Talk:List of English monarchs

Ambiguous title
The title should be 'Monarchs of England'. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 01:18, 12 October 2023 (UTC)

Family Tree
Hello all I would like to understand why my family tree is deleted with the mention 'too small' when it is 1.8m by 2.6m? How can something that size be called small? It's also much more comprehensive, readable, and especially easier to understand than the mandatory tree. I'd just like to understand the logic behind it. Thank you very much. M F Gervais (talk) 22:37, 19 October 2023 (UTC)
 * It is 120 or 180 pixels across when displayed in the article. Clearly a file that size cannot be read when displayed at such a scale. Celia Homeford (talk) 07:51, 20 October 2023 (UTC)
 * I think it is safe to say that almost nothing, and I mean almost nothing, in the world was designed to be "read" in a 120x180 pixel format. That's why thumbnails, tiny images that you can click on to access a larger file, have become so popular. M F Gervais (talk) 17:04, 20 October 2023 (UTC)
 * It also seems you have an undeclared WP:COI and WP:SELFPROMOTE problem. Bazza (talk) 08:21, 20 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Hello everyone,
 * Not wanting to cause any trouble whatsoever and accepting your decision without quibble, I set about reading the articles that would cite my shortcomings.
 * So I carefully read the article about the WP:COI mentioned above. In my opinion, the key sentence describing this article is: Conflict of interest (COI) editing involves contributing to Wikipedia about yourself, family, friends, clients, employers, or your financial and other relationships. Any external relationship can trigger a conflict of interest. None of the above applies to me in any way whatsoever. I represent no one, least of all a company or group, not even myself, whether for profit or not. I therefore cannot declare a link about myself, friends, family, clients, employers or any type of financial ties that do not exist. So I'm confused. Did I've misunderstood the definition of conflict of interest as described in WP:COI? It would therefore be appreciated, in order to help me contribute in the future, if someone could explain to me how this conflict of interest seems to apply to me.
 * As for WP:SELFPROMOTE, I'm even more puzzled. The first sentence of the paragraph is: You should generally refrain from creating articles about yourself, or anyone you know, living or dead, unless through the Articles for Creation process. As you've probably seen, the published family tree is a complete visual transposition of the Wikipedia article List of English monarchs as well as two others, List of British monarchs and List of Scottish monarchs. So, apart from a few people at the end of the tree - King Charles III, his wife and their heir son - no one is alive. It goes without saying that I'm not represented in this tree, nor is anyone I might know from near or far, let alone a member of my family, and so on. So once again, please enlighten me. Where, or in what way, is my personal promotion involved in this image.
 * Finally, I'm sincerely sorry for causing trouble. This is why I would like to understand everything so that my future actions are in tune with my reality: namely, an unknown person transposing a written article from wikipedia into an image without being associated in any way whatsoever, with anyone or anything. I would therefore like to ask you to take a little of your time to explain to me what your assertions are with regard to my previous publication.
 * Thank you for your time. 173.179.89.77 (talk) 13:49, 20 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Assuming you've forgotten to sign in and really are : you wrote "my family tree", which I reasonably assumed meant a tree for a family of which you are a member. If I'm mistaken, then ignore my previous comments.
 * r Bazza (talk) 19:39, 20 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Have you just looked at it? "My" in the sense of "the one I did". M F Gervais (talk) 19:45, 20 October 2023 (UTC)

Merging 3 Pages
Idk if this was discussed but why aren't the monarchs of Wessex, England, and Britain on the same page? GamerKlim9716 (talk) 13:49, 27 November 2023 (UTC)


 * Why would they be? They are not the same entities. Bazza (talk) 14:33, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

