[Musicbrainz-style] Sortname Question

[Don Redman]

On Wed, 18 May 2005 05:44:04 -0500, Cristov Russell wrote:

>> I think we have another tricky case to fix definititevely,
>> that is the "from" matter, which I can't found to be
>> discussed on wiki as it have to be.

>> 1) von Karajan, Herbert
>> or
>> 2) Karajan, Herbert von?
>>
>> Just to check, we all agree with 1), which puts correctly
>> Beethoven under "B"? If so IMO we have to wrote down the rule.
>>
>> Ciao
>>
>> MArco / ClutchEr2
>
> I would say 1 is correct. The article is considered part of the surname  
> for
> sorting. If you were to ask a native what the family name of these people
> were, the article would not be dropped because in some cases it would  
> make a difference.

That is wrong. The native (me :-) says: Yes the "von part" is a part of  
the last name but at least in Germany it is not part of the sortname.

The German sortname of "Herbert von Karajan" is "Karajan, Herbert von". I  
am 100% sure of that.

I am not sure whether this is true for other languages. It might be  
different in roman languages (French, Italian). What about Dutch?

The question is then, whether we want one guideline or language-specific  
ones. I perfer the latter.

   DonRedman



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