Talk:Lithuania/Archive 2

message: "On February 16, 1918, Lithuania re-established its independence. From July, 1918 until November of that year, Monaco-born King Mindaugas II was the titular monarch of Lithuania" - what the f***? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.12.179.6 (talk • contribs) 
* That's all correct. That was done when Lithuania was occupied by German forces at the end of World War I. Germans did not want independent Lithuania and were thinking to make their monarch the head of Lithuania, but Lithuanians beat them by announcing Mindaugas II as their king. Renata 17:33, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mindaugas II from Monaco? 

message: The definition of apskritis is given as being "round" without specifying which meaning of round was meant.  I've inquired on the talk page for apskritis as to the exact meaning so that the page can be improved, but if the meaning is "a regular customary course or circuit" might not "circuit" be the best translation for "apskritis"?  Granted, it is normally used today primarily for judicial circuits, but has been used for other sorts of regional organization.  I myself live in the 11th Circuit of South Carolina.  Caerwine 02:26, 7 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Circuit

message: I've said, that using of extraneous words causes plenty of troubles. But let it be. Let's go further. When i revised these “Vilnius apskritis”, “Kauno apskritis” before our current revisions  I decided to use the English word for apskritis because using of Lithuanian words complicates the system too much. The one problem of it is, how to deal with Lithuanian pronouncing. Now, I have an additional idea on it: user page: LinasLit/simplified_phonetic_transcription_of_Lithuanian_language_(wikipedia). Now, how it looks specifically and this problem generally? 
Notes:
# I know without any doubt, that we may add English phonetic transcription. And even more, if we add any other transcription we should add English one too. But the English transcription isn't precise for Lithuanian language. If we give the precise coat of arms, if we don't translate “cepelinai” for precision, we also should add a precise transcription, i think. 
# The Lithuanian scientific transcription or the IPA (which even hasn't any commonly adopted variant for Lithuanian) for Lithuanian both are complicate and cause troubles for editors not linguists, both for them who revise and for them who simply read the article. Linas   Lituanus 12:07, 2005 May 4 (UTC)
*I think it is good. But a few comments: if it is done specially for understanding in English, maybe "sh" (š), "kh" ("ch") and such could be used? I am not advocating it, just a possibility. I'd personally prefer just using Lithuanian letters which would be explained at some place, and bolding the accented letter.
*As for diphtongs, maybe it could just be used that way: first long letter (dashed) if there is <tvirtapradė priegaidė> or long second letter (dashed) if it is <tvirtagalė priegaidė>. Pvz. Klaipėda wiuld be with dashed "i" and Petrauskaitė would be with dashed "a". As it might be hard to understand the accenting of diphtongs for English speakers (čia iš patirties žinau, niekaip neišėjo vienam raštu paaiškint kaip reikia "žemaitis" tart, vis tvirtapradę priegaidę dėjo kai į mikrofoną pasakydavo).DeirYassin 12:26, 4 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: The need of a phonetic transcription

message: 1) Vilnius always was capital of Lithuania (since Gediminas times). Lithuania never recognized occupation of capital by poland (1920 - 1939). In 1938 it only created diplomatic relations with that country after ultimatum to begin war (see Talk:Lithuania -> Archive);
2) Lithuanian rulers after Mindaugas to Jogaila were pagan Kings of Lithuania, not Grand Dukes (the first Grand Duke was Vytautas The Great (since 1392)) (see Talk:Lithuania -> Archive);
3) Mindaugas continued uniting (began his father) only Lithuanian dukes to one state (see Talk:Lithuania -> Archive);
4) There was Third Partition of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, not poland (see Talk:Lithuania -> Archive);
5) Lithuanians established great medieval Empire which included lands of present Ukraine, Bielorussia, Russia and poland;
6) Poland occupied (1920 - 1939) Eastern Lithuania (Southern Suvalkija including), not unrecognized by nobody puppet "state" of "central Lithuania".
I will do my changes. Could I? Zivinbudas 06:01, 2 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Changes in text 

