Talk:Malcolm III of Scotland/Archive 1

Naming Convention
Sorry, but the recent revert is clearly contrary to Wikipedia naming conventions. See Naming Conventions. It is a clear Wikipedia convention to refer to refer to people, including monarchs, by the name by which they are most commonly known in English. As a general rule, this does mean using anglicised versions of names. The only exceptions might be (see Talk:Umberto I of Italy) where the anglicised version is not common in English (e.g. Humbert). Please don't try to argue that this convention only applies to the titles of articles. This is the first time I have seen some of these monarchs not referred to by their English names, and (as the article touches on) I expect that in some cases the English names are the names they were baptised with, not the work of later historians, and the names the article uses are Gaelicisations fo English names rather than vice versa. PatGallacher 23:35, 2005 July 30 (UTC)


 * Gaelicizations in some cases, but in the cases of most, these are modern English versions, and one has to be consistent. No matter the narrowness of your reading, it is quite common to refer to Malcolm as Máel Coluim in the context of Scottish kings these days, and Malcolm is certainly one of the more horrific anglicizations. In any case, there are a whole bunch of non-Anglicized names on Wiki. Anyways, since the trend is towards Anglicizations, I've leave them all, so long as the authentic and Gaelicized names are kept in brackets on first appearance. User:Calgacus 23:47, 2005 July 30


 * Pat is correct. This is extremely confusing for the general reader and is a clear contravention of Wikipedia's naming convention for people: this monarch's name should reflect "the name that is most generally recognisable". It may be "quite common to refer to Malcolm as Máel Coluim" (although I would contest such an assertion), but "quite common" is not good enough. The most common form is what is required. In the English language, this man is most commonly known as Malcolm III or Malcolm Canmore. The image on the page illustrates the point rather well. Other non-anglicized names on Wikipedia may fall into the category which Pat describes, or perhaps they too should be changed to the "most generally recognisable name". There existence is irrelevant to this article. As you say, the Gaelic version of the name should, of course, always appear bracketed in the introductory paragraph. The same is true of all the Kings Kenneth, Duncan and Donald who have also disappeared. Verica Atrebatum 19:57, 15 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Well, the Canmore thing is addressed in the article, so that's not an option. Given that Máel (Whatever) names are rather common - Máel Duins, Máel Isus, Máel Sechnaills, Máel Ruanaids, Máel Snechtais, Máel Brigtes and Máel Coluims are all present now on Wikipedia, using Máel (Whatever) is something we're stuck with - there are only four cases where one might argue that the latinate form is a common one, and just the one where I'd be inclined to agree that it was the better form. Even if we accept that it is better for kings, we are left with the odd sight of having "Malcolm II" appearing alongside Máel Coluim mac Maíl Brigte, and so on.


 * The argument that "least surprise" is achieved by using the latinate forms is superficially plausible, but it just defers the surprise from arrival until the point in the article where the first unavoidable Gaeliform named person appears. The "X mac Y (Anglicised Z)" formula addresses expectations to minimise surprise and ensures that names are similar in language throughout. Whether the page name should be "X numeral of Scotland", "Z numeral of Scotland", "X numeral, King of Scots", "Z numeral, King of Scots" or (as I'd prefer) "X mac Y" is neither here nor there as the content will be the same in all cases. It's all a storm in a teacup. Angus McLellan (Talk) 20:53, 15 August 2006 (UTC)


 * I must agree with the correspondents above and against Angus that the article title contravenes Wikipedia naming policy. Not only does it not use the most recognizable name, but it contravenes the policy that names should be in English form where possible. Now, no-one but a barbarian would, for example, entitle articles on the French kings Louis as "Lewis", because the French form is the most commonly used form in the English world. But the French kings Philippe and Jean are more commonly known as "Philip" and "John", and thus are their Wikipedia articles called. Similarly, few people (outside of Scotland, at any rate) would recognize Máel Coluim as the widely-used English name "Malcolm", and most English-language works (outside of Scotland) would use the Gaelic form. So the article title should be "Malcolm III" as likely to be msot recognizable. The Gaelic form should certainly appear in the first paragraph, although I would suspect the Anglicized form throughout the rest of the article would be more consistent. The Gaelic form should certainly be used in the article titles of the Gaelic or Scots versions of Wikipedia.


 * This might seem like much ado about nothing, but if so, then why not adhere to the clear Wikipedia guidelines? Wikipedia is not the forum to strike a blow for Scottish/Gaelic identity and nationalism by playing with article titles. For a similar issue, compare the debate about naming the Byzantine emperors.


