe Rumania is British English, which I normally do not speak. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:27, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
Roumania and Rumania can be found in older maps and international documents. All three are acceptable, but "Romania" is much more common nowadays. nat.utoronto 21:38, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
Hi, Nat -- I'm not sure what you mean by "acceptable". Of course, it's a free country, one can write anything any which way—even Roomania, I guess. But in all modern international dealings and documents, scholarly journals, all serious newspapers and magazines—in other words, the vast majority of reliable sources—and, last, but not least, here at Wikipedia, it's Romania. The other spellings are way obsolete and musty. As for the above claim that "Rumania" is (current) British English, well, how so? Just ask BBCRomanian.com, or check Country profile: Romania at the Beeb. -- Turgidson (talk) 23:50, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
No one is proposing to rename the article; merely to note that these names, which do occur in current writing, do in fact mean Romania, and not, say, Rumelia. As far as I can tell from the Google result, Roomania doesn't. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 00:13, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
And no one with a basic understanding of Logic and the English language would mistake my comment as implying that I thought someone is "proposing to rename the article". This kind of argument is called a red herring, or setting up a straw man. What I said (if one is to read carefully what I said), is that Rumania and Roumania are "obsolete and musty" spellings, with no current usage in reliable sources. Period. -- Turgidson (talk) 21:00, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
Which is nonsense; reliable sources which use them in the title are cited. If Turgidson would explain why this matters to him, we might be able to converge on a solution. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:03, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
Of course, this is discussed (and referenced) in the section on Etymology, and in Etymology of Romania. That's the proper way to do it—not bolded, in the first sentence of the lead. See WP:POINT, WP:MOS, WP:UNDUE, etc. Turgidson (talk) 18:16, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
The only bold word in the first sentence is Romania. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:38, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

If fr:Roumanie is "now deprecated", someone had better tell the French Wikipedia. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:26, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Clearly you have no basic knowledge in French and at least you should know that country names in French are very different from English. For example: Etats Units - States United. --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 20:55, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
So what's your point? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:57, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
There is no consensus to add Rumania/Roumania in the article. Sources added by me contradict your claims clearly. --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 21:11, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
Nonsense. The fact that most people use Romania, which nobody disputes, cannot contradict the fact that some English-speakers use something else. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:15, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
Non sequitur. Yes, some people mispronounce the name of the country. So what? Some avid golfers call it Rumenia. Should we also have that in the lead? And some people mistake Bucharest for Budapest, and vice-versa (especially in English-speaking countries). Should we mention all the possible confusions in the leads of the articles on Bucharest and Budapest? Where would that stop? Turgidson (talk) 22:22, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
If you check Google Scholar for the word "Rumania", there are 18,400 results with most of the material publish from the 1940s to the 1990s. "Rumania" had been a popular form with scholars and international diplomats. nat.utoronto 22:37, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
  • A third of it is published in the 2000s; the first page here contains a result by one Oprescu, published in Bucharest. To insist further on this minor matter is to be more correct than the Romanians themselves. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:18, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
Nat: Of course, I don't dispute the fact that "Rumania" was used in English in the old days — to do so would be silly of me. What I argue is that (1) essentially no serious, reliable source would use that spelling nowadays, unless they want to expose their ignorance (please do correct me if I'm wrong in this assumption); and (2) the proper place to discuss the etymology of the name, its various variants and spellings, etc, is in the Etymology section (and, of course, in Etymology of Romania). What I argue against is cluttering the lead (especially, the first sentence) with such a discussion, which sounds very peripheral to the real subject of the article. Turgidson (talk) 23:33, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
Anyone who reads the first sentence will see that the "clutter" consists of four words, which are part of a parenthesis which exists anyway - for the Romanian spelling and the pronunciation. If it makes for compromise, I would be willing to place some of them ("less common" and perhaps Roumania, which is less common than Rumania) inside the footnote, but that would mean removing the express acknowledgement that Romania is indeed the most common form. Let me know. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:10, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
From WP:NCGN In the lead "Any archaic names in the list (including names used before the standardization of English orthography) should be clearly marked as such, i.e., (archaic: name1)." Rumania is an archaic spelling for Romania (both in English and Romanian, in English it seems that most of the recent results point to Romania while old ones point to Rumania which support the idea that's archaic usage) -- AdrianTM (talk) 16:30, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
I would also be content with "now largely historic"; archaic in WP:NCGN is intended to have its common meaning, of terms no longer in use, which is not true here. The standardization of English orthography, after all, took place while Rumania was still Moldavia and Wallachia. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:15, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
Pmanderson, you have been reported for breaking the 3RR in this article. Here's the link - [2]. --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 16:47, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

The most simple way to end this useless discussion would be to start a poll in which editors would support/oppose the inclusion of the so called "alternate names" in the article. Anybody agree? --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 18:22, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

