Talk:Shimōsa Province

Poll

The following discussion is an archived debate 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.

The result of the debate was move. —Nightstallion (?) 09:46, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Title

Shimosa or Shimousa? Both can be in Japanese "lazy" pronunciation. Which will we use? --Nanshu 02:57, 2 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I personally think "Shimousa" is better. Usually, I am against using "ou" to romanize おう, but in this case, we have two kanji, shimo + usa, and "Shimosa" just doesn't seem like an accurate romanization. It's like Minoo... if you use the prettier romaji, you lose part of the name. - Sekicho

下総国 was born as a result of the split of 総国 (Fusa no kuni). Then its name had been changed as follows:

Shimo-tsu-fusa -> Shimo-fusa -> Shimousa

The problem is that the loss of the f was happened at the middle of a word in Japanese (eg. kefu -> keu -> kyou). This means that people considered shimofusa as a single word instead of a compound. Otherwide the f must be preserved. But I changed my mind because some googling suggests that some still call 下総 Shimofusa.

Japanese romanization is more complicated than I expected. The Hepburn romanization system distinguishes what is not dinstinguished in Japanese. Sometime it needs etymological analysis. --Nanshu 02:53, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with that name, but if it's pronounced as Shimoosa (2 syllables), then it's fine as Shimosa. If it's pronounced with three syllables, as I suspect it is because 下 is prounounced "shimo," then it should be written as Shimo-Usa. Exploding Boy 04:03, Jun 16, 2004 (UTC)

If it is "Shimo-Usa", the page should be moved to "Shimo-Usa Province". WhisperToMe 06:33, 17 Jun 2004 (UTC)

It is Shimo-Usa, I looked it up. I'm going to move this page to that name. Exploding Boy 08:18, Jun 17, 2004 (UTC)

where did you people find "Shimo-Usa" ??!!

Waiiiiit a minute. Where did you find the name "Shimo-Usa"? I just Googled the name and it only came up six times! ... compared to hundreds of hits for both "Shimosa" and "Shimousa." -- Sekicho 13:21, Jun 17, 2004 (UTC)

I found it right here on this talk page. ;)

The purpose of "Shimo-Usa" is to explain how the name of the province is pronounced. WhisperToMe 02:56, 18 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I don't think it's appropriate to invent a romanization just to show how something is pronounced. Why not say

Shimousa (pronounced shimo-usa) is...

instead of making the article's title all wacky? It's not like we spell Ljubljana in a manner reflective of its pronunciation... Sekicho 19:01, Jun 18, 2004 (UTC)

I said above that romanization needs etymological analysis, but now I correct it to "morphological analysis" to distinguish it from "real" etymological analysis. There is a morphological boundary between "shimo" and "usa," so I think it should be spelled Shimousa. I don't like to invent a new romanization too.

As for the pronunciation, I don't know. My poor native ears indiscriminate both pronunciations. But I think I pronounce it shi-mo-u-sa. --Nanshu 02:23, 19 Jun 2004 (UTC) --Nanshu 02:23, 19 Jun 2004 (UTC)

The main difference for the dash was so that one wouldn't confuse it with a wapuro double-o (ou). WhisperToMe 16:26, 21 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Again, the dash is needless, or shouldn't be included. It departs from the romanization standard. Don't invent a new romanization! --Nanshu 02:37, 7 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Why do we still use this weird romanization? This article should be moved to Shimousa Province. --Nanshu 01:01, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes, proper Hepburn romanization should be used! Deiaemeth 00:39, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. 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.

Sengoku House Codes

Possibly appropriate addition to this article -- but perhaps better placed elsewhere?

• 1556: Yūki Masakatsu issues Yūki-shi shin hatto.