 * Anyhow, will someone change the naming conventions in this (and other Scottish king) articles, and will others refrain from reverting these changes? (apologies for a rather prolix entry) --Iacobus 00:27, 24 August 2006 (UTC)


 * The problem for your view, Iacobus, is that most of the contemporary historical writing on this monarch call him Máel Coluim, not Malcolm. When you request that Angus reject the usage of the historians who work on this topic for the simple aim of dumbing down and anglicizing, it's not a request I'd say should be taken very seriously. You've also missed one crucial point; Máel Coluim is not his name name in modern Gaelic; this is in fact Maol Chaluim (Bald one, i.e. devotee, of Columba), or in Hebridean Gaelic, where the name was never very common, simply Calum (Columba). Máel Coluim is pre-13th century common Scottish and Irish spelling of his name. So how exactly this is nationalist, is beyond me. Angus is simply following his sources. And wiki is very lucky to have a user who makes so much effort and spends so much of his own money enabling himself to use up-to-date scholarship, when without him wiki would be stuck with the third rate grossly inaccurate spam-fests which were the medieval Scottish kings before Angus came to edit them. The only people who object to such spellings are people who, quite frankly, haven't read a thing written about the topic in the last decade. People who have certainly wouldn't be saying things like that. Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 01:03, 24 August 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm sorry that you had to cast personal aspersions to make your point. I respect what Angus has done for these articles, and he is very obviously abreast of the latest scholarship. Perhaps I shouldn't have made assumptions about his intent. I am certainly no export on Scottish history, I just have a general knowledge of medieval history. But isn't that the point? If a Wikipedia article title confuses or misleads those who "quite frankly, haven't read a thing written about the topic in the last decade", then Wikipedia has become a forum for specialists, not general readers that an encyclopedia is designed for. Anyhow, I've made my contribution, and am probably making too much by this reply. I will leave it to other to assess the merits of the case.--Iacobus 02:51, 25 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Apart from the name, what would be confusing ? If the article is not comprehensible to general readers, aided by clicking on hyperlinks where necessary, then it needs to be fixed. Please feel free to expand on the above comments at as great length as required. Angus McLellan (Talk) 09:52, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree with everyone who has expressed an opinion here save Angusmclellan and Calgacus. There is no warrant in policy for the moves of all early Scottish monarchs to Gaelic names. These titles may be used in some recent works, but they are certainly not the most common names in English. Considering that even Kaiser Wilhelm is at William II, German Emperor, I don't see why Scottish monarchs are treated any differently. Kaiser Wilhelm not only has the fact that many English language sources call him "Wilhelm" but also the fact that there's the entire literature of his native language on him (which is, of course, extensive) refers to him as "Wilhelm." On the other hand, there is, so far as I am aware, almost no Gaelic language literature on the subject, and to refer to Malcolm III as "Máel Coluim III" is much less common in English than to refer to Kaiser Bill as "Wilhelm." How can this possibly be justified in terms of our current policies? If you disagree with current policies, you should make the case on policy pages, not just move every damned article without any discussion. john k 03:38, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Sorry, Máel Coluim III would not be used in Gaelic language literature as the language form because the current form is Maol Chaluim. This has already been said above, and clearly shows you haven't read the arguments for this name, and are just disagreeing on impulse. What sort of discussion is that supposed to produce? Incidentally, I wouldn't agree with William II, German Emperor because even in popular English he is widely known as "Kaiser Wilhelm". Let me also ask, and don't take this personally, should you really be jumping in and taking a hard stand when you don't know anything about the topic or the current literature? So far, all three people who have objected have no history of adding substantial content to articles in this area, whereas Angus and I are the only two wikipedians currently adding content to these topic matters. That, perhaps, says it all. Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 04:40, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Kaiser Wilhelm is, I think, a borderline case - he is often called by both names. I think "William" was decided upon for consistency's saske because the other two German Emperors are much more widely known by the anglicized "William" and "Frederick."  Beyond that, what exact arguments were produced?  You guys just changed all the articles and moved all the pages without any discussion.  You defended it somewhat here when people questioned you, but that's about the extent of it.  These changes were all made with no discussion anywhere.  You don't own the articles because you and Angus have been contributing.  Your contributions to the articles are of course welcome, but they don't give you the right to flout naming conventions at will.  It is completely undeniable that these people are better known in English by the anglicized names.  In terms of knowing the literature, I will admit that I am not fully up on the most recent specialist literature, but I am perfectly willing to concede everything you and Angus claim about it, which seems to amount to the claim that a large proportion of the recent specialist literature uses the Gaelic names.  I don't believe this is sufficient.  There's a large body of older literature that's still in print, and a large body of books for more general audiences, and the example of every other general reference work that I'm aware of, that argues for the anglicized names.  I would add that the argument of the most recent specialist literature could be used to argue for just about any monarch to be moved to the native form of his name.  Which is why our naming policy is not based merely on the most recent specialist literature, but the most common name as a whole.  john k 12:06, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

