Talk:Great Seal of the Realm

Untitled
This does not seem a proper redirect. The page redirected to discusses the history of the keeper of the seal, not what the seal is, nor the role it plays in goverment. Elde 06:51, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Edward VIII
What about Edward VIII's seal? Kowalmistrz (talk) 14:42, 18 July 2010 (UTC)

English translation of Elizabeth II's seal
The Latin of Elizabeth II's seal is pretty clearly indicating that she's the queen of Britain (or maybe "the Britains?") -- Britanniarum, but in the English translation her English-language title of "Great Britain and Northern Ireland" is given instead. --Jfruh (talk) 15:36, 12 January 2011 (UTC)


 * This English translation certainly isn't as literal as the others are. It is the full title of which the Latin is the official translation, apparently. Perhaps there ought to be two English translations here, the literal and the official? As it is, it may be confusing to anyone trying to decipher the Latin. Cymrodor (talk) 00:33, 28 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Her Majesty's title is defined by an Order in Counsel, which gives an official English version and an official Latin version. In the Latin version "of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland" is rendered "Britanniarum", which literally means "of the Britains" (not "of the Britons", which would be Britanniorum). Hogweard (talk) 22:18, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

Commissioners
We have an article on the Lord Keeper of the Great Seal but no article or section on Commissioner of the Great Seal. Rich Farmbrough, 14:13, 27 February 2012 (UTC).

Some monarchs had more than one great seal
It needs to be made clear which seal is being used. For example Henry VIII had three seals during his reign. He was not style Defender of the Faith until after the Pope said he was, and he did not become King of Ireland until some time after his reign started (before that he was style like his father Lord of Ireland).

In the long term I would suggest that the years in which a seal was in used is added to the article, but in the short term, it would be useful to note if a monarch had more than one great seal.



-- PBS (talk) 10:16, 5 June 2016 (UTC)

Recent changes to lead
I'd like to explain my recent reverts. I believe this version is poorly written because the lead sentence focuses on the union of Scotland and England to form Great Britain -- no where in it does it explain what seal is. This is in violation of WP:LEAD, which states "The lead should stand on its own as a concise overview of the article's topic. It should identify the topic, establish context, explain why the topic is notable, and summarize the most important points."The version I've tried reverting to does explain what the seal is and complies with WP:LEAD.  Calidum   02:16, 23 December 2016 (UTC)

Your point is understood, and no more edits will take place to the existing lead paragraph until we both reach a consensus. The lead paragraph is inconsistent with the body of the article because before the union of Scotland and England, Queen Anne did not style herself Queen of England, she styled herself Queen of Great Britain. You have to understand the paradox situation. Her realm did not only include the Kingdom of England it also included the Kingdom of Scotland. Two Kingdoms, One Realm, and that occurred because in 1603, the Kingdom of England, essentially, in the royal sense, became a vassal kingdom of the Kingdom of Scotland. Meenmore (talk) 02:31, 23 December 2016 (UTC)

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Incorrect and unsourced seal legends.
Researching the seal of William & Mary I read the legend here as ending 'Golden apples grow in flowering rosebushes : The security of Britain restored.' but this is not the right inscription, it is one taken from a commemorative coronation medal. I found this in D. Macleane The great solemnity of the coronation... (London 1911) pp. 168-169 but there was no citation provided for the incorrect original. None of the other seal legends on the page have been cited, and may be similarly inaccurate. Corinthians2021 (talk) 12:21, 16 April 2021 (UTC)

Crown Office Tweets
See [this thread]. Some of it could be incorporated. Robin S. Taylor (talk) 23:11, 17 August 2022 (UTC)