No, m:Polling is evil and slow, and the combination of an offer to poll with an effort to get the other side blocked has its dubious features.
There are two ways for Eurocopter to settle this right now. I have made no less than three compromise proposals immediately above. Eurocopter can either specify which of them he finds most acceptable and we can install them; or he can explain why he declines all compromise and insists on acknowledging only the official name, to the inconvenience of our readers and against our policies. If we understand his reasons, we can accommmodate them. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:36, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
Please stop talking as I would be the only who opposes the inclusion of those "alternate names". In fact, I think you are the only one who supports their inclusion. Your so called "compromises" are unnacceptable for me and other users involved in this discussion. Also, you are the only one who terribly seaks to add these "alternate names", as a revenge resulting from the discussion on Talk:Iaşi-Chişinău Offensive. Let's see if somebody would agree with a poll, so we would stop this endless discussion. --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 18:45, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
Please answer my question: which of these compromises would you find acceptable? ("None" is a perfectly good answer, but please stop delaying; a poll will take five days.) Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:47, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
Which of your comments do you actually call them "compromises"? And why you would not accept a poll? --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 18:53, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
  • To exclude "less common" or move it to the footnote.
  • To include "now largely historic"
  • To move Roumania, as least common of the three, to the footnote.
Polling will take days, and has all the evils mentioned at m:why polling is evil; nor can it really justify suppression of fact, see WP:NPOV. But if Eurocopter can bring himself to accept any combination of the proposals above, we can end this now. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:06, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
I agree with Eurocopter; a poll would be best (once Pmanderson has served his block). Epbr123 (talk) 19:21, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
Pmanderson received only a 24 hours block, so he would post his opinion in the poll tommorow. --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 19:59, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
I agree too, a poll seems the way to go, otherwise I would remain with the impression that only one person pushes something on this page and complains if the rest of the people don't "compromise" -- AdrianTM (talk) 20:18, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Another element to be taken into consideration, given the fact that "rumân" has a specific (rather negative) connotation in Romanian, I think that "Rumania/Rumanian" is to be avoided even by English speakers (just like other terms that were initially pure ethnonyms but for one reason or another are considered offensive by the people who are called that way) -- AdrianTM (talk) 20:27, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

A poll would be fine. Rumania and Roumania are in a gray zone somewhere between being common alternative names and historical names. Until the middle of the 20th century Rumania was decidedly the standard name of the country in English. Since that time, almost all usage has shifted to Romania, but there are still some holdouts using Rumania, as well as many existing works that have not yet accumulated enough age to be called "archaic." I think it's fair to say that Rumania is an acceptable and established alternative, but one that's dated and on its way out. As such, it's sensible to mention it in the intro, but it doesn't necessarily need equal billing with the now-standard spelling. It would be fine to put it in a later sentence in the intro. Connotations of related Romanian words are irrelevant, as it's only English-language usage that matters here. --Reuben (talk) 22:56, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
Roumania is not /that/ old a variant, certainly it was still in use when I started school in the 80s though it seemed to quickly fall out of use in the 90s. Rumania is a term I have only heard from my great grandfathers generation, and up until his death he still referred to 'Mesopotamia' and the 'Fuzzy Wuzzies'. Then again, I still know people (and still use myself) the pronunciation 'Keenya' for Kenya. Alot of what might be termed archaic terms are still used in British English at least. Narson (talk) 08:38, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
That's exactly why "archaic" is not the right word. Something that was in common use 30 years ago may be dated, but it's not even close to archaic yet! I've seen Rumania in histories of WWII, so it was still common as recently as 60 year ago. Again, dated, but not archaic. --Reuben (talk) 18:51, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
Adrian's argument is the best against including Rumania, and is therefore worth answering. The encyclopedic thing to do is to include it and include a note on usage, with a source. Many English speakers will not know this, and should be told; I suspect that includes most of the diplomatic historians who do use it. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:03, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
As per the explanation in Etymology of Romania Romanian had two spelling too "Român" and "Rumân" the second one came to mean bondsman (bondservant) only, I do not have any proof that the English use of that form could be considered offensive by Romanians (besides the "u" form is used by many other languages), but it's not a big stretch to imagine it's not necessarily a pleasant association (it would be offensive if it were in Romanian, but that's probably irrelevant for English use), but in any case I'm pretty sure it's considered dated (I haven't seen any official English document that uses that form recently) -- AdrianTM (talk) 00:33, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
My God, do you people just make this up as you go?! The document that the article points to as being the original mention of Romania is simply a mis-spelled error. EVERY Ottoman map since the 14th century calls the region in which Wallachians lived 'Rum', and Rumania was simply the post-Ottoman Latinisation of the name. In the Christian Europe the people of the region, where they were ethnicaly different, were referred to by their ethnic names, Magyars, Walachians, Ukranians, Ruthenians, etc. Rum is a Turkish word for the province, and has nothing to do with Roma, the Italian city, or Romans who were long gone by the time Wallachians settled by the Black sea. Now, the reason the province was called Rum is because at the time it included Greece, and the Greek was the France lingua in the region. Rum is STILL the name for Greeks in Turkish!!! Enough with this nationalistic busines snad trying to make like the Italians! It just happens that Wallachins chose to Latinise (Romanise?)their language in the same way the French did to distinguish themselves from the Greeks, so they now fall into the Latin language group.--mrg3105mrg3105 13:52, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Poll

