Talk:Kythira

Kythira and Attica

It would be interesting to know why Kythira is part of the periphery of Attica, despite being physically distant from the rest of it. --Jfruh 00:59, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Cythera and Piraeus

Because of naval-connection with harbor of Piraeus, in Attica.

Laconia is a agricultural district.

Note: Cythera (or preciously, Cythêra) but not Kythira.

--IonnKorr 15:39, 2 November 2005 (UTC)

Spelling of name

Google shows 139,000 times Kythera and 412,000 times Kythira.Andreas 20:39, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

---

The reason Kythira is the predominant spelling is because this is the official transliteration from modern hellenic characters (Κύθηρα) to latin characters according to ELOT (ΕΛΟΤ, Ελληνικός όργανισμός τυποποίησης, Hellenic Organisation for Standardisation, the ANSI equivalent of Greece). As the de facto authority on Hellenic->Latin transliteration, the ELOT standard is actually adopted by the UN. While the word Kythira is hellenic and the transliteration standard is clear with regards to its spelling in a latin alphabet, it's prior use by non-Hellenes has established Cythère, Cythera, Kythera as common alternatives in the Western world. I would not go as far as calling any of the above spellings wrong, although the official spelling in use by the Hellenic Government and the International Organisations when referring to the island in latin is Kythira, not any of the others.

I recommend moving the article back to Kythira as per the proposal found at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions_(Greek)#Proposal:_UN.2FELOT regarding the transliteration of Hellenic.

Cosmix 18:06, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

According to Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Greek), the name would be "Cythera" if we treat it as an Ancient Greek site, and "Kythira" if we treat it as Modern Greek. Most of the article is about the present island, so that would favour using "Kythira". Google search (with "Greece" included in order to exclude false hits, only English, no wikipedia): Kythira 184k, Kythera 57k, Cythera 27k, Kithira 56k. I admit it's a rough search, but the difference is large enough to say that Kythira is the most used version in English. I'll move it back to Kythira. Markussep 14:51, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Page moved to Cythera (island). While there was consensus to move, this was not a multimove and replacing a dab page requires more discussion. So it this can be demonstrated as the primary topic, a new multimove should be listed at WP:RM. Vegaswikian (talk) 18:49, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Kythira → Cythera – per WP:COMMONNAME & WP:USEENGLISH.

Cythera is not only one of the historical names, but also today's common name of this island in English language like Cologne, Munich, Prague, Turin, Milan, Corfu, Cephalonia etc.

According to Books Ngram Viewer, Cythera is most common in English sources (1. Cythera > 2. Kythera > 3. Kythira > 4. Kithira) -- Takabeg (talk) 04:03, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

• Strongly support. Much of the reference to the island, under any spelling, is to its cultural and mythological meaninng, as in the Embarkation to Cythera of Watteau, right. In this function, it is called Cythera, rarely Kythera, not the present title; this should be much expanded, (as should the island's history). Rather than picking one of the several systems of transliterating Demotic, we should reassure those readers that they are at the right article. If the article concerns a concept that is significant in the Hellenistic period or before (i.e. would merit its own article even if the modern concept did not), use the archaic spelling. This is particularly intended for place-names. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:33, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

