Talk:Trinity College, Oxford/Archive 1

Balliol ownership of land
We need some sort of citation for the claim that Balliol owns the land on which Trinity stands, otherwise it might just have been added by some rivalrous Balliol student.86.134.62.132 21:26, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Arthur Quiller-Couch
Is there any point in mentioning Q's famous dedication, "To the President Fellows and Scholars of Trinity College Oxford A House of Learning Ancient Liberal Humane And My Most Kindly Nurse"? It is noteworthy for its being widely known, indicating the esteem in which he held Trinity, and perhaps now sounding a little pompous.--AlexanderLondon 15:18, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

College templates
I have created a series of templates for former students of Oxford's various colleges. There are still plenty to do, but if you want to add one of the templates to your user page then feel free. See Userboxes/Education/United Kingdom/University of Oxford for complete list. Please contact me if you would like another college fast-tracked... Deano 18:19, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

College name
Is the full name "The College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity in the University of Oxford, of the foundation of Thomas Pope" as in the opening paragraph, or "The College of the Most Holy and Undivided Trinity and Sir Thomas Pope (Knight)" as in the infobox?

The former is referenced to a book while the latter has no citation attached. Is one of these more correct than the other, or are they both valid? Either way it's a little confusing to have two different versions without explanation! --Casper Gutman 09:50, 22 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Changed infobox to match lead, purely because that version had a citation. --Casper Gutman 16:13, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

College Shield
I have added the college shield to the infobox on this article. --Austin Wellbelove (talk) 13:59, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

Clearly there is a revