Talk:Vitebsk

Alternative spellings of Vitebsk and other place names in Belarus

The variety of alternative spellings is explained by different transliterations of both Russian and Belarusian names. In Belarusian 'Łacinka" the city name is spelled Viciebsk. The pronunciation in Russian in Belarusian is close, both are palatalised, the Belarusian has palatalised /ts'/, the Russian has palatalised /t'/. As with other Belarusian proper names, there are active edit wars as to how to spell the names in English and other languages, based on Russian or Belarusian and which transliteration method to use.

Logically Polish should be - Wiciebsk and Czech - Vitěbsk (whether Belarusian or Russian was taken as a base). Anatoli 13:42, 13 September 2009 (UTC)