message: Why did you protect false polish version, but not discussed last (see Talk:Lithuania -> above) version? 85.206.193.33 09:48, 3 May 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Because it's always the wrong version protected here in wikipedia. Halibutt 16:05, May 4, 2005 (UTC)
Not exactly. Always polish version - lets be correct. 85.206.194.143 18:11, 4 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  to polish "administrators" 

message: Relevant background:  After the partitions of Poland & Lithuania by Prussia and Russia in the 1790's, much of the area that was once Lithuania was governed by Russia.  Where ethnic groups had ALREADY been intermixed for centuries the arbitrary borders were now different, so still more mixing (sometimes orchestrated by the Russian government) occurred.  Then comes the Versailles treaty, the Russian Civil War and armies and people fighting to settle new borders.
Some areas that had many Poles, Lithuanians and Russians intermixed ended up in Russia.  (And some of the "Russians" were in fact other minorities like Ukrainians etc.)
Some areas that had many Poles, Lithuanians and Russians intermixed ended up in Poland.
Some areas that had many Poles, Lithuanians and Russians intermixed ended up in Lithuania.
To the west you can add Germans and the descendents of the Austrian refugees from the expulsion of Protestants from Salzburg in 1731 in place of Russians, and you have an improbable Lithuanian-Polish-German-Austrian Catholic-Protestant mix.  They were divided by new borders in sometimes illogical ways as well.
Some of the 20th century arguments that are interfering with finishing this article come from this period.  Vilnius is historically a Lithuanian city.  During the centuries-long alliance between Poland and Lithuania the city absorbed a lot of Polish culture, and there's a lot of documentation of it being regarded as a gem in the Polish-Lithuanian empire.  A Polish minority came to live there.
In 1918-24 each side was fighting to establish those new borders.  The Poles had to turn the Russians back from Warsaw.  The Lithuanians had to beat back the Russians from Vilnius.  I could list another 25 such battles, many in ethnically mixed areas where sizable minorities (and sometimes majorities) ended up on the "wrong" side.
EVERY side lost land that was dear to them where some of their people lived.  Sometimes a more powerful neighbor took a region where they were the minority.
In that context the Poles (who were getting pushed at from all sides in the post-Versailles rumbles) seized Vilnius.  They called the area Central Lithuania presumably because under the then-current borders it was in the center of the Versailles border between Poland and Lithuania.  As I said, it was one of 25 such events as everyone jockied for control of the areas around them.
After World War II the Russians took over the whole region and administratively linked it to Lithuania again, since those were its deep historical roots.  But the whole area fell under the control of the Soviet Empire.
Another reason this creates so much emotion for Lithuanians and Poles:  In 1939 Russia joined with Hitler to again invade, conquer and divide Poland.  The Jews who had lived in Poland and Lithuania for centuries were destroyed by the Holocaust.  After World War II Russia took the eastern "slice" of Poland 200 miles wide that Hitler had given them and made it part of Russia, and in turn they gave a similar slice of eastern Germany to Poland.  The Russians also took the German areas of East Prussia and the major German city of Konigsberg as compensation for the damage of the war.  All these areas had heavily mixed populations for centuries.  All the Germans were expelled from the new Poland and the new Russia by force, often on 24 hours notice.  Not long after this, most Poles were expelled from the corresponding parts of Russia by force.  It was "ethnic cleansing," just as we saw in Yugoslavia in the 1990s.
During this post-war period many Lithuanians, Poles (and Germans and Austrians) were killed by the Soviets or sent to the Gulag.
If readers wonder why we have a hard time settling on an impartial academic view of the period, it is because there were millions of deaths in the wars and the ethnic cleansings... AFTER the incomprehensible tragedy of the Holocaust.  Lithuanians, Poles, Germans and Austrians all suffered terribly at the hands of the Nazis and the Soviets.  The fate of the native Russians at the hands of the Soviets often wasn't much better.
My family suffered many dead and many disappeared.  I'm sure that many of the people on this page who debate these issues have the same history.
We still have to calm down and create a documented, impartial Wiki article before we can ask the admins to help us defend its accuracy.  But anyone who thinks all this passion just comes from silly nationalism doesn't understand.  The Poles and Lithuanians have both suffered terribly in this century, and places like Vilnius where there was conflict between us are merely side effects of much greater mistakes at Versailles, by the Nazis and by the Soviets.
I think we Lithuanians and Poles should focus on documenting what was done by the Nazis, the Soviets and the horse-traders of Versailles, not on blaming each other.
Coll7 01:30, 23 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Context on Vilnius conflicts 1918-39 

