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Archive 1Archive 2Archive 3Archive 4

History section

I moved the history stuff down to a new section, specifically for it; it didn't really belong in with the temperament stuff, especially at the top. I changed the information on weights to make it less America-centric -- I have found one standard allows weights up to 4 kg (though most of them call for lower weights). I made a few minor phrasing tweaks.

Inkburrow 21:36, 24 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Added another Maltese Picture

Put it under the "care" section, outlining a "normal" Maltese, without excessive professional grooming or much done to curb the slight tear stain she has. Its main point is to show the cuteness of a Maltese, even without long hair or professional grooming.

Weight of Maltese

The weight of 15# or 8 kg is considered way above standard in all the different kennel clubs. The Maltese is a Toy dog and Toy dogs should generally be under 10# or 4.6 kg. A 15# Maltese probably has Bichon Frisé or Miniature Poodle in its bloodlines. maltmomma

I again changed back the weight to a more standard weight that is considered more accurate. maltmomma 17:25, May 21, 2005 (UTC)

Maltese biting

Maltese are a very gentle breed of dog and were once called Spaniel Gentle. Generally the breed is not a biting type. I left in information about biting but I don't think it is really relevent. maltmomma

If you have good info on this, please change the article. I suspect that some info gets into these articles based on one person's experience with one dog. Elf | Talk 16:45, 4 May 2005 (UTC)

I am gathering information and will add it. Where do you suggest I put the sources? maltmomma

In a section titled "References". There seems to be a push to have references for all articles. Elf | Talk 20:07, 4 May 2005 (UTC)

I want to make it as accurate as possible and will add a resource section with the information. maltmomma

When my mother got a Maltese, she chose the breed specifically because all her reading on the topic said that Maltese dogs are so gentle with children, you have to be careful -- not that the dog will hurt the child, but that the child will hurt the dog! This has been true in my experience of Maleteses. My mom's dog, for instance, will let my nephews torture him, and hardly even barks at them. If you go to http://www.americanmaltese.org/amabreedinfo.htm and skim down to "Temperment" that'll back up what I'm saying. Lorettagrace

Winter Nose

I replaced the material that the anonymous user 149.63.96.145 removed for no apparent reason; it's a well-known issue with the Maltese breed and is considered pertinent information. maltmomma 17:23, May 21, 2005 (UTC) im having funnnnnnnnnnnnnnn!! maltase rock!!!!!!!!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.37.129.187 (talk) 01:37, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Copyrighted text

Parts of this article have been taken verbatum from various sites, such as [1], [2] (from a book) and [3]. Very little seems original to the article. Please consider rewriting the article in your own words (rather than simply taking them from other sources). 

Mel "MelSkunk" Smith 2 July 2005 04:51 (UTC)

Hi, I did not take the information from these sites. I don't know about anyone else here. The first site, I've never heard of. The second site quoted the same references that I gave at the bottom of this article and the third is the standard given by the AKC that is used everywhere. maltmomma July 2, 2005 12:37 (UTC)

Famous Maltese Owners

I have never heard of Rose Wilder Lane owning a Maltese dog. I have a rather long compilation of famous owners and have never come across her name in my research. I Googled it and was unable to make a hit. Can the anon. editor point to where we can find this information? If not, after a time, I will remove it until we can find info. to substantiate this. Maltmomma (chat) 02:56, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

Actually, we were discussing it here and had decided to get rid of lists like this, they don't help the article at all. If someone owns a maltese, put that bit of info in the person's article, not the maltese article. - Trysha (talk) 03:02, 19 January 2006 (UTC)
Thank you Trysha. Maltmomma (chat) 03:09, 19 January 2006 (UTC)
I'm having second, or maybe third, thoughts about this whole thing. See addition to discussion mentioned above. Elf | Talk 05:12, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

Asthma

Maltese dogs have hair, not fur, so they do not shed. Because they have hair and not fur they are excellent dogs for people who suffer from asthma or animal related allergies.Rlinds01 (talk) 01:58, 30 October 2008 (UTC) I would like to know if Malteses are good for asthma.

Yes they are because they don't shed.

History/Origins

A couple of websites mention that early/proto- Malteses were used for rodent control, with the implication that the original value was this task. Is it OK to put the web addresses here? I mention this because most sources imply the dog's value was its cuteness. Certainly my own experience (original research?) is that my bitch is very keen to despatch mice and rats! Gordon | Talk, 16 April 2006 @ 12:00 UTC

I've modified like anomimal user the origin in Infobox to Malta in Central Mediterranean region (Italy)... reading Fci standards,IMHO it seems more correct it:User:Brodo --83.184.35.129 10:47, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

I've removed the anecdote about "Snobal" until Summerdog12 cares to supply a valid verification. Gordon | Talk, 14 May 2006 @ 12:10 UTC

Call for Cleanup

Ummm... OK, this is not deathless prose here. OTH, what's so horrible about it? Gordon | Talk, 5 June 2006 @05:45 UTC

New picture

I added a picture of a maltese that i think is adorable and speaks well for the breed. I added it before but it got deleted. If someone has a reason why it should be deleted please tell me. Thanks --Tobyw87 20:36, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

It was deleted by a vandal 207.216.4.215 who removed the whole section. As far as your picture goes -- and it is superb! -- make sure it is not subject to any copyright. It should be in the public domain, see WP:IUP for a good overview. Gordon | Talk, 22 July 2006 @12:45 UTC

Needs to be more objective

A picture with the Maltese with text underneath stated it was "adorable", this doesn't sound very encyclopedic to me because what is adorable or not is subjective. I did keep the picture though even though it doesn't really express any idea, but it is damn cute. 1607m4dsk1llz 04:23, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

"White dog?"

Um, isn't this phrased a little odd? "A small breed of white dog?" That suggests white dog is a species in itself. Shouldn't it be a "small white breed of dog" or "a small white dog breed?" Dead men's bells 18:35, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

As it happens, white dogs are odd. They aren't actually albino, but white is an absence of colour which is unusual in the canine world -- sufficiently unusual that they can be taken as a "type", regardless of size. You are correct in that we cannot talk of (for example) black dogs in the same way. As it happens, Malteses weren't always pure white: it is said that in the south of France you can still find parti-colour Maltese. The white is the result of intense selective breeding over several centuries at least.
I was going to edit the main article to "correct" the oddity, but in this case it can stand, simply because it is an oddity. Gordon | Talk, 13 August 2006 @10:57 UTC

Easily injured?

"Because of their size, Maltese dogs are not a good choice for families with small children because they can be easily injured."

Who can be easily injured? The Maltese or the small children?

The dogs can be injured, Not the children. Puplover4 @ 2:51 PM December 14th

Article Name/Move

Shouldn't this be Maltese (dog)? The breed is called "maltese" not "moltese dog". It used to be there but somebody moved it and now it can't be moved back except by an admin. Are there any admins around?--WilliamThweatt 01:03, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Picture of Maltese

I added a picture of a maltese puppy with long-ish hair. I'll understand if someone has to remove it. Macken985 17:54, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

New Main Picture

I changed the main picture for the Maltese page. If someone is looking to buy a dog and they look here to see pictures, they might change their decision after seeing two long haired Maltese dogs and thinking that that's what all Malteses look like. Most pet owners prefer puppy cuts and think their cuter, so this way, they get to see both cuts, instead of two of the same, ugly (in my opinion as well as many others) cuts. Anyquestions 13:59, 26 May 2007 (UTC)


Thank you!!!!!!!!!!!! Finally somebody else who thinks the same way I do. Everytime I look at a book or website it shows a maltese with really long hair. I have a maltese and my puppy has short hair. I think there should be a variety of pictures here. (some with long hair and others with short.):)4 December 2007

Expanded the intro

I have expanded the intro, as per the tooshort template (and removed the template). I have also upgraded some grammar, broken some paragraphs apart for ease of reading, and created two new sections, Conformation champions and Cross-bred Maltese. The latter covers something i added (Tiffany, the movie dog) and something already in the article, namely, the Llasa-Apso-Maltese cross-breed dogs. cat Catherineyronwode 10:36, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Quick Facts