BTW, A google scholar search for +"Malcolm III" +Scotland turns up 171 results. The name "Máel Coluim" all by itself, turns up 10 results. john k 12:19, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Which just goes to show that you can prove any old crap with Google, but surely none of us are very surprised by that. I am only marginally keener on the current name than the old one. My view is that the naming used for Irish and Welsh kings would be more appropriate, avoiding the ridiculous "of Scotland" in big bold letters at the top of pages which state something quite different. But "of country", so we're told, is absolutely inviolable. Well, except for every Irish and Welsh king, all of the Franks, Roman and Byzantine Emperors, rulers of Lithuania, and so on, ad nauseam. So far as I see, there is no naming policy. Angus McLellan (Talk) 14:08, 27 August 2006 (UTC)


 * The "of country" thing is unevenly applied, certainly. It should be noted that the convention is only meant to apply to modern countries, and thus not to the Roman Empire, or to ancient Irish kings, and so forth, where there is no likelihood of repetition.  Alexander III and Robert II are surely ambiguous, no?  But you're entirely changing the subject. Well done.  Various Polish users moved all the articles on Polish kings to their Polish names.  It took a while, but most are in the process of being moved back, with pretty strong consensus from non-Polish users that this is the right solution.  I don't see how this instance is any different, save that you have done it in a much more underhand way than Piotrus moved the Polish articles.  Piotrus proposed the change on the List of Polish monarchs talk page, and discussed it with some likeminded users for a few days before making the change.  You and Calgacus seem to have made these changes without consulting anybody.  As to google scholar, obviously it's not perfect, but it does give a sense that you are greatly exaggerating the prevalence of the usage of Gaelic names for these monarchs. john k 14:25, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Sorry, only Angus and I have given substantial contributions, and as most of the scholars working in the area use these forms, why would there be a problem? Baffles me why people such as yourself, who never contribute or read these articles, suddenly get all active when article titles have been brought inline with the content they've had for ages. I won't lose any sleep over it being moved to an English name, but this sort of thing shows why users good users should prolly reconsider offering their time and services to wikipedia. Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 15:44, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

BTW,Calgacus, how can you justify your opposition to having Polish monarchs at the Polish forms, while at the same time actively moving all these Scottish monarchs? You are on record saying things like Support for [having Polish monarch articles at Polish forms] will just be used as an excuse to reduce further the English language content of English wiki and ''The moves were horrid. I'm not too fussed, but diactrics should not be there. I support these pages being moved back to English versions of their names. Polonizing the names of monarchs at least makes it difficult to maintain the credibility of Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English), although it's probably worthless and unbeneficial to try to keep more obscure Polish names English.'' This was about two months ago. One could easily argue that the most recent specialist literature on Polish history in English uses the Polish formes of names of Polish monarchs. How is Jan Sobieski reducing the English language content of English wiki, while Máel Coluim III is not? john k 14:33, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Entirely different; I opposed modern Polish forms for multi-national medieval monarchs of Poland, here I support medieval Gaelic forms for medieval Gaelic kings. The other differences here are that 1) modern scholars are universally using these forms in the Scottish case, but with Polish monarchs there are dozens of possible forms; in current writing, using English forms tends to be the surest sign that the writings themselves are out of date, and we don't want wiki to be out of date; more importantly, 2) giving English forms to Scottish names implies that the holders themselves were subject to anglicization, so anglicizing the names cannot it these cases be made out to be neutral. Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 15:44, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