The following discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

This is a poll in which editors are invited to express their support/oppose regarding the inclusion in the main article of the alternate names for Romania, as proposed by User:Pmanderson.

  • Oppose - per discussion above and WP:Naming conventions. --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 13:33, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Support-ish - Per bullet point 1 in section 2 of Wikipedia:Naming conventions (geographic names). However with the caveat that, per that point, they should be labelled as archaic. They have fallen out of general use. I would also support an expansion of the Etyomology section rather than putting it in the lead. I do not buy the argument that people looking for Rumania or Roumania would be confused if they arrived at this page and didn't see those names in the lead. I think the etymology section can be expanded into the English name for the country as well as the Romanian name. Narson (talk) 14:21, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Support - Per Narson and per the fact that "Rumania" was a popular anglicized form of the name used by scholars and diplomats from the c.1940s (or earlier) to the early 1990s. Label the term as archaic. nat.utoronto 16:33, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Oppose - Those spellings are obsolete, "Romania" spelling is used in 99% or more (actually many instances of "Rumanian" provided by Google are from other languages than English) of the cases and 100% in official communication in English language -- since that's the official standard. If we mention "Rumania" we need to clearly label it as archaic per WP:Naming conventions -- AdrianTM (talk) 18:48, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Support as above. An approval poll seems the best way to do this, since there are a number of options. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:17, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Comments

  • Comment: the phrasing of this poll is unfortunately very vague. It's quite hard to tell what exactly I'm being asked to support or oppose, and the opposes seem to have in mind something quite specific rather than just any "inclusion in the main article." I suggest we start over with a list of specific proposals, and ask editors to support as many as they find acceptable. I suspect there's an acceptable compromise lurking here somewhere. --Reuben (talk) 18:55, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


[edit] Approval poll

The result of the poll is a close run between options 3 and 6, repeated here for convenience:

As this was supposed to be an "approval poll", I'm counting only the positive votes. Option 3 has 6 approvals, of which 4 are marked as "first choice". Option 6 has 7 approvals, of which 2 are marked as "first choice" and 3 as explicitly weak approvals. All other options have much fewer approvals. Now, the difference between the two texts is minor (just the choice between "dated" and "less commonly"), but if you insist on a decision between these two: how do we weigh the difference in total approvals as opposed to "first choice" approvals? I'd personally favour weighing the strength of approval, so I recommend taking this as a vote for number 3, despite the marginally higher number of total voters in 6. Now, you can all flay me for not giving a definite decision. Fut.Perf. ☼ 20:43, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

{{RFChist }}

[edit] Data

  • WP:NCGN and other naming convention pages dislike raw www.google.com results, preferring Google Scholar, and Google Books. Googlefight comes under this, especially since it makes no effort to sort for English pages. Please note that the question here is not, and never has been, which name is most frequent; but which are frequent enough to be well-known. The case for Roumania is that it is pointless to exclude it if Rumania is included; it is the spelling used by and of Queen Marie, both in her own writing and in, say, Dorothy Parker. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:24, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Disagree to this view as per what I stated below.Nergaal (talk) 04:59, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Google Scholar:
    • Romania (and country, to force English results): 91,200 hits
    • Rumania (and country, to force English results): 19,000 hits
    • Roumania (and country, to force English results): 6,480 hits
  • Google Books:
    • Romania (and country): 4020
    • Rumania (and country): 3600
    • Roumania (and country): 1760

[edit] Discussion

I don't think any of these gives equal billing to the less common spellings; they're certainly not intended to. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:32, 9 January 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Seriously now

Is it really necessary to put all the outdated names that the country has been known as in the introductory paragraph? There is a Etymology section. In that section all the older usages can be added and it can even be stated around what period were they in use. Nergaal (talk) 00:45, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

See paragraph 2 of WP:NCGN: Relevant foreign language names (one used by at least 10% of sources in the English language or is used by a group of people which used to inhabit this geographical place) are permitted and should be listed in alphabetic order of their respective languages,... We would include even names which are neither English nor Romanian, if they were used by 10% of the available sources (Rumania is used by some 45% of Google Books). The three words required to do so are much shorter than an express link to the Etymology section would be. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 04:27, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
  1. Why do sources in the English language have to refer to Google Books counting and not simply Google? Maybe it is the case that the country was more often debated among scholars in books in the past (i.e. around its independence, or around the time it was on the frontline of the two World wars) and now it is simply a subjet of less 'interestingness' to write about. This would count towards a skewed view on the present situation of the naming.
    • Because raw Google is notoriously unreliable; see WP:GOOGLE. One quite common difficulty is that it does not accurately filter texts in English, and hits on Romanian and Italian are irrelevant to the question at hand. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 06:09, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
  2. Please read paragraph 2 again.

