Battle of the Ligurian Sea Battle of the Ligurian Sea The Battle of the Ligurian Sea was a naval surface action of the Second World War fought on 18 March 1945, in the Gulf of Genoa in the Mediterranean Sea. A "Kriegsmarine" flotilla of two torpedo boats and one destroyer was conducting an offensive mine laying operation when it was intercepted by a British Royal Navy force. The British destroyers and sank two of the German ships and severely damaged the third; it was the last German naval surface action of the war. At the Malta Conference (30 January – 3 February 1945), it was
Ligurian language (ancient) the Ligurian place-name "Genua" (modern Genoa, located near a river mouth) is claimed by Delamarre to derive from PIE *"ǵenu-", "chin(bone)". Many Indo-European languages use 'mouth' to mean the part of a river which meets the sea or a lake, but it is only in Celtic for which reflexes of PIE *"ǵenu-" mean 'mouth'. Besides Genua, which is considered Ligurian (Delamarre 2003, p. 177), this is found also in "Genava" (modern Geneva), which may be Gaulish. However, "Genua" and "Genava" may well derive from another PIE root with the form *"ǵonu-", which means "knee" (so in Pokorny, IEW). Delamarre's second