Talk:Ecclesiastical History of the English People

Move discussion
Shouldn't this article be moved to Ecclesiastical History of the English People, since this is the English Wikipedia? I know the book was written in Latin, but the article about Euclid's Elements is located at Euclid's Elements, not Στοιχεία του Ευκλείδη. –Benjamin  ( talk ) 01:40, 10 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Many Latin manuscipts on Wikipedia are called by the Latin name, but also many by the translation, there is no definitive rule. Probably comes down to most common and/or most professional use. --Stbalbach 02:51, 10 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I agree the article should be moved. In fact all articles with Latin titles should be moved, but at least this one should be.  So do it! :) Wjhonson 22:56, 24 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I disagree. When a work is commonly known by a Latin name, that name should be preserved and used to reference the work.  Species Plantarum (Linneaus) is always referred to as Species Plantarum.  I have never heard it called anything else.  This would also be applied to Systema Naturae.  Changing these to English equivalents would create confusion rather than assuage it.  The title of each work should be judged individually rather than appling a "blanket policy" to works written or titled in another language. Arx Fortis 05:09, 7 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I disagree also! the work was written in Latin (as mentioned above)and so should be kept in the original language. If it was transferred to English it would lose some of its feeling in the writing. and also it wourld have been written in Old English, something that we could not understand even if we tried. In the translation from Latin to English it would lose a lot (like i already said). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.65.164.254 (talk) 15:55, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Bede and footnoting
The claim here that Bede invented footnotes seems bizarre to me. I'm pretty certain that his _Historia ecclesiastica_ doesn't contain any, for a start! And I would have expected to have heard of this, since my professional research relates to Anglo-Saxon history. Does anyone know of any basis for this claim? Otherwise, I think it should be deleted.

It is bizarre, delete it. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof. Wjhonson 22:56, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Critics (cont.. edit note)
Sorry my edit note was cut off. I was saying, that criticizing Bede for not following professional historian standards is kinda anachronistic when it was standard practice by all historians of the period to simply make stuff up, lift entire passages from other works and copy them as their own etc.. "history" from the period is nothing like how history is defined today, it was akin to literature in form and function, written by people who were not part of a "historical profession" or had any standards of conduct. -- Stbalbach 01:40, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

This is discussed, in general, with references, at English historians in the Middle Ages. -- Stbalbach 01:49, 25 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Then link to that page possibly, but simply not stating it, gives people the impression that he was an accurate historian. You have to realize that every general reader reads these pages, not people *familiar* with the situation. Wjhonson 02:57, 25 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Fine. But it seems pretty silly to have to add a qualifier to every single article about every single author and work written before the 19th century, because of an assumption that the reader has an "impression" that they are an "accurate" history/historian.  -- Stbalbach 05:12, 25 June 2006 (UTC)


 * The implication, in the article and on this talk poage, that modern historical writing is by definition accurate, reference-citing, non-plagiaristic and objective, is utterly misleading! Some of it meets these criteria, some of it doesn't.


 * But, yes, the criteria of Bede and other medieval historians were different from those of modern academic historicans. If Bede stands out from the others, that fact belongs here. To the extent that they were all alike, English historians in the Middle Ages seems the place for general information about their aims and methods. Andrew Dalby 12:03, 7 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I could understand the objection to specifically pointing out the nature of medieveal historical writing if this article was long enough to warrant trimming, but this is not the case. For now, it serves as a good caveat lector for people unfamiliar with the topic/time period.  And I don't see anyone here claiming that "modern historical writing is by definition accurate, reference-citing, non-plagiaristic and objective."  All that the article is pointing out is that that medieval historical writing is less accurate, less reference-citing, more plagiaristic and less objective than what many people expect (erronously or not) of "modern" historical writing.--Hraefen Talk 14:40, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
 * I derived my view from the following words in the article: "cannot be expected to have the same degree of objectivity as modern historical writings" and from the following on the present page: "it was standard practice by all historians of the period to simply make stuff up, lift entire passages from other works and copy them as their own etc ... 'history' from the period is nothing like how history is defined today ... written by people who were not part of a "historical profession" or had any standards of conduct [presumably meaning "had no standards of conduct"?]. And I don't see any caveats about "what many people expect (erronously or not)". But it's probably not worth arguing over! All the best Andrew Dalby 19:10, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
 * I agree that the wording is not the best and if you review my edit from June 26 2006 I think (hope) you'll agree that I removed a bit of bias and made it generally more readable. Please tweak the wording a little more if you feel you can improve it.  There does still seem to be some undue respect paid to modern historians who are assumed to be free of bias (which is why I love Howard Zinn's acceptance of bias as inevitable).  I am just opposed to the removal of the mention that Bede cannot be taken at face value, even if this is still true of modern historians (although less true, in my opinion).--Hraefen Talk 20:00, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Bede's References
The 4th paragraph states Beed cited his references. The 5th paragraph states Bede did not provide refernces. Which is true?...or am I mis-reading something here?

