Talk:Kaliningrad

No Demography section

It seems strange that there is no demography section with statistics about how many ethnic russians, germans, poles, etc, actually live in the city.

Given that the place was emptied of Germans in 1945 and settled with Russians you'd expect there to be only Russians except for the 'odd' foreigner who married into Kaliningrad. I think Russia wanted to sell the exclave to Germany or a neighbour of the place in the early 1990s but nobody wanted to buy. "What are we supposed to do with half a million Russians?" Since then the place has been rebuilt more and more and is popular with Russian holiday makers. They now get their gas from Russia through a new pipeline - and all is well apparently. As someone from Abkhazia, whose status is 'open', said 'what do you want, we eat, the children go to school ....'.

In order to destroy Königsberg in 1945, Sweden breached their neutrality and let the British Lancaster bombers land and refuel. 2001:8003:AC60:1400:80:8612:7E9:8687 (talk) 06:24, 15 June 2019 (UTC)

Do you have any proof of that? The wiki article clearly says they took off and landed back in UK. And they certainly didn;t need to land in Sweden to bomb Berlin. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.44.211.137 (talk) 15:54, 19 January 2022 (UTC)

You stole my suggestion! --108.45.56.173 (talk) 19:11, 18 September 2014 (UTC)

Present-Day Kalingrad

I am in the process of conducting some research about the region. Specifically, the role it plays in both conflict and cooperation between Russia and the West. I will be updating this page within one month. If there is anything you would like to see added to this page, chances are I will be coming across the data. QatBurglar (talk) 22:55, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Any chance of a better map? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.168.116.56 (talk) 06:58, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

With the recent unpleasantness, there needs to be much more definitive explanation of what is the legal status, or a link to that, and discussion, especially as regards latest news regarding sanctions, Lithuania and Russian jurisdiction if any. The article leaves one rather confused on these questions. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.181.193.59 (talk) 20:40, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

Königsberg Pre War Population

The figure 316.000 in main article is wrong. The offical German statistic shows:

Stadtkreis Königsberg 193 km2 Einwohner 1.1.1940 372.270. I correct this in the main article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.112.188.135 (talk) 10:32, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Languages

Can anyone add information about the percentage of speakers of each language in Kaliningrad if possible, or some idea as to how prevelant Russian, German, etc. are in the region? Paxuniv (talk) 18:38, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Kienigsberg

The direct German name Königsberg in Cyrillic Kjenigsbjerg was used also much earlier than 1945 - 1946. At least during the days of Imperial Russia and in Soviet Union up to 1946.

Layout

Could someone sort out the mess on the left hand side adjacent to the temperature table? It is beyond my skill level! I have since noticed that the mess in is Firefox and Safari but not in IE or Chrome, and that quite a lot of information is missing in Firefox, obviously a formatting issue.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.0.221.95 (talk) 09:37, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

Startling Omission

The article mentions a 2002 Census determined 78% Russian ethnicity and 0.6% German; an intriguing result albiet the article mentioned the USSR Russified the population. Here you have a nation founded and existing for nearly 700 years as part of the Germanic state and in a mere 57 years nearly all Germans there cease to exist. What happened? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Micael (talk • contribs) 03:07, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

It is in the article: "The remaining German population was expelled from 1945–48." Please read Expulsion of Germans after World War II. Fentener van Vlissingen (talk) 04:01, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

It's called Ethnic cleansing. Erikeltic (talk) 11:57, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Michael. This section itself feels "cleansed," lacking important information. By stating that the population was "expelled," the impression is given that they were perhaps simply asked to move or transported. Following the war, in the winter of 1945, the Red army decimated whole German civilian populations. How can there be no history of the nature of the violence exacted or threatened against the German civilians in this area? The article feels unbalanced by avoiding the topic, probably because it is an uncomfortable subject for those who wish to see the war as "black-and-white" - Germans as evil Nazis, Allies as good. Of course, that type of partisanship has no place in the article page of an encyclopedia. But even if it did, what this position misses is that Russia, along with Germany, began the war by mutually invading Poland. So, their hands were not clean as non-aggressors to begin with. Also, the expulsion of civilian populations (with or without killing) was one of the bases of war crime charges resulting in Nuremberg sentences at the time. But not so for Red Army commanders? These are historically important facts, and the article should simply state them if they are available. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.86.88.60 (talk) 03:09, 9 November 2010 (UTC)

No. "Expelled" is to remove by force - by definition, the German population was not "asked." This was part of the Stalin regime's setting up buffer states, security areas, and wholesale moving the borders of Germany away from that of the USSR. - HammerFilmFan — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.111.21.24 (talk) 15:55, 20 June 2022 (UTC)

Agree with you, but this article is not the place for it. This article is about the new city built on the ruins. That detail belongs either in the konigsberg article or (more probably) in a special article. Roger Pearse (talk) 16:35, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

Traveling to/from the rest of Russia by land

Related to traveling from the rest of Russia to Kaliningrad by land through the EU, the article says that Special travel arrangements for the territory's inhabitants have been made. Can anybody expand that, here or in other article? --Anna Lincoln (talk) 08:47, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

I found them here to be the Facilitated Transit Document (FTD) and Facilitated Rail Transit Document (FRTD), the documents needed for the transit. --Anna Lincoln (talk) 09:03, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

The legislation implementing the documents is here. --Anna Lincoln (talk) 09:08, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

Kaliningrad.ru City portal

Hi, friends. Kaliningrad.ru was a popular news portal in Kaliningrad since 2003, and one of the most visited independent regional news portals in Russia for about 5 last years.

On 09-10-2009, the domain was misappropriated by a pro-government RF organization. New location of the Kaliningrad.ru news portal is now www.NewKaliningrad.ru/ - The details of the issue are available in Russian here: http://knia.ru/digest/751.html - it is another independent city news site, and here is the translated by Google into English version of that article: http://translate.google.ru/translate?hl=en&sl=ru&u=http://knia.ru/digest/751.html

Currently, the original owners of the "Kaliningrad.ru" trademark are thinking over further steps to obtain justice.

At the moment, all web site contents, with numerous subject forums, are available under http://www.NewKaliningrad.ru —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kaliningradka (talk • contribs) 01:20, 10 October 2009 (UTC)

Hi there! Not to appear insensitive or something, but, all in all, we don't care. You are, of course, welcome to update the links so they lead to proper sites, but the politics around this situation is of no relevance to Wikipedia.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); 16:42, October 13, 2009 (UTC)

"Rumors" present in the article

The "Military" subsection includes this sentence: "Since 1991 there have been rumors that the Russians have transferred numerous tactical nuclear warheads to the exclave."

Even though there is a reference, it is still admittedly a reference to rumors and I believe the whole sentence should be deleted. 97.125.48.202 (talk) 06:37, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

On Eulers solution of the "Seven Bridges of Königsberg" problem

The sentences "The city is famous in the history of mathematics in connection with the famous Seven Bridges of Königsberg problem. The solution of this problem by Leonard Euler was the beginning of the branch of mathematics known as graph theory, and the first example of methods which were to form the mathematical discipline of Topology." are in contradiction with the article "Seven Bridges of Königsberg" which contains the sentence "Euler proved that the problem has no solution.". Tis is confusing. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.89.11.183 (talk) 08:46, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

While in math the word "solution" is also used for resolving the problem by proving that the problem has no solution, i agree, that this can be misleading to a laical reader. I propose to change " The solution of this problem" to "The mathematical analysis of this problem" to avoid misunderstanding. 94.64.39.46 (talk) 21:31, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

Calininopolis (or Kalininopolis)

This Greek name seems a bit odd. I respelled it with a K... Anyway, there's no corresponding name on Greek Wikipedia. It's spelled "Καλίνινγκραντ" (Kaliningkrant) and Καίνιξμπεργκ (Kalinixmpergk) or Καινιξβέργη (Kainixberge) for Konigsberg. Is this correct or relevant?

Cheers, Cashie (talk) 03:56, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

No: "Καλίνινγκραντ" (transliteration: Kaliningkrant, transcription: Kaliningrad) and Καίνιξμπεργκ (transliteration: Kainixmpergk, transcription: Kenixberg) or Καινιξβέργη (transliteration: Kainixberge, transcription: Kenixberyi) for Konigsberg. -- PhJ (talk) 13:42, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Neutrality dispute August 2010?

The History section of the article is marked with a neutrality dispute from 8/2010, but I don't see any comment on the discussion page dated from then that flags specific areas for neutrality.

IMHO the current section is factual, if a little bit terse when describing the transition from Russian to German population (per 'Startling Omissions' above). Does anyone want to take a stab at trying to fill that in a bit more without recapitulating the full history of ethnic cleansing during and after WW2, or is there a consensus for leaving it and clearing the neutrality tag? Willhsmit (talk) 19:19, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Seems reasonable to me. I think the tag should be cleared. That said ... the section could probably be abbreviated. All that it really needs to say is "Kaliningrad was formerly Konigsberg, and was populated by Russians after the German population was expelled." The rest belongs to the Konigsberg article, IMHO. Roger Pearse (talk) 16:34, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

Russian name (pre-Soviet)

What was the original name of the city in Russian, before the Soviet take-over? best. 188.221.129.72 (talk) 20:57, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Right above, German: Königsberg. Also sometimes Anglicized as Koensigsburg. PЄTЄRS J V ►TALK 11:41, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

Koensigsburg is a typo (google returns very few, 7, hits, which are also typos).

The umlaut in ö is an abbreviation for oe, so Königsberg will be typed as Koenigsburg on keyboards lacking ö. (similarly ae/ä and ue/ü). See

Umlaut_(diacritic)#Printing_conventions_in_German Mattymmoo (talk) 08:45, 24 April 2024 (UTC)

Odd inconsistency

I find it quite odd that this article makes such a radical break between the pre-war German period and the post-war Soviet/Russian one. This is very different from the approach taken in the articles about the cities that became part of Poland, such as Stettin or Breslau. Those cities, much like Koenigberg, were also incredibly destroyed and completely ethnically cleansed. Globo (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 06:01, 28 July 2011 (UTC).

Kaliningrad/Königsberg was conquered by the Red Army and Germans driven out. Breslau was allocated to Poland by the Yalta or maybe Potsdam conference or both, and emptied of Germans only in 1946. That was an orderly ethnic cleansing while Kaliningrad was not, from what I have read. Breslau: I know because I have a relative who was born there and spent two years as a hungry toddler (aged 4 to 6) on the roads and in trains until the family reached Germany proper. East Germany. Soon they had to move again, fleeing to West Germany. Wars impact on people. 2001:8003:AC60:1400:81E3:7ACC:4412:7B77 (talk) 03:43, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

German name of city

The article starts by saying: "Kaliningrad (Russian: Калининград; IPA: [kəlʲɪnʲɪnˈgrat]; German: Königsberg". This suggests that the current German name for Kaliningrad is Königsberg, in the same sense that the English name for Napoli is Naples. But this is not correct. The current German name for Kaliningrad is Kaliningrad. Königsberg is the former name for the city when it was a German city. The current wording implies that Germany does not recognise the fact that the city is now in Russia, which is untrue. Intelligent Mr Toad (talk) 19:15, 9 October 2012 (UTC)

Good point. I've made the corrections for German, and for Polish as well.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); October 24, 2012; 18:32 (UTC)

Thanks for that. I hate to quibble, but what does "Polish: Königsberg (formerly Królewiec)" mean? I don't doubt that the city is called Królewiec by some Poles, but it has never been a Polish city and that has never been the actual name of the city. The wording suggests that now the Poles have stopped calling it Królewiec and started calling it Königsberg, which makes no sense. Intelligent Mr Toad (talk) 20:18, 25 October 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, but just using the name of the city by which it was known for centuries does NOT imply that Germans don't recognise it is now a Russian city. The German name of the city is Königsberg. 84.154.92.6 (talk) 02:07, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

It means I'm a moron who didn't bother to re-check his edit after posting. What I meant to do is to put "Kaliningrad" as the Polish name (because, just as it is with German, "Kaliningrad" is the name used to refer to the modern city in Polish) and to retain "Królewiec" the same way I retained "Königsberg" for German. Instead of "Kaliningrad", however, I must have accidentally pasted "Königsberg", so you have a full right to quibble :)

How to best format all these details in the lede without overwhelming it, I'm not entirely sure, but I like neither the way I did it, nor the way you corrected it today. Perhaps Polish name shouldn't even be in there at all. Cheers,—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); October 25, 2012; 20:49 (UTC)

Area?

Why there is no area information? There is census figure from 2010, and a city has to have some kind of borders by which the inhabitants are determined. Or is it done differently? 82.141.65.120 (talk) 06:04, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

There is no one single source to get the area, as it is the case with the population and the Census data. What's more, an area can be reported in multiple ways (that of the city proper, of the administrative division, or of the municipal formation). Official websites aren't always helpful either—many don't report an area at all, or often don't specify what kind of area is provided. With Kaliningrad, however, you seem to be in luck :) Their official website has a link to the passport of the urban okrug; I've added the area reported in that document to the infobox. Cheers,—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); October 19, 2012; 14:02 (UTC)

Proposed merger

Kantgrad ---> Kaliningrad

• This information should be merged, and the article Kantgrad redirected to this article. Vanjagenije (talk) 19:04, 25 July 2013 (UTC)
• Support. A no-brainer. That is, of course, if the "Kantgrad" moniker even passes notability test (because if it doesn't, that stub should be deleted altogether).—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); July 25, 2013; 19:28 (UTC)
• Strongly support. "Kantgrad" is a mere pipe dream promoted by a society that apparently isn't even in Kaliningrad anymore. --RBBrittain (talk) 16:02, 31 July 2013 (UTC)

OK, i will merge myself and I'll redirect Kantgrad to Kaliningrad. Vanjagenije (talk) 01:13, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

Proposed merger - Königsberg to Kaliningrad

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

I close this as not done. Numerically, we have 8 opposes against 3 supports, which is slightly above the usual consensus threshold. In terms of the arguments, in the end of the day what was discussed is a matter of convenince: Whether the article is long enough to be split, and, assuming this is the case, what should be the name for the split off article. I do not see significant opposition to the suggestion that it should be History of Kaliningrad, but I do not see sufficient support for this point of view either, so that if someone wants to rename the article (possible with adding more info on the Soviet period), this would be a reasonable discussion topic for this talk page.--Ymblanter (talk) 11:51, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

---

Proposed merger - Königsberg to Kaliningrad -There seems to be a content fork here created in 2006. Claims that Kaliningrad was built "on the site of" Königsberg were used to deny the simple truth that they are simply two names for the same Russian city, as these two definitions support. Ka·li·nin·grad (k-lnn-grd, -gräd, -ly-nn-grät) A city of extreme western Russia on the Baltic Sea near the Polish border. It was founded in 1255 by the Teutonic Knights and joined the Hanseatic League in 1340. Called Königsberg, it was an important Prussian city and the birthplace of Immanuel Kant (1724). Transferred to the USSR in 1945, it was renamed Kaliningrad in 1946. Population: 426,000. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition copyright ©2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. Kaliningrad (Russian) [kəlininˈgrat] n (Placename) a port in W Russia, on the Pregolya River: severely damaged in World War II as the chief German naval base on the Baltic; ceded to the Soviet Union in 1945 and is now Russia's chief Baltic naval base. Pop.: 427 200 (1999 est.) Former name (until 1946) Königsberg Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged. 5.28.89.25 (talk) 11:57, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

