I was thinking about The Hague, the Dutch city that is home to the U.N.’s International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court.
All the time I thought that it was just Hague, but in reality it is “The Hague” - Den Haag.
So it should be really correct to write that the international court is in the The Hague?
Many headlines in the American press do go like: “The court at The Hague found…”, no “the”, but I see places in Holland were they do add the article to the proper city name that is “The Hague”:
I don’t get why it could be. If the international court was constructed it Saskatoon, we would not say “the international court is in the Saskatoon” – just “the international court is in Saskatoon”. Replace Saskatoon with “The Hague” and you get just the one “the”, not two.
Or “the The Netherlands.” Or, for that matter, something like “The The Beatles were an influential band.” When “the” is included in part of the name, it usually gets dropped for the uncapitalized definite article when appropriate (or sometimes the capitalized “the” that is part of the name remains; either way, there’s just one “the.”) The first link where it says “Welcome at the The Hague Convention Convention Bureau” just sounds like badly rendered English. First, no English speaker would say “Welcome at.” Second, no native would double up on the “the” there, either.
Likewise, in America, official documents of a city often say “City of __________” on the letterhead (example) or on the signs you see as you enter the city. But some cities include the word “City” as part of the official city name (e.g., Kansas City, Carson City, Salt Lake City).
Would their letterhead (or city entrance signs) say “City of Carson City” or “City of Salt Lake City”. Only in bad translations, probably.
Because there are some placenames like that. Like Amsterdam is in the Netherlands. Yankee Stadium is in the Bronx. And there are several American cities that begin with "the " (The Dalles, OR; The Woodlands, TX; etc. And, of course, all the Spanish place names that start with “La” or “Las” or “Los” or whatever, if you want to count them.)
In any case I do agree with most of the posters then, “The Hague” it is and no extra “the” is needed even if the city is called like that, although I have a nit here:
Google does call it just Netherlands.
The Hague is just The Hague. I think I got to wonder because I thought all these years that the city was just called Hague.
Go back and read the OP. He wants to put another “the” in front of “The Hague”. I ask why? We don’t put “the” in front of city names, so why would “The Hague” need an extra “the” when referring to it.
“City of Carson” is the only reasonable way to put it, according to my gut. I remember in Boardwalk Empire, Nucky Thompson refers to the “City of Atlantic.” Makes total sense. But the Atlantic City website refers to the “City of Atlantic City,” which makes me want to go over there and have a word with their City Council City.
True, on its own or in a dateline, it’s just “Netherlands.” I guess that wasn’t the best example, because context would dictate whether the “the” is used or not. (Just like you would say “Chicago is in the United States of America” instead of “Chicago is in United States of America” in the same way you would say “Amsterdam is in the Netherlands” instead of “Amsterdam is in Netherlands.” (Or at least that’s the natural way for me to say it.)
Las Vegas (the meadows)
Los Angeles (the angels)
Los Alamos (the poplars)
Las Cruces (the crosses)
El Centro (the center)
El Cajon (the big box)
El Dorado (the golden one)
El Paso (the pass)
El Segundo (the second)
La Joya (the jewel)
La Mesa (the table)
La Plata (the silver)
La Villa (the village)
La Puente (the bridge)
La Vista (the view)
La Junta (the junction)