Perhaps sometimes he did and sometimes he didn't (much like Wikipedia heheh).

Either way, neither of these assertions have their own references. Not really sure what should be done here, but perhaps someone knowledgeable can clarify and clean it up? Arx Fortis 05:27, 7 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I removed both references. That he did, or that he didnt, seems to be in conflict and so should have a citation itself instead of just being a bald statement. Wjhonson 04:55, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying. Arx Fortis 05:27, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Requested move

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of the . Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section. 

I propose that we move this page to Ecclesiastical History of the English People. I see from a discussion above that this is likely to be controversial, so I am listing it using the "Requesting potentially controversial moves" method at WP:RM.

I checked eleven secondary sources; I will give very abbreviated bibliographic info for them here but I can provide more if needed. Page numbers are exemplary to make it easy to check a ref; the uses are throughout as far as I checked.

Books using "Ecclesiastical History of the English People", "Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation", or "Ecclesiastical History":
 * Swanton, Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, p.129 n. 12
 * Campbell, The Anglo-Saxon State, per index and p. 43
 * Abels, Alfred the Great, xi (though he uses HE as the abbreviation, a relic of the Latin)
 * Farmer/Sherley-Price, Bede's Ecclesiastical History etc.; throughout
 * Keynes & Lapidge, Asser's Alfred the Great, generally, e.g. p.40, though the index itself gives the Latin first
 * Fletcher, Who's Who in Roman Britain and Anglo-Saxon England, p. 70
 * Campbell et al., The Anglo-Saxons, p. 29
 * Hunter Blair, Roman Britain and Early England, p. 3
 * Hunter Blair, An Introduction to Anglo-Saxon England, p. 322

Books using "Historia Ecclesiastica":
 * Stenton, Anglo-Saxon England, p. 8
 * Kirby, The Earliest English Kings, p. 25 n. 24; Kirby actually uses both forms, but the Latin is cited first.

I think this establishes that the English form is now more current in the secondary literature.

Where the Latin form is used, it's actually cited as "Historia Ecclesiastica", which is currently a dab, rather than the full form of "Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum". I would think there's a case to be made for making this article the target and putting a dab note at the top saying "for other uses of "Historia Ecclesiastica", see "Historia Ecclesiastica (disambiguation)". I'll refrain from making that move proposal now in case it confuses the issue, but anyone who comments on this proposal might comment on that too.  Mike Christie (talk) 20:05, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Alternate suggestion: Merge back to Bede. Section redirects are possible; if you insert,  #REDIRECT Pagetitle will redirect to it. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:54, 31 May 2007 (UTC)
 * There's currently not enough separate information in the two articles to justify a split, it's true. In the somewhat parallel case of Asser, who is really only notable for the work he wrote, the man and his work are both covered in a single article.  However, in Bede's case, I think there is a great deal to say about the Ecclesiastical History; the manuscript history itself could take quite a bit of coverage; and Bede is important for other reasons than just EH.  Hence I think I'd prefer to keep them separate.  Mike Christie (talk) 00:55, 1 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Then the English is probably better, I agree. And if you do intend to expand this article, it should not be merged. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:41, 1 June 2007 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the . Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The consensus view seems to be that the article should be merged into Bede, making any page moves redundant. It was requested that this article be renamed but there was no consensus for it be moved. --Stemonitis 11:45, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

"History of the manuscripts" section: Manuscript U at Weissenburg
The article says U has been at Weissenburg since the end of the Middle Ages. This conflicts with the information in the List of manuscripts of Bede's Historia Ecclesiastica article, which says U is at Wolfenbüttel and is known at one time to have been at Weissenburg. I assume (guesswork!) the Weissenburg referred to is the once-German town now in France and now called Wissembourg. Perhaps someone who knows could make the appropriate edits. Thanks.