At the moment, the following all redirect to Koenigsberg

Konigsberg (redirect page) ‎ (links) Karaliacius (redirect page) ‎ (links) Regiomontium (redirect page) ‎ (links) Köningsberg (redirect page) ‎ (links) Konigsberg, Prussia (redirect page) ‎ (links) Königsberg, Prussia (redirect page) ‎ (links) Koeningsberg (redirect page) ‎ (links) Koningsberg (redirect page) ‎ (links) Koenigsburg (redirect page) ‎ (links) Kyonigsberg (redirect page) ‎ (links) Königsberg (Preußen) (redirect page) ‎ (links) Königsberg in Preußen (redirect page) ‎ (links) Karaliaučius (redirect page) ‎ (links) Karaliaucius (redirect page) ‎ (links) Königsberg (Prussia) (redirect page) ‎ (links) Konigsberg in Preussen (redirect page) ‎ (links) Konigsberg (Preussen) (redirect page) ‎ (links) Königsbarg (redirect page) ‎ (links) Koenisberg (redirect page) ‎ (links) K\xC3\xB6nigsberg (redirect page) ‎ (links) 5.28.89.25 (talk) 12:11, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

Survey

• I don't recall anyone justifying the split because "Kaliningrad was built on the site of Königsberg" and is somehow a totally distinct entity. The split was simply a convenience matter to better handle large chunks of information; the Kaliningrad/Königsberg divide seems to be the best breaking point to use. Merging the articles would produce an unwieldy monster; I simply see no tangible benefit to doing so.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); August 16, 2013; 12:13 (UTC)

Please look at the articles-that justification has been made- eg This article currently says "The site now occupied by Kaliningrad was previously the site of the East Prussian city of Königsberg." Other Russian cities do not have seperate articles under their old and new names- why should Kaliningrad? For example, Leningrad, and Petrograd redirect to St. Petersburg, while Tsaritsyn & Stalingrad redirect to Volgagrad. Danzig redirects to Gdansk. Why should Kaliningrad be different? 5.28.89.25 (talk) 12:19, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

Both [1] and [2] show that having a seperate article under the old name of a city is not normal.5.28.89.25 (talk) 12:36, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

The argument that it is a new city is expressed here- [3]. Discussion about the name split is all in that archive. It seems as though the decision was taken on nationalistic grounds. Moreover, when Kaliningrad was split from Konigsberg in 2006, it lost its talk page archive, as Kaliningrad was renamed Konigsberg, and a new Kaliningrad page was created. I can see no advantages, and significant disadvantages, to having two entries for the same city. If the unified article would be too long, parts could be spun off. 5.28.89.25 (talk) 13:03, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

If a claim is made in the article that Kaliningrad is a new city, that certainly needs to be corrected, but that was not the justification for the split (even though some opinions which may be viewed as nationalistic had been voiced in the process). The only reason why these two articles are separate is because both have a wealth of information, and the Soviet takeover is the most logical point at which the split could be made. Articles on history are split like that all the time; the Kaliningrad/Königsberg situation may be a little unusual, but I just don't see why it should be a problem. If the misleading claims are fixed and the two articles are properly interlinked (and contain summaries of one another), I see no problem with them being separate.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); August 16, 2013; 13:32 (UTC)

The split is not made at the Soviet takeover, which is covered at length in the Konigsberg article, and predates the name change. If you look at the links above, you will see that it is not normal have two articles for the same city under different names. Konigsberg has been called Kaliningrad since 1946. Konigsberg should default to Kaliningrad. I have no objections to the article being subdivided if it is too long, but I do not see a) why that split should be made 70 years ago for a 750 year old city and b) why a defunct city name should be presented as though it still exists.5.28.89.25 (talk) 13:56, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

But the split was made at the Soviet takeover, more or less. Doing so does not preclude us from briefly describing what happened after in the Königsberg article or from what happened before in the Kaliningrad article (in fact, doing so is necessary for maintaining proper continuity across the two articles). The split point is logical, because articles generally tend to swell the closer we get to the present (that's how it is possible to end up with roughly equal articles for 600 years of history vs ~70 most recent years of history), and the name change provides a natural solution for titling the two separate pages. If we are to split the article due to its size, I don't see any other more natural point, do you?

On your last objection, I simply don't get what you mean. The very first paragraph in Königsberg makes it crystal clear that the article is about a period in the history of the city, not about a city which is completely different from modern Kaliningrad. If that is contradicted further into the article, it can be edited accordingly.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); August 16, 2013; 14:25 (UTC)

Why must the article be spilt? Even with the duplicate material, both articles added together are not that long. Without the duplications, the article would be about the same length as Stettin or Gdansk, significantly shorter than Berlin or London. on the other matter, the first paragraph is

Königsberg was the capital of Prussia from the Late Middle Ages until 1701 when the capital was moved to Berlin. During the period from 1701 until 1945 it was the regional capital of the Prussian (and from 1871, German) province of East Prussia. It was the easternmost large German city until it was captured by the Soviet Union and Allies near the end of World War II. In 1946 the city was renamed Kaliningrad (Калинингра́д).

A clear version would be-

Kaliningrad, then known as Königsberg, was the capital of Prussia from the Late Middle Ages until 1701 when the capital was moved to Berlin. During the period from 1701 until 1945 it was the regional capital of the Prussian (and from 1871, German) province of East Prussia. It was the easternmost large German city until it was captured by the Soviet Union and Allies near the end of World War II. In 1946 the city was renamed Kaliningrad (Калинингра́д).

The article was split because it was considered to be long. If the consensus has changed since then, I'm sure other people will make themselves heard in this thread. I don't really have anything more to say beyond what I've already said. Cheers,—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); August 16, 2013; 14:50 (UTC)

Note that city authorities don't distinguish any difference and see historical continuity of the city(especially since it was Russian before 1945). As to excessive information I suggest to move it to History of Kaliningrad article. --MyMoloboaccount (talk) 22:16, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

• Oppose per reasons above. We have similar solutions for Byzantium, Constantinople and Istanbul or Mexico City and Tenochtitlan. HerkusMonte (talk) 15:38, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

Kaliningrad authorities don't see 1945 as beginning of new city. They celebrated its 750 existence(and we shouldn't forget that it was Russian before 1945). Hence your comparisons are flawed. This is the same city as before.--MyMoloboaccount (talk) 22:16, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

• Comment there seems to be a lot of material in the history section that pertains solely to the history of Königsberg. i.e. detail that should be summarised much more succinctly in the overall Kaliningrad article. So if anything this is a subarticle of Kaliningrad dealing solely with the period when it was called Königsberg. But it's quite hard to know how to deal with that, other than History of Kaliningrad (xxx to yyy) or somesuch  — Amakuru (talk) 15:45, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

HerkusMonte - which reasons? The examples you give are very inexact parallels- why should this article differ from Gdansk? As described at WP:Article_titles#Treatment_of_alternative_names

By the design of Wikipedia's software, an article can only have one title. When this title is a name, significant alternative names for the topic should be mentioned in the article, usually in the first sentence or paragraph. If there are at least three alternative names, or there is something notable about the names themselves, a separate name section is recommended (see Lead section). These may include alternative spellings, longer or shorter forms, historical names, significant names in other languages, etc. There is also no reason why alternative names cannot be used in article text, in contexts where they are more appropriate than the name used as the title of the article. For example, the city now called Gdańsk is referred to as Danzig in historical contexts to which that name is more suited (e.g. when it was part of Germany or a Free City).

86.56.71.208 (talk) 16:02, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

• Support: The amount of text in these articles (~100 kB total) is enough to justify the split. However, it's unclear which article should cover 1945-1946, when the Soviet Union captured the region and began a program of ethnic cleansing of which the renaming was a part. Resolving the ambiguity and covering this period (apart from the battle) in one place would be worth the inconveniences that come with a long article. —rybec 21:28, 16 August 2013 (UTC)
• Strong support. We don't have seperate articles for Poznan and Posen, or Wroclaw and Breslau. It is the same city, same history(including being part of Russian state before in 18th century), and several old buildings remaining. There is absolutely no reason why we should have two different articles. Excessive text should be moved to sub article called History of Kaliningrad and that's it--MyMoloboaccount (talk) 23:49, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

Additional comment-it might be also worth adding that city authorities don't see the city as new creation in 1945 but as continuation of the long history. In 2005 there were celebrations of its 750 years of existence under the slogan "One city-one history"(I can provide source for that). I think this heavily suggests we shouldn't engage in creative writing here and claim the city is something new.--MyMoloboaccount (talk) 23:49, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

• Week Oppose - I think there is enough material for two articles here... and distinguishing them by historical name / modern name (the way we do with Byzantium, Constantinople and Istanbul) is appropriate. That said... the Königsberg article does need to take a purely historical tone... as currently written, it does occasionally stray into material that would be better placed in the article on the modern city. I would suggest a review of both articles, with selective merging of individual paragraphs and sections... rather than a compete merger of one article into the other. Blueboar (talk) 15:18, 21 August 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose - I agree with Blueboar in that there is enough material for two articles here, and that it is good to distinguish them by historical name / modern name. If we merge, we might well end up with an over-long article, which would then probably have the 'History' section split off to create History of Kaliningrad, which we already happen to have ready-made in Königsberg . -- Marek.69 ^talk 17:26, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

That's not a problem. We can shorten info from here and add it to Kaliningrad, larger part of information can be moved into History of Kaliningrad article. I can volunteer to do it. There is no reason for two separate articles, especially as city authorities underline historical continuity of the city.--MyMoloboaccount (talk) 22:11, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

• Oppose merge. I think the split is a good way to get to grips with the complexity of the history and the volume of our content - and it also better reflects how English-language sources treat the topic in different eras. bobrayner (talk) 10:36, 25 August 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose merge - the history article is largely about a Germanic city, so History of Kaliningrad is a misnoma. In ictu oculi (talk) 14:34, 25 August 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose merge - per Blueboar, Bobrayner and In ictu oculi. -- PhJ (talk) 13:36, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose - While referring to the same place, the two articles are referering to entirelyt dirrent eras. Elmmapleoakpine (talk) 01:00, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Name change to History of Kaliningrad

The name should change to History of Kaliningrad, and I think Koenigsberg should perhaps link straight to Kaliningrad. The consensus is that Kaliningrad is the current name for Koenigsberg. Troy does not link directly to the first five civilisations, it is confusing to use different names for articles on different time periods of the same city.♥ L'Origine du monde ♥ ^{(♥ Talk♥ )} 00:26, 24 September 2013 (UTC)

High traffic on Polish border

[4] - may be notable enough to warrant discussion in the article. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 09:56, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

I added a paragraph about it. —rybec 20:55, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

Date of Name-Change

The article states the name was changed to Kaliningrad in 1946 in honor of Kalinin following his death, which was in 1946. There is no source for this information. I have a source claiming the name of the city was changed to Kaliningrad in 1947, not 1946: The Amber Room: The Fate of the World's Greatest Lost Treasure by Catherine Scott-Clark and Adrian Levy, New York 2004. Here is a quote: "It is from Kaliningrad, the Soviet name for Konigsberg, given to the city in October 1947 following the death of Mikhail Kalinin, chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet." Scott-Clark doesn't have a footnote for this statement, but her work is heavily footnoted throughout, and I assume she got this year right.

There also seems to be some confusion in the article about which year exactly Kaliningrad was officially incorporated into the Soviet Union, from the Soviet perspective, and focuses instead on what the non-Soviet Allies were willing to grant rather than actual votes and measures by Soviet parliamentary organs for, for example, applying the Soviet constitution inside Kaliningrad, naming it an oblast and incorporating it into the RSFSR. These matters need better sourcing if the article is to meet the minimum requirements for a true history and encyclopedic content. Hypatea (talk) 16:43, 25 June 2014 (UTC)

Lead image

Something's gone wrong with the labelling of the composite lead image. The labels top left etc do not seem to correspond with the images. The composite on Commons is labelled in Russian so perhaps it'd be easier for someone who reads that or knows the city to fix it. Chiswick Chap (talk) 22:03, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for removing the wrong labels; now the individual images aren't labelled at all, just as "Views of Kaliningrad". Readers can work that bit out for themselves. What are these local landmarks, some of them surprisingly old-looking and beautiful, despite the claimed near-total destruction of the city? Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:10, 17 March 2015 (UTC)

Here are the component files, named in Russian:

File:Вид на рыбацкую деревню (Калининград).jpg

File:Кафедральный собор (Калининград).jpg

File:Площадь Победы (Калининград).jpg

File:Памятник морякам-балтийцам (Калининград).jpg

File:Храм Христа Спасителя (Калининград).jpg

File:Дворец культуры моряков (Калининград).jpg

Thanks for listing them here. I'm on a mobile connection now, so it wasn't convenient to jump between browser windows. The landmarks, in the order above, are:

• View of the "fishing village" (which is not an actual fishing village, but rather a historical neighborhood built in German style)
• Königsberg Cathedral
• Victory Square
• Monument to the Baltic Seamen
• Church of Christ the Savior
• Seamen's Palace of Culture

If you could format this properly and transfer it to the article, I'd appreciate it. Thanks!—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); March 17, 2015; 12:10 (UTC)

Done! Chiswick Chap (talk) 13:10, 17 March 2015 (UTC)

Kaliningrad is not contiguous with the rest of Russia

It would be helpful if a clear statement to this effect was at the beginning of the article. It would also be useful to state ways of getting from Kaliningrad to the main part of Russia.

A better map showing this would also help.

Marvin Kornblau — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.90.79.66 (talk) 15:52, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

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Sources about Kaliningrad

• Tétrault-Farber, Gabrielle. "If Russia Gets Crimea, Should Germany Get Kaliningrad?" (Archive). The Moscow Times. March 21, 2014.
• Beyer, Susanne. "Resurrecting Königsberg: Russian City Looks to German Roots." Der Spiegel. July 25, 2014. Translated by Daryl Lindsey. - Originally in German in German in issue 28/2014 (July 7, 2014)

Deutsche Welle had "Kant Serves as a Cultural Bridge" but the article gives a 403 and there's no archive. Other articles have a preview: "German Foreign Minister Fischer is scheduled to open the first Consulate General in Kaliningrad on Thursday, the 200th anniversary of the death of philosopher Immanuel Kant, the city's most famous son." WhisperToMe (talk) 10:29, 16 May 2016 (UTC)

New governor

Deserves a discussion — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rustastra (talk • contribs) 17:47, 31 July 2016 (UTC)

Care to elaborate? :) For example, why do you think it is even necessary to discuss the governor in an article about the city?—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); August 18, 2016; 13:22 (UTC)

IPA and transliteration of names

The first line or two are a bit inconsistent. The Russian version of Kaliningrad is followed by the IPA; the Russian version of Konigsberg is followed by a transliteration. and do Poles and Lithuanians not say "Kaliningrad"? Or is it identical to the English? --Richardson mcphillips (talk) 17:47, 11 January 2017 (UTC)

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Military

used to be the most heavily militarized area. What about today?Xx236 (talk) 07:41, 17 May 2017 (UTC)

Small border traffic law

To be updated.Xx236 (talk) 07:44, 17 May 2017 (UTC)

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Karl Andree's POV

POV of a German book from 1831, which was much less biased than Kulturkampf-era and 20th century Anti-Polish German nationalist POV: https://books.google.pl/books?id=xgUEAAAAYAAJ&pg=P218

Domen von Wielkopolska (talk) 14:31, 23 December 2018 (UTC)

Please stop WP:editwarring, you already broke the WP:3RR rule. A book published in 1831 is hardly a reliable source for such a strong claim (WP:AGEMATTERS). We use modern sources and summarize what modern sources say. Your language above also shows a pretty blatant POV pushing attitude. HerkusMonte (talk) 14:43, 23 December 2018 (UTC)

I just checked the source, Andree says "von Polen abhängig war", abhängig = dependent, he does not say, it was considered or actually was part of Poland. HerkusMonte (talk) 14:59, 23 December 2018 (UTC)

Ok, I will change it to dependent (or fiefdom). BTW it is just a matter of fact that early 1800s German sources are not anti-Polish while late 1800s / early 1900s often are.

Domen von Wielkopolska (talk) 15:17, 23 December 2018 (UTC)

1675 is obviously a matter of transposed digits, because the Treaty of Wehlau ended the fiefdom in 1657. HerkusMonte (talk) 08:21, 25 December 2018 (UTC)

Language of the article

Before we get into an 'edit war', this article has been set to European English, both for consistency with the article on Konigsberg, and because it is a European city. HughEverPulsatingBrainThatRulesFromTheCentreOfTheUltraworld (talk) 06:56, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

I am sorry, but this is not up to you to decide, but for people who actually write the artyicle. I am reverting.--Ymblanter (talk) 06:59, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

Actually, as I understand the rules it's not up to anyone to claim 'ownership' of the article, Ymblanter. Edit-warring is bad form. Let's escalate the matter for a competent adjudication.HughEverPulsatingBrainThatRulesFromTheCentreOfTheUltraworld (talk) 11:08, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

Sure, just please do not forget to mention WP:BRD (which you failed to follow) and that the article is perfectly consistent with aseverl thousands other articles on Russian localities.--Ymblanter (talk) 11:12, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

3O According to Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Retaining_the_existing_variety the existing variety should be retained in the absence of consensus. Although Kaliningrad is a european city, I can not see how it would have an especially strong tie to British English. Therefore I would say that the original variant, which in this case is AE, should be retained. --Cerotidinon (talk) 21:02, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

Thanks Cerotidinon; helpful to have that question raised. Actually, this has little to do with British English, specifically, and more to do with European English. 'Not sure if everyone is aware that there is such a thing, but there certainly is. So a question I'd pose in return is whether there is any reason to believe that there are specific ties to American English? It does sometimes happen, quite legitimately, e.g. re USAF bases in Germany, but it's hard to see a case for it in this instance.HughEverPulsatingBrainThatRulesFromTheCentreOfTheUltraworld (talk) 15:20, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

I cannot follow you on your claim that there is such a thing as European English. For example, Wikipedia explicitly distinguishes British English and Irish English. It is highly questionable whether Russia has stronger ties to British English than to American English just because it lies partly in Europe.

Addendum: There is an article on Euro English stating "The question whether the appropriation of English by non-native speakers in Continental Europe is giving rise to a potential European variety of English has not yet been resolved.". So for now, I would not acknowledge that claim as a basis for Wikipedia articles. --Cerotidinon (talk) 16:12, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for locating that helpful article, Cerotidinon. It does accord with the experience of many European contributors. There are many countries and regions where European English is officially a second language but unofficially the lingua franca - Malta, Cyprus and Menorca leap to mind - but despite (or perhaps because of) the history it would be highly insensitive to call that 'British English'. HughEverPulsatingBrainThatRulesFromTheCentreOfTheUltraworld (talk) 15:18, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

Please do not engage in further edit-warring on this article. The consensus view, as established above, is that European English should be employed. Repeatedly inserting irrelevant changes makes the article less readable and wastes the time of contributors.HughEverPulsatingBrainThatRulesFromTheCentreOfTheUltraworld (talk) 09:15, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

There is no consensus established above that European English must be employed.--Ymblanter (talk) 09:22, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

There very clearly is. Might it be helpful to consult some fellow editors who speak English as their first language? Repeatedly insisting upon a point of view without evidence is unlikely to lead to a positive conclusion.HughEverPulsatingBrainThatRulesFromTheCentreOfTheUltraworld (talk) 18:00, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

Edit warring

This article has unfortunately come under fire from an editor who has apparently been so reluctant to discuss content and act upon consensus that a blocking procedure was used inappropriately. The two complaints, apparently triggered by that editor's preference for American English, were essentially "I don't see it" and "I wrote this so keep your hands off". These are both unhelpful attitudes. When something is not understood, that is not a reason to undo another editor's good faith contributions; the appropriate response is to engage in conversation on the talk page. The appropriateness of European English to this particular article, and the lack of a plausible cause for employing American English, are both covered in some detail in the discussion above and wilfully ignoring this is not helpful or constructive. Asking or expecting other editors to avoid contributing in deference to an earlier contributor is attempted ownership of content, and that's a cardinal sin, as any experienced editor should be well aware. Input from other editors to repair the damage done to this particular article would be appreciate. The transgressing editor may unfortunately have to be the subject of a formal complaint if malicious behaviour reoccurs.HughEverPulsatingBrainThatRulesFromTheCentreOfTheUltraworld (talk) 12:04, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

Your block was perfectly appropriate, and your claims that this very talk page has consensus for usage of British English is are ridiculous.--Ymblanter (talk) 12:09, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

Hello, Ymblanter, sorry to be summoning you again so soon, but there appears to be a sock puppet of this now blocked account. The editor has returned to this page to change the EngVar again ([5]), and is doing so on at least two other articles as well (see 1 and 2). The user at the time of the earlier block stated he might set up a new account and you cautioned him about doing so here (adding a ping to original blocking admin Ivanvector). The editor continues to make the argument that everyone else is mistaken, despite clear policy explanations. Laszlo Panaflex (talk) 13:51, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

I reverted the first edit, but I can not revert the second edit, this must be done manually, and I totaly do not have time this week.--Ymblanter (talk) 22:05, 2 August 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for copying me in, Laszlo. 'Happy to confirm no socks were harmed in the making of this article! I honestly can't imagine why or how anyone would see this article as appropriate to set in US English, but a glimpse at this section of the talk page is surely to enough to convince anyone that an edit war is indeed likely - so I shall gladly walk away.ByzantiumLives (talk) 12:30, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

The user has been blocked as a sock--Ymblanter (talk) 20:28, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Kaliningrad/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Buidhe (talk · contribs) 18:21, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

The article currently meets the quick-fail criteria due to outstanding tags and the fact that a large amount of content is not verifiable to reliable sources. Please make sure that all content is cited to reliable sources and then re-nominate. (t · c) buidhe 18:21, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

Since there has not been any response, I'm going to close as delist. (t · c) buidhe 22:26, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:Königsberg which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 22:46, 26 April 2021 (UTC)

Blockade

Russia has been complaining recently about Lithuania restricting supplies to Kaliningrad. Does any ENWP article discuss the matter? Jim.henderson (talk) 18:21, 13 July 2022 (UTC)

There’s no “blockade.” Sea, rail, road, and air traffic to Kaliningrad oblast is not hindered.

Lithuania has implemented International sanctions during the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine on rail traffic entering its territory from Russia. This only affects certain products entering Lithuania.

Apparently it’s been pressured to drop the enforcement of these on this rail traffic anyway. —Michael Z. 04:59, 14 July 2022 (UTC)

context for current protect status, if anyone was wondering

https://nypost.com/2022/10/05/czechs-troll-russia-with-mock-annexation-of-kaliningrad/ 66.190.13.201 (talk) 06:29, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

If Kaliningrad is to be called Königsberg, maybe we should change Odessa to Odesa?

Kaliningrad and obwód kaliningradzki (the Kaliningrad Oblast) — these names should no longer be used in Polish. Instead, we should use the names Królewiec (Königsberg) and obwód królewiecki (Königsberg District). This is the latest recommendation of the Commission on Standardization of Geographical Names Outside the Republic of Poland. For the city with the Russian name Калининград (Kaliningrad), only the Polish name Królewiec is recommended and the use of the name Kaliningrad in Polish is not recommended, and for the administrative unit in which this city is located and bearing the Russian name Калининградская область (Kaliningradskaja oblast') it is recommended the Polish name is Królewiec Oblast and it is not recommended to use the name Kaliningrad Oblast in Polish.

The recommendation to move away from Russian names in favor of Polish ones was justified by the commission: the current Russian name of this city is unrelated to either the city or the region and commemorates the criminal Mikhail Kalinin, who signed (among several other members of the Soviet Politburo) the decision to murder Polish officers in Katyn in 1940.

The recommendations come into force today, May 9, 2023.

Unfortunately, the name Kaliningrad is still used in many languages and on many maps.