In terms of Google Scholar, note for instance that "Jan Sobieski" actually gets more hits than "John Sobieski." '"Charles II" +Spain -England' gets fewer results than '"Carlos II" +Spain' and yet somehow that is unacceptable, but "Máel Coluim", which gets less than 10% as many hits as '"Malcolm III" +Scotland' is acceptable? I agree that google scholar is not the be all and end all, but on most subjects it provides estimates that come fairly close to what I would assume, if not results biased somewhat in favor of native names, as opposed to anglicizations. Its search includes JSTOR, which has archives of most of the major history journals. I could see it bringing back a lot of junk hits. But there are still only 10 hits total for Máel Coluim. I don't see how that's a meaningless figure. john k 14:48, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Notice also Google Books, which gives 135 hits for "Máel Coluim," and 2510 for "Malcolm III" +Scotland. Are you actually disputing that the English names are more commonly used in English? john k 14:50, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I'd dispute that; contemporary scholarship shuns anachronistic English forms such as Malcolm (the latter is one of several later anglicizations, not an English name); more popular works are beginning to catch up (see, for intance, Who's Who in British History, Viking Empires, etc), but it will take some time. I oppose dumbing down scholarly wiki articles just cause a few users who never contribute and know nothing of the subject have a religious-like commitment to anglicization. Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 15:44, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
 * The fact that you can point to a few sources that do this does not mean it is the most commonly used name. The notion is pretty absurd, especially when one compares to a perfectly well-used name like "Jan Sobieski," which you opposed (still less common, I think, than "John Sobieski," which is why I agreed on that, but probably more used int he most recent scholarly literature, and much more generally familiar in English).  Beyond that, the insults are really not necessary.  john k 17:12, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
 * My argument is very simple, and has nothing to do with ghits: "of Scotland" is wrong in most of the cases. Whether that means calling them e.g. Kenneth son of Alpín or Kenneth mac A[i]lpín or Cináed mac A[i]lpín or Cináed son of Alpín or Kenneth Elfwinesson or something else altogether is secondary to the fact that the "kingdom of Scotland" didn't exist in the lifetime of any of the kings whose page names are disputed. Unlike the Polish cabal, who want to project a modern Polish chauvinist vision onto the past, I want to see the corresponding Scottish fantasy-world removed and replaced by modern scholarship, something which would be considerably easier to do were the pages moved to match the sort of names used in the articles, as this would divorce them from the modern political and geographical entity. Again, the Polish kings analogy would be accurate if this page had been moved to Maol Chaluim MacDonnchadha or Maol Chaluim III na h-Alba, but you can see that that's not the case. The Byzantine Emperors naming debate (Latin vs Greek derived versions) would be rather closer. Angus McLellan (Talk) 15:50, 27 August 2006 (UTC)


 * "of Scotland" is technically wrong, I suppose. But so are various other similar things we use.  Certainly Malcolm III was "King of Scots," wasn't he?  Beyond that, I have no idea what "of Scotland" has to do with anything.  The articles remain at "of Scotland".  This argument about whether Scotland existed does not provide the slightest reason to use "Máel Coluim".


 * The Polish kings analogy is perfectly adequate as applied to Calgacus, given that he opposed perfectly reasonable forms like Jan III Sobieski, which is much more common in English than Máel Coluim. I wasn't applying the question to you, as I don't recall you intervening in that discussion, and the issue was more one of inconsistency than anything else.  I'm not sure how referring to Polish kings in the 16th through 18th centuries by their Polish name consists of "projecting a modern Polish chauvinist vision onto the past."  It's clearly against naming policies, but so equally is this.


 * In the byzantine empire debate, note that monarchs who have clear anglicizations for their given names are put there - we have John Komnenos and Manuel Palailogos and Constantine XI, not Ioannes, Manouel, Mikhael, and Konstantinos. "Malcolm" is clearly a proper anglicization, and it continues to be used for Malcolm IV.  "Duncan," "Donald," "Constantine," and "Kenneth" are equally understood equivalents for Donnchad, Domnall, Causantin, and Cinaed.  "Macbeth" may not be a much used English name, but is sanctified by Shakespeare.  All these names are, at any rate, the most commonly used names for these people in, at the very least, everything but scholarly specialist sources and Scottish nationalist type publications.  It has yet to be demonstrated that the Gaelic forms are more common even in scholarly literature - Google Scholar certainly suggests otherwise, and rarely does one get so disproportionate a result unless there's some reason (i.e. usage is disproportionate). john k 17:12, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Please give me an example of "Scottish nationalist type publications"; besides the fact that Scottish nationalism has little relationship in practice with the Gaelic language, this seems yet another disingenuous and ill-informed statement. To me, Jan III Sobieski is on a parallel with Iain Balliol, and I have never advocated moving John of Scotland to Iain Balliol. Not that all this matters, I don't need to explain my views on every article I've ever edited or voted on just because you decided you wanna occupy my time and stop me getting on with more important things. Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 17:22, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
 * What I meant was works like Norman Davies' The Isles (although obviously Davies, as a Welshman, is not much of a Scottish nationalist), which make it a purposeful point to use unfamiliar forms of monarchs' names to defy the Anglocentric consensus, or whatever. Davies (a historian of Poland, natch) is obviously not a specialist, and his work is not scholarly, so I was trying to make allowances for his kind of work.  As for "Iain Balliol," can one find any scholarly literature that uses this name?  If I had access to the library, at the moment, I'd imagine I could find numerous English language sources that use "Jan Sobieski."  If you want to get on with more important things, why did you make a controversial move without any prior discussion or explanation?  Would you then object if I move them all back, and let you get on with more important other things?  If not, then you are just as hung up on these unimportant matters of naming as I am. john k 18:00, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
 * And BTW, how on earth does the Gaelic name of Anglo-Norman John Balliol compare to the Polish name of a Polish king? Is there any literature in English which calls John Balliol "Iain Balliol"? Because there's plenty that calls John Sobieski "Jan Sobieski."  john k 18:23, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