Just another possibility not yet fully realized .... --Ooperhoofd 20:58, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

References

Title redux

This article is misspelled. Although previously discussed above, it is simply wrong. The correct spelling is Shimōsa, or even Shimosa if the diacritics are dropped. Shimousa is simply not a valid romanization. For those who wish to verify this, you may look it up in Nihon Kokugo Daijiten or Shin Meikai Nihongo Akusento Jiten, which both list the pronunciation (シモーサ) which romanization is based on separate from the Japanese spelling. Alternatively, you may look it up in the official US National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) database which lists it as "Shimōsa" with no alternative spellings. For those in Japan in the former Shimōsa region, you may easily verify the correct spelling a number of train stations which give the proper spelling:

• Shimōsa-Manzaki Station (下総松崎駅)
• Shimōsa-Toyosato Station (下総豊里駅)
• Shimōsa-Nakayama Station (下総中山駅)
• Shimōsa-Tachibana Station (下総橘駅)
• Shimōsa-Kōzaki Station (下総神崎駅)

For the visually inclined, you may even verify pictures of the above stations at Commons. Here is one example showing Shimōsa Kōzaki Station. Regards, Bendono (talk) 09:34, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Your logic may seem sound in your head, but to call it "wrong" and "not a valid romanization" is a distortion. The fastest counterpoint: type 'shimosa' using wāpuro rōmaji, and you will have much trouble typing 下総. Moreover, シモーサ is merely a pronunciation and has nothing to do with orthography. The origin of the name is Shimo + tsu + Fusa, and this has changed in pronunciation to "shimōsa" over the ages. If one were to consider the 下 to have the pronunciation 'shimō' attached to it and the 総 to have the pronunciation 'sa' attached to it, they would be wrong, and thus the romanization would be wrong in an orthographical sense. By this line of logic, however, what of, something as (oh, let's arbitrarily pick one...) 上総? It came from kami + tsu + fusa, which changed to かづさ over time (and finally かずさ). One cannot extract pronunciations from the individual kanji from that at all.

Whether romanization should follow orthography or pronunciation is an issue that has not been resolved at MOS:J, which is really where this issue needs to be taken up. There is no "incorrect" romanization between the two, simply because the only "proper" way to put the name in writing, if there is one, is the Japanese language. The Japanese language doesn't dictate proper romanizations in and of itself, nor is any one organization currently a proper authority on how to romanize everything in the language; it's all up to the system you use, and Wikipedia's system is ambivalent in this case.

In fact, it's funny you should mention the train station, because at least one sign I can find pictures of on the Internet has it "misspelled" (according to what you say here). In fact, historical romanizations are pretty schizophrenic on the topic, too. For what it's worth, Papinot's dictionary uses "Shimōsa", "Kōchi", etc.

Taking it to Google as would normally settle a common-spelling issue would be pretty useless in this case, since wāpuro rōmaji's prevalence kind of screws with you. Google Books reveals many books (most of them authoritative enough to say, "okay, that's an accepted spelling") that use one way or the other. Still, you can find reasoning, questions, and de-facto standards going both ways if you put in the right queries. Granted, it's not a whole lot to look at.

For what it's worth, since we're supposed to use "revised Hepburn" here, Hepburn himself used "ou" for the verb 追う (or 追フ, as it was written in his day), in a very few spots, though I can't attest for sure that he used it anywhere else; e.g. he has 請う (請フ) as 'kō', 囲う (圍フ) as 'kakō', 憩う (休フ!!) as 'ikō'. His initial need for romanization was more or less for pronunciation purposes (at the time, kana didn't have a one-to-one correspondence with pronunciation). Wikipedia's needs may be different, though I'm no authority on that.

In summation: there is no clear policy on this for Wikipedian purposes, and to say one or the other is "wrong" is not entirely in the right as long as there is no "policy" to follow in this regard. -BRPXQZME (talk) 01:30, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

I think the spelling should follow the pronunciation. I was under the impression that the お and う of 下総 were pronounced separately, as in Marunouchi or Inoue. If this is not the case, and they are pronounced as オー, then the spelling should be ō. LeeWilson (talk) 13:56, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Hello. I grew up in Chiba. There are many place still with this name. We Japanese pronounce it シモーサ, not シモウサ. The o is long. 180.11.41.83 (talk) 02:59, 23 February 2010 (UTC)