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Why do we have an English Wiki article on a strictly German term?

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German castellology has an immensely rich terminology, which English lacks in. I get that, easily. But that doesn't mean that we can wag the dog by the tail and force English to accept all the terms it's "missing" by creating enWiki articles about them. Or is this a new mission assumed by the Wiki project?

Just go ahead and search for academic sources created by native English-speakers who use, not as a quotation from German, the following terms as common nouns. I am quite sure that the British Isles do have all these types of fortifications, so if the inhabitants never felt the need to call them that way, it means something - about the spirit of English language, the way it works and goes about describing its inhabited environment. And now here we come, full of Central European spirit, and go about changing it. Who thinks this is the right thing to do for an encyclopedia?

I've opened this discussion before at Talk:Lowland castle & Talk:Water castle, and made some - I hope - constructive suggestions there on how to use all this German-based knowledge w/o using force on the English language. #EnglishWordsMatter!!! I know to appreciate the value of precise terminology. But also that of a language, such as it is. Btw, my English is mediocre, so don't take my word for it. The one who started the discussion is Cyclopaedic, a "middle-aged lawyer in England with a lifelong interest in military history", so a native-speaker who made his living dealing with communication and special terminology in English, and who is well-read in this specific field of military history.

I've checked most of them, but not all:

  • Ordensburg - taked directly from German. There are lots of castles built by the military orders and used by the English knights from among the Templars and Hospitallers in the Middle East. It's not for lack of contact, or some German exclusivity (Prussia) that the word didn't appear in English!
  • Bridge castle (translated literally from Brückenburg)
  • Cave castle or grotto castle (translated literally from Höhlenburg/Grottenburg)
  • Hill castle (translated literally but poorly from Höhenburg, which can also be a mountaintop castle; Höhenburg is just the opposite of Niederungsburg, sp it should be smth. like "high-set castle" if anything, not "hill" castle.)
  • Lowland castle (translated literally from Niederungsburg)
  • Island castle (translated literally from Inselburg)
  • Marsh castle (translated literally from Sumpfburg)
  • Refuge castle (translated literally from Fliehburg)
  • Ridge castle (translated literally from Kammburg)
  • Rock castle (translated literally from Felsenburg) - makes absolutely no sense in English!
  • Shield wall (castle) (translated literally from Schildmauer) - already has a different meaning in English!
  • Toll castle (translated literally from Waterburgburg)
  • Water castle (translated literally from Wasserburg)

Spur castle on the other hand does very much exist in English, as do dozens of other good terms. Arminden (talk) 01:31, 23 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. British castles tend to be classified by age or design rather than by the topography of the site. For example, both Caerphilly and Kenilworth were surrounded by artificial lakes but I have never heard either described as a "water castle". Cyclopaedic (talk) 08:33, 23 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Cyclopaedic That's fine and of course we should classify British castles using British castle terminology. But continental castles are classified in other ways by experts - both by topography or by function - and so we should follow that too. Applying the continental system to British castles or vice versa would be WP:OR.
Arminden If something exists about which there is a body of literature, it is valid as a subject on Wikipedia. The fact that the literature is partially or wholly in another language is utterly irrelevant. Since Ordensburgen exist and there is literature about them, it's valid to have an article about them. The issue is what to call it and I'll come to that. I didn't write any of it BTW.
The implication that the above terms were translated in some mindless, mechanical way is is I'm afraid simply wrong. Let me explain what actually happened. When I lived in Germany, I visited a lot of the castles and, as a result, translated their articles on German Wikipedia into English Wikipedia. In doing so, I naturally came across a lot of specialist terminology. Now the art of translation is to decide how best to translate something in a way which is understandable and accurate. So my approach was to:
a. Track down specialist literature in English. Although many concepts were common, I quickly noticed the difference in the way castles were classified.
b. Search English sources to identify an equivalent term. Clearly, the more scholarly the source, the better. Sometimes there were many sources, sometimes very few. That's how it is. Sometimes the English term is a loanword like bergfried or palas, sometimes it's an English equivalent e.g. drawbridge.
c. If I find no English sources for a term (and that's rare), I make a judgement as to whether to keep the German term or translate it into the nearest equivalent. This is the normal translation process; the aim is to help the reader and translation is an art, not a science. If I felt the translation was understandable and sufficiently accurate, I would use it. In some cases, however, I felt I couldn't do it justice so have left it in German with an explanation in lede. Of course, if we come across an accepted English term, we can change the title. An example is angstloch for which I could find no English equivalent and for which I could come up with no obvious translation that would do it justice. Clearly the literal translation, "fear hole", adds no useful information for the reader, so I left it untranslated.
Turning to a couple of specifics:
Hill castle/Höhenburg. First, the Germans make no distinction between a hill and a mountain, so "hill castle" and "mountain castle" are both valid and mentioned in the lede. Mountaintop is inaccurate: these castles may be on the side of hills, on ridges, spurs or summits; as the article makes clear. To contrast it with lowland castle, I could have used upland castle or highland castle, but when I scoured the literature, upland castle is barely used and highland castle is far less common than hill or mountain castle and seems to be used to refer to castles in the Scottish highlands. I only found 2 examples of "high-set castle" and, as a native speaker, I'd say it's not very clear. Hence the reason I went for hill castle. Leaving it in German makes no sense when there is a clear and understandable English translation, used in English sources, which conveys the sense well enough.
Hilltop castle. Let me quote Kaufmann and Kaufmann (2001) on The Medieval Fortress: "Otzberg is a classic example of a German hilltop castle..." Of course they could have translated Gipfelburg in various ways, but research shows that "summit castle" and "peak castle" aren't used, whereas "hilltop castle" is very common and "mountaintop castle" quite uncommon. That's unsurprising since way more castles are built on hilltops than mountaintops.
Rock castle/Felsenburg. Rock castle occurs quite frequently in English so it can hardly "make no sense" or it wouldn't be used. But feel free to suggest another term.
Shield wall. Has 2 meanings in English. In castellology it is very common and is the same as the German Schildmauer. The lede explains this and is referenced. Kaufmann and Kaufmann define a shield wall as "a masonry structure used as a main defensive position and substantially higher than curtain walls" and have diagrams of no less than four types used in eastern Europe. Taylor (2009) defines it as a "particularly thick and high wall protecting the only line of attack to a castle built on a mountain or on a spur."
Ordensburg. I've had no hand in this article. A quick look at English terms shows that it has been variously translated as "castle of the order" (clumsy in my view), "order castle" (literal but not clear), "Teutonic Order castle" or "Templar castle" (pretty clear), "castle order" (misleading) or "knight's castle" (a bit too wide in meaning). It has also been left untranslated. I'll leave someone else to do the research, but the same principles (abc) apply.
HTH. Bermicourt (talk) 13:24, 23 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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