General Reference Works

 * Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (which is brand new, and the articles of which are often written by respected specialists) - Malcolm III
 * Encyclopædia Britannica - Malcolm III Canmore
 * Columbia Encyclopedia - Malcolm III
 * Encyclopedia of World History - Malcolm Canmore
 * Encarta - Malcolm III

This seems fairly universal. john k 18:00, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Specialist sources
I don't really have books readily available to me at the moment, but JSTOR provides the following (Obviously, JSTOR only goes up to about 2000):

Firstly, a search for the phrase "Máel Coluim" in journals of history, art history, architecture history, and religion, turns up precisely three results:
 * 1) An article from 1992 by Benjamin T. Hudson in the April 1992 English Historical Review, entitled "Cnut and the Scottish Kings"
 * 2) A review by Robin Chapman Tracy of Benjamin T. Hudson's book Kings of Celtic Scotland, in the October 1995 edition of Speculum.
 * 3) A review by the same, of Hudson's Prophecy of Berchán.

All the uses of "Máel Coluim" in JSTOR would thus appear to derive from work by Benjamin T. Hudson, and all the reviews of his work that use that name are by Robin Chapman Tracy. This is hardly impressive. But perhaps the accent has mislead. I do the same search for "Mael Coluim," but this only turns up the same three references.

A search in the same domains for "Malcolm III" turns up 22 results, many of them older and a few clearly not relevant (a search which requires the presence of the word "Scotland" brings the results down to 19). A search for "Malcolm Canmore" turns up 18, mostly relevant, but many of them still older. There are, nonetheless, well more than three relatively recent articles that continue to use "Malcolm". And note that this is not even looking for sources that mention Malcolm II or Malcolm I, which are clearly included in the previous search of Máel Coluim (indeed, Hudson's article is apparently about Malcolm II.) So, on the one hand, every general reference work at hand. On the other hand, three JSTOR results, all referring to works by a single author. The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, at least, seems like it should be a fairly standard source on how to refer to British monarchs. I'm sorry I can't do a better search than this with my current resources, but this preliminary investigation certainly does not suggest any good reason for moving all these articles about. john k 18:00, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

OK, here's a short list. There are no Scottish or Celtic history journals on JSTOR, so hardly a good test; if you wanna do the google count, not that I'd take any notice in any case, you might as well stick with the ordinary spam search. Anyways, here is a short list from source immediately to hand; I'd need to rumage through my piles of articles to do a fuller one:


 * Broun, Dauvit, "Anglo-French acculturation", in Brendan Smith (ed.), Britain and Ireland, 900-1300, (Cambridge, 1999), pp. 135–53
 * Broun, Dauvit, The Irish Identity of the Kingdom of the Scots in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries, (Woodbridge 1999)
 * Broun, Dauvit, "Recovering the Full Text of Version A of the Foundation Legend", in Simon Taylor (ed.) Kings, Clerics and Chronicles in Scotland, 500–1297, (Dublin, 2000), pp. 108-14
 * Clancy, Thomas Owen, “Scotland, the ‘Nennian’ recension of the Historia Brittonum, and the Lebor Bretnach”, in Simon Taylor (ed.) Kings, Clerics and Chronicles in Scotland, 500–1297, (Dublin/Portland, 2000), pp. 87–107.
 * Duncan, A.A.M., The Kingship of the Scots 842–1292: Succession and Independence, (Edinburgh, 2002)
 * Hudson, Benjamin T., Kings of Celtic Scotland, (Westport, 1994)
 * Jackson, Kenneth H. (ed), The Gaelic Notes in the Book of Deer: The Osborn Bergin Memorial Lecture 1970, (Cambridge, 1972)
 * MacLeod, W., Divided Gaels: Gaelic Cultural Identities in Scotland and Ireland: c.1200–1650, (Oxford, 2004)
 * Neville, Cynthia J., Native Lorship in Medieval Scotland: The Earldoms of Strathearn and Lennox, c. 1140–1365, (Portland/Dublin, 2005)
 * Oram, Richard, David: The King Who Made Scotland, (Gloucestershire, 2004).
 * Oram, Richard, The Lordship of Galloway, (Edinburgh, 2000)
 * Veitch, Kenneth, "“Replanting Paradise”:Alexander I and the Reform of Religious Life in Scotland", in The Innes Review, 52, (Autumn,2001), pp. 136–166