message: The problem of kings before Jogaila is more problem of tradition. I didn't check it very accurate, but as I know, the tradition to call Lithuanian rulers dukes raised in the Great Duchy of Lithuania not later than in the beginning of the 16th century. We deal with the tradition of the chancellery office of our state, and historians almost without any exception keep this tradition. However this tradition is ... wrong indeed. Why? Some historians argue, that it based on acknowledgment of the Pope. This argument is false totally. The acknowledgment of popes was necessary during certain period of the history and in the Western European countries. For example the later kings of Prussia (I thing , nobody doubts, that they were kings) were not crowned by popes, as well as kings of many countries outside Europe. Lithuania wasn't catholic country before 1387, and looking from the point of the modern history, the argumentation of papal rights weren't valid for it (as they aren't valid for the majority of present crowned persons in Europe). Lithuanian rulers before 1387 called themselves kings (rex in Latin, which translation don't leave any doubts) and were often recognized as bearers of this title (e. g. by Bizantyne Emperors). - I don't actually know, why later officials of the state changed this thing, creating the new tradition  still existing till now. Perhaps they didn't want to be accused in paganism? Or they didn't want to degrade the memory of Vytautas the Great, who hadn't been crowned? Or other reasons existed? In any case we have things as they are, now.  Linas Lituanus15:34, 2005 May 9 (UTC)
I fully agree with you. But situation is changing now. Algirdas even called themselves Bassileus (Emperor) and it was completely truth - he was the emperor. Zivinbudas 17:07, 9 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Why dukes, why kings? 

message: Prašau pareikšti savo nuomonę Talk:Confederation. Ačiū. Zivinbudas 15:21, 26 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Confederation 

message: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naming_conventions/Vote_on_city_naming , tell your opinion on the matter DeirYassin 22:11, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Discution and vote about the Polish and Lithuanian city names 

message: Does anyone know of an online translator for Lithuanian to English?
: No, there is no any. Only the dictionaries :-) Since Lithuanian is syntetic (without any formalised grammar) language, there is no possibility to make any automated translator (of course, maybe it will be created... After 10 or 20 years... Who knows?). In Lithuania we have some strong scientists and programmers who work on language translation and recognition systems for few decades, but actually they prefer work with Chinese language rather than Lithuanian. --Gvorl 20:34, 11 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Lithuanian language is by no means synthetic. It is a live Lithuanian language dialect taken as a basis for the official Lithuanian language. (To be more specific, it is Western Aukstaitian dialect spoken around Marijampole). Official Chinese is also a standartised language but nobody calls Chinese synthetic. Creation of the automatic translators is not the question of the language complexity-simlicity, it is a question of financing such projects. Juraune 10:03, 22 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lithuanian translator? 

message: ::::Hmmm what I have seems to state that Polish and Lithuanians fought bolsheviks at these northern places at the same time and also the maps indicates that the area was controlled by Lithuania. It was most certainly promised according to 1920 treaty for sure, (around Breslauja/Braslavas (currently Braslau, Belarus) and such. I will try to check more when I am home, as I am in internet cafe now so don't have my maps and books with me. Will try to tell sources.
::::As for dispute supposedly being "not real" according to you if country did not actually control the area, I explained that in Talk:Vilnius region now. Most of disputes are like that actuall, Pakistan never controlled Indian part of kashmir (but disputes it on the basis that it is a muslim place, and as for partition of Indian colony muslim places should have wnet to Pakistan, while hindu - to India; but hindu Maharaja of Kashmir against people's will invited Indian army), People's Republic of China never controlled Taiwan (but disputes it on the fact that it was part of single China state previously) and so on. Actual control does not means more in dispute sthan various documents, recognition, historical things and such. Germany controlled half of Europe during WW2, but I don't think it has many rights to all these areas.
::::I hope you will not withdraw from the articles and help to make them more neutral; trust me, I don't want to make everything POV, each person has their opinions though and therefore one person probably couldn't make something totally NPOV, many people with different opinions are needed for that. Sorry if I seem to be pushing too much POV sometimes, nobody is neutral though
::::My suggestion here is: avoid "judging words" like "occupied", "part of", "liberated", instead use "taken", "controlled by"; I believe nobody questions the fact that there were conflicts over areas between Poland and Lithuania during interwar, and if it is spoken in this articles about these disputes, it should link to pages about the disputes, therefore, I think we should leave leave links to Suvalkai region and Vilnius region. However, if something is not neutral there, let's immidietly move to those pages and discuss there, as it is not good anyways if there are POV articles in Wikipedia. Now by adding and removing these links we do not actually solve problem and never will; the problem will only be solved by neutralising articles about said disputes, so then everyone will agree on keeping links. I hope eventually mind will win over bias. DeirYassin 13:43, 14 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Answer and suggestion