    Alternatively, all alternative names can be moved to and explained in a "Names" or "Etymology" section immediately following the lead, or a special paragraph of the lead; we recommend that this be done if there are at least three alternate names, or there is something notable about the names themselves. Once such a section or paragraph is created, the alternative English or foreign names should not be moved back to the first line. As an exception, a local official name different from a widely accepted English name should be retained in the lead "(Foreign language: Local name; known also by several alternative names)".

The Etymology section here allready states "In the following centuries, Romanian documents use interchangeably two spelling forms: Român and Rumân" and " Wallachia being here named The Rumanian Land - Ţeara Rumânească " This almost covers the issue we are debating here. I believe a simple explicit statement to the two alternate names should be enough, as here.Nergaal (talk) 04:49, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

That is intended for cases in which there are at least three alternative names, each in a different language. We could do it here; but the explicit link would be as long as proposal (6) above, rather more obtrusive, and less clear. But feel free to draft a proposed text; if short and clear enough I will support it. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 04:54, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
No, it is recomended to be done if there are 3 or more. If there are less, then it is still an option without being explicitly recomended.Nergaal (talk) 04:57, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
As I said, it may be considered; we who wrote that guideline did not want reasonable solutions prohibited by arbitrary lines; but the intention was that it not be done unless there are three, or some other clear reason for the movement (like long explanations for the names in text, which are not necessary here). Septentrionalis PMAnderson 06:05, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
By explicit statement I meant adding a sentence in the Etymology section that clearly discusses the archaic naming and at the same time leave the intro simple as per (1).Nergaal (talk) 05:06, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
That is expressly deprecated by WP:NCGN: In this case, the redundant list of the names in the article's first line should be replaced by a link to the section phrased, for example: "(known also by several alternative names)". Septentrionalis PMAnderson 06:05, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

I think I can understand those editors who maintain that the alternate names should appear elsewhere in the article (or nowhere, if possible). As Romanians, we all want our country to have a uniquely identifiable name, like a brand, with no room for ambiguity, variation, or uncertainty. However, we're writing an encyclopedia here, which should contain all relevant knowledge. Those alternate names do exist, no matter if we like them (I myself don't), they can be found in lots of especially older books, newspapers and scientific articles, and are still in use by a small minority of English speakers. As such, they just have to be mentioned in the leading section. Here's my suggested phrasing:

Romania (rarely spelled Rumania or Roumania, Romanian: România, IPA: [ro.mɨˈni.a]) is a country in Southeastern Europe.

This is not a matter of etymology (see that article), but a matter of alternate names used synchronously with the main form, in the recent past as well as today. Besides, the etymology section only deals with the word in Romanian, not in English. If anyone has data about how the three alternate names appeared and evolved in English, a special section would be very useful. But even then the leading section should mention all those names. — AdiJapan ☎ 09:05, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

I prefer "less commonly" to this variant, "dated" is also a good options since it communicates the idea that those spellings were used before, but now they are less common (especially in official writings) -- AdrianTM (talk) 13:51, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
Fine with me. — AdiJapan ☎ 16:34, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
See above, but the origin of the English Rumania is the Ottoman 'Rum', which actually means Greek in Turkish. So the ONLY logical name to call the country and its people is Wallachia, which is what it used to be called before the Ottoman occupation. Of course why the Ottomans called the Greeks 'Rum', is another story. As another example all Europeans in Turkish were called French :o)--mrg3105mrg3105 13:59, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
"Now, the reason the province was called Rum is because at the time it included Greece" What? Are you serious or just trolling this page... AdrianTM (talk) 14:01, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
Maybe mrg3105 can also show us some sources to support those claims? Remember though, exceptional claims require exceptional sources. — AdiJapan ☎ 19:25, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Sources

Talk pages are not an arena for scientific debate. Anyone who maintains a certain view in spite of objections has to support that view not through scientific arguments, but through references. Several sections prior to this one are full of meaningless explanations, perfectly good for a discussion forum, however, Wikipedia is not a discussion forum.

Here are just a couple sources for the etymology of Romanian, which I think haven't been mentioned before:

  • [3] --- Three dictionaries give Latin romanus as the etymon for român.
  • The Making of Modern Romanian Culture, by Alex Drace-Francis (2006), see page 8: The etymology of rumân can be explained by two vowel changes in the word romanus. (Google Scholar has parts of the book, including this.)

