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Shortcut: WP:MOSPOL

This page lists style and naming conventions that have been adopted for articles on Poland-related subjects. Please discuss proposed significant changes at the talk page, announcing them at the Poland project talk page.

Contents 1 Orthography 2 Pronunciation 3 Places 3.1 Administrative divisions 3.2 Towns and villages 3.3 Rivers 4 See also

[edit] Orthography

For the naming of articles follow the advice in Wikipedia:Naming conventions policy and the Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English) guideline. For the use within articles follow the advice in the section "Foreign terms" in the Manual of Style.

If there is no established usage in verifiable reliable sources in English then use Polish spelling and diacritics. Notice that emigrants may have adopted naturalized spellings of their names, e.g. Stanislaw Ulam (rather than "Stanisław") or Frédéric Chopin, not "Fryderyk" or "Franciszek".

When ordering items alphabetically, remember to ignore diacritics (leading to a different ordering than in Polish). Articles whose names contain diacritics should be assigned category sort keys which omit the diacritics (e.g. Łódź should have the sort key "Lodz").

[edit] Pronunciation

The template {{IPAc-pl}} can be used to generate phonetic transcriptions without the need to type in the IPA symbols. The transcription automatically links to the explanatory page Wikipedia:IPA for Polish. To do this, the words should be respelt using the Polish letters or digraphs that represent the exact sounds, spaces between words replaced by hyphens, and apostrophes inserted before stressed syllables (commas before secondary stress). In the template, characters or digraphs are separated with pipes. For example:

• '''Nakło nad Notecią''' {{IPAc-pl|'|n|a|k|ł|o|-|,|n|a|d|-|n|o|'|t|e|ć|ą}}

produces

• Nakło nad Notecią [ˈnakwɔ ˌnad nɔˈtɛt​͡ɕɔ̃]

If an audio file is available, use the following syntax (adding "AUD" and the filename):

• '''Bydgoszcz''' {{IPAc-pl|AUD|Pl-Bydgoszcz.ogg|'|b|y|d|g|o|sz|cz}}

produces

• Bydgoszcz [ˈbɨdgɔʂt​͡ʂ] ( listen)

The template {{IPA-pl}} can also be used; in this case the IPA representation is typed directly, For full details, see the template pages (IPAc-pl and IPA-pl).

[edit] Places

Main guideline Wikipedia:Naming conventions (geographic names)

English usage for places within the present borders of Poland is usually the present official name of the place in Polish, but there are exceptions, such as Warsaw, the Vistula and Silesia. When a city or other place is mentioned in a historical context, if there is no common English name for it in that historical period and context, use the appropriate historical name with the current Polish name in parentheses (if it is not the same word) the first time the place is mentioned.

[edit] Administrative divisions

Województwo is generally translated "voivodeship". The names of voivodeships are translated into English if an established English name exists; for example, Greater Poland Voivodeship but Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship. If a link is required for "voivodeship", it is normally appropriate to make a piped link to Voivodeships of Poland rather than the less specific article Voivodeship.

Powiat is generally translated "county" (except where more precise language is needed). Names of counties are translated into English (Poznań County, Łódź East County, Tatra County and so on). The choice of longer or shorter names generally depends on the need for disambiguation: Bielsko County (not "Bielsko-Biała County") is sufficient for powiat bielski (since that name already distinguishes it from Bielsk County), but the longer names Grodzisk Mazowiecki County and Grodzisk Wielkopolski County are required to distinguish those two entities (both powiat grodziski in Polish).

Gmina is not translated, but should be explained in article text. Names of gminas take their original Polish form, and are disambiguated (if necessary) in the same way as villages (see below). They are however capitalized ("Gmina Suchy Las" rather than "gmina Suchy Las") in line with English convention.

Sołectwo, dzielnica and osiedle are not translated, but should be explained in article text. They are pluralized in -s (as is gmina, and powiat where used).

[edit] Towns and villages

It should never be implied that there is any formal distinction between towns and cities in Poland. Smaller miasta may be referred to as towns, larger ones as cities; when referring to them collectively it may be clearer to write "cities and towns".

In article titles, any disambiguating tags use commas rather than parentheses, e.g. Głęboczek, Greater Poland Voivodeship, except as stated below. The following rules apply:

• If the name is unique among Wikipedia topics or the settlement is the primary topic for that name, no tag is used. A town or city is considered primary with respect to Polish villages of the same name (unless there is a compelling reason to do otherwise).
• If the settlement is unique or primary within Poland, but not within Wikipedia as a whole, use "Poland" as the tag (e.g. Police, Poland).
• If disambiguation within Poland is required, use the name of the voivodeship or, if that is not sufficient, the name of the county (powiat) or, if even that is not sufficient, the name of the gmina. If there are two places of the same name within a gmina, use neighbouring villages as disambiguating tags, but place them in parentheses.
• In rare cases where the above methods are inadequate, use generic tags in parentheses (e.g. Wolin (town), to distinguish from the better-known island on which it lies).

[edit] Rivers

The great majority of rivers in Poland are best known under their Polish names (e.g. Noteć, Warta), although the Wisła is known in English as the Vistula. The Odra and Nysa Łużycka are better known in English as the Oder and Neisse (their articles are titled Oder and Lusatian Neisse), but their Polish names should also be given where relevant to the context.

When naming articles on rivers, if the name of the river alone is ambiguous, add "(river)" after it, as in Pilica (river). See also the general river naming rules. Check existing article names when making links to them, as some have additional disambiguators (for example, the article on the Bug is called Western Bug).

Similar rules apply to lakes and other natural features.

[edit] See also

• Wikipedia:Naming conventions (geographic names)
• Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English)