• Against. In modern English I always found "Kythira" for the island. All web pages in English about tourism, weather forecast, maps and so on about the island use the spelling with the "k". Moreover would the association with "Antikythera" where the Antikythera mechanism was found little sense. That a French painter at the end of the 17th century used Chytere is not pertinent. First is the correct spelling in French (with no alternative version starting with "k") and secondly, well, this is the English Wikipedia. --Dia^ (talk) 18:40, 13 September 2011 (UTC)
  • The French for Cythera is fr: Cythère, which I would also oppose; but that is not what is suggested. Neither Nancy Williard's Sailing to Cythera or Ken Ireland's Cythera Regained? are in French; I could go on citing WorldCat's titles in English, of which there are over a hundred. By contrast, of the eighteen titles using Kythira, a large number are roadmaps and guidebooks, which Wikipedia does not follow; as our guideline says: When a guidebook or roadmap written in English shows an autobahn between München and Nürnberg, it is attesting to local usage, because that is what the signs on the autobahn will say; Munich and Nuremberg are still the English names. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:11, 13 September 2011 (UTC)
    • Maps were just one of my examples. If you are looking for books about the island, the spelling is always "Kythira". I you are looking for literary or music works, than the spelling is "Cythera". To compare it with you example with Milan, Munich and so on, all the books about these towns are with the English spelling. --Dia^ (talk) 19:46, 13 September 2011 (UTC)
      • Actually looking for books on Cythera turns out differently.
      • When I looked for books on the island, in English, in major catalogues, I found four books by Byzantinists, which used Kythera (not Kythira), such as Gillian Ince's Paliochora on Kythera: survey and interpretation : studies in medieval and post-medieval settlements; but one expects them to spell that way. These are the only whole books in English, guidebooks aside, on the island; it was neither an ancient city-state, nor densely populated in modern times.
      • Looking for books which mention it (again, not guidebooks) I found a good many books that use Cythera; as with Michael Whitby's Sparta, (2002) or Melville-Jones's Venice and Thessalonica (2009). Conversely, there are English guidebooks (i've seen them), titled München, as there are guidebooks that use Kythira. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:15, 13 September 2011 (UTC)
        • Mhmm...I wonder where you have been looking...In amazon.com searching for "Kythira" you get:
          1. 'Kythira Sights: a travel guide to the top attractions and beaches in Kythira Island, Greece' (2011)
          2. 'The Greek Experience Book of Walking on Kythira' (1999)
          3. 'Walking in Kythira' (2002)
          4. 'KYTHIRA - HISTORICAL AND TOURIST GUIDE (KYTHIRAIKA)' (2000)
          5. 'Saronic Gulf Islands and Kythira (Lascelles Greek Island guides)' (1988)
          6. 'Lonely Planet Greek Islands (Regional Travel Guide)' (2010)
          7. 'Lonely Planet Corfu & the Ionians' (2002)
        • For "Cythera" you get:
          1. 'News from New Cythera: A Report of Bougainville's Voyage, 1766-1769' (1970)
          2. 'Attrazione D'Amore/Voyage to Cythera' (2005)
          3. 'Sailing to Cythera: And Other Anatole Stories' (2008)
          4. 'Voyage to Cythera'
          5. 'Embarking for Cythera Study Score'
          6. 'The Four Slaves of Cythera (Romantic Content : Poetry : Significant Minor Poetry 1789-1830)' (1978)
          7. 'Cythera' (novel) (1998)
          8. 'farewell to cythera'
          9. 'Cythera Regained: The Rococo Revival in European Literature And the Arts, 1830-1910' (2006)
        • So zero travel book titled "Cythera". Moreover with your chosen example, searching for "München" again in amazon.com, under "Travels", the first 5 books are in German, that follow 9 travel book in English that bear "Munich" in the title (Lonley Planet Guides included).--Dia^ (talk) 10:17, 14 September 2011 (UTC)
          • • Precisely. We are not compiling a travel book. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 14:16, 14 September 2011 (UTC)
• Support. This is English Wikipedia, and most English sources refer to Cythera, including most scholarly and historical works. It's the form that'll be the most familiar to English speakers. Since Greek has no "C" and Latin renders "Kappa" as either "C" or "Ch", Cythera is how the name Κυθηρα would be properly transliterated. The tendency to transliterate Kappa only as "K" seems to be a modern convention, and if Modern Greek now prefers to transliterate Eta as "I", the letter is still literally a long "E" and has always been transliterated that way into English. That's why the English form predominates in English sources.

That said, the opening line should make clear what both the ancient and modern Greek forms are, both in Greek and transliterated into English. I suggest something along the lines of: "Cythera (Greek Κύθηρα, modern Kythira) is one of the [[Ionian Islands]] of [[Greece]]." That seems less awkward than the present sentence, which links to "Island" and provides the Italian name, which, while relevant to the article, doesn't need to be listed in the opening sentence. A list of forms of the name in other languages or alternate transliterations might be appropriate toward the end of the article. P Aculeius (talk) 01:00, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

But Cerigo is used (like Candia or Negroponte or Smyrna) in appropriate historic contexts, so it is something more than an interwiki link. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 14:16, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