Quick facts need to be in prose form. IMHO. miranda 17:46, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Its About Time

I want to know what is the right month or age to own a baby Maltese —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.162.160.31 (talk) 23:40, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

The Real Maltese

Well some people reasd those wrong anser artcles but here is the real inf on maltese's. So maltese's usually way up to 7 ponds but it is okay if it ways a little over. If you maaltese is over wheigth that is npot good at all. Also there coat is very whight so make sure they get b athed at least 1 time a weak. Some maltese's could have allegies so becareful what you give them too. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mickey1290 (talk • contribs) 14:08, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

Country of origin

Pietru il-Boqli a.k.a the roof of this court is too high to be yours and Tool2Die4 reverted without even looking at the source. The origin of the Maltese is not exactly defined. The FCI recognized as the area of origin the Central Mediterranean Area and the Asian Continent is also mentioned by some scientists. -- Imbris (talk) 01:11, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

I read the cite listed in the lead paragraph. Nothing resembling "even if the Fédération Cynologique Internationale does not acknowledge that widely belived association." was anywhere to be found. Stop adding bias. It's an article about a freakin' breed of dog. You've already been warned to stop the POV crap. If you've got something that resembles a reliable source, then add it. Otherwise, stop wasting people's time. Tool2Die4 (talk) 01:13, 26 January 2009 (UTC)
Such harshness is not what I have expected.
http://www.fci.be/uploaded_files/065gb98_en.doc is the most reliable source.
It says: "His name does not signify that he originates from the island of Malta"
Pietru il-Boqli is the one who is making POV editing. He denied the patronage of Italy before I have added it and he has denied the Adriatic from the "equation".
I hope that this is enough for the time being. -- Imbris (talk) 01:28, 26 January 2009 (UTC)
I'm undoing Imbris' nationalistic pov pushing. Imbris, continue along this path and I'll be forced to take the matter up with an admin. the roof of this court is too high to be yours (talk) 02:59, 26 January 2009 (UTC)
I would be more that welcoming the assistance of an administrator in this matter. Please if you insist on bringing the administrator into this small dispute you should consider the sources and then make up your mind about the position you are insisting.
First of all I have not insisted on using the exact phrase from the FCI standard where the first sentence of that standard says: "His name does not signify that he originates from the island of Malta". If you insist this sentence will be included in the article.
Second your accusations of nationalistic POV are unfounded because the standard explicitly named the locations, first Mljet, second Sicilian Melita and third Malta. This is the order of the sentence used in the FCI standard and should be used here if we want to be unbiased and if we want to be not defamatory towards Malta by including the first sentence of the standard.
I have offered you lots of compromising but you insist on nationalist rethoric like including Malta in the patronage which is not true. If we want to be inclusionist we should then alpabetically list Croatia, Italy and Malta as patronages, but this would be original research (which you obviously support).
You wanted historical references, what historical references do you have on the existance of the Maltese language in the times of Greeks. Issa in Roman language was the name of the Adriatic island of Vis.
Since there are three claims for the patronage of this dog breed I find it apsolutely and completely justified to list as other names of this dog breed the names in the Croatian language and the Maltese language, obviously Italian and English too.
You are the one who do not have historical sources nor clear and rational NPOV to edit this article.
Historical references are comming to this article, whether you like it or not.
Imbris (talk) 23:45, 26 January 2009 (UTC)
You are removing the historical information: if you prefer, we can find a better source of information (the one being used is hardly excellent) which doesn't mention any Adriatic islands or Sicilian towns at all. It is wonderful you enjoy being Eastern European; the rest of us can't muster quite the same enthusiasm for it. Your vandalism will be stopped. Cheers, the roof of this court is too high to be yours (talk) 06:04, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
In all seriousness, seek third-party resolution. It's obvious you two aren't going to come to an agreement, and the petty edit-warring gets old. Arguments revolving around nationalism are always ugly. Tool2Die4 (talk) 13:35, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
Pietru il-Boqli is the only one that have not read the FCI standard No. 65 where the Adriatic island was mentioned first, then Sicilian town second and the island of Malta third. Also he is the only one who describes my editing as vandalism. His opinion is to use sources which are not official and he insist on using only Roman sources and Greek sources not to be used. He insist that Malta should be put in the patronage section along with Italy is pure original research. Pietru il-Boqli is from Malta thus probably biased towards the official sources which do not recognize Malta as the place of orrigin. He should look at the Italian Wikipedia where Maltese orrigin of the Maltese (dog) is denied. -- Imbris (talk) 19:52, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
The only one to show bias is you. Cease your agenda pushing. Also: what other Wikipedias do is not relevant, I have visited the Italian one as it happens: it is certainly sub-standard. the roof of this court is too high to be yours (talk) 19:59, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
Nevertheless what you think of Italian Wikipedia they include only Italy as the subsection of the Country of origin and also include the sentence that the Maltese doesn't have anything with Malta but its British given name. -- Imbris (talk) 20:05, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
Supply such a reference from a reputable source. Italian anti-English sentiment aside, thanks^^ the roof of this court is too high to be yours (talk) 20:08, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
If you continue to be dismissive of "His name does not signify that he originates from the island of Malta" written in the http://www.fci.be/uploaded_files/065gb98_en.doc (Standards of Maltese dog) you will end up with that sentence written in the article. This would serve nobody but if you insist... Also stop making jockes about Italians, where do you get such information. -- Imbris (talk) 21:33, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
Ma cosa dici? Io amo gli italiani. Ma sono tutti scemi. the roof of this court is too high to be yours (talk) 21:53, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Edit-war on sources

Pietru il-Boqli a.k.a the roof of this court is too high to be yours wrote "if you prefer, we can find a better source of information (the one being used is hardly excellent) which doesn't mention any Adriatic islands or Sicilian towns at all."

I hope that he meant sources in accordance with WP:SOURCE, which is a big difference.

Short introductory to the issue:

  • The article was created at 2004-02-13 [4] by IP user 24.225.239.100
  • Brodo from Italy edited as 83.184.35.129 on May 9th, 2006 10:47 (UTC). His editing can be seen here
  • Gordon prevented insertion of Malta as the country of origin [5] with explanation "It might be called MALTese, but it's Italian."]

We cannot use various personal blogs and different salesman/breeders websites as relevant if they do not cite where they found the information. There are a bunch of cut-copy-paste websites that use Wikipedia as its only source.

Here is a rare example of interpretation of the Wikipedia article on the Maltese by an outside user:

No matter how much of such personal/salesman websites could be collected we cannot deem those reliable simply on the basis of statistics.

There are currently a lot of pages on this topic (Maltese (dog)) that cut-copy-paste the text from Wikipedia word by word.

Pietru il-Boqli refused to talk about the content and continued to vandalise, denied Greek and Roman sources, laughs at the very mention of Mljet and has very abusive approach towards other editors of this article.

