File talk:Historical German linguistical area.PNG

It's important to noticed that this map shows NOT nations but the area where people knew german language. You need to know that especially in north Poland, lived people who were bi-lingual (they knew Polish and german. It was caused of Poland parti-tion in XVIIIth century and captivity under Prussian kingdom till 1918 Second Polish Republic). Also I'm not convinced of some of the noumbers shown in the note. Especially about (Danzig) Gdańsk and retired west Prussia (Danziger surrounding countryside). Before World War II in Free City of Gdańsk lived sth about 400 000 people and about 40 - 50 000 were Pole (we need notice that some people who identified as germans were germanized after Partitions of Poland, I didn't count them as Polish citizens). When in december 1939 Albert Forster made population census over 70 % of people said that polish is their mother-thongue, and over 100 000 (from 180 000) Kashubian who declared kashbian as their mother thongue said that they were Pole (rest from them didn't identified with Poland and Germans).

fyi, in 1920, Danzig was over 95% German-speaking. What that means as far as the "Polish" population there, meaning German-speaking, but of Polish ancestry (think Lu Lu Lu Podloski) is unknown, but I think it can be assumed that the percentage was relatively small. I really doubt your figures. The reason is the Free City of Danzig had legislation designed to prevent Poles from obtaining citizenship there. This was the idea...that the city would remain separate from Germany, but remain German. The city's Germanness was the assurance that it would also remain separate from Poland, to the wishes of the Danzigers. Unlike a country, which can sustain immigration without its identity rapidly changing, a city is very much smaller, and the designers of the Free City arrangement knew there would be practically no reason for the city to remain independent from Poland if something was not done to keep it German. If Danzig was to vote on reincorporation into Germany or Poland at a later date (this had been mentioned at the Treaty of Versailles) demographics were particularly important, and seeing as Germany wanted the city returned, a rapid influx of Poles into the city would surely create an outrage and obviously create tensions. I think you need to read more about the subject of the Free City of Danzig. As for the rest of the map's distribution, it seems pretty accurate -- although it is possible that this is not an ethnic map per se, but a language map. I see no reason to delete it as long as this distinction is made.--Npovshark (talk) 22:20, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

On the other hand, when you talk about Germanized "Poles" from over two centuries, then I really have to question your assessment on the subject. What is Poland but migrated cluster of Christianized Slavs? Who is to say the people you call "Poles" are not Polonized Czechs or Slovaks? And what about the Lithuanians? The Polish partitions you speak of broke apart what was an expansive, hardly centralized multi-ethnic empire of people paying homage to a king. How does that make them "Polish"?--Npovshark (talk) 22:41, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

map

is this better? http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/dc/Historisches_deutsches_Sprachgebiet.PNG 178.8.226.175 (talk) 08:23, 30 November 2012 (UTC)

Ruhr

Ruhr had 5-13% Polish minority and many other minorities. So the map is German biased.Xx236 (talk) 08:19, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

What is "German"?

In 1910 many dialects were spoken, sometimes the "Germans" weren't able to communicate. Xx236 (talk) 08:23, 7 February 2013 (UTC)