message: The following is a list of books that comes to my mind. Some of them I read only in fragments, while others (mostly related to military history) I have on my shelves. 
# 
#  (hillarious caricatures)
# 
#  (one of few monographies on the topic)
# 
#  (sadly the second part was not yet published)
#  (a classic)
#  (lots of interesting stuff on the elections boycotted by the Lithuanian minority)
#  (part 1)
#  (part 2; I've spent half of my monthly income on that book once...)
#  (book written by a profesional soldier, so it's not passionating, but has lots of details on Bolshevik-Lithuanian cooperation)
#  (I wonder if his memoirs were ever translated to Lithuanian ;) )
Halibutt 08:05, August 14, 2005 (UTC)
::Not getting too deep into discussion, note that there is just one non Polish book in the list. When reading any lithuanian book on history I try to be critical in terms of pro lt pov; I assume the same on the list above, vice versa (pl-lt). What can for sure be said on what was taught to us (poles and lithuanians) in schools (based on works of our historians, etc) is oriented towards increasing our national awareness, thus often showing very nationalistiuc picture of history. I offer being very critical on that. --UmR 07:33:10, 2005-08-29 (UTC)
:::Just to set some things straight: Nos. 6, 7, 9 and 10 are not Polish. But even then, what you write is generally true for all sources, regardless of their topic or author. One has to bear in mind that interpretation of facts and statement of facts are two different things. //Halibutt 20:09, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: My sources

message: I think this is funny place! Slum of all unrecognized geniuses, pimpled teens, mental patients and similar. I made sure that nobody takes this Wikipedia (Shitypedia) seriously. Let rubbish play. Bye trashers. Benjamin07 13:15, 15 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  My opinion about Wikipedia 

message: Hello. I would like to inform you all here that there is an ongoing discussion at article Territorial claims of the Baltic States (formerly was known as "Lost territories of the Baltic States", but was recently renamed; some users seems to disagree with that renaming). Recent edits as well were accused of POV, and, in fact, article was disputed for a long time already. There currently seems to be no Lithuanians editing the article and in order to get the most neutral viewpoint represantatives from all of related nations are needed. It would be nice if you would add that article to your watchlist and continue helping to improve it until a decition will be reached about its future (there is currently a poll about it in the article's talk page). I hope together we all will be able to make that article neutral. Kaiser 747 10:52, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Please take part in the improval of this article 

message: This article suffers from major wikilinking, especially in the first section. I removed a few wikilinks but there's still some work to be done. Gflores Talk 01:47, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  excessive wikilinking 