Imbris (talk) 02:10, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

I think we all object to your blind nationalism Imbris, which has been evidenced on various articles you've worked on. Agenda driven edits are rarely up to scratch. the roof of this court is too high to be yours (talk) 06:02, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
Pietru il-Boqli produced zero reliable sources, negliable asisstence toward users, harsh language, not willingness to compromise and dubious rethoric. He deletes sourced and referenced material and denies his own POV statements. He has not been keen to discussing the matter over at his talk page, used abusive language and threats. I will continue to work with him as long as he is a viable editor but as everyone could see this would be very difficult it he insist on threating and retaliation moves. -- Imbris (talk) 21:05, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
Your edits speak for themselves Imbris: pushing your Croatian POV runs counter to the integrity of this project, as do your dubious sources. Your spelling mistakes are also rather annoying. the roof of this court is too high to be yours (talk) 22:37, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
You have not attempted to discuss, not once, every address that you made to me has been accusatory and without sources. You have not answered a single question I asked you about my editing, namely what you think is wrong and why you thought it wrong. Your attempts to present me as the one who "you don't seem to understand?" (Pietru's comment on me being the one who do not understand) and such have harmed our possible colaboration and your accusatory and inquisitory methods against Callimachus proved to me lack of constructivness on your part. -- Imbris (talk) 01:53, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
Even a cursory look at the contemporary standing of Callimachus shows him to be generally discredited: and yet you are using the source in an entirely unqualified manner to bolster a pro-Yugoslav bias. It is this I take issue with and have repeated this warning against revisionist nationalism repeatedly. Feel free to visit my talkpage archive and review the things I have previously said to you regarding these issues. the roof of this court is too high to be yours (talk) 08:52, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
Where are your sources against Callimachus, maybe in moot court's like your own. I have quoted Pliny the Elder as a contemporary of Callimachus. I have named others who agreed with Callimachus throught the centuries. You haven't even looked at the sources and keep only those you approve of. Your level of communication is deterioring as well as your standings in this community! Why? Because you use sources from certain breeders and pet shops which is not the level of any encyclopaedia, and most certainly not the English Wikipedia's. Where do you come up with your nationalist accusation when that label is more than suitable towards a Maltese nationalist who denied Italy, Adriatic, Roman and Greek sources, quotes from reliable sources and most of all communication. Why do you keep on edit-waring + not contributing + not discussing. Your method of accusations will not work. -- Imbris (talk) 22:27, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
Your blind nationalism (made evident by attempts at introducing skewed references to discredited sources/bias to specific causes, specifically defunct ideologies) is truly pitiable. I hope you will overcome this regrettable tendency.the roof of this court is too high to be yours (talk) 06:56, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
Insult, after insult. Your denialism of:
  1. Italy as the patron
  2. Central Mediterranean Area as the country of origin
  3. FCI standards
  4. Mentioning the Adriatic, the island of Mljet and the Sicilian town of Melita
  5. Sources which mentions the predecessor native inhabitants of the island of Mljet, the Illyrians
  6. Your POV of omitting Dalmatia and Croatia as part of the heritage of the island of Mljet
And much, much more denialism on your part will not prevail
Imbris (talk) 22:00, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
If you bothered to look at the current state I left the article in, it includes much of the points you seem to suggest I would do away with. All I have done is cull your nationalistic agenda, as expressed in a pro-Yugoslav bias, and re-introduce the points regarding Martial you so arrogantly brushed aside. Be more careful when compiling (fictional) lists in future. the roof of this court is too high to be yours (talk) 22:36, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
You just cannot rise above this approach of shifting "guilt" towards other users. You have deliberately moved the paragraph on Publius and Martial right after the paragraph where you intentionaly use wikilinks on the island of Malta and the Mediterranean thus "supporting" the first paragraph of Maltese POV with the second paragraph of roman sources (that source has nothing to do with an encyclopaedia, maybe wikisource but not encyclopaedia). And your deletion of sources and vandalisation of my editing ([6] where you deleted much, much more. Even Tool2Die4 has removed that Publius/Martial stuff. -- Imbris (talk) 23:42, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
What are you talking about? I'm finding it difficult to follow your arguments here. Is Italian your first language by any chance, and would you prefer to communicate (here) in that? For the record, the Governor Publius/Martial reference is entirely relevant and contextualised, impeccably referenced and generally quite interesting. Your nationalistic pushing of Yugoslav (mis)information is not.the roof of this court is too high to be yours (talk) 00:06, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Factual accuracy dispute

Hopefully the conflict over this article (about a fluffy little white dog, btw) will finally be resolved. the roof of this court is too high to be yours (talk) 00:47, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

You speak of hope? There is no hope with you as an self appointed factchecker. This was a content dispute from its beginings but you weren't interested about a meere content dispute, even now you call it a conflict. To your POV this is a conflict because you are not an inclusionist. No, Sir you are not. -- Imbris (talk) 01:24, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

I simply object to pushing the Yugoslav POV as though such a thing were acceptable. As you can see (have you re-read the article?) many of your suggestions have been incorporated. The wheat has been separated from the chaff. the roof of this court is too high to be yours (talk) 01:28, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Maltese dog/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

Are you people crazy - you never hit a dog.

Your comments:Many local counties recommend physical discipline to prevent yapping, such as sharp hits to the back of the head or foot twisting when the animal barks - should be taken out of this article. This is illegal in our state.

Why is the page locked?

Last edited at 17:13, 3 February 2009 (UTC). Substituted at 21:19, 3 May 2016 (UTC)

Archive 1Archive 2Archive 3Archive 4

The History Section Cleaned

The history section starts with an apparently spurious claim about the Latin name of the breed. The source cited makes no mention of canis melitaeus. Besides, canis melitaeus appears in very different connection in some other sources. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sjlain (talk • contribs) 17:43, 15 September 2018 (UTC)

Removal of picture from article

Hello everyone, I have removed the image "Maltese dog behavior" from the article because it wasn't descriptive enough to show the actual "behavioral traits" of the dog breed. Please add a good image in the place of the old one. Thank you, Dinan Blueje (talk) 01:08, 31 August 2019 (UTC)

Italian translation of name

Provocation, irrelevant to improvement of this article
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.


Various IP editors wish to add an Italian translation of this dog breed to the article's lead. Dog breeds are certified by the Fédération Cynologique Internationale (FCI), and the Maltese is listed here, where its "patronage" is listed as Italy. The FCI vaguely defines patronage here as:

  • "country of origin/patronage/development of the breed", and
  • "ORIGIN: If required name of the country of patronage or development."

Template:Infobox dog breed has a parameter for "patronage", and explains its meaning as:

  • "patronage: Country of patronage, according to the Article 2 Objectives, Section II, Paragraph g) of the Statutes of the Fédération Cynologique Internationale, used when no country of origin is responsible for the breed and in some other cases."

We can sort-of conclude from this that when a dog breed's specific country of origin is not known, then its "patronage" is the place where the breed was developed. Because the Maltese originated in the Central Mediterranean Area, and was developed into the breed we love today in Italy, its patronage is Italy.

I'm still not sure why "Maltese" should be translated into Italian on an English Wikipedia article? Has there been a consensus reached about this someplace? Magnolia677 (talk) 21:04, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

Please also see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Dogs/Archive 5#RfC: Maltese (dog) -- Magnolia677 (talk) 21:13, 18 January 2020 (UTC)
Well, there's not a lot of point in adding a translation, as the Italian equivalent of English "Maltese" is ... "Maltese"; the pronunciation is different, though. The breed standard is here. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 21:34, 18 January 2020 (UTC)
"Maltese" is an English word and there is no reason to add the Italian pronounce to the article as it is not relevant. Again: "Maltese, breed of toy dog named for the island of Malta, where it may have originated about 2,800 years ago." (https://www.britannica.com/animal/Maltese-dog). --108.172.129.1 (talk) 21:43, 18 January 2020 (UTC)
No need for an Italian translation/pronunciation. Let’s drop the patronage parameter altogether, just because the FCI states something in an extremely non-descriptive manner does not mean it should be included in the infobox. Cavalryman (talk) 22:42, 18 January 2020 (UTC).
Even if the word is derived from the Semetic, I cannot see what the Italian has to do with it. The page is silver-locked for one week, hopefully that is the end of it. If not, you know where to reach us. William Harristalk 07:22, 19 January 2020 (UTC)


Unfortunately I couldn't notice earlier what happened, the page protected after the controversial edit had been redone and this discussion, or I'd have intervened yesterday, but I'm no always in front of a computer, specially on Saturday evening... Should anyone be interested in this one way issue, which wouldn't exist without the creator of the thread because nobody in many years has ever created any problems, here's a list of truths about it:

  1. this is "not at all" about "translations", this is about the "pronunciation", I can't hide to be surprised that this user hasn't even understood this (or maybe he has but he's trying misleading future participants in the discussion);
  2. the Italian pronunciation has always been in the page since many years, but this "Magnolia677" (who, for sure, knows "absolutely nothing" about either dogs or Italian language, not to talk about this precise Italian dog, but seems to be willing to impose his point of view anyway) has suddently decided on his own that it had to be removed, without any valid reason, and he hasn't said anything about this in his message;
  3. the beginning of the head paragraph is "The Maltese (Italian: malˈteːze)", which means that the word "Maltese", in this case, may be also read "in Italian", because the dog is Italian and in this language the word indicates exactly that dog, and because "Maltese", in this case, isn't the English adjective meaning "from Malta" but a different word with a different etymology (as written in the PDF linked in the page itself), the consensual beginning of the page gives the readers the best information about it, suggesting an alternative pronunciation for a higher speech;
  4. I've tried many, many times to discuss about this matter with this user, I've asked him over and over to reply in my talk page, where I'd written all this information and even more, but he's just kept ignoring me and now he's opened this discussion hoping that somebody would come to his aid, this is a kind of behaviour I'm not going to comment, I'll let everyone think about their own opinion about it, however it wasn't "various IP editors" but just one with dynamic IP from one range, me, the "various IP editors" may be instead the anonymous Canadian IP-hopper vandal(s) who appeared suddently after the pronunciation was first removed (it's better I don't write down my suspicions about this, but everyone is free to have a look at what "Magnolia677" wrote in the very first version of his user page...);

as far as a new consensus is reached the previous consensual version is kept, or at least this is the way things work in Wikipedia, i.e. when an edit (in this case the removal) is challenged the previous version will be kept until a new consensus is reached in a discussion... I hoped that "Magnolia677" would leave his personal feelings and interests out of this issues and give the example as expected from his older position, but I was totally wrong, I overestimated his intellectual honesty and personal dignity, my bad. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.64.182.255 (talk) 08:00, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

IP 151.64.182.255, would you please confine your remarks to the content of the article, and not direct comments at to other users? – that might help the discussion to move forward. An apology to Magnolia677 would not be out of place. Thank you, Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 22:32, 19 January 2020 (UTC)
Perhaps I haven't understood, give me a hand please... Have you said that I should apologise to the user who removed a content of the page stable since many years ago and, when this vandalism was reverted, instead of following the consensus diagramme (stopping restoring the challenged edit and discuss, as I asked him to do so many times without success), kept on removing it and then asked to protect the page so that I couldn't restore the previous consensual version? I'm sure I've misunderstood your words, because the hypothesis I've just written above is patently absurd. By the way, you talked about "adding a translation" but I've shown this matter isn't about "adding a translation" at all, neither "adding" nor "translation", so I'd like to read your opinion about the "real" matter instead of the "fake" matter written by the starter of this thread (consciously or not: in the first case there would be patent intention to mislead participants, in the second more simply lack of knowledge and comprehension of the subject itself; since the expression "adding an Italian translation" was contained in the only message I've ever received by him and since I even replied to such a lie as I've done a few lines above, I can't really believe that he wasn't aware he was telling a lie when he started the thread, despite all the good faith I could ever assume). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.64.182.255 (talk) 08:16, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
Please also keep an eye to Maltese cat and Maltese tiger since this situation is being reproduced there also. Thanks. --104.159.54.102 (talk) 05:14, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
We represent WikiProject Dogs - what WikiProject Cats decides to do regarding their articles is their issue. William Harristalk 10:06, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

151.64.164.170 has approached a few of us wanting to know "Please tell us your opinion about the unmotivated removal of the Italian pronunciation which has been in the age for years and provided further information to the readers until it was removed without consensus". I concur with editor Justlettersandnumbers - your personal views regarding other editors is irrelevant. Material can be removed from Wikipedia under WP:BOLD - Wikipedia is not a static undertaking that is set in concrete. In my opinion, the Italian pronunciation is irrelevant to the article - this is not Wiktionary nor a course in the lingua italiana - and I and others support its removal. It is now removed with consensus; QED. William Harristalk 10:06, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for your comment William Harris. My reply is the following.
  1. About my "personal views regarding other editors" ("Magnolia677" I suppose), I'm not asking your opinion about that but about the subject of the thread, but let me precise that among my personal views there's also a fact, i.e. that he didn't respect the consensus diagramme (this) because after removing the pronunciation and being reverted he didn't stop and discuss to seek a compromise but just continued head-on.
  2. About the "Be bold" principle, let me first precise that "Be bold" doesn't mean "do your edit and, when it's reverted, go on doing it over and over" and let me also refer you to the "BOLD, revert, discuss cycle", where it's written exactly what I've just said above, in particular "Discuss the contribution, and the reasons for the contribution, on the article's talk page with the person who reverted your contribution. Don't restore your changes or engage in back-and-forth reverting." (and guess what "Magnolia677" did instead...).
  3. About the relevance of the Italian pronunciation in the article, I'd like you to tell me why, in your opinion, do the linguistic templates "Help:IPA/languageX" exist. If they're irrelevant in Wikipedia because "this is not Wiktionary nor a course in the language X", then why thousands (yes, thousands) of pages contain, usually in the head paragraph, the pronunciation of the word or name in language X? Why should Wikipedia indicate the Italian pronunciation for "pasta", or the French pronunciation for "champagne", or the Spanish pronunciation for "tortilla"? Why? If you're coherent with the opinion you've written about the relevance of Italian pronunciation in an article of Wikipedia in English language, you should start removing all Italian pronunciations from all the articles where they're inserted when they're about words normally used in English such as "pasta", otherwise Wikipedia is turned either in Wiktionary or in a course in the "lingua italiana" (your words, not mine).
I'm more and more shocked and consequently disappointed in experiencing how the "free encyclopedy" open to everyone and subject to rules which (should) apply to each of its users actually works... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.64.182.255 (talk) 10:55, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
151.64.164.170 (talk · contribs · WHOIS), it is unnecessary to ping on multiple occasions, we are well aware of what you have written above. I too concur with Justlettersandnumbers, and my opinion has remained unchanged. As William Harris has now articulated, consensus is now against reintroduction of the Italian pronunciation. Cavalryman (talk) 10:32, 20 January 2020 (UTC).
Thank you too for your message Cavalryman. I've got just one question: why are you worrying "now" about the correspondence between the consensus and the page while as long as "Magnolia677" has been keeping altering consensus and restore his challenged edit the previous consensus wasn't considered at all? I'm asking because my feeling (maybe not requested, but I'd like to write it down anyway), after reading what's been written by the participants in this discussion, is that "I", an anonymous, have to follow rules and respect consensus, while "he", the user who started all this thing although having never shown any interest in the page before 5 days ago, can do as he likes and you agree with this. I'm speechless, I can't really find proper words to write down what I'm thinking... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.64.182.255 (talk) 10:55, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
The View History logue for this article shows that a number of IPs that were located just north of Milan continued putting the entry back, and a number of editors reverted them, not just one editor. There was an invitation to discuss this matter on the Talk page, which was not taken up. Then the Silverlock was put in place because the higher powers on Wikipedia had enough of the revert-counterrevert, and IPs can no longer edit. You actually believe that this is all very unfair to you and that you would now like to talk; that time has passed. William Harristalk 12:14, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
All right, your honour, I'm going to explain the whole story in a way that even a child would understand so that there won't be any possibility that you don't understand or pretend you don't.
  1. That "number of IPs that were located just north of Milan" (the locations of an IP address is always imprecise, it's Northern Italy but not at all near Milan) was just me with different IP addresses. Do you know what's a dynamic IP address? I'm sure you know a lot of things about dogs, so much more than me, but maybe you don't know what's a dynamic IP address. It's an IP address which can vary, but always inside a certain range. In my case, the IP address always starts with the numbers "151" and "64", while the last 2 numbers always change. So: if you've thought that there were many anonymous users restoring the consensual version you got wrong, because it was always me and I've done absolutely nothing to hide this fact.
  2. There're other IP addresses in the history of the page, such as 165.29.76.107, but I'd like to focus on 2 of them: 142.167.63.11 and 74.15.115.86. They're located in Canada, exactly like the 2 other IPs you can find in the history of the talk page: 108.172.129.1 and 104.159.54.102. I admit that I thought that the user behind those IPs might have been "Magnolia677" anonymised. I apologise to him because I've just noticed that I got wrong (at 99%): they're all "open proxies". Yes, open proxies which are forbidden in Wikipedia. The user behind them doesn't even have guts to show himself, neither through his registered name nor through his real IP address. This is the kind of person who's been keeping on removing the pronunciation after I'd restored it and it hadn't been reverted by anyone else (included "Magnolia677" who, at a certain point, stopped removing it). This is the kind of person who's writing comments in this talk page supporting the removal of the pronunciation. A person who thinks that acting "openly" would be counterproductive to him, so he prefer disguise and mislead other users. What do you sincerely think about such a person? Please answer this question at least.
  3. User "Magnolia677", who first wrote a message in my back-to-then talk page (this), has willingly ignored all my invitations (as you can see there) to discuss with me about the matter. Why? Does Wikipedia work like "everyone can edit but anonymous users can be reverted limitlessly by registered users and their explanation request can be ignored by them" or like "everyone can edit and rules are the same for everyone"? He patently broke rules, because he went on restoring his edit, challenged by me, instead of stopping and talk. You said that my personal views about that user are irrelevant, so I won't write any.
  4. I missed this part when I first read your comment: "the higher powers on Wikipedia had enough of the revert-counterrevert". So "Magnolia677" is a "higher power"? So he can blow hot and cold? Because it's him who requested to protect the page, after restoring the challenged edit once again, and neither the consensus diagramme nor the "BOLD, revert, discuss cycle" indicate that he acted correctly. It isn't my point of view, they're the rules of Wikipedia.
Have you understood all what I've said or does something seem unclear to you? English isn't my first language, so perhaps I'm not as able as I would like in expressing my thoughts and explaining facts... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.64.182.255 (talk) 13:05, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
I removed the translation because I wasn't prepared to let sleeping dogs lie. Consensus can be ruff and I'm sorry this hounds you so much, but friend, it's time to hit the paws key. Magnolia677 (talk) 13:32, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
Thanks for the confirmation of my thought about you. I'd just said that "English isn't my first language" and you replied just to use uncommon words and ways of saying to mock me... I'm disgusted. And again with that LIE about the fact that this is a matter of "translation" when this matter isn't about "translations" at all... Before meeting you I had no idea of how much a human being could stoop. Thank you for letting me learn this English verb. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.64.182.255 (talk) 14:15, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Linnaeus