Great Seal of the United Kingdom
you have undone my change to the first sentence without justification, and supplying an erroneous claim in lieu of it. The Acts of Union clearly state, in the first instance, that the seal is to be known as the "the Great Seal for the United Kingdom of Great Britain" [sic], followed by two references to "the Great Seal of the United Kingdom" [sic] without any mention of "Great Britain". There does not appear to be any substance to your suggestion that the word "United" should be decapitalized, and even if it were, as was frequently the case in early American constitutional documents, that would not change the fact that the standard spelling of the "United Kingdom of Great Britain" is to capitalize both initials. Furthermore, the manuscript copies of the Treaty of Union demonstrate, that, at least in Articles I and II, the "United Kingdom" and "United Kingdom of Great Britain" are written as such, and not as "united Kingdom of Great Britain", as you have tried to claim. The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 17:12, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Please see the text of the Articles of Union provided by the UK Parliament website here. As you can see in Article XXIV "united" is not capitalilized every time it is mentioned. Parliament has deliberately used this orthography to avoid the confusion that you have fallen into. But this is a side issue. The main point is you are over-interpeting a primary text in a way that is not permitted in Wikipedia - please see WP:PRIMARY. The major point is the United Kingdom was created in 1801.. The state that existed between 1707 and 1801 was called simply "Great Britain" and normally referred to as the Kingdom of Great Britain. You can't misuse the looseness of 18th century orthography to change this and claim the "United Kingdom" and its seal pre-dates 1801. (WP:PRIMARY doesn't allow you to do that.). One cannot draw conclusions from whether a letter is or is not capitalised in an 18th century document - modern orthographical rules didn't apply. What Parliament's version of the Articles of Union I linked to does is to correct that looseness so there is no such misuse. DeCausa (talk) 18:09, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * By the way, I thought you might like the irony of the 1800 Act of Union refering to the "Great Seal of Great Britain". DeCausa (talk) 19:38, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * , apologies for my long answer, but your claims need answering in full. Firstly, at least one of your sources directly contradicts your claim:
 * The other two simply say that the present-day UK was created in 1801, which is perfectly true, but wholly irrelevant to the question of what the Great Seal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain was called.
 * Secondly, you appear to be doing precisely what you warn against: you claim "Parliament has deliberately used this orthography" but then "You can't misuse the looseness of 18th century orthography" and "One cannot draw conclusions from whether a letter is or is not capitalised in an 18th century document". You appear to be misusing one document (which decapitalizes "united", which was not done in 1707) to invalidate another document on legislation.gov.uk which does (exactly as was done in 1707). As you may know, capitalizing all nouns was common practice in the 18th century, which is why, for example, the American Declaration of Independence did not capitalize "united" in "united States of America". All the more reason why it is striking that the 1707 manuscript used "United Kingdom" and not "united Kingdom". Apart from anything else, your claim that "Parliament has deliberately used this orthography" obviously isn't even true, since in some places the orthography "United Kingdom" is used. Moreover, the document you cite is not a publication of parliament, even if the PDF is hosted on the parliamentary website. Rather, it is a transcription from "Tome IV" of "The History and Proceedings of the House of Commons" published in 1742 (it says this at the foot of the PDF). So what you done is to argue that the handwritten copy of 1707 is wrong, and the digital copy on legislation.gov.uk is wrong, because a middle 18th-century private publication ("London: Printed for, and sold at the Ship without Temple-Bar, and at York and Scarborough. 1742") fails to capitalize "united" in "United Kingdom". This is a very unsound argument! Your claim "Parliament has deliberately used this orthography" simply isn't true. One might equally apply it to the parliamentary website which today says:
 * Thirdly, if the United Kingdom, and its Great Seal, did not exist in 1707, then it would be very curious of the Parliament of Great Britain to make such laws as:
 * What does this "United Kingdom" refer to if not the same "United Kingdom" mentioned several dozen times in the 1707 Acts of Union? Where is the reliable source that claims that the United Kingdom created in 1707 was somehow not the United Kingdom and that the Great Seal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain was somehow repeatedly wrongly named in the Acts of Union?
 * Thirdly, reliable sources state quite unequivocally that the United Kingdom was created in 1707. Among them I cite Professor John Ford, Chair in Civil Law at the University of Aberdeen; Dr Alexander Murdoch, of the University of Edinburgh; Allan MacInnes, Emeritus Professor of History at the University of Strathclyde; Colin Turpin, Fellow of Clare College, Emeritus Reader in Public Law at the University of Cambridge, and sometime editor of the Cambridge Law Journal; Adam Tomkins, John Millar Professor of Public Law at the University of Glasgow; Roger Masterman, Professor of Constitutional Law at Durham Law School and editor of the journal Public Law; Colin Murray, Professor of Law and Democracy at Newcastle Law School; W. A. Speck, Professor of Modern History at the University of Leeds and sometime president of the Historical Association;and Niall Ferguson, Milbank Family Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University and formerly Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History at Harvard University. Are all of these people wrong, in your esteemed view?
 * Lastly, the fact that the UK was established in 1707 is not some arcane fact, but common knowledge, widely reported.
 * Please forgive the slightly overkill nature of the citations, but it really is quite beyond contention that the United Kingdom of Great Britain was created by acts of parliaments in 1707, with a seal to match, just as the Treaty of Union, and the Acts of Union which ratified it state, and just as subsequent 18th-century legislation makes plain. The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 21:33, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * What does this "United Kingdom" refer to if not the same "United Kingdom" mentioned several dozen times in the 1707 Acts of Union? Where is the reliable source that claims that the United Kingdom created in 1707 was somehow not the United Kingdom and that the Great Seal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain was somehow repeatedly wrongly named in the Acts of Union?
 * Thirdly, reliable sources state quite unequivocally that the United Kingdom was created in 1707. Among them I cite Professor John Ford, Chair in Civil Law at the University of Aberdeen; Dr Alexander Murdoch, of the University of Edinburgh; Allan MacInnes, Emeritus Professor of History at the University of Strathclyde; Colin Turpin, Fellow of Clare College, Emeritus Reader in Public Law at the University of Cambridge, and sometime editor of the Cambridge Law Journal; Adam Tomkins, John Millar Professor of Public Law at the University of Glasgow; Roger Masterman, Professor of Constitutional Law at Durham Law School and editor of the journal Public Law; Colin Murray, Professor of Law and Democracy at Newcastle Law School; W. A. Speck, Professor of Modern History at the University of Leeds and sometime president of the Historical Association;and Niall Ferguson, Milbank Family Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University and formerly Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History at Harvard University. Are all of these people wrong, in your esteemed view?
 * Lastly, the fact that the UK was established in 1707 is not some arcane fact, but common knowledge, widely reported.
 * Please forgive the slightly overkill nature of the citations, but it really is quite beyond contention that the United Kingdom of Great Britain was created by acts of parliaments in 1707, with a seal to match, just as the Treaty of Union, and the Acts of Union which ratified it state, and just as subsequent 18th-century legislation makes plain. The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 21:33, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Lastly, the fact that the UK was established in 1707 is not some arcane fact, but common knowledge, widely reported.