• Support. Our article title policy requires the prevalent English usage, and there is no contest: it's "Cythera." I believe it's clear that the claim above, "In modern English I always found 'Kythira'," could not be made by anyone who read or surveyed very much of what is written in modern English about the place. Google Books has 63900 occurences of Cythera to 3720 of Kythira; the JSTOR repository of scholarly journal articles has 867:34. And other major languages use other spellings, so that we can be assured that the vast majority of hits for "Cythera" are in English. I can't find a case on the other side. Wareh (talk) 01:25, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

The thing is, that when a word like "Cythera" has been extensively used in literature for his mythological meaning - or just even its "aura" (see the list I posted above), that has little to do with the island itself, and you do a simple search, you are bound to get overwhelming results for that word. That doesn't mean necessary that these articles refer to the island and not maybe to the paintings, music pieces, novels, ships, short stories, planet Venus and so on. Doing a Google book search ordered for publication date, seems that "Cythera" was the old spelling, slowly being replaced by "Kythira", but as I pointed out before, it doesn't really say what the works were about. For Wikipedia users, namespace "Kythira" gets on average 120 hits a day (higher in the summer months seems to me, but I haven't really calculated the differences), "Cythera" 46.--Dia^ (talk) 07:22, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

I just searched in JSTOR, so, not only scholar works and no common amazon books, here the results: for "Cythera":

1. about Watteau's painting
2. about poetry
3. a review about a film
4. another article about Watteau's painting
5. a third article about Watteau's painting
6. a forth article about Watteau's painting
7. a fifth article about Watteau's painting
8. article about poetry
9. another article about poetry
10. "Embarking for Cythera"
11. "The Embarkation for Cythera"
12. "The Embarkation for Cythera" (another article)
13. first hit actually about the island
14. poem (Pushkin's)
15. Charles Baudelaire's poem
16. Mythology
17. again about Watteau's painting
18. a review or a German book possibly about Watteau's painting
19. second hit about the island (a bishop born on the island in 17th century)
20. a review of a book about Antoine de Bougainville
21. another hit about important person from the island (Philoxenus)
22. Review about a book on Russian cultural history in 18th century.
23. an article about Hypnerotomachia Poliphili
24. again about Watteau
25. third hit about the island
26. French Libertine Movement

Compare that with "Kythira":

1. Archaeology, about the island
2. Review German book about archaeology on the island
3. Archaeology, about the island
4. Botany, article about the island
5. Zoology, article about the island
6. Botany, article about the island
7. Botany, article about the island (German)
8. Botany, article about the island
9. British School at Athens
10. Taxonomy, article about the island
11. Geography, article about the island
12. Greek Folk Dance Music about the island
13. Botany, article about the island
14. Archaeology, about the island
15. Botany, article about the island (German)
16. Geology, article about the island
17. Taxonomy, article about the island
18. History, article about the island
19. Geography, article about the island(German)
20. Agriculture, article about the island
21. History, article about the island (French)
22. Biogeography, article about the island
23. Biogeography, article about the island (again)

It seems clear, that if one exclude all the results that "Kythira" is the term used in all scholar works that are not about Watteau's or Baudelaire's works.--Dia^ (talk) 08:42, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

What Dia does not mention is that Kythira only appears in 33 JSTOR articles; Kythera in 764; Cythera in 840. Kythera (with an e for eta) would be the second most acceptable form, although it is not our usual practice - its frequency in JSTOR is in part produced by its appearances in German articles, which transliterate Greek differently; Cythera is more recognizable and less pedantic. In short, Dia is quoting almost all the evidence for his choice; almost none of the evidence for actual English usage.

However, even we did not count the appearance of the island in modern European culture (which there is absolutely no reason to omit), Cythera still has 240 hits. (JSTOR subscription required). Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:14, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

Just to dispel any doubt: I didn't "choose". I just looked behind the numbers in the first page for both spellings. Not to mention again, that for English speaking tourists is apparently "Kythira" the "spelling of choice". That modern tourist guides are pedantic, is news to me. As you wrote in your first post here, if one is looking for "its cultural and mythological meaninng" than the spelling of choice is "Cythera", if one is looking for the spelling for the island (and this IS the article about the island) than the preferred spelling should be "Kythira". I think I've already proposed it, but I do it again, why not have two articles linked together in the hatnote? Or even in the lead section if preferred. One for the island and one about the island in its cultural and mythological meaning (especially in Europe in 1800). We have already Cytherean. By the way, for a laugh, I just discovered that there is a Cytherian too (°_°) LOL! --Dia^ (talk) 15:42, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

This article should cover all aspects of its subject; other geographical articles do - and there is no reason this should not. The cult of Aphrodite Ourania on Cythera is part of its history: one of the chief reasons for concluding that there was a Phoenician settlement.