12 July 927
The wild notion that the English monarchy was created on 12 July 927 is entirely implausible and unsupported by any source. The English monarchy began as the kings of Wessex who gradually and eventually established their dominance over the other Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, which didn't all unite on the same day. The text of this very article acknowledges that the kingdom formed during the reigns of Alfred, Edward and Athelstan, a period of decades. And there have been several discussions of that very topic on previous occasions (see archived talk pages). So I propose taking that date out of the infobox and substituting "tenth century" or "9th-10th centuries" or similar. Richard75 (talk) 13:35, 28 November 2023 (UTC)


 * @Richard75: Thank you for following WP:BRD; I partly because you had not provided a reason for making it.
 * I agree that the very specific date is a step too far, but the article suggests, in the lead's third paragraph (with two references), that 927 is a reasonable year to choose. Even if that precision is too much, I think broadening the date to centuries is a step too far, and would prefer to see c. 930 with a footnote.
 * Other editors may join in to disagree. Bazza (talk) 14:18, 28 November 2023 (UTC)
 * That is also a reasonable idea, although it has the drawback of implying that Alfred was not king of England, when an earlier consensus was that the list should start with him. Richard75 (talk) 15:40, 29 November 2023 (UTC)
 * The article states clearly in its lead that "Æthelstan became the first king to rule the whole of England when he conquered Northumbria in 927, and he is regarded by some modern historians as the first true king of England". That would need to be reconciled with any different claims. Bazza (talk) 10:21, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

That's very selective quoting! This is what the article says:

"Arguments are made for a few different kings thought to have controlled enough Anglo-Saxon kingdoms to be deemed the first king of England... Offa achieved a dominance over many of the kingdoms of southern England, but this did not survive his death in 796. Likewise, in 829 Egbert of Wessex conquered Mercia, but he soon lost control of it. It was not until the late 9th century that one kingdom, Wessex, had become the dominant Anglo-Saxon kingdom. Its king, Alfred the Great, was overlord of western Mercia and used the title King of the Angles and Saxons, but he never ruled eastern and northern England, which was then known as the Danelaw, having earlier been conquered by the Danes from southern Scandinavia. His son Edward the Elder conquered the eastern Danelaw, but Edward's son Æthelstan became the first king to rule the whole of England when he conquered Northumbria in 927, and he is regarded by some modern historians as the first true king of England. (Emphasis added.) Richard75 (talk) 23:17, 30 November 2023 (UTC)


 * @Richard75: It's not selective quoting, and you don't need to show me the paragraph I've taken the words from. I'm asking how a definitive statement made in the article can be reconciled with other stuff which seems to obliquely contradict it.
 * Readers (me included) may look to find who actually was the first king of England, and will find the words "Æthelstan became the first king to rule the whole of England when he conquered Northumbria in 927". That's pretty definitive. The qualifier which follows ("and he is regarded by some modern historians as the first true king of England") suggests this is backed up by some experts, even if other disagree (as is often the case in any supposition).
 * The sentence in question is preceded by others about those who didn't quite make the mark (including Alfred); and is followed by a couple who came much later. Either the definitive statement needs to be not so assertive, or the article needs to adopt 927, or thereabouts, as a good stick in the sand.
 * It did occur to me that there's no indication in the lead of what "England" is, but Kingdom of England is helpfully linked and currently seems to use 927 as a starting point, albeit tagged for further checks. Bazza (talk) 10:05, 1 December 2023 (UTC)


 * The paragraph as a whole makes it clear that there isn't a definitive answer and that there is disagreement on the subject. Maybe the bit you picked up on needs to be re-worded a little. It isn't Wikipedia's job to decide which historians are right. Richard75 (talk) 10:20, 1 December 2023 (UTC)
 * P.S.- Apologies if my previous comment was rude. Richard75 (talk) 14:13, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Alfred vs Athelstan
Who to start this list with has been debated a lot in this talk page over the years (in 2015, 2016, 2019 and 2022), and a consensus was reached to change it from Athelstan to Alfred. Please don't change it back without first getting a consensus to do that. (And frankly, don't even bother to do that because it's flogging a dead horse at this point!) Richard75 (talk) 11:36, 28 February 2024 (UTC)