 * Please forgive the slightly overkill nature of the citations, but it really is quite beyond contention that the United Kingdom of Great Britain was created by acts of parliaments in 1707, with a seal to match, just as the Treaty of Union, and the Acts of Union which ratified it state, and just as subsequent 18th-century legislation makes plain. The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 21:33, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Lastly, the fact that the UK was established in 1707 is not some arcane fact, but common knowledge, widely reported.
 * Please forgive the slightly overkill nature of the citations, but it really is quite beyond contention that the United Kingdom of Great Britain was created by acts of parliaments in 1707, with a seal to match, just as the Treaty of Union, and the Acts of Union which ratified it state, and just as subsequent 18th-century legislation makes plain. The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 21:33, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Lastly, the fact that the UK was established in 1707 is not some arcane fact, but common knowledge, widely reported.
 * Please forgive the slightly overkill nature of the citations, but it really is quite beyond contention that the United Kingdom of Great Britain was created by acts of parliaments in 1707, with a seal to match, just as the Treaty of Union, and the Acts of Union which ratified it state, and just as subsequent 18th-century legislation makes plain. The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 21:33, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Lastly, the fact that the UK was established in 1707 is not some arcane fact, but common knowledge, widely reported.
 * Please forgive the slightly overkill nature of the citations, but it really is quite beyond contention that the United Kingdom of Great Britain was created by acts of parliaments in 1707, with a seal to match, just as the Treaty of Union, and the Acts of Union which ratified it state, and just as subsequent 18th-century legislation makes plain. The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 21:33, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Lastly, the fact that the UK was established in 1707 is not some arcane fact, but common knowledge, widely reported.
 * Please forgive the slightly overkill nature of the citations, but it really is quite beyond contention that the United Kingdom of Great Britain was created by acts of parliaments in 1707, with a seal to match, just as the Treaty of Union, and the Acts of Union which ratified it state, and just as subsequent 18th-century legislation makes plain. The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 21:33, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Please forgive the slightly overkill nature of the citations, but it really is quite beyond contention that the United Kingdom of Great Britain was created by acts of parliaments in 1707, with a seal to match, just as the Treaty of Union, and the Acts of Union which ratified it state, and just as subsequent 18th-century legislation makes plain. The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 21:33, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Please forgive the slightly overkill nature of the citations, but it really is quite beyond contention that the United Kingdom of Great Britain was created by acts of parliaments in 1707, with a seal to match, just as the Treaty of Union, and the Acts of Union which ratified it state, and just as subsequent 18th-century legislation makes plain. The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 21:33, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Please forgive the slightly overkill nature of the citations, but it really is quite beyond contention that the United Kingdom of Great Britain was created by acts of parliaments in 1707, with a seal to match, just as the Treaty of Union, and the Acts of Union which ratified it state, and just as subsequent 18th-century legislation makes plain. The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 21:33, 21 October 2023 (UTC)