In many languages, including Polish, the name of the Ukrainian city is Odessa, but in many languages, including Ukrainian, the name of this city is Odesa, therefore, one should also consider changing the name Odessa to Odesa. Mir.Nalezinski (talk) 19:05, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

That article is titled Odesa since July 2022. But Kaliningrad is internationally recognized as in the Russian Federation, so this article is not likely to be renamed. Not sure that Polish legal acts on the naming of a Russian, formerly German city are notable enough to include in this article.  —Michael Z. 20:29, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

What the Polish government decides to call a Russian city has no meaning. The name of the city was not changed by the relevant authorities, so it will remain as Kaliningrad here. Also, this is enwiki, so what is used in Polish is especially not applicable here. And it's worth noting that political views do not belong on Wikipedia. michael60634 / talk / contributions 05:08, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Poland

Poland is using Konigsberg as the official name of this place again. 47.187.199.76 (talk) 02:29, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

What the Polish government decides to call a Russian city has no meaning. The name of the city was not changed by the relevant authorities, so it will remain as Kaliningrad. michael60634 / talk / contributions 05:04, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

But now Medvedev has responded with a threat to Poland. Queue reliable sources appearing in 3, 2 . . .  —Michael Z. 15:17, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

This whole discussion section is missing the point. It's not that the name of this article should change from Kaliningrad. It's that the content of the article should mention somewhere that Poland has decided to call this place the Polish translation for Königsberg, and Lithuania and Latvia have decided to follow suit with name changes in their respective jurisdiction. 104.175.74.27 (talk) 17:31, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

Königsberg is the name of the city, and "Kaliningrad" is just a Russian creation. Eurohunter (talk) 11:57, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Russia is the legal owner of Kaliningrad. So its legal name is Kaliningrad. 110.142.86.86 (talk) 23:53, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Merger proposal

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

To not merge, given that Königsberg and Kaliningrad cover distinct periods with a clear event separating them; recognizing that a city is more than a place, but a population, and that the populations are distinct; given the size of the articles, readers are appropriately served by having them separate. Klbrain (talk) 18:50, 18 November 2023 (UTC)

---

I propose merging Königsberg into Kaliningrad. There's no reason to have two separate articles about the same city just because it changed hands administratively, and there is a lot of duplication between the two articles in the History section that could be considerably condensed down. No other city that changed like that has two articles (Pressburg redirects to Bratislava, Stettin redirects to Szczecin, etc) and the amount of duplication between two separate articles on the same city is just unnecessary. Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 14:00, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

He does this work in practice? It looks like the combined article would be too long, and inevitably History of Kaliningrad would be broken off in WP:summary style, leading to the exact situation we currently have. Compare History of Bratislava and History of Szczecin.  —Michael Z. 14:13, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Splitting out a separate "History of" article after the merger would be fine; that's not the same thing as having a separate article that treats the city before a certain date as if it was entirely different. A History of Kaliningrad article would cover up to the present day, just as History of Bratislava does. Compare with the fact that there's both a Timeline of Kaliningrad article and a Timeline of Bratislava article.Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 15:20, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Seems to me that renaming and editing Königsberg → History of Kaliningrad would be more efficient than planning to merge and then split to virtually rewrite that entire article from scratch.  —Michael Z. 15:53, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

After considering arguments below, I vote Rename Königsberg → History of Kaliningrad. Appropriate edits should follow.  —Michael Z. 22:50, 16 May 2023 (UTC)

Oppose Here we have a situation similar to what's been happening on Israel and Palestine history related articles, Königsberg and Kaliningrad are different topics. The only thing they have in common is the location. The Königsberg article should mainly focus on the such as the Demographics, culture and history between 1255 and 1945, while this article should focus more on the 1945- Kaliningrad, of course both articles should mention what came after/before. Crainsaw (talk) 12:28, 7 July 2023 (UTC)

Indeed, you make a good point about the fact they're quite different topics! Which just happen to share the same location (but totally different time periods, and different cultures). Mathmo ^Talk 05:24, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

I fully agree that the combined article would be far too long, as there would be far too much content that would have be covered due to this city's long and very eventful history. You'd end up splitting off various articles anyway, you might as well keep this article here for Kaliningrad as it is. As this logically makes sense. Mathmo ^Talk 05:22, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

Oppose These are separate topics. The city was heavily destroyed and the population had little continuity before and after 1945. The main thing that Konigsburg and Kaliningrad have in common is their location. Other cities that changed hands after World War II retained greater continuity of population which strengthens the case for considering them the same entity. (t · c) buidhe 09:17, 14 May 2023 (UTC)

The History sections could definitely use mutual summary style condensation, but in principle I see no issue with a snapshot-in-time city article, much like how similar articles exist for entities like countries. CMD (talk) 14:29, 14 May 2023 (UTC)

Another example is Istanbul, Constantinople, and Byzantium.  —Michael Z. 14:50, 14 May 2023 (UTC)

Support We don't have separate articles about St. Petersburg, Petrograd and Leningrad. 5.173.151.26 (talk) 16:45, 14 May 2023 (UTC)

A single example that is fundamentally different, and not a basis for a merge here. Saint Pete only had (four) politically motivated official name changes. Königsberg’s renaming followed its destruction and accompanied its complete ethnic cleansing.

Other examples of cities with different enough identities to warrant article titles include New Amsterdam and New York City, York, Upper Canada and Toronto.  —Michael Z. 17:24, 14 May 2023 (UTC)

The city of Lviv/Lwów/Lvov/Lemberg went through multiple rounds of ethnic cleansing and genocide, but we don't have separate articles for each timeframe. 5.173.151.26 (talk) 11:25, 15 May 2023 (UTC)

Lviv is not the same as Kaliningrad. I didn’t say every place that underwent ethnic cleansing must have multiple articles. Lviv has never been renamed, by the way.  —Michael Z. 16:28, 15 May 2023 (UTC)

Support, there is no reason to separate artificially the history of the same place; I understand that the 1945 change was tremendous, but it's a part of the same continuity. Let's move Königsberg to History of Kaliningrad and expand the article. Marcelus (talk) 19:50, 14 May 2023 (UTC)

Moving Königsberg to History of Kaliningrad would look quite odd. Most of the sections don't fit within our usual history article structure, which tend to be chronological flows. CMD (talk) 02:01, 15 May 2023 (UTC)

Then it should be remodelled Marcelus (talk) 11:39, 15 May 2023 (UTC)

Agreed, having "History of Kaliningrad" when the entire article is about something else (Königsberg!) would be rather weird! Mathmo ^Talk 05:25, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

Support moving Königsberg to History of Kaliningrad. The Königsberg article is certainly Germano-centric, looks essentially at 1255-1945 and avoids the millenia before it when it was inhabited by Balts. An analog would be to have an article (not a redirect) called Breslau when various Germanic states ruled it and avoiding the rest of its history. It seems rather unreasonable. Cukrakalnis (talk) 10:00, 16 May 2023 (UTC)

Support The separate article thing here has always been a nonsense. Per the nom, Cukrakalnis, Marcelus and others, eastern Europe is full of cities that have changed dominant ethnicity & ruling power, Baltic Prussians, Germans, & Russians all established cultures of the region that are part of its story, it is clearly the same city. In any case, the name is not the traditional Slavic name for the town (whatever Królewiec would be in Russian guise), it's a Soviet-era ideological name like Stalingrad or Leningrad than never got its old name back post-Communism. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 21:48, 16 May 2023 (UTC)

@Deacon of Pndapetzim: I'd be interested in your thoughts on Constantinople, which just had a failed RM. Srnec (talk) 20:42, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

I don't support that either for the same reasons, Istanbul is just the Turkish word for the city that most of us have adopted officially out of courtesy, the position doesn't even make sense in Greek where the name is still used. The RM request there wasn't framed properly. In an ideal world I'd move the Constantinople article to History of Istanbul or something similar, but consensus varies across pieces. There is a dark undertone to this I don't like much also, not that I'm saying this is a motivation for anyone here, but I think some of us out there don't like 'very civilised places' like this having new names from cultures that some of us like to pretend are different or 'less than', as if Turks couldn't really have civilization. Again not saying that's what anyone here thinks or that this should contribute to Wikipedia policy, but it bothers me that that's out there. Similar perhaps with this city, given its centrality to modern German intellectual culture ,,,and I dare say the anon post below might support my suspicions. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 22:31, 20 May 2023 (UTC)