The actual number of sources for this etymology is so large that if anyone comes with a different point of view, he will have to bring forward a sources good enough to allow the inclusion of that view in the article (let's be clear, not the replacement of the other points of view, but just the inclusion of an additional POV). Also, one should be aware that exceptional claims require exceptional sources. And deriving român from Turkish is indeed an exceptional claim. — AdiJapan ☎ 16:40, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Things to do:

For those that want to help:

  • find references for the 37 31 29 25 'citation needed' tags that are throught the article (in Communist Romania, Culture, Tourism and Foreign relations)
  • trim down the Communist Romania section
  • Check external links Nergaal (talk) 10:31, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] location

plz fix the location, is not "Southeastern Europe" is central europe because Romania is on 26°06′E and Europe is from 15º W to 60º E that make Romania a center contry not eastern contry, acording to World_map —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cosy18 (talk • contribs) 17:53, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] list of other minority ethnic groups

Jews are listed as a minority ethnic group. Judaism is a religion- not an ethnicity. This really should be changed- it is a juvenile mistake that threatens the credibility of the whole article. Lindsaywindsor (talk) 07:31, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

Please inform yourself before you come here and proclaim things with such a certitude (which threatens your credibility), I'd suggest you read the first paragraph of Jew article. -- AdrianTM (talk) 07:42, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Political subdivisions

The only political subdivisions of Romania are the counties on one level and the municipalities/cities/communes on another level. The "macroregions", etc. are NOT administrative divisions of Romania. Look at the Romanian administrative laws if you don't believe, starting with the constitution. A change in the political administration would require a change in the constitution, therefore a referendum and this has not happened, nor it will in the close future.

The "macroregions" were created by the European Union as a grouping of counties used for statistics. Nothing more than statistics. Most countries don't even even have names for such groupings of counties.[citation needed] bogdan (talk) 18:55, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Are there some trans-border deals that involve macroregions? Or there are laws that apply only in some macroregions? (such as tax incentives)-- AdrianTM (talk) 19:17, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
Trans-border deals are done through the "euroregions", which have nothing to do with the macroregions.
Fiscal incentives are found in the "zone defavorizate" (of which there are around 30 in Romania), which are also unrelated to the "macroregions". bogdan (talk) 19:37, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
Thanks. Just asking to learn stuff, I wasn't challenging your changes. -- AdrianTM (talk) 19:38, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Wtf is your problem for deleting that chunk of text? If you would have bothered to work on this article at all you might have a right to go ahead and chop parts that you don't feel like being there. But before taking any drastic actions, please at least bother discussing the issues you have. And also, the points you have raised have allready been listed in the text you keep chopping. Nergaal (talk) 04:41, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

Since they are used just in some reports of the European Union, knowing about their existence is not useful for almost anyone and that's why thye are not relevant to this article. BTW, You don't own an article, so I have as much a "right" as anyone to edit it. bogdan (talk) 10:31, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
No, I don't own the article but at least I did bother to go through the history of the article and I know why is it in the present state. I am not going to bother spending time to explain to you why since you seem ignorant enough of what is in the article? Go through the reviews that this article has been through and only then come and express your opinions. Nergaal (talk) 11:30, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
What do you mean? I looked in the archives and reviews and there is no discussion on this. bogdan (talk) 11:48, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

And here I go spending my time into proving my point to a random editor that once reads my points will NOT make any contributions to the article. Thanks for "contributing":

  1. you replaced the main link from "Administrative divisions of Romania" to Counties. This article is suposed to be comprehensive and one point of the article on any country is Administrative regions. The fact that the specific subdivision of the article was called counties is most likely from a random user "contributing".
  2. as per above, that section is meant to cover the administrative divisions of the country. It begins with the discussion on the counties and in the past it was followed immediately by a list of all the counties. If you actually read through the reviews, you would have noticed that a list of counties was undesiderable because it is unnecessarly detailed. The idea of covering development regions is something in between.
  3. the text exlaines precisely that these groupings into NUTS I&II are artificial and only for statistical purposes, and that the NUTS III are the same with the counties.
  4. you deleted THE ONLY map in the entire article related to administrative divisions. For the sake of the argument, if you were actually intending to contribute to the article you would have deleted the NUTS text but would have replaced the image with one showing only the counties. But as you just showed, you are not interestied in CONTRIBUITING! You just want to impose your point of view which might be more or less correct than mine, but you are in no ways interested in contribuiting.
  5. without the discussion on NUTS the section is a stub.
  6. Romania as a member of EU SHOULD be presented as such. No article on an EU member should be presented as a simple country with a simple short notice of membership. Instead, the article should relate how is the country related/integrated to the EU, and I see absolutely no reason not to discuss in the administrative region how is it see from a more central point of EU.
  7. the point above makes especially sense since EU does not label Romania as the poorest member, but it labels one of its NUTS II as the poorest region.