We read in our article that "Linnaeus wrote in 1792 that these dogs were about the size of a squirrel". That's quite an achievement, considering that he died in 1778. I intend to remove that paragraph unless proper sources are provided, including the page number where Linnaeus posthumously made this observation (there is a work by Gmelin published in 1792 on the mammalia of Linnaeus, but it does not seem to contain this statement). I'm tempted to remove the Joe Fulda source altogether as patently unreliable. Thoughts? Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 00:03, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

I agree, JLAN. Good find! Atsme Talk 📧 01:42, 26 January 2020 (UTC)
Axing Fulda was my intention if nobody provided page numbers over the next 6 months, which I doubt is going to happen (especially for the deceased Linn). I am supportive of removing him right now. William Harristalk 03:43, 26 January 2020 (UTC)
Excellent, William Harris, thank you! I think the unsourced stuff about poodles and spaniels should go too. I'm a little concerned about the wording of the lead, "more recently they are thought to have originated in south-central Europe from spitz-type dogs" – the Helen Johnson reference from 1919 clearly states that the Maltese derives from the spitz. How about something like "Nineteenth-century sources derived ... Malta, but it has long been thought that .... "? We should take care not to associate mentions in Ancient Classical literature/iconography with the modern breed, per WP:OR – we have no idea what kind of dog Aristotle was talking about, so we shouldn't conflate it with a modern breed just because both are associated with Malta; I think that wording needs tightening up. There's a 2000-year gap in the history at the moment; restoring the Wegener image to the page would reduce that by a half-century or so; all those in favour, raise a hand!
What is our source for the date of FCI and/or AKC recognition – I sincerely hope it is not 2puppies.com? And so on ... Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 22:46, 26 January 2020 (UTC)
It is worse than that, JLAN - AKC is 2puppies.com and should be axed, FCI has no source at all! I support the direction you propose with the lede etc, and I have split the "Melitae" controversy into its own subsection, where we have sources for both Pliny and Stabo conflicting with each other! I am not sure how to play this from here on. William Harristalk 03:04, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Italian pronunciation of name

I'm opening this thread not to talk about users but precisaly about the matter written in the title: the Italian pronunciation of the name "Maltese". I'm asking everyone to read the explanations below and answer about this matter.

The page "Maltese (dog)" has been starting for years with the following words: "The Maltese (Italian: [malˈteːze])". The haead paragraph has been containing the pronunciation of the name in Italian for all this time, nobody has ever challenged its presence and so it was the stable consensual version. The reason there was the pronunciation in Italian is that, in this particular case (not in general), the word "Maltese" can be pronounced non only in English but also in Italian. "Maltese" is the Italian word indicating this particular dog breed. "Maltese", in this case, in English doesn't mean "from Malta", it derives from a Semitic word ("màlat") from the which also the name "Malta" and others derive (Fédération Cynologique Internationale). More, the origin of the dog isn't "the island of Malta" but generically "the Central Mediterranean Sea area", which includes Malta and Italy. The patronage of the dog breed is Italian (FCI). It follows from what I've explained that this dog breed is linked to Italy, not to Malta, except for its name which coincides with the English adjective meaning "from Malta".

For those who don't know, in Wikipedia it's very common including in the head paragraph a foreign pronunciation when the word (or name) can be pronounced in a foreign language, in order to give the reader one more information, which is nothing bad at all. Al Pacino and De Niro are American actors, their surnames are normally and correctly pronounced in English, but next to the English pronunciation it's indicated also the Italian pronunciation ("(/pəˈtʃiːnoʊ/, Italian: [paˈtʃiːno])" "(/də ˈnɪəroʊ/, Italian: [de ˈniːro])"): better one more piece of information for the readers, who perhaps won't read and so it'll be useless, than one less, which perhaps would be searched and not found. The word "pasta" is commonly used in English (both British and American) and pronounced /ˈpæstə/ or /ˈpɑːstə/ (as written in the head paragraph of the article), but it's indicated also the Italian pronunciation [ˈpasta]: again, better one more piece of information than one less. And this is exactly the reason why the "Help:IPA/languageX" template exist, not just for Italian but for every language. Removing the Italian pronunciation from those pages would be couterproductive, it wouldn't be a useful edit and I frankly can't see how it could ever be, I hope that everyone concurs. The same goes for "Maltese", which is commonly pronounced as the English adjective meaning "from Malta" (/mɑlˈtiz/ or /mɒlˈtiːz/) but could be pronounced also in Italian, as it's an Italian dog breed. Same speech as for pasta.

I light of all this, do you think that the Italian pronunciation must be removed from the article or have you convinced yourself that removing it wouldn't be an improvement but a worsening? @Justlettersandnumbers, Cavalryman, and William Harris: I'm addressing you in particular but also whoever wants to write down his/her opinion. I didn't mention the wrong way this whole thing has been dealt with, i.e. without respecting the rules of Wikipedia itself, but the only thing I'm interested in is giving you correct information about this matter and read your opinions. 151.64.186.73 (talk) 10:22, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