In the Constantinople discussion, I cited Edo and Tenochtitlan specifically to "prebut" any allegation of a dark undertone to this, but I'm sure such motivations exist. Srnec (talk) 18:33, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

Comment– for what it's worth as the creator of this discussion, I'd be fine with either making a new History of Kaliningrad article, or moving Königsberg to that title followed by extensive edits to transform it into a more typical "history of" page. Go for whichever is easiest. Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 13:32, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

It would be easiest to make History of Kaliningrad, merging together the bulk of Königsberg and Kaliningrad#History. (I suppose Timeline of Kaliningrad hangs around as an alternative format.) This would leave Königsberg with Name, Demographics, Culture, and Fortifications along with a much reduced WP:Summary style history section. I'm happy to take this on. CMD (talk) 14:17, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

Support It is literally the same city, just with a different name. Budapest, London, Paris, Rome, Berlin even the Kaliningrad article, All have #History. So why shouldn't it be merged to Kaliningrad#History? I think that is the best option. There really is no reason for there to be two seperate articles Kaliningrad#History & Königsberg if they serve the same purpose. Oğuzlar 14:15, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

Oppose. The only similarity that Koenigsberg and kaliningrad have is location and the occasional historic building. Other cities that have been ethnically cleansed usually do not change as much as Koenigsberg did. Huntertheediter (talk) 03:03, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

:Oppose Those who support Kaliningrad are votarys of the declining russian colonial empire. There is neiter histoy nor culture in Kaliningrad Russia, just barbarism.

• Flight and expulsion of Germans from Poland during and after World War II
• Joining Poland, Lithuania proposes renaming Kaliningrad to Karaliaučiaus
• Latvia to revert to historic name when referring to Kaliningrad exclave
• National Divorce
• National Divorce: Q and A

--84.150.121.228 (talk) 20:37, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

If Kaliningrad is not legitimately Russian, then is Gdansk not Polish? 5.173.204.84 (talk) 16:04, 20 May 2023 (UTC)

The IP does not realize that "oppose" followed by personal attacks will just be simply ignored. Mellk (talk) 20:28, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose a merger and oppose a move. The current title is natural disambiguation for "History of Kaliningrad before 1945", a legitimate topic. This would be like moving Constantinople to History of Istanbul. Accurate, but what's the gain? It just creates a title that won't jive with the most of the content. Srnec (talk) 20:42, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

  Key gains are that we have content in the most obvious place & won't duplicate & confuse things for no reason. I would take issue with the Constantinople comparison. As I indicated above, I don't think there is much of a case for having the separate articles there either. It's not enough that Constantinople is irregular also to rely on the comparison for a position. I would suggest that the fragmentation of these cities into differ Wikipedia articles are two separate accident of Wikipedia history, but if you think there is something more I'd like you to explain what makes Kallingrad different from any other European city that's undergone a change of name or otherwise elucidate some kind of general principle into which both Constantinople and Kallingrad fit but others don't. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 22:46, 20 May 2023 (UTC)

  It isn't just those two. We also have Byzantium, Edo, Tenochtitlan, New Amsterdam, Mediolanum, Londinium, Khanbaliq, Ashdod-Yam, Laodicea in Syria, Augusta Emerita, Bytown, Aelia Capitolina, Batavia, Eboracum... I don't think there is a single principle that covers all of these. Some are probably illegitimate. What Constantinople and Kaliningrad have in common is that nobody calls the Byzantine capital 'Istanbul' or the Prussian capital 'Kaliningrad'. Putting all of that history under the modern name just creates an awkward mismatch between title and contents. The same is not true, e.g., of Wroclaw/Breslau, which scholars might call by either name at any time, although in some cases one is more warranted than another. This practice is similar to our own guideline with respect to Danzig/Gdansk. I would strongly deny that "History of Istanbul" is the most obvious place to look for information on Constantinople, a name that appears in the titles of multiple scholarly books year after year. Srnec (talk) 18:33, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

  Mediolanum is another nonsense false distinction. The good examples at the top aren't analogous, and examples where the title is used to refer to a classical 'precursor' city are hardly comparable to Kaliningrad or Constantinople where you are putting a random chronological boundary in the 20th century because of some bureaucracy rather than, as is the case with classical cities, following idiosyncratic conventions of Classics as a discipline (e.g. Mediolanum but Rome not Roma). I don't think the examples meet the principle you outlined. You hear the term 'Roman London' or 'London in Roman times' all the time for instance. Also, having an urban development in roughly the same place is not the same thing as being exactly the same city. Constantinople covers part of the site of the polis Byzantion, but the city is not the same and if 'Byzantine' writers of the Middle Ages didn't like classicisms so much I doubt we'd use those terms the way we do. Istanbul on the other hand is just a vernacular name for Constantinople derived thereof, & the only reason Anglophones call it that is because of diplomatic courtesy. Do we call Constantinople before the 20th century 'Istanbul'? it's not that common but you cannot say it does not happen, you certainly hear it used in reference to the Ottoman era. You wouldn't call Koenigsburg Kaliningrad before it became Communist because it's explicitly a Communist renaming, the same reason you wouldn't called St Petersburg Leningrad when writing about the 18th century, we're not saying they are different cities though. The authorities could easily restore Kaliningrad's old name say next year (there's no problem with St Petersburg being German/Dutch), what then will we call this article, Königsberg(2024–)? Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 14:11, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

@Srnec, here's another way of explaining it, perhaps an idea for a test principle. If the article opening can read ' Placename was a city', it can have its own article; if it cannot say that without seeming absurd or if it has to read ' Placename was the name of the city ...' or ' Place-name was an instition ' then, being about a name or a legal status and not a separate city should not on the latter bases have its own article. Any issues with that? Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 14:30, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

@Deacon of Pndapetzim: I'm not sure I'd call the Kaliningrad change some bureaucracy. The change of name was immediately preceded by some pretty major changes to the city's physical makeup and demography. I agree with you about Mediolanum and Londinium. If Kaliningrad were re-named, I think the current Königsberg article would be moved to History of Königsberg and this article would be moved.
I would be more inclined to agree with your proposal if I thought the articles in question (Königsberg and Constantinople) were trying to imply a lack of continuity. In fact, they are perfectly clear that Königsberg is now called Kaliningrad and Constantinople is now called Istanbul. The issue, as I see it, is that it makes no sense to have a "History of X" article if "X" is a redirect to "Y". But why have it at "History of Y" if the only name you are going to be using in it is "X"? This is how Königsberg and Constantinople differ from many other East European cities, such as the Prussian examples given below. Smaller cities either do not have such distinctive and recognizable names or else do not have separate history articles in the first place. Srnec (talk) 23:41, 26 May 2023 (UTC)

The Istanbul example was just bureaucracy. The renaming of Kaliningrad & the ethnic transfers in eastern European cities under Stalin are not related, admittedly they look so because the Kaliningrad renaming happened to be a German name changing to a Soviet one. And as has been said, Kaliningrad was hardly the only city with major demographic changes, & you are making too much of the 'physical' changes (another point not we never hear made for to rename analogous transferred cities in the region!), pre-war Koenigsburg's recognisability easily exceeds even some western German towns like Hamburg. These arguments are very ad lib, I don't see these applied elsewhere, and the History of Y argument, I mean... is it worth noting in the History of the USA article that USA is the country's only name or anything like? Again, these appear to be very ad lib / ad hoc arguments. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 22:14, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Dancing around the forest for all the trees. The USSR annexed part of Germany is the lede. That they destroyed it, rebuilt it with slave labour, renamed it after a commie, and purged it of most traces of its history and population are all

part of that.  —Michael Z. 23:42, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

"Key gains are that we have content in the most obvious place & won't duplicate & confuse things for no reason."