Go in peace and debate your non-contributive points somewhere else. Nergaal (talk) 12:20, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Linguistic and geo-historical analyses

Linguistic and geo-historical analyses tend to indicate that Romanians have coalesced as a major ethnic group both South and North of the Danube.

I dispute this. Before 1100, Romanians were not a major element either north or south of the Danube. It was only in the 12th century that they became a "major" ethnic group in the south of the Danube, strong enough to matter in the politics of the region, being involved in event such as the founding of Great Wallachia (~1150, in Greece), Vlach-Bulgarian Rebellion (1185, in Bulgaria) and the Founding of Wallachia (~1290). bogdan (talk) 13:29, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

On which sources do you base your assessment? Also please pay attention that that paragraph doesn't mention a timeline, how can you dispute that Romanians have coalesced as a major ethnic group at North of Danube? -- AdrianTM (talk) 13:34, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
Well, indeed, that's the problem: it doesn't mention any year. Also it fails to name any "linguistic" and "geo-historical" analyses. bogdan (talk) 13:57, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
Yes, it needs a reference, let's add the tag, but your claims need reference too. -- AdrianTM (talk) 14:14, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Romania during WWI

Moldavia remained under Romanian control after the invading forces were stopped in 1917

Well they did manage to stop the offensive in 1917 at the 3 major battles : Marasti, Marasesti and Oituz. But Romania still had to capitulate. ~~Marius~~ —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.208.174.72 (talk) 22:54, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Actually, this phrase makes one understand that Romania was able to stop the German invasion. It didn't, it simply gave up fighting and signed the Treaty of Bucharest, joining the war again only toward its end.

See Romania during World War I and it's result: "Central Powers victory, Treaty of Bucharest" bogdan (talk) 13:46, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

I agree, this needs to reformulated. Feel free. -- AdrianTM (talk) 14:16, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Two million

it is estimated that, in total, the [Communist] regime directly killed up to two million people.

It's a misunderstanding of the wording in the Tismăneanu Report:

"cifra victimelor directe ale represiunii comuniste se ridică la 2 milioane."

The "direct victims" include both people who were killed and those who were imprisoned, tortured, etc. bogdan (talk) 14:05, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

I change that, see if that sounds better, if not change it. -- AdrianTM (talk) 14:21, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Density

The population density of the country as a whole has doubled since 1900 although, in contrast to other central European states, there is still considerable room for further growth.

I'm not sure what this is meant to say. There is room for growth in all of them, not only in Romania. All the central European states (such as Romania 93/km², Austria 99/km², Hungary 109/km² or Slovakia 111/km²) have way lower densities than some western countries (such as England 388.7/km² or Netherlands 395/km²). bogdan (talk) 14:34, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] What the Problem with this Article: Székelyland?

This is not against Romania! Help me in the construction!

[edit] Székely Land
Szekely Land as envisaged by the autonomy supporters
Szekely Land as envisaged by the autonomy supporters

Székely Land refers to the territories inhabited by the Székely, a Hungarian minority living in the centre of Romania. They live in the valleys and hills of the Eastern Carpathian Mountains, corresponding to the present-day Harghita, Covasna, and parts of Mureş Counties in Romania. From the 12th and 13th centuries until 1876, the Székely Land enjoyed a considerable but varying amount of autonomy, first as a part of the Kingdom of Hungary, then inside the Principality of Transylvania, and finally as a part of the Habsburg Empire. The autonomy was largely due to the military service the Székely provided until the beginning of the 18th century. Medieval Székely Land was an alliance of the seven autonomous Székely Seats of Udvarhely, Csík, Maros, Sepsi, Kézdi, Orbai and Aranyos. The Székely were considered the finest warriors of medieval Transylvania. They were part of the Unio Trium Nationum ("Union of Three Nations") a coalition of the three Transylvanian Estates, the other two nations being the (also predominantly Hungarian) nobility and the Saxon (that is, ethnic German) burghers. These three nations ruled Transylvania, usually in harmony though sometimes in conflict with one another. During the Long War, the Székely formed an alliance with Prince Michael the Brave of Wallachia against the army of Andrew Cardinal Báthory, recently appointed Prince of Transylvania. As a result of the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867, Transylvania became again part of the Kingdom of Hungary within Austria-Hungary and ceased to exist as a separate legal or administrative entity. In the Treaty of Trianon of 1920 following World War I, the Kingdom of Romania acquired Transylvania. In 1940, Romania was forced to cede Northern Transylvania to Hungary in the Second Vienna Award; this territory included most of the historical Székely areas.Following the territory's return to Romania after World War II, a Hungarian Autonomous Region was created in 1952, which encompassed most of the land inhabited by the Székely. After the fall of Communism, many hoped that the former Hungarian Autonomous Region, abolished by the Ceausescu Regime, would soon be restored again. Uzo20 13:07, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Latin Europe