I have read your lengthy thread; I do not think that our discussing "correct pronunciation" of Maltese is of value to the Wikipedia article. I note that your IP address is in the north of Italy.
Cheers! Gareth Griffith-Jones (contribs) (talk) 11:52, 21 January 2020 (UTC)
Thank you for your kind answer Gareth Griffith-Jones. You said: "I do not think that our discussing "correct pronunciation" of Maltese is of value to the Wikipedia article". There're thousands of articles containing words referring to things of foreign origin where it's indicated the original pronunciation ("pasta" for Italian, "champagne" for French, "tortilla" for Spanish, etc...). This means that, in your opinion, they're all of no value to the related Wikipedia articles. I don't agree with that, like probably almost every other user in Wikipedia doesn't, but your position about this matter is totally coherent: you don't think that the Italian pronunciation of "Maltese" should be added to this article because you don't think that the Italian pronunciation of any word or name should be added to any article, same goes for every other foreign language. I appreciate this coherence of yours, I wish every other user here could be as you instead of making distinction depending on what suits them... 151.64.186.73 (talk) 13:45, 21 January 2020 (UTC)
We need not include an Italian pronunciation, because the dominant and official language in Malta (a sovereign nation-state) is Maltese (an offshoot of Arabic but written with the Latin alphabet). Almost surprisingly (until you did into the Island's post-medieval history) English is also an official language there. Italian is unofficial and a minority first-language, though conversationally intelligible to about 66% of the population there (so says our article Malta). If we were going to add alternative-language naming info for this breed, we would start with the Maltese language, and probably exclude Italian anyway. Even if Malta were part of Italy, with an overwhelmingly monoglot Italian-speaking population, we wouldn't need to include Italian pronunciation here because Maltese is not a recent Italian loan-word borrowed for use in English, it's a cognate in English (and fully assimilated into English for hundreds of years) that coincidentally matches the spelling in Italian (unlike, say, the English-language word Spanish for the Spanish-language word español). If there's evidence that English-speaking dog owners/breeders regularly hyper-correct and use an approximation of the Italian pronunciation of the breed name (as some do, usually rather poorly, with German breed names and a few others that originated outside of English-speaking areas), then it might be reasonable to include the Italian pronunciation. We just don't have a reason to do so otherwise, per WP:NOT#INDISCRIMINATE. If there's not a real reason to include it that pertains to what an English-speaker is likely to encounter, then it's just trivia in the context of an English-language encyclopedia. If there were cause to include any of this stuff, then include the English, Maltese, and maybe Italian names and pronunciations, in that order.

What we definitely do not do is include, for example, the Italian and Japanese pronunciation for things pertaining to Afghanistan or Australia. And consideration of this incidentally brings to light some WP:NOR problems in the article (in summary: commingling landraces and breeds; commingling 9 historical breeds with one modern one; mistaking ancient folklore and ambiguous medieval claims for modern-researched history). While there's a bit of an Italian cultural-historical connection to Malta (today mostly a language-intelligibility one due to media broadcasts), there doesn't seem to be any such Italian connection to this dog breed (neither culturally nor genetically), which in a strict sense of breed definition post-dates Malta's independence from Italy [or part of what became Italy, the Kingdom of Sicily, in 1530, and which even then was House of Anjou territory and thus had stronger ties to France anyway). Since then, Malta was controlled by France and England/UK, until full independence in 1964 (or 1979, depending on definitions). Meanwhile, as a breed in the modern sense, the variety (or varieties, really – at least 9 of them, of unknown inter-relationship) appear to date to the 17th century at the earliest, developed from local landrace dogs, and was/were not formalized with breed standards (which do not all agree with each other) until the early-to-mid-20th c. The sourcing we have so far seems to indicate it is most closely related to dogs of Switzerland and the south of France – not Italy. While there are written records of dogs purportedly from the area, going back to at least the 4th c. BCE, there's no reason to consider them all a single breed, and some specific pre-modern sources of this type have been challenged as to their meaning (e.g. referring to Méléda, not Malta, and with English writers of the Early Modern period seeming to show a bias in their interpretation). Our article needs to be re-written to better reflect all this, focusing on the dog breed history (including relationships to mainland dogs) and standardization as can be established using reliable modern sources; and separately treating pre-modern dogs of Malta, the historical claims about those and their veracity, and what modern sources suggest about how those dogs may relate to the modern breed[s]. I've done similar "separate facts from folklore" and "distinguish between landraces and standardized breeds" edits at several other breed articles, e.g. Cyprus cat, which may serve as a good model.

PS (and this is a long ramble leading up to a Wikipedia essay; it's time I did another WP:Common sense piece as a non-human followup to WP:Race and ethnicity): There's a strong element of what I would call "the fallacy of the perpetual breed" at work here and in many other articles. Animal breeds are not fixed (within a human time-frame of reference) like sculptures or continents; they are an ongoing process and they change over time, more like gardens or political borders. It's just how genetics works. No breed extant right now will still exist in 200 years – except perhaps in name but very different form, like what's happened with the Persian cat over less than a century; or perhaps in similar form due to forced artificial selection but as cross-breeds with very different genetics through admixture to "recover" traits lost in the original stock (cf. ). When researchers (on our site or off of it) note that a modern breed (of anything) – subject to highly controlled attempts to breed-true very specific traits to a published breed standard – is mostly white (or whatever), and they find a source from 137 CE claiming white dogs were seen in the same area, it's just patent nonsense to leap to the idea that they're the same dogs and represent a continual process of breed refinement of the same breed. It's anti-scientific WP:FRINGE. And its very rare for us to have pre-modern evidence of strictly controlled selection. More often, common breeders selected from whatever healthy livestock was available within a few villages away, or at a major market in the nearest proper town. These were adapted to their environment – this is how landraces develop. A select few aristocrats with a lot of time on their hands had the wherewithal to be much more selective, but were concerned with results (e.g. breed Baron von Snuffleporp's unusually fast hounds to mine, so I get faster dogs for my hunts), not with the establishment and perpetuation of some kind of "subsubspecies" as a named breed with standards. That's an entirely modern preoccupation dating to the late Victoria era, and probably itself has a finite lifespan of another century or less. We know for a fact now how genetic bottlenecks work, what hybrid vigor is, and that long-sustained fairly close inbreeding (e.g. first- or second-cousin to cousin, over and over again) can cause more genetic damage than rare closer (e.g. sibling) inbreeding. Lots of overly-inbred formal breeds are due for extinction as their genomes degrade, and this is more true among dog breeds than any other sector. Meanwhile, new breeds are being established by crossbreeding to avoid such problems, and themselves will ultimately have a finite range of viable breeding within the same breed. Even livestock breeding is increasingly shifting to the devising of new crossbreeds and even interspecific hybrids, not rote maintenance of old bloodlines. It's interesting that the perpetual-breed fallacy also pertains to humans and also dates mostly to the same era and earlier: eugenics first arose in the Victorian period, as did a lot of wacky and pseudo-anthropological ideas about "race", though some of it goes back to the 15th century; that stuff commingled with a common belief in the "breeding" superiority of the upper class (despite obvious evidence to the contrary like porphyria, color-blindness, lantern-jaw, etc.), and even a very frequent practice among commoners of first- and second-cousin marriages to keep land and other inheritance in the same family; plus sweeping romantic notions about what we'd today call ethnicity, e.g. the Celtic Twilight and German Romanticism, grounded in false beliefs that, say, the Irish and the Nordic peoples represent untainted lines of human breeding and culture to ancient times, yadda yadda yadda. To bring this back to breeds: the genetics are simply going to adapt to local conditions and available genes to mix with, as with any life form. Various discrete elements of the genetic makeup (haplogroups) are going to remain stable over a long period of time, and are not strongly affected by shallow levels of crossbreeding nor overwhelmingly corrupted by a few inbreeding instances (like a few drops of soy sauce in a large pot of water), because the overall genetic pool is stable, as is the environment to which it is long-term adapted. Where you're going to get a distinct-breed effect is when focused artificial selection (controlled breeding) is applied rather consistently – like dumping an entire pint of soy sauce into the pot. But even then genetics are not magically undone; the same forces of adaptation, mutation, dominant and recessive inheritance, etc., are all still in operation and largely outside of breeders' control. It's not possible to maintain exactly the same breed over a long period time.
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  01:20, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

