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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 85.197.46.63 (talk) at 17:19, 30 September 2016 (→The punctuation question: new section). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Former featured articleSanssouci is a former featured article. Please see the links under Article milestones below for its original nomination page (for older articles, check the nomination archive) and why it was removed.
Main Page trophyThis article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on May 14, 2006.
Article milestones
DateProcessResult
February 6, 2006Peer reviewReviewed
April 13, 2006Featured article candidatePromoted
December 20, 2013Featured article reviewDemoted
Current status: Former featured article

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Sanssouci as a motif on the 5 DDM banknote?

Being myself a child of the GDR I cannot confirm, that - as statet under "Sanssouci in modern times" - the palace was used as a motif on the 5 DDM banknote in 1984. The last issue of that banknote was published in 1975 and showed a portrait of Thomas Muentzer (front) and a fleet of combine harvesters on a field (back). In fact, i was not able to find any proof of a german (post-WW2) banknote with a picture of that palace, nor was I able to find someone, who ever possessed such a note. So maybe you should delete that part...

greetings Kampfbrot —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.193.233.199 (talk) 14:50, 11 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, I don't know where that info came from, but it is now removed. Please no-one re-insert it without some proof. Giano (talk) 16:33, 11 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
In 1986, East Germany issued two different 5 mark commemorative coins with a Potsdam theme. One of them depicted Sanssouci (see http://www.muenztreff.de/galerie/ddr/5mark/1609.php). Those coins were collector items, they were rarely (if ever) seen in circulation. Alfons Åberg (talk) 14:49, 21 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

couple of queries

Dear contributors: In the excerpt quoted below, I've changed the translation of "sans souci" from "carefree" to "free of care", which fits the grammar of the sentence. Is this OK?

My other question concerns the use of "Hence", which is unclear to me.

"With its extensive views of the countryside in the midst of nature, Frederick wanted to reside there sans souci (French for "free of care") and to follow his personal and artistic interests. Hence, the palace was intended for the use of Frederick and his private guests only during the summer months, from the end of April to the beginning of October."

Tony 14:06, 14 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I don't suppose the exact translation matters that much "Carefree", "Free of Care", of course the exact translation is "Without Care", and if you look at the lettering in one of the images, it is in fact spelt "Sans, Souci". I don't understand Germanic ancient French but perhaps the commar represented a missing word (like an apostrophe) ie "Without A Care" - just a personal theory. On your secod point when I was learning English "Hence" was an alternative word for "Therefore" or "Thus" so I don't see a problem with "Hence" in in that context. Giano | talk 18:02, 14 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I think "without a care" captures it. I'm not sure what the "Hence" is doing there - is it not possible to be free of care in the autumn or winter? -- ALoan (Talk) 21:02, 14 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Who ALoan is ever happy and carefree in the Winter and Autumn? People die in those seasons! Oh you English I despair - change what you like it matters nothing to me - I am without a care because it is summer, but we should remember poor Tony who is in winter! Giano | talk 21:20, 14 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, some of us are footloose and fancy-free, whatever the season! And other people have more cares in the long, hot, oppressive summer months than in the cool, blithe months of winter. I must admit that I struggle just a little to imagine our Freddy in "carefree" mode, though. -- ALoan (Talk) 22:16, 14 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"free of care" is clumsy, if not actually wrong, because one meaning of care is "caring for someone else, eg who's sick" and it sounds more like this use, whereas actually Frederick meant "[a place] without cares or worries". "Carefree" is probably better than "without a care", actually, which is what I just put in the article; never mind the sentence, it just fits better as a placename. I'll leave someone else to change it if they agree... Rd232 talk 22:37, 14 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"Without a care" is much better—I should have thought of that. I prefer winter to summer. The winters here are distressingly warm (max 18–20 degrees). Give me sunny, windless, really cold, crisp days and I'll be happy. Giano, I'd taken "hence" to mean "therefore"; so is the intended meaning that it's usual/possible to follow personal and artistic interests in the warmer months? If so, I guess I didn't get it because so many leisure interests are indoors in a cold climate, anyway.

Palace in Haiti

I'm not sure if it would be worth mentioning in the article (or even if I'm typing this in the right place), but Frederick named the palace after the similarly named one in Haiti: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sans-Souci_Palace. This, in turn, was named after the slave Sans-Souci, who was a major leader of the rebellion against both the French and ex-slaves like Christophe. Sans Souci refused to acknowledge Christophe's victory at his surrender (unlike the french's), so in response Christophe invited him to his home and killed Souci, later building the palace to secure this 'victory'. All of this is explained in Michel-Rolph Trouillot's book "Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History". So, it is in fact irrelevent what Sans, Souci means exactly in regards to "Without a Care", because it refers to a man's name. [Iball, 16:31, 26th May 2007]

Nice story, but I think you will find the one in Haiti was in fact built in 1810, a long time after the completetion of the Potsdamer Sanssouci which was built between 1745 and 1747. Giano 15:59, 26 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Template:Cv-unsure Hweimer (talk)

Today, the German Bundesgerichtshof ruled that images taken on Sanssouci's ground may only be legally distributed by consent with the foundation maintaining the property. So far, the decision seems to be available only in German, but the ruling means that you have to get written permission and pay a fee if you want to distribute the images. The guidelines for taking pictures of Sanssouci are available here, and it doesn't seem that the author of the images distributed on WP has sought proper permission. Note that this not really a copyright issue (this has long expired), but that your entrance to the property is governed by a contract that does not allow distribution of imagery. --Hweimer (talk) 18:40, 17 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