Hello Romania! There is a vote going on at Latin Europe that might interest you. Please everyone, do come and give your opinion and votes. Thank you. The Ogre (talk) 20:56, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

There is no geographical landmarks or historical landmarks for romania. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.250.250.114 (talk) 23:48, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Romano-Catholic Cathedral at the Religion Section

In a predominantly Orthodox country it is rediculouse to have an image with a Catholic Cathedral(with exceptions if it were a very important monument such as the Haghia Sophia in Turkey, or the Maya pyramid at Tikal that are more historical then a reflection of current demographics ) so I changed it with an Orthodox Monestary, any objections? AdrianCo (talk) 11:44, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Romania - different - Roma or Rroma or Gypsies

There's great injustice for The Romanian Nation to use the name Roma for Gypsies. It's a big confusion. The strangers can say that Romania is the land of the Gypsies. See Romani for Gypsies. This is an aberation. Or Roma. What's that? That's sh...t. Nobody asked Romanians if they agree with that and that's a shame to hide the Gypsies behind the Romanians. Romanian - different - Gypsy or Roma. Unless use the term Rroma for no confusion. Romania is the land of Romanian Nation. The minority of Gypsy Etnie should not use the name of country. How about Francs for Gypsy from France instead French people? Nice isn't that? Or Brits instead British people? Corect? Or Hongory insteand Hungarians? True? Should I continue? Ok. Germa for Germans, Itals for Italians, Spans for Spanish, etc. So Ady from Japan , Tara unde poate iti vei lumina mintea, you in quality of Romanian not as Gypsy or "Rroma" and not Roma, you must watch for interest of your country. It's about identity of Romanians (Rumanians) Nation and not about discrimination. It's about the right to exist with the name in respect. The Gypsy can build their respect with an solid education and decently instead steeling Romanians identity. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nomád Terv (talk • contribs) 20:55, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

It's neither the Romanians' nor the Roma's fault that their names happen to sound so similar. It's not the fault of the English language either. For whatever reasons, English has ended up calling them like this, so that's what we have to stick with. Whether you find that unjust or not is immaterial. WP:USEENGLISH is the only relevant policy. Wikipedia calls things whatever the English language calls them. Fut.Perf. ☼ 21:06, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
I agree Rroma is never used in English. Gypsy is used, but it might have other meanings, or it might be considered offensive, is it? -- AdrianTM (talk) 00:33, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
The name itself, "Gypsy" is not offensive, it comes from Egyptyan. Neither is Tigan or Zigeneur, Cigany, Zingaro etc. which comes form Athiganoi, a greek religious sect which means "untouchable".
Funny how they always took names which never had connection with, isn't it ? Should I remember other names they took  ? “Satra” comes from Kshatria (warrior) an ancient Indian worrior tribe (never had connection with gypsies), “Yensser” like they are known in New York comes from Turkish worriors “Yensser” like they presented themselves when they emigrated in America around the year 1900, "Bohemians" like they were untill recently known in Central Europe but it wasn't correct for inhabitants of Bohemia, a province of Czech Republic so, this name was abandoned..... etc :) Rezistenta (talk) 02:27, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
Words of wisdom Rezistenta.Bravo! AdrianCo (talk) 11:47, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
Your explanations don't make any sense, it doesn't matter how the word come by, if the people consider it offensive then it's offensive, you can't tell them "no, no, it's not offensive because it comes from Greek" or "it's not offensive because it meant Egyptian". Whenever a word is used pejoratively, like "he's just a gypsy" it's clear that's an offensive word. I don't know English very well, that's why I asked, but I think Gypsy is not acceptable. "Rrom" is out of the question, it doesn't exist in English. -- AdrianTM (talk) 16:08, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
My explinations make very much sense, the NAME itself is not peiorative, it's the people who wear this name which made it peiorative (like now "Rom/Roma/Romani" becomes peiorative).And I agree with you, if they consider they don't like gypsy (which is untrue, ex .remember the band Gypsy Kings, they take pride of this name) they should take their original name which according to all etymological dictionaries is "Dom/Domba" with "D" and not "Rom/Roma/Romani" and which means "male of low-caste minstrel" in their language. Watch here. They have no connection with the name "Rom/Roma/Romani"
and I ask you one question, if every nation in this world will begin changing their name just because they don't "like" it anymore, where we would get? If they want to use "Rom" they can use in THEIR language but not impose others to use it.. By others are knowns as Gypsies, Zigeneurs, Zingari, Zincali, Cigany, etc ...I don't see the germans imposing others to be called "Deutsche" or Albanians imposing others to call them "Shqiptarë" etc....... Rezistenta (talk) 16:41, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Kind of a good point Rezistenta, one more thing, romanian PM of Gipsy origin Madalin Voicu also does not consider it an offense to be called "tigan"(Gipsy). So why all the fuss?! It`s not pejorative. AdrianCo (talk) 12:45, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