I'm glad you've written a comment SMcCandlish. Unfortunately, you did it before gathering enough information about this matter and about the way similar cases are dealth with in Wikipedia.
About this matter, probably you haven't even read carefully what I wrote above. The name "Maltese", in this case, "has absolutely nothing to do with the island of Malta". Have a look at this, a document linked in the page itself (the same kind of document is found in every article about dog breeds), page 2, "BRIEF HISTORICAL SUMMARY"; watch what's written after "ORIGIN" and "PATRONAGE" too, please. This is enough to write the first part of your comment off, sorry.
About the way similar cases are dealth with in Wikipedia, you have to know that in Italy there're zones where a second language, different from Italian, is spoken, for example South Tyrol, where the first language in almost every city is German and the first name of the cities is German. Well, in Wikipedia also the Italian pronunciation and name of the cities is added, although most of the population living in those cities speak German which is acknowledged as an official language like Italian. If your opinion is that a pronunciation not used by most of the population shouldn't be inserted, then we should delete all the Italian pronunciations and names from all the articles about South Tyrol cities. More, in Italy also a huge number of dialects exist, but in most of the country they're spoken only by old people, and young people can't speak it. Despite this, most of the articles about Italian cities contain the dialectal pronunciation and name of the cities. We should get rid of all of them because almost nobody calls his own city with the dialectal name nowadays. This is enough to write the second part of your comment off, but the previous point would have already been enough because your speech about "the incorrectness of including Italian pronunciation for a dog who lives in Malta where Italian is spoken only ("only"?!) by 2/3 of the population" was built upon the wrong assumption that the name "Maltese" means "from Malta".
So, since you've even admitted that "it might be reasonable to include the Italian pronunciation" for the reason you said, and since your claims against its insertion have been justifiably rejected as just explained by me, I think that now you should totally concur that the Italian pronunciation shouldn't have been removed (perhaps the English pronunciation(s) could be added too, nothing against it). About a possible Maltese pronunciation, it wouldn't be for sure a pronunciation of "Maltese" but a pronunciation of the Maltese name of the dog which, if it exists, isn't "Maltese", but as this dog has nothing to do with Malta specifically I don't see why including the Maltese pronunciation and not the Greek pronunciation for example, but if you find it I won't oppose to its insertion. I'd like to read what you think about the information I've provided in my comment. 151.64.186.73 (talk) 09:30, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
We already have the it.wp which provides whatever our Italian speaking readers want to know. All they have to do is click on the language link in the left margin of the article. I see no need to contribute further to this very lengthy tl;dr discussion. What I did notice about the article was the lead's failure to comply with MOS so I tagged it. I may have time later in the day to help expand it but for now, I'll just say happy editing! Atsme Talk 📧 14:44, 23 January 2020 (UTC)
Atsme, I'll tell you in short what's the matter (probably you haven't understood it): it's about the unexplained removal of the Italian pronunciation of the dog breed. Dozens of pages containing Italian words and names have in the head paragraph the indication of the Italian pronunciations, and this happens also for words and names in other languages. "Maltese" isn't the Maltese name of the dog which isn't original of Malta, "Maltese" doesn't mean "from Malta" in this case. Adding an indication for the readers about the Italian pronunciation of the name is a piece of information which could somehow useful to them, or Wikipedia wouldn't have the Italian pronunciation of "pasta" indicated in the head paragraph of the article about pasta. If the discussion seems too long for you just read my first intervention, this. 151.64.186.73 (talk) 15:20, 23 January 2020 (UTC)
Atsme is correct; en.wikipedia is not the place to inject Italian-language-specific information except on topics that pertain to Italy. I already addressed this above ("What we definitely do not do is include, for example, the Italian and Japanese pronunciation for things pertaining to Afghanistan or Australia.") Malta's cultural connections to Italy are too tenuous for English Wikipedia to pepper Malta-related articles with Italian pronunciation information. Next, none of your opinion-mongering about the ultimate origin of these dogs is pertinent. If you (151…) don't have reliable (actually reliable) sources with which to rewrite the article, then your hypothesis that the dogs are "really" Italian is just a WP:NOT#FORUM problem. Wikipedia article talk pages are not a place to debate people's novel ideas about things. Ironically, your observation that Maltese is not the name of the breed in the Maltese language is actually important, for different reasons: we should have but still lack information in the lead about what that name actually is. That would be relevant to include, for the same reason we have Danish name information at Danish landrace goose (our title is at the English-language name per WP:COMMONNAME and WP:USEENGLISH, same as with this one and most others).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  20:10, 23 January 2020 (UTC)
Ok. I agree that "en.wikipedia is not the place to inject Italian-language-specific information except on topics that pertain to Italy". But the breed is Italian, the patronage is Italian, "Maltese" is an Italian word (English too, of course). This is the point that half of the participants in this discussion hasn't understood yet: you think that this dog is... Maltese! I mean, from Malta. It isn't. If it was, then you'd be right: why adding an Italian pronunciation for a word in Maltese? If it was... But it isn't! And it isn't me saying, it's the International Cynologique Federation, in the document I've linked above and that's linked in the article itself (read it, if you hadn't done it yet, please, read it), and similar documents are linked in almost all articles about dog breeds. The joke about Japan is misplaced. The word for "Maltese" is Maltese isn't even "Maltese", while it is in Italian and English. Have you understood it now? This whole story has absolutely nothing to do with anything similar to nationalism: there has always been the Italian pronunciation in the head paragraph (for the reasons I said), then "Magnolia677" removed it after revreting a vandalism which had nothing to do with that, just because his personal opinion was that the Italian pronunciation corresponding to a previous consensus was damaging the page. There's also an Italian pronunciation for "pasta", next to English pronunciations, why don't we remove them too then? The example of the Danish goose isn't pertinent, because "Danish goose" isn't the Danish name of that animal, while "Maltese" is the Italian name of the dog breed, as well as the English name, and we're talking about dog breeds which usually have foreign names depending on their origins, not about animal species which have a Latin name and a common name in each language... This is all I can say to counter-argument your comment, if you aren't convinced now I don't think you'll be if I go on explaining. However, thank you for commenting this thread. 151.64.186.73 (talk) 21:10, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

IP, just call an WP:RfC and get formal consensus regarding your proposal. Atsme Talk 📧 17:54, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