The most natural and obvious naming is to use "Constantinople", having "History of Istanbul" would confuse things additionally for new reason. Same principle applies here for Kaliningrad. Mathmo ^Talk 05:30, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose, per User:Srnec, we have similar solutions for Byzantium / Constantinople / Istanbul, Mexico City / Tenochtitlan and New Amsterdam / New York. Gdansk or Wroclaw were the existing Polish versions, Kaliningrad is a completely new name for a completely repopulated city, which happens to be located at the same area as Königsberg. HerkusMonte (talk) 13:36, 26 May 2023 (UTC)

  This is a false comparison; many German cities were largely destroyed as a result of the Second World War and their inhabitants were forced to abandon them. Königsberg is an exception compared to them, as it has a separate article. The only difference is that Königsberg's name was changed. However, this was also the case with other East Prussian cities, but none of them have a separate article and their German names are redirects: Tilsit, Pillau, Gumbinnen, Insterburg etc. There is no reason to treat Königsberg/Kaliningrad differently. Marcelus (talk) 13:58, 26 May 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. These aren't 'solutions' either, there is no problem, the content of these duplicated articles could easily be in 'History of X' articles. If we wanna keep 2 separate articles for the same city, like Koenigsburg and Kaliningrad, fine but let's not try and pretend there is some universally applied principle behind it. While there is comparable nonsense fragmentation randomly scattered elsewhere on Wikipedia, like Constantinople / Istanbul, they are very exceptional and do not rest on any reasoned force other than the preferences of the random editors who manage them. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk)

• Oppose - it is separate topic, per User:HerkusMonte. WP:COMMONNAME also applied to that article, I think. Dede2008 (talk) 14:12, 29 May 2023 (UTC)
• Comment - I think the original question of merging Königsberg to Kaliningrad should be clearly resolved in the negative because they are not the same content. Now as for merging Königsberg into History of Kaliningrad - I think the distinction is that Königsberg refers to a specific era for a specific city entity, one that was changed after the Soviet Union annexed the city and surrounding territory to Russia, whereas "History of Kaliningrad" refers to the entire history leading up to this point, including the more recent time of existing as Kaliningrad. If an argument is made that Königsberg refers to a German administrative unit (like Prussia), rather than simply a location, then it makes sense to have two articles, Königsberg and History of Kaliningrad. Otherwise, perhaps the former can be moved to the latter if there is just too much overlap. I do think that History of Kaliningrad should be the title rather than Königsberg in that case, because History of Kaliningrad is a necessary topic and more expansive in its meaning - it would be weird to redirect Cold War and post-Cold War history of Kaliningrad to Königsberg article. 104.175.74.27 (talk) 17:59, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

The Königsburg and History of Kaliningrad articles would be very similar, since the content would be the history of the same city, with one article cutting off in the 1940s and the other duplicating 90% of the former but also adding c. 10% to continue after the Soviet takeover to the present. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 17:35, 2 June 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose - Absolutely not; it's a completely separate topic. – Sullay (Let's talk about it) 21:51, 12 June 2023 (UTC)
• Support a renaming of Königsberg → History of Kaliningrad per Danzig, Breslau, et al. —  AjaxSmack  14:14, 21 July 2023 (UTC)

  Those names were changed because cities like Gdańsk ad Wrocław were already a city before German settlement, and it wasn't some small village either, they were fully fledged cities, on the other hand Kaliningrad, the city, was founded by the German, of course there was a small village or settlement there before, but there is no continuity or any similartiez between them except the land they are located on. Crainsaw (talk) 14:39, 21 July 2023 (UTC)

• Soft oppose (and also Comment) -

I think it is important to note and define where exactly one city ends and one city starts. As previously mentioned Constantinople, Istanbul, and Byzantium are all their own separate articles despite them all- geographically wise, being the exact same settlement. They're treated, however, as different settlements because in the timeframes where each city formed, its identity, architecture, peoples, etc. differed so wildly from one-another that calling them the same city would be foolish. The same can be applied to Königsberg and Kaliningrad.

Königsberg and Kaliningrad have little to nothing in common with each-other outside of remnants of the old German city here and there. The German population was entirely wiped out and exiled and the city was destroyed and rebuilt during the Soviet period. Using the same arguments for dividing Constantinople and Istanbul between two cities, we find that we can also use those arguments for Königsberg. Changing the name of Königsberg sets up more questions for whether or not cities with similar situations (a la, again, Constantinople and Istanbul) should be distinguished themselves.

If a name-change were to happen (from Königsberg to History of Kaliningrad), care needs to be made sure to distinguish between the two cities, because they are fundamentally different cities with different identities. The only continuity between them is in location. Königsberg itself already has enough history and details about it in its article to distinguish it clearly from Kaliningrad anyway. TheodoresTomfooleries (talk) 16:37, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

only continuity between them is in location No disrespect, but this is nonsense, typical of so much in this thread. There was never a disappearance of Koenigsburg and recreation of a new city, indeed the city's name under Soviet rule was initially Koenigsburg THEN like a number of other Soviet cities it was renamed to promote Communism. You are similarly mistaken about Istanbul-Constantinople, the renaming was a technical bureaucratic change (followed in English due to respect) in the 20th cent. for a city that had been under Turkish rule for nearly half a millennium. If anything the misunderstandings in these types of comment, widespread in this thread, show precisely the dangers of fragmenting the histories of cities and why such fragmentation should be fixed in an project that is supposed to be educational. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 00:17, 28 August 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose: They're two cities with their own extensive histories that happen to have shared the same location. Regardless, even disregarding that, if Koenigsberg is taken to merely be a historical name for Kaliningrad, the amount of coverage owed to it is enough to warrant its own article, separate from a general "History of Kaliningrad" article. This is evidenced by the length of already existing Königsberg article. --Inops (talk) 17:11, 12 August 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose It's a valid WP:SPLIT. SportingFlyer T·C 19:02, 23 August 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose Much simpler and more logical as it is. Dan100 (Talk) 20:59, 26 August 2023 (UTC)
• Support The city name changed, not he city or its location. Merge, and then split the majority of the history section to its own article if too large. That's encyclopedic. We shouldn't have multiple articles on the same thing, even if called something different. A rose is a rose, etc. GenQuest ^"scribble" 17:48, 13 September 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose. The city was not just renamed, it was completely wiped off the face of the earth, it entire population was deported to Germany, and after that a completely new city was built on the smoking ruins, with different population, administrative subordination and name. Wroclaw/Breslau or Danzig/Gdansk was just two city names in two languages in the same time, like Moscow/Москва now. This case is different: pre-war German word "Danzig" has Polish translation "Gdansk", today Russian word "Москва" has English translation "Moscow", but Калининград is not a Russian translation of word "Koenigsberg". Pre-war city is not Kaliningrad, and current city is not Koenigsberg, Koenigsberg was destroyed and never been restored. Kaliningrad and Koenigsberg are just as different cities as Chinese Shenzhen and Brazilian Rio de Janeiro. MBH (talk) 11:09, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose Exactly, They are different. The size of the article to represent both would be enormous, but fundamentally they are different and there is no commonality of domain information. The merge should never have been posted. No merging and no moving. scope_creep^Talk 18:47, 11 October 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose in the same way that Byzantium is not Constantinople is not Istanbul. -- Veggies (talk) 06:16, 23 October 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose Quite frankly, some of those saying 'support' seem not to know the city at all; comparisons made with other cities are widely off. It's not a city that changed name, or country. Königsberg and Kaliningrad nevet had any overlap in population; the entire population was killed or deported. It's not even the same buildings, old Königsberg was bombed and erased. Jeppiz (talk) 22:20, 5 November 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Population size

There seems to be an error in the quoted population size. The text states in the first paragraph that the population in 2020 was 489,359. Ref [13] links to census data from 2010 of 941,873, and 2021 with 1,029,966. Is there any reason not to quote the 2021 figure? This would put into sensible context the urban figure of 800,000. Cypherspaceman (talk) 16:37, 14 June 2023 (UTC)