I could make the evidence quite exhaustive, and spend hours writing out a bibliography. Suffice it to say, read anything by scholars who work in this area, i.e. Dauvit Broun, Alex Woolf, Thomas Owen Clancy, James E. Fraser, David Dumville, etc. Those pages have bibliographies of the authors, or else bibliographies in the external links. But I think the point in sufficiently made by looking at the recently published book, Viking Empires. The book is broad in scope, designed to have a broad (if educated) readership. Look up "Kenneth" in the index, you'll find nothing. Look up "Malcolm", you will find pages for Malcolm IV, but none for the other three (I've never understood why so many scholars, at least three, have decided stick with Malcolm for Máel Coluim IV, but abandoned Malcolm for the others). Look up Cináed or Máel Coluim, and there you go ,you find their references. It's this kind of thing which means Wikipedia really ought to reflect current scholarship, because this is where wikipedia readers will go afterwards. Now, if wiki had no redirect functions, then I'd agree thatthis article should have been left at Malcolm, with the real name used throughout the text; but as it does have redirect functions, there is no problem. Given this, I think it'd be very difficult to find arguments which can be comfortably set against what has already been said. Regards, Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 18:39, 27 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the references. I assume that all of these sources use the Gaelic forms you support?  You don't have any recent books at hand that use the anglicized forms?  In terms of Malcolm IV, I would assume it has to do with the idea that starting with St. Margaret's children, the Scottish kings were anglicized, but prior to that they were not.  Seems an awkward solution to me, as well.  At any rate, I will say that I'm willing to accept from this that there is a decent amount of recent scholarship that uses the Gaelic names.  I'm not convinced, however, that the inadequacies of the index of one book (however good it may be) should be the basis for our policy.  Whatever the author wants to call the kings, he should provide cross-references in the index for commonly used alternate names, especially Kenneth, which doesn't start with the same letter as Cináed.  But that's rather beside the point.  The issue, I think, is that wikipedia policy is based around the most common name in English over all, and not on the most current scholarly usage.  I suspect that if we looked at English language publications on Polish history over the last 6 years, we'd discover that "Jan Sobieski" and so forth have begun to overtake "John Sobieski" and its ilk.  Certainly, for the history I'm most familiar with, one is starting to see "Friedrich Wilhelm IV" replace "Frederick William IV," and so forth, in scholarly publications.  I imagine I could cite a mountain of books indicating the same, and similar things for Spanish or Italian or French history, had I the time and energy to do so, and were I back with access to my university library, and not stuck here 3000 miles way from it.  I think, however, that there's perfectly good reason not to do this.  In everything but specialist literature, the anglicized names remain predominant, and this is even more true of the Scottish cases than of many cases of European monarchs where we retainthe Anglicized name.  "Wilhelm II," as we have both previously noted (or perhaps Angus did, I don't recall), is probably about equally common, over all, with "William II," and in fact has been in common use in English ever since the Kaiser's own days.  We chose to leave it as is so that all the Prussian monarchs would be more or less consistent, and because it's a close call.  But if we'd only been looking at specialist literature of the last few years, "Wilhelm II" would, I think, be the overwhelming favorite.  I also will dispute the idea that the sources people turn to after wikipedia are necessarily going to be the most recent scholarly publications.  It's quite likely that people will turn to somewhat older works, and books from as long ago as, say, 20 or 25 years ago can still be useful references, and on certain subjects may still be the specific reference in the field.