Even it were covering the hunk of rock south of Laconia without dealing with art or mythology, Cythera and Kythera are both more common than Kythira, which represents neither ancient nor modern Greek (in the former, the second vowel is an e; in the latter, the first two syllables have the same vowel). Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:42, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

Well, yes, "Kythira" does correctly represent Modern Greek, insofar as it follows the UN-ELOT norm of transliteration (see Romanization of Greek), which is the standard we typically use per WP:GREEK. No comment at this point on whether "Cythera" qualifies as "common English usage" orverriding this standard transliteration. Fut.Perf. ☼ 11:00, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

Leave it to the UN to choose a system which reflects neither the pronunciation nor the spelling of Demotic, but wavers in between, dreaming of both.

Cythera doesn't have to "override" WP:GREEK; consider the section on Words appearing in both Modern and Ancient Greek. Articles, especially geographical articles, which deal with places which are as important in classical antiquity as they are now, use the classical transliteration - for precisely this reason, that it will be better known. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:33, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

• Support, and move the DAB to Cythera (disambiguation). When the evidence above is purged of non-English sources, it favours the Cythera spelling. Andrewa (talk) 08:42, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Requested move Feb 2014

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: moved to Kythira. – Fayenatic London 08:11, 22 March 2014 (UTC)

---

Cythera (island) → Cythera

Cythera → Cythera (disambiguation) (added 14:28, 6 March 2014 (UTC))

– This would also affect Category:Kythira and Category:People from Kythira. Per the previous RM, right above, on the form of the name (Latinized or transliterated); per the fact that the island came first and is inherently more important than all the other instances at Cythera (disambiguation) that derive from it; per the fact that the island page is visited many more times than the video game, US patrol boat, novel, or yacht combined; per even the most perfunctory search in Google that makes clear that "Cythera" or derivatives like "Voyage to Cythera" refer to the island first and foremost. This so clear-cut a case I am surprised a new RM is even considered necessary. --Relisted. BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 09:55, 6 March 2014 (UTC) --Constantine ✍ 12:00, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

• Comment it's strange that we have this and Antikythera — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.120.175.135 (talk) 00:06, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

• I agree it is rather weird. For some reason, while Cythera is more used, Antikythera seems to be the preferred form. I too would prefer consistency, but unless other people comment here so some consensus can be displayed, the move could easily be reversed on technicalities. Constantine ✍ 07:57, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

• Comment: I have added Cythera → Cythera (disambiguation) to the nomination, as this nomination was not initially made as a multi-move as required by the closer of the previous RM above. I suggest that this discussion be extended accordingly. – Fayenatic London 14:28, 6 March 2014 (UTC)
• Support a move; preferrably to Kythira. I've read the previous RM discussion, but I find it rather backwards. Even if we take for granted that Cythera is more common spelling than Kythira, a) it's arguable if it's true in modern context, as there's a general trend in usage towards endonyms/transliterations over historical spellings and b) It created an ambiguity resolved by a supervote from closer, and badly at that. Title Kythira would come as a WP:NATURALDAB, and allow a decision whether we should have a redirect or dab page at Cythera. No such user (talk) 21:46, 13 March 2014 (UTC)
• Support a move; preferrably to Kythira. - the above RM was completely wrong-headed, several of the users arguing "This is the English Wikipedia" were making arguments closer to "This is the Napoleonic Wikipedia". The island in 2014 is Kythiria in English. In ictu oculi (talk) 23:00, 13 March 2014 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

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Hospital

Too much emphasis is given to the old hospital.The new general hospital which includes all medical and domestic facilities is almost neglected. The new excellent hospital was built with a perfect design made by Depanom , and the financial aid of the European community.The Greeks usually neglect the people who helped them and the new hospital is mentioned only as a note. This is outside the standards and recommendations of Wikipedia. Delete the paragraph of the hospital,or describe the history and the facilities of the new hospital. Jestmoon(talk) 09:24, 16 June 2023 (UTC)