Uhm, I might try... Even if I don't understand why removing the pronunciation could be done without consulting anyone while to restore the consensual version with pronunciation one has to do all this (it's absurd and opposite to the spirit of Wikipedia for sure...). But meanwhile don't you want to comment what I've written? 151.64.186.73 (talk) 18:55, 23 January 2020 (UTC)
I agree with the positions stated by @Justlettersandnumbers, Cavalryman, Magnolia677, William Harris, and SMcCandlish:, including the hatted discussion. Atsme Talk 📧 19:25, 23 January 2020 (UTC)
Ok. May I ask you the reasons why you "agree with the positions stated by" them? Because:
  1. Justlettersandnumbers answeres as the matter was a "translation" and not the "pronunciation";
  2. Cavalryman would delete without a valid reason half of the information contained in the page if it were up to him just because he doesn't consider it useful;
  3. Magnolia677 doesn't understand a thing about dogs nor Italian and persisted in this thing just because he's one of the "higher powers" in here so it'd be inconvenient to him admitting that he committed a mistake (not to talk about the fact that he was let free to remove a consensual content without consensus and then to ask to reach a consensus to restore it...);
  4. William Harris says that "this is not Wiktionary nor a course in lingua italiana" which means he doesn't know how things work in Wikipedia because countless articles contain pronunciations not only in Italian and nobody wants to delete them for such a reason but he refuses to comment his incoherence after I put him in front of it;
  5. SMcCandlish thought mistakenly that this dog was from Malta and that this was the meaning of his name;
Gareth Griffith-Jones, whom you didn't mention, was the only one who gave an informed and rasoned opinion: he thinks that language templates should be totally removed from Wikipedia, including this, so his opinion is the only one really about the matter so far, besides mine. Would you like to argue your "no" to the pronunciation? If you don't want to do it I won't disturb you any more, but I hope you will. 151.64.186.73 (talk) 19:55, 23 January 2020 (UTC)
You have not demonstrated a single thing I said (based on the sources we already cite in this article and Malta and related articles) is "mistaken", you've simply made odd assertions without any evidence at all. And now you're bashing other editors without cause ("doesn't understand a thing about dogs", etc.). If this WP:BATTLEGROUND behavior continues, you're liable to be banned from the topic or simply blocked from editing.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  20:10, 23 January 2020 (UTC)
Read here, please, page 2, read, I beg you, read! Search the word "Malta" and comment what you find! I don't want anyone to trust "me", I want who joins the discussion to consult that reliable authoritative source linked in the article! My opinion about that user maybe came out bad, but I didn't say nothing false: he never edits articles about dogs nor languages, he mainly rollbacks vandalisms, he has out of place here. 151.64.186.73 (talk) 14:56, 23 January 2020 (UTC)
The anon appears to not understand how Wikipedia works (e.g. WP:EDITING policy). There is no principle anywhere on any Wikipedia (this one or the Wikipedia for any other language, or related projects like Wiktionary and Commons and WikiData) that someone has to be "consulted" before content is changed. See also WP:OWN policy, etc. I think this is a wiki-competence issue. If this WP:FRINGE-leaning nationalistic browbeating continues, a topic-ban is probably in order. I'm not sure why dogs attract so much of this sort of thing, but we already have a several similar topic bans from last year and earlier as precedent.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  20:10, 23 January 2020 (UTC)
So, if there's no principle anywhere on any Wikipedia that someone has to be consulted before content is changed... WHY, for Godness sake, WHY must "I" consult all these people to change the current version of the page and restore its content? Perhaps this principle exists but only for "weak" users like me, not for "strong" users like him... Answer this question, please. And wonder why dogs attract so much "Magnolia677" (I'm not attracted by dogs but I just wanted an information about a pronunciation in my language to be kept in Wikipedia so that English users could know how to pronounce correctly an Italian word, exactly like "pasta", and this is nowhere near nationalism, exactly like it wouldn't be if we were discussing of "pasta" instead of "Maltese"). 151.64.186.73 (talk) 14:56, 23 January 2020 (UTC)
False choice. I would suggest we include English, Italian and Maltese pronunciations. I would add the IPA, and a link to the words being pronounced in the relevant language. WP:Not paper. I would err on the side of too much of the irrelevant, rather than too little of the relevant. And your discussion about this dog's origins would help. Cheers. 7&6=thirteen (☎) 12:38, 27 January 2020 (UTC)
Thank you, 7&6=thirteen, you're the second who read, understood and replied precisely in the regard of what I wrote. I'd have nothing against the addition of the English pronunciation too and, if found anywhere, also the Maltese, I'd already said it. But most of the other users seem to be biased against the re-insertion of the Italian pronunciation, either because it was a friend of theirs who removed it, or because they have something against Italy or not English speaking countries (but maybe even both). Indeed, none of them could give a valid justification to their refusal: they ignore things, or they're incoherent, or they refuse to justify their choice... English Wikipedia is in their hands, so the fact that "Maltese" is also an Italian name, that the etymology of the name has nothing to do with Malta and that the breed is officially Italian, all break on the rocks of the "high powers" of this Wikipedia. It's sad, but that's how it is. Now I understand the meaning of those researches made by some American universities about the decline of Wikipedia (example)... 151.64.186.73 (talk) 15:14, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Dogs are no respecter of national boundaries. Nor were dog fanciers. Breeds appeared and were reproduced (sometimes badly) all over the world.
This is not unlike the constant nattering about the national origins of Tadeusz Kościuszko or Nikola Tesla, which I find boring and unproductive. Who know for sure? Who can? And given that international boundaries and allegiances have shifted subtly and at time grossly, what are we taking about. 7&6=thirteen (☎) 17:20, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

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Introduction

The article has had for some time a tag (This article's lead section may be too short to adequately summarize the key points). I worked in providing it with an introduction, so I guess the tag can go now. Also, the previous lead didn't make much sense: "Despite the name, it has no verified historic or scientific connection to the island of Malta": well, it has been claimed to come from the island of Malta since Strabo 2000 years ago, and has been reported through the centuries to have been bred there, so it does have a historic connection to the island - by the way the introduction was written, it seemed like the breed name was just a coincidental homonym and not actually the same word as the one meaning "relating to Malta", which is not the case. It would make more sense to have something more in line with [Britannica], which states in its introduction that it is named for the island of Malta, where it may have originated. Dan Palraz (talk)

Well, that's your theory; people have been disagreeing about this for 2000 years. According to the Busuttil paper (ref #11 as I write), what Strabo actually said was along the lines of "... before Pachynus there lies Melite from where the Melitaean dogs came"; plenty of other Classical writers thought they were from the Adriatic. If there's a verifiable, factual scientific or historic connection to the island of Malta, please cite the peer-reviewed historic or scientific journals where that finding is reported and discussed. Once that's done, we'd need to find some scientific or historic connection between the lapdog of the Ancient World and the modern lapdog, which appears to have a documented history of no more than about 150 years at a pinch. Whatever else, I think we should keep speculation about any of this out of the lead. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 22:28, 3 July 2021 (UTC)
These are two different things: one thing is the discussion about what island was the Melita that the Greek name of the dog referred to; the English name, however, comes undoubtedly from the island of Malta, even if it might be a misnomer, and, regardless of its factual correction, the fact is that because of the English name, the island has been associated with the breed ever since, and they have even bred the dog there, so saying that it has no "proven historical connection" to the island is misleading. If you really prefer a short introduction, then no mention is needed in the lead of the name origin at all. Dan Palraz (talk) 22:33, 3 July 2021‎ (UTC)
You've had almost 11 months to argue, counter-argument, discuss or try to find a lead that is acceptable to all. If you don't want to compromise on a consensual phrase, the controversial phrase will not be in the lead, as it is not needed there. Dan Palraz (talk) 10:23, 26 May 2022 (UTC)
The3 article has some useful information but is generally a mess, in terms of formatting, architecture and the placing of details. The lead, as Dan states, is incorrect. There are several sources that should not be there: history books about the geography of the Mediterranean printed in 1828 have no place here, nor do conjectures about Maltese dog origins cited from books dated to the 19th century. The article must distinguish between two sets of data: the modern breed, to which the name is attached, and the ancient evidence for a similar type of dog, associated generally with Malta with some marginal dissent that the island of origin may be another with a similar name. The genetics of breed dogs are such that they don't allow direct genealogy from anything earlier than a century or so ago. I will review it, using a standard ref format. I.e. after decades of tinkering, this has to be overhauled and wikified according to best practice to iron out numerous sloppy incongruencies.Nishidani (talk) 12:11, 4 June 2022 (UTC)
Thank you, Nishidani, the page certainly needs considerable work; however, a position that a dispute that has lasted 2000 years is "some marginal dissent" may perhaps not be the best point to start from. I'm no classicist, but I'm a little perplexed by your assertion that "Melitaios always refers in classical Greek to Malta, and never to an Adriatic island, Mljet". When Pliny wrote this, what text of Callimachus was he citing? What word for Mljet did Callimachus use that Pliny translates as 'melitaeos'? Also, would you kindly link to the actual text of the Aristotle mention rather than our page on the book? Thanks, Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 08:07, 6 June 2022 (UTC)
Well, I've been busy drinking at a 4 hour foodfeast to celebrate a niece's confirmation yesterday, and haven't had time to finish. Far from it. What I intend to do is line up all the classical sources in Greek and Latin and cite the commentaries' verdicts. Most of the page evidence came from 19th century texts citing the same material, recycling some secondary text, which however misses much, and ignores the verdicts of modern scholarship. For example I think Lycophron's Alexandra, is not mentioned here for Melita (Μελίτη/Melítê). There too, as with Callimachus, there has been some discussion as to whether he referred to Malta or Mlit, but, the finest and most recent edition of that extraordinary poem, by Simon Hornblower, is unequivocal. The full textual context (ll.1027ff) leaves no doubt that, despite the usual ambiguities (name doubling for islands is common reflecting perhaps emigration patterns), In those cases, one goes ad fontes and to the latest scholarship, all of which is ignored by the secondary paste-and-copy remarks by people who certainly have an intimate knowledge of dog breeds, but not of classical scholarship. I'll clarify the Pliny reference, since I have Rudolf Pfeiffer's definitive edition of Callimachus and his fragments (It's clarified in vol.1 1949 p.404). Pliny's latin is the source of the attribution to Callimachus, whose original however has not been transmitted. Callimachus, like Lycophron, excelled in making allusions to obscure, uncommon knowledge that contradicts much received lore. By classical Greek, I am referring to the high Athenian heyday of usage down to Aristotle's time. But I must get rid of a hangover before fixing this.Nishidani (talk) 11:07, 6 June 2022 (UTC)
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