 * I'm interested by your comment that you think they ought have stayed if there were not redirects available. The question of "Where would be the best place for an article, assuming we had no redirects" seems to me to be precisely the same question as "What is the best place for an article?"  So, anyway, my basic point remains - Wikipedia is a general reference work, and not a scholarly specialists' publication.  It makes sense to follow usage of the English language in general, rather than simply the usage of recent scholarly works.  If we did want to go to the usage of recent scholarly works, this would constitute a change from our current naming policies, and ought to be taken up at Naming conventions, most likely.


 * What irks me most about this business is not so much the arguments you are making (I disagree with you, but I don't think the argument that we should follow scholarly standards is in itself out of line - just currently contrary to naming policies), but rather with the fact that you moved all these articles without any discussion anywhere, and in spite of some previous warnings that it might be controversial. Previous attempts to carry out widespread moves of this sort have always had at least some kind of prior discussion.  What also irks me is your attitude that because you are more familiar with the scholarly literature than I am, I am not qualified to have an opinion, which is, additionally, rather insulting. With respect to my own areas of study, I tend to feel that my familiarity with the scholarly literature is more likely to give me a distorted perspective of what "common usage" is than it is to give me the right to determine "common usage" unilaterally, because I know more than other people.  My point throughout has been that the scholarly literature alone is not what should be used for determining what the most common name is.  It is only a secondary question as to the extent to which you are correct in asserting that these forms are now dominant in scholarly usage (something which is, indeed, difficult to demonstrate.)  Even giving you the benefit of the doubt on that question, I think that anglicization is still the correct course.  Also, why haven't the Constantines, and Macbeth, been moved?  Why only Kenneth/Donald/Malcolm/Duncan? john k 19:32, 27 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Of course you think "anglicization is still the correct course", it's obvious from your edit history that your are always going to think that. In the end, neither I nor Angus control wikipedia; the articles will be moved back if there is enough power behind it; the wiki convention that almost no-one participated in and the desire for LCD are peripheral. Why only these names? Because these names are Gaelic, Constantine is a general European name, as is John (Aramaic-Greek), Robert (French), David (Hebrew), Alexander (Greek) and Edgar (English). I don't share your desire to reduce wiki to the lowest common denominator, esp. when these articles have really went beyond other popular encyclopedias (e.g. Encarta, Britannica, etc) in quality, the key feature of which is being decades out of date. However, neither do I desire to give people native names just for the sake of it. As to anglicization, I'm not sure many historians these days believe that Donnchad, Alexander or Edgar were any less Gaelic than Macbeth or Máel Coluim III, it's prolly more to do with Máel Coluim IV being half Anglo-French and being the son of the Scottish Earl of Northumberland. Anyways, sorry for irking you, that's just wikipedia. I could write a huge list of things which have irked me. It's painfully obvious I should leave wikipedia in the near future, as actually knowing something and contributing is of less worth than a user account. As to all those comparisons, I am not responsible for naming Kaiser Wilhelm II or other such names; making comparisons serves no value, that is up to the random bunch of users who edit or view that page. This is how wiki actually works. Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 22:25, 27 August 2006 (UTC)