"it's the people who wear this name which made it peiorative" I think you should be careful about this because it sounds racist, also the point is not if it's deserved or not the point is that they consider it that way. It's an subjective matter not an objective one, you can't come here and bring arguments that it should be objective because that's the point, it's not: if you call me in a way no matter how correct you think you are if I consider that's offensive and ask you to stop using that term you should stop even if you don't agree... but I don't think there's a need to teach basic education to any anonymous guy on the internet. Anyway, it's never Rroma in English it's either Roma or Gypsy and as I said I'm not sure about Gypsy term and somebody who knows English better should intervene to explain, but since the main article about Roma people uses this term and not Gypsy it's pretty clear that this is the preferred term, in addition in that article you can find this "are often referred to as Gypsies or Gipsies, a term that is sometimes considered pejorative and is based on a mistaken belief of an origin in Egypt". So there you go, is sometimes considered pejorative and is a mistaken term too. -- AdrianTM (talk) 14:46, 16 March 2008 (UTC):
Stop having a pathethic and subjective attitude, let's view the subject from an objective point of view .. and i'm not the anonymus guy which openeed this subject, I only replied to him, watch more carefully next time. What i'm saying It's not racist, it's the naked reality, Gypsy doesn't mean "Stupid", "Idiot" or anyhing that could be considered peiorative. Gypsy comes from Egyptian as I and you, already said... what's so hard to understand? It's Egyptian a peiorative term?
"Roma" it's the preffered term for obvious reasons by them and for the same reasons as "Romani" is preffered instead of "Romany" . If Gypsy is "mistaken" term as they sustain what makes "Rom/Roma/Romani" the correct term? Here's what you can find about this term at the Etymology section of this words "There are no historical proofs to clarify the etymology of these words." And stop accusing others for being racists when you have no arguments for your accusations yRezistenta (talk) 17:10, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
Aha, so a geocities article is now a "reference"?! Deleting it imediatly, and no, many gypsies cosider the term to be ok! Including well knowend ones(can you prove I am wrong?!?)...oh, there is a pejorative term in english for gypsies, if i recall it is "pikies". AdrianCo (talk) 16:35, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

I totally agree that changing a people's name because it is considered 'offensive' is totally nonsense, and unjust, if the people changing their name adopt a new name which alludes to another people. As an exmaple from my own experience (I'm Greek) I remember that the word 'byzantine' was considered pejorative not too far ago - it is still used with negative connotations, though rarely - but the Greeks have supported it, and it now is predominately used to describe the largest European empire of the Middle Ages, with no negative meaning. However, the role of a dictionary/encyclopedia is not to judge wether something is just/good/nice or not, it is to describe the present situation. And the present situation is that the more 'politically correct' name for the people in question is Roma. As I already said, I personnally regret it, I consider such things as narrow-mindness, but an encyclopedia HAS TO record it as it is being used. (sorry for not signing, I've forgort my password) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.169.208.134 (talk) 10:46, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

I understand why Romanians are offended by the usurpation of the word "Rom" when gypsy is the correct usage.Here in Italy,it's ridiculous; journalists group gypsies and Romanians into a single category: "Rom" and that's not all.They constantly label Albanians,gypsies,Romanians as Slavs!!!I've a Czech friend and her blood boils whenever she hears it on tv.I get angry as well,and I'm neither Slavic nor Romanian.People assume all Eastern Europeans are Slavs,but Albanians are Iliac,Romanians are Dacian/Roman and gypsies came from India originally.But ignorance reigns over television,alas.jeanne (talk) 17:36, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Antiquity

How could Herodotus have documented the Dacians/Getae in 513 BCE if he was not alive at this time? The source for this does not appear to be the most credible. Best to go back to the primary sources for this sort of information. So far I haven't been able to find any mention of the Dacians in Herodtus' texts, but I will keep looking. QatBurglar (talk) 07:11, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Herodotus goes into quite a bit of detail about the Getae in book IV of his Histories (article 93). But this was written in 440 BCE, not 513. (By the way, the mistake I was making: the Greeks called these people 'Getae' and it was the Romans who called them 'Dacians'). QatBurglar (talk) 07:25, 29 May 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Euphemism?

"Communists and their allied parties claimed 80% of the vote, through a combination of vote manipulation, elimination, and forced mergers of competing parties, thus establishing themselves as the dominant force"

What is meant by "elimination" here? Is it a euphemism for murder/execution or something procedural in the electoral process? If it's a euphemism, then it should be replaced by a more literal and accurate description.--156.34.52.127 (talk) 13:52, 8 June 2008 (UTC)