message: The center of Europe is in Lithuania, so Lithuania is in the central Europe, I think.
User of Lithuanian wikipedia, Vikte
::The "central", "eastern," or "western" Europe does not depend that much on the goegraphical location as on geopolitical situation. The debate which region to use for Lithuania is old and never ending. If someone asks me - it's eastern Europe (history, culture, etc.) North eastern ios more accurate. But it's not central europe for sure. Renata 17:05, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Definitely Central Europe. Not East, South, West or North. Article does not say that North-East is a geopolitital location, and geopolitics is more ambiguous than geography. Sigitas 17:26, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  The problem is that the phrases "Eastern Europe", "Central Europe", "Western Europe" are commonly used, and they mean more than just the geographical location with respect to some agreed-upon (ha!) reference point.  Poland may be west of the "center of Europe", but NOBODY would seriously refer to Poland as being in Western Europe.  London, England may be south of this same reference point, but NOBODY would seriously refer to London as being in Southern Europe.  I'm not sure where the dividing line is exactly, but (in my mind, at least) the lands around the Mediterranean sea are "Southern Europe", the lands north of the Baltic sea are definitely "Northern Europe" (and possibly the other lands around the Baltic sea are also), the lands east of where the Iron Curtain went are "Eastern Europe" (or maybe it should be the lands east of the historic Catholic-Orthodox division line? Hmm, that WOULD place Poland in the western part).  Nevertheless, it's not particularly useful to use these terms as we think they SHOULD be used, if that's not how the majority of readers will understand them. Ifdef 18:55, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

text: I think Lithuania would fit in historically with Central Europe. It's not Western Europe for sure, but it's interaction with Poland and the Teutonic Knights and its Catholicism would move it towards Central Europe. Geographically... I dunno Jztinfinity 01:45, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:   Sigitas 17:47, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

text: Yes, fully conclusive. Geographical centre of Europe is in Lithuania, very close to Vilnius. Only from geopolitical perpective it can be moved to the east or north. Check this one map for example - Lithuania is clearly on the very centre of continent, unlike Austria or Hungary Sigitas 18:12, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  North-eastern Europe?! 

message: It is very clear, and supported by statistics, that Church attendance in Lithuania is high, and that Roman Catholicism is the majority religion of the country. This may not be changed in favour of some protestant evangelical propagandist editing this site, even claiming that only 1,5 % of Catholics go to church regularly. That's propaganda, not fact. Given the mount of crosses etc. Lithuanian Catholicism is well known and deeply rooted.82.72.148.85 21:47, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree. I also think, that polls as such should be avoided in encyclopedia. M.K. 22:07, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Polls are OK, Church attendance in Lithuania is very low by european standards Sigitas 22:11, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I will tell you a bit of “polls”. “Polls” as such are pointless spam. If you want that polls be a bit more then spam it should have several points – year then it was carried out, number of population which was asked, territory in which it was carried out, methodology how the data was spread, margin of error,   etc. etc. etc. This why, official data should be used in first place. M.K. 18:06, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

text: Figures don't lie, liars figure - Twain. Bowley and Strunsky expressed quite good view on statistics. Political statistics should not be interfered here also (Churchill made a straight remark on this issue). M.K. 22:35, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Which is nonsense. I must stress, that the weird allegations as to religion are not confirmed by European Union standards. Maybe evangelical fundamentalist protestants will see with pleasure, that Catholics do not attend, but that is not the real case in Lithuania. The English of the demographics part is of Eastern European quality, that is: total hogwash and babylonian, not fitting for an encylopedia. And the allegation of 1,5 % has to be proven, as not even the Netherlands have such a low Mass attendance rate. "A poll" does not suffice. Maybe if you ask amongst communists, socialists or ex-Catholic evangelical protestants they might respond with such a result, but not if one asks a common Lithuanian. The Roman Catholic Church is closely tied to the country. Protestantism is no majority religion, it is neither a dominant religion. Protestantism disappeared virtually with the expulsion of Baltic Germans after WW II. It will revert the paragraph of demographics to the state in which it was. I ask the moderators to watch the demographics particularly, reverting all attempts by protestant fundamentalists, liberals and communists to imply "facts" about a country they don't even know or only want to depict in a caricaturical sense. 82.72.148.85 20:54, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

text: Hundred's edition is better than older one overstating influence of Catholicism. Still, sources need to be cited, and love for basketball moved from the section. Sigitas 17:06, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

text: Mine aim is this problem - Some voices -, not a pro or anti church. Is it good to formulate sentence in this way? Is it good style for encyclopedia? Maybe better is - opinion but it is  a bit wrong too... M.K. 23:59, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It is bad style; see wikipedia:Weasel words. If it is an opinion, a reputable source is a must. `'mikka (t) 00:19, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Religion