Frans Fowler (talk) 20:25, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

731 and Muslim battle
I've deleted the note that read " . This refers to a passage that reads "remained for almost a fortnight. At this time* a terrible plague of Saracens ravaged Gaul with cruel bloodshed and not long afterwards* they received the due reward of their treachery* in the same kingdom. In the same year the holy man of God". The note on this in The Ecclesiastical History of the English People (Oxford World's Classics) by Bede, Judith McClure, Roger Collins and Bertram Colgrave says "not long afterwards: the only events this can refer to are the defeat of the first Arab attack on Gaul at Toulouse in 721 or that of another Arab raid at the battle of Poitiers in October (?) of 732 or 733. If it were the latter, this would represent a late revision or posthumous editorial addition to the text of Book V. Bede's lack of contemporary information about Arab attacks on Gaul is also apparent in the Chronicle." This does not suggest a problem with the dating of 731. Dougweller (talk) 14:41, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
 * fwiw, many historians think the Battle of Tours was actually in 733 anyway - see note 27 in the 1st line there. Johnbod (talk) 20:28, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

Title case
The Latin name is shown in title case in the OUP edition of the Ecclesiastical History, and it should surely be the same in the title of this article. Any reason why it is not? Dudley Miles (talk) 10:31, 29 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Probably because no one has gotten around to it. For a very long time ... italic titles were "discouraged" so a lot of articles still lack it. Ealdgyth - Talk 12:51, 29 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks Ealdgyth. What do you think of reviving Mike Christie's proposal to rename as the English name? I agree for the reasons he gave, but it seems to have failed for lack of opinions either way. Dudley Miles (talk) 13:07, 29 June 2014 (UTC)
 * I still think that would be a good idea. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 13:21, 29 June 2014 (UTC)

Requested move (2)

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: page moved. Armbrust The Homunculus 06:44, 10 July 2014 (UTC)

Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum → Ecclesiastical History of the English People – Mike Christie proposed this change back in 2007, and it was rejected on the ground of lack of consensus, even though the only editor to comment on the proposal supported it. The work is usually cited by its English name, as shown by Mike in the previous request, and people interested in the article will search for Ecclesiastical History in the great majority of cases. Dudley Miles (talk) 17:18, 3 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Support, per the previous discussion. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 17:22, 3 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Support Both the Oxford and Penguin editions use the English name and so do the Anglo-Saxon history books I've read.--Britannicus (talk) 17:35, 3 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Support This is one of the more prominent medieval histories and it's usually named in English. The more obscure histories often still get cited in their Latin form, however, including many of Bede's works. Ealdgyth - Talk 20:03, 3 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Support Everyking (talk) 20:28, 3 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Support per all Johnbod (talk) 00:19, 4 July 2014 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Orphaned references in Ecclesiastical History of the English People
I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Ecclesiastical History of the English People's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "DNB": From Geoffrey of Monmouth: J. C. Crick, "Monmouth, Geoffrey of (d. 1154/5)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004, accessed 7 June 2009 From Eorcenberht of Kent: S. E. Kelly, Eorcenberht, Oxford Online Dictionary of National Biography, 2004 From John Allen Giles:  From Augustine of Canterbury: Mayr-Harting "Augustine" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography From Wilfrid: Thacker "Wilfrid" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography From Justus: Hunt "Justus" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography From John Smith (priest, born 1659): </li> <li>From Wighard: Bateson "Wigheard" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography</li> <li>From Honorius of Canterbury: Hunt "Honorius (St Honorius)" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography</li> <li>From Nothhelm: Hunt and Mayr-Harting "Nothhelm" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography</li> <li>From Cuthbert: </li> <li>From William de St-Calais: Barlow "St Calais, William of" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography</li> <li>From Gesta Pontificum Anglorum: Thomson "Malmesbury, William of (b. c.1090, d. in or after 1142)" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography</li> <li>From Rædwald of East Anglia: Hunt, "Redwald", Dictionary of National Biography, p. 386</li> <li>From Mellitus: Brooks "Mellitus" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography</li> <li>From Deusdedit of Canterbury: Thacker "Deusdedit" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography</li> <li>From Eadbald of Kent: S. E. Kelly, Eadbald, Oxford Online Dictionary of National Biography, 2004</li> <li>From Romanus (bishop of Rochester): Beazley "Romanus" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography</li> <li>From John Stevens (translator): </li> <li>From Sæberht of Essex: Brooks "Mellitus (d. 624)" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography</li> <li>From Eanflæd: Thacker, Eanflæd</li> <li>From Christianisation of Anglo-Saxon England: Mayr-Harting "Augustine [St Augustine] (d. 604)" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography</li> <li>From List of Henry I's new men: Doherty "Henry I's new men (act. 1100-1135)" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography</li> <li>From Henry of Huntingdon: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography: Henry</li> <li>From Laurence of Canterbury: Brooks "Laurence" Oxford Dictionary of National Biography</li> </ul>

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 09:56, 29 December 2015 (UTC)