 * First, is the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography really the lowest common denominator? That seems completely ridiculous to me.  These are articles written in the very recent past, often by eminent scholars in the field (Conrad Russell wrote the articles on John Pym and several other notable Civil War figures, for instance), and published by possibly the leading academic publishing house in the world.  Obviously, it's not a specialist work, but neither is Wikipedia.  The considerations that led the ODNB to use the anglicized names are exactly those which should lead us to do the same.  Second, as I noted before, I do not always think that anglicization is the correct course.  I think the anglicized version is the correct version when the name is anglicized.  I am perfectly happy with non-anglicized names when the name does not have a standard angliciation.  Beyond that, do I understand that it is your position that when discussing Scottish kings, we should anglicize names that are not of Gaelic origin, but not names that are of Gaelic origin?  That seems utterly strange to me.  Whatever the origins of the English names "Malcolm," "Duncan," "Donald," and "Kenneth," they are perfectly good and well known English names.  To get back to the Byzantine example, these names are not analogous to "Alexius" or "Romanus."  They are analogous to "Constantine."  Konstantinos is a Greek name, but our article on the (Greek) emperors of that name remain at "Constantine."  As to comparisons, of course you are not responsible for the naming of other articles.  The point is that we have naming conventions, and most of our articles follow them (some do not, due to insistent interest group action, like those for Polish monarchs, unfortunately).  These articles flagrantly violate the conventions, and you barely have any excuse for it.  At least with the Polish examples, the issue has been voted on ad nauseam, and the current locations conform to where a majority wants them to be.  These articles don't even have that going for them - they both do not conform to naming conventions, and no chance has been given for the community to decide that it is a good idea for them to flout the conventions. john k 22:51, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Who wrote the articles on Oxford Dictionary of National Biography for the Scottish kings, and when. Tell me that and I'll give you an answer. Not interested in who wrote the articles for subject you have selected for their prominent authors. No, I do think that the medieval Scottish kings should have contemporary (not modern) Gaelic or Gaelicized names, but in the case of Constantine and Indulf, there is no actual standard version of the name; and in the case of Constantine, it is a standard European name that carries no implication of "anglicization" (i.e. Francization) and no cognitive dissonance. In the cases of Donnchad (Duncan), Máel Coluim (Malcolm) and Domnall (Donald), these names are purely Gaelic in origin, and are indigenous to no land except Scotland and Ireland. Since you like comparisons so much, why has your passion for anglicizing names not led you to articles like Domnall Midi, Donnchad Midi mac Domnaill and Gearoid Mór Fitzgerald, 8th Earl of Kildare? Making Máel Coluim "Malcolm" sounds ok in principle, but since you have no knowledge of this topic or experience contributing, you have not dealt with the problem of having a Malcolm, but a Máel Brigte, Máel Muire or Máel Ruanaid in the same article. As for the conventions, they sound alright to the tiny number of thoughtless busy-bodies who invented them, but in practice become meaningless in articles like this. Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 23:14, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Máel Coluim was "Malcolm" for years without any notable problems that I'm aware of. And it's not as though these kind of issues are unique.  One has to deal with Francis II of France and his wife's uncle François, Duke of Guise, for instance [Note, our article on the Duke of Guise is unfortunately at Francis, Duke of Guise, rather unfortunately undermining my point.  But I'm sure other examples of this could be found.].  With monarchs, one mixes anglicized forms for the monarch, and non-anglicized forms for other people in the country literally all the time.  This happens a great deal in historical works, and is not unique to Scotland, and my having an opinion on it does not necessarily require me to have a great deal of expertise on Scottish history. john k 23:24, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
 * This only happens because certain users make insist on anglicizing names. A name such as Malcolm is, in any case, different, because it consists of two words which had meanings at the time and still do in the modern languages. "Máel Coluim" consists of "Máel", meaning "bald" or "tonsured" (implying monastic devotion) plus the genitive of Colum, that is, Columba. How can you seriously want to have the name Malcolm floating about a text which also contains the names Máel Brigte (Máel of Brigit)? 23:36, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Indeed I do. Perhaps a better example of this being common is Assyrian and Babylonian kings.  There we mix hebraized forms like Nebuchadrezzar and Sennacherib and Tiglath-Pileser with straight up forms like Nabu-mukin-apli and Tukulti-Ninurta.  Sure it's inconsistent, and sometimes awkward, and makes it unclear that Tukulti-apla-usur is actually a similar name form to Tukulti-Ninurta, but that's the way it goes.  The issue should be addressed in a notice on the name at the beginning of the article. john k 00:07, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Request move
Since we can't agree to differ, or to leave things as they are, or put them back they way they were, I have opened a request move for this, and other, pages. Please share your opinion at Talk:Cináed I of Scotland. Angus McLellan (Talk) 22:54, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
 * (Update) The article has been restored to its original name, of "Malcolm III of Scotland". --Elonka 04:33, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Revision
Not yet completed. To do: something on his lack of interest in religion (notable when compared to his predecessors and successors), perhaps a summary of his myriad offspring in list format and some idea of how the subsequent kings relate to him (yes, this could be seen as recapitulating House of Dunkeld, or should do if that was a decent article, but my views on that aren't hard to find). Spin-off-wise, the various articles where I expressed doubts over whether Ingebjorg Finnsdotter was Thorfinn's widow or daughter need to be aligned with this, Ingebjorg needs her own article, and so does Finn Arnesson. John of Fordun, I see, has more on Edward's death, so I suppose that needs to be included. Any comments much appreciated. Angus McLellan (Talk) 23:34, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Wonderful transformation. Congrats so far. I did a few edits, and added one reference. Regarding religion, although he's certainly not as active as his sons Edgar, Alexander and David, I wouldn't say he had a total lack of interest in religion; I'd be careful about ascribing the supposed religious innovations to his English queen, as later propganda usually has it. Anyways, great job! - Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) 00:22, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Ta. I wasn't going to credit Margaret with many reforms either. Almost all the actual examples in Barrow's Kingdom of the Scots are down to Alexander and David. Angus McLellan (Talk) 00:52, 16 June 2006 (UTC)