If this is true, let's delete the whole article. --Wetman (talk) 19:37, 17 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
English report --Hweimer (talk) 22:20, 17 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Complete poppycock. Even if genuine (and I find it hard to beleive Germany publishes its laws in "word", the law would not be retrospective. Assuming this new ruling were valid, Wikipedia as a non-cemmercial body would be exempt and failing all of that, the case in bound to be challenged in the European courts, where it will almost certainly not be upheld. Wikipedia has nothing to worry about with the images used here.  Giacomo  22:29, 17 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Unfortunately, I think you got a bit confused here. There is no law involved in the matter, except for basic contract law, which should be equivalent in almost every jurisdiction. The contract, which you implicitly agree to when you set foot inside the property, is reproduced in the Word document above. This contract restricts the distribution of images taken during your visit to a level that even the non-free provisions of WP would not apply (and since CC-BY-SA allows commercial redistribution, the non-commercial clause would not help anyway). There is no reason to believe that the contract was different at the time when the pictures for WP were taken, and also very little reason to believe that the contract would be deemed to be unenforceable by any other court of law, be it in Europe or in the US.--Hweimer (talk) 22:45, 17 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
You are mistaken and confused I fear; a contract is only binding when all parties have indicated that they are fully aware and agree to be bound by it; as this clearly needed to be clarified in law, it must be assumed that this was not the case before. Therefore, the ruling cannot be retrospective under European law.  Giacomo  22:50, 17 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
It's not that, the what the ruling says is that the Stiftung's provisions, which allow a fee to be charged for photography, are within the confines of prevailing law. 74.65.111.74 (talk) 00:54, 18 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Haven't read the decisions themselves, but from the press release it seems that the BGH ruled on commercial use only. Since Wikipedia is non-commercial the story should end right there. 74.65.111.74 (talk) 00:54, 18 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
First, WP's licenses (CC-BY-SA/GFDL) allow commercial distribution, and this is a good thing. Second, the contract with the foundation only allows distribution within a very narrow non-commercial scope, which WP clearly doesn't fall under.--Hweimer (talk) 04:20, 18 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Why would the type of image license matter? The defendants in that case were two photo agencies and a movie company, all three of them for-profit businesses. The court argues that even though Preußische Schlösser und Gärten is public property they may charge commercial entities for image rights. That and nothing more is the scope of the case. Wikipedia is non-commercial, so the case does not apply. Of course any commercial publisher can reuse imagery from Wikipedia provided the license terms are followed, but when Schlösser und Gärten property is involved that would be between the user and Schlösser und Gärten. 74.65.111.74 (talk) 04:43, 18 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Clearly not FA level

This article is clearly not up to modern WP:FA standards; even a quick glance shows numerous unreferenced paragraphs. References are poorly formatted; there are MoS issues (improper use of bold text), and so on. Is there anyone interested in improving this before I slap {{FAR}} on this relic? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 11:08, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I think I am one of the few who watch this and attempt it maintain it and I only re-wrote it when the original authors were having a job to get it through FAC years ago. Do what you like; I don't believe in FAs anymore and believe an article is often better and often has more integrity and freedom without the little star. I don't see anything lacking a reference that isn't fairly widely known and accepted. So it's up to you. I shall continue to maintain it whatever.  Giano  12:49, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I appreciate that you are maintaining it, and I certainly have quite a few issues about the FA process. That said, with many unreferenced paragraphs, this simply does not qualify as a FA. Sure you wouldn't be interested in adding those references? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 02:55, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
What exactly do you feel needs reffing, what is it you are unsure of? I am very disinclined to spend a long time reffing the unquestionable and obvious; but I'll take a quick look at whatever it is that's troubling you.  Giano  10:36, 20 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It's the general problem with unreferenced paragraphs. Where did the information come from? Can we trust it? Even with an expert like yourself paying attention to the article, can you be 100% sure that there are no errors, if we cannot easily verify the sources? And while experienced Wikipedians like myself can see that you are maintaining higher-than-it-would-appear-on-first-glance standards here, for 99.9% of our readers this is not a judgement they can be expected to make. Yes, the article is probably mostly correct, but unless we can properly verify it, I don't think this article should be starred as Featured. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 07:34, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Piotrus, I cannot be bothered to go through the page and provide an exact ratio of references to words. I don't see any errors or even anything particularly controversial. It's a page on a tiny palace in Germany not a page explaining the origins and causes of the Big Bang. I keep telling you, I am not bothered if it's an FA or not. If it's that bothersome, why don't you leave a note on the pages of the original authors (if they are still here) and ask them where they found it - otherwise, let it be de-FAd  Giano  09:22, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Done and done. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 07:23, 22 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Well as they have not edited since 2008 and 2009 respectively, I would not hold my breath waiting for them.  Giano  08:23, 22 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Post WWII Meetings

The Palace was used for meetings between the Allied Leaders in the immediate aftermath of the War- there should be some reference to that here I think. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.254.58.205 (talk) 00:20, 9 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Featured Article Review

Have been started for this article at Wikipedia:Featured article review/Sanssouci/archive1. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 07:13, 25 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Potsdam is not Berlin

Why is the destruction of the Berliner Stadtschloss mentioned?101.98.175.68 (talk) 01:45, 12 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Because it's an interesting and worthy of note comparison of how less fortunate some other relics of Imperial Germany were under communist rule. Giano (talk) 08:32, 12 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The punctuation question

If you read the punctuation marks as words, then you have a punning French sentence: 'sans virgule souci point'. 'Virgule' means a rod or staff, 'point' means 'not at all'. Frederick the Great was famously celibate. So 'without a rod, no cares at all' suggests he was celebrating his own impotence.

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