Talk:Nesebar
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[edit] Naming controversy
There has been some controversy over which name should be used as the title of this article. The name of the town in the Cyrilic script is definitely Несебър, but the question is how this should appear in an English language encyclopedia.
Nesebâr originally seemed to me to be the most correct way of transcribing the name (see below), but this appears to be rare in English usage. I was enventually convinced that Nessebar was the best option because this is the name used by UNESCO on their list of World Heritage Sites, which in my mind gives this spelling some official status, although for all I know UNESCO could have made an arbitrary decision on this matter.
As an indication of the popularity of various alternatives, here are the number of Google hits for some possible spellings of the name:
- Nessebar: 91,500
- Nesebar: 81,000
- Nessebur: 6,430
- Nesebur: 3,790
- Nesebâr: 1,100
My original preference of Nesebâr is not common, however I remember seeing it in Bulgaria. Furthermore the â seems to be a good unambiguous way of transliterating the Bulgarian ъ which is a schwa. As for how the word is pronounced in Bulgaria, I seem to remember it as having the emphasis on the second syllable, and the last syllable hardly being pronounced at all — it was not like the English words "bar" or "burr".
The following discussion was had on my talk page and that of Deb:
- Hello. Please don't take offence that I have moved your article on Nesebar to Nessebur. An article had already been started, under what was felt to be the most common English spelling of the placename. You will still be able to access it and add to it. Deb 16:38, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)
- No offence taken. However, I began a rewrite of the article on this town at Nesebâr because I believe that is the correct transcription from the Bulgarian Cyrilic alphabet, even if it only gets 1000 Google hits. Nessebur which you give as the most common English spelling only gets 6000 as opposed to Nessebar with 60,000, which is currently a redirect. The Bulgarian 'ъ' is a schwa which corresponds roughly to the 'a' in English 'about' or 'o' in 'harmony', and is usually transcribed as 'â'. Nesebâr isn't the most common spelling encountered in English language tourist literature because the authors of such material are just looking for a simple phonetic representation, which either an 'a' or a 'u', along with a double 's' do well. If we are striving for encyclopedic accuracy though we should have Nesebâr as the main article with common spellings as redirects. This is also the spelling I encountered most on signs and bus timetables in the area itself. — Trilobite 16:58, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)
- I understand your position. If you feel it has to be under the "most correct" spelling (although it's debatable whether any spelling that involves accents can ever be appropriate in the English language), then please feel free to move it. However, we must have only one article, and no double-redirects. Deb 17:03, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)
At that time, a stub existed at Nessebur with Nessebar and Nesebâr as redirects. I have since discovered an unrelated stub at Nesebur. Now I have written a more extensive article I have chosen Nessebar as the location, with the others as redirects.
I have provided this information to explain why the article can be found where it is. If you disagree with my conclusions please raise them here before moving the article. It would help to have some input from someone who actually knows a lot about these matters.
— Trilobite 01:47, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
There are several ways to transliterate the Bulgarian Cyrillic alphabet. See Transliteration of Bulgarian into English. According to the official Bulgarian transliteration (used by the ministry of interior for personal names) it should be Nesebar. Markussep 21:06, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)