 * WP:WALLOFTEXT which will be ignored. On a scan, none of it seem relavant. To cut to the chase: here's WP:RS that reference it as the "Great Seal of Great Britain". End of. DeCausa (talk) 21:39, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * , Your "RS" was originally published in 1874 and repeatedly uses the phrase "Great Seal of the United Kingdom". Under the heading "NOTE 84 - The Great Seal of the United Kingdom", it says the following:
 * This appears to directly contradict your claims. End of? The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 21:49, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Yes end of. Just google "Great Seal of Great Britain" literally dozens and dozens of statutory references. This is a waste of time. Start an RfC if you're really that obsessed and ill-informed. DeCausa (talk) 21:59, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * If I'm the one that's ill-informed, why is you that has repeatedly tried to support your arguments with documents that don't support your claims and clearly support the fact that "Great Seal of the the United Kingdom" was used in 1707 and after? Won't an RfC just tell you same thing? The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 22:02, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * I've just notice what you previously said! It only refers to the GS of the UK post-1801! It quite clearly refers to "great seal of Great Britain" prior to that. You seem to have a comprehension problem. I'm sorry, WP:CIR. DeCausa (talk) 22:06, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * No, I think it must be you who has a problem comprehending. The sources you produced say, quite unequivocally, "By Art. 34 of the Union between England and Scotland (5 Anne 8), it is provided that there should be one Great Seal for the United Kingdom". The "Union between England and Scotland" took place in 1707, by means of the Acts of Union 1707, which Wynne Baxter cites as "5 Anne 8",  i.e., in the reign of Anne, Queen of Great Britain. The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 22:10, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * And again, another source you supplied says: "There were Great Seals for Scotland and Ireland, but the Great Seal of the United Kingdom superseded the former in 1707 and the latter in 1800." The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 22:12, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * "The Office of Keeper of the Great Seal of Great Britain". Can you read???? DeCausa (talk) 22:13, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Sure I can read. I would be grateful if you have similar courtesy. I even put the relevant sections in bold to help you. The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 22:14, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * And I even put it in quotes for you. I ask again, can you read that? Or do you have a difficultly with the phrase "The Office of Keeper of the Great Seal of Great Britain". Is there something about that that confuses you? DeCausa (talk) 22:17, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * What confuses me is that you yourself have laid out two sources which unequivocally state that in 1707, a new seal was created which was called the Great Seal of the United Kingdom. Are you disputing this now? Are you questioning the reliability of the sources which minutes ago you described as "RS"? If not, why then do you continue to claim that the Great Seal was not called what it is called in the Acts of Union? Or have you dropped this untenable claim now? The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 22:20, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * FFS, this is going in circles. The reference to "United Kingdom" is not to the 1707 creation but, as a name, to the 1801 creation. Your orthographic confusion was widely discussed across Wikipedia and what I'm trying to tell you is the WP:CONSENSUS. Check out multiple related articles - you're not saying anything that wasn't raised and dismissed a decade ago. Otherwise, how on earth do you explain the attestation of the Act of Union 1800 being "His Majesty...shall declare under the Great Seal of Great Britain..". (don't bother answering, I won't be reading it). Start an RfC. DeCausa (talk) 22:35, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * No, I'm afraid that your claim is untenable. It is not possible to derive the erroneous claim:
 * from the source text:
 * This text makes no mention of Ireland or of 1801. It cannot be reasonably denied that the source, just like all the others I have cited, and just like the Acts of Union themselves, explicitly says the "Great Seal of the United Kingdom'" was created as consequence of Article 34 [recte 24] of the Acts of Union. This Article 24 states, as has already been said:
 * "That from and after the Union there be one Great Seal for the United Kingdom of Great Britain which shall be different from the Great Seal now used in either Kingdom" … "the Great Seal of the United Kingdom"
 * If it's going in circles it's because you refuse to accept the obvious. The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 23:30, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * On the BBC Bitesize website it makes it clear for even for children: "A Great Seal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain would replace the separate seals of both Scotland and England. The Scottish crown jewels were to remain in Scotland." The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 23:32, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * If there was any further room for doubt, on dealing with the actual seal Queen Anne had made following the union of 1707, Wyon & Wyon, in their very detailed work on the Great Seals, say of Anne's second seal:
 * That about nails down the coffin of any claim that there was not a "Great Seal of the United Kingdom" from 1707. The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 02:39, 30 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Ha! WP:AGEMATTERS: antiquarian engraver quoting directly 18th century text (just as you did). Hardly! DeCausa (talk) 07:07, 30 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Are you suggesting that the source you quoted from 1874 is acceptable (even though it proves my arguments and disproves yours), but a source from 1887 is unacceptable because it's too old? Are you aware that that does not make sense? Previously you relied on a source from 1742. Aren't you applying a double standard in an effort to defend the indefensible? The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 16:14, 30 October 2023 (UTC)
 * And can you stop pinging me. It's not the norm to do that in an ongoing thread. DeCausa (talk) 22:09, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * That about nails down the coffin of any claim that there was not a "Great Seal of the United Kingdom" from 1707. The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 02:39, 30 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Ha! WP:AGEMATTERS: antiquarian engraver quoting directly 18th century text (just as you did). Hardly! DeCausa (talk) 07:07, 30 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Are you suggesting that the source you quoted from 1874 is acceptable (even though it proves my arguments and disproves yours), but a source from 1887 is unacceptable because it's too old? Are you aware that that does not make sense? Previously you relied on a source from 1742. Aren't you applying a double standard in an effort to defend the indefensible? The wisest fool in Christendom (talk) 16:14, 30 October 2023 (UTC)
 * And can you stop pinging me. It's not the norm to do that in an ongoing thread. DeCausa (talk) 22:09, 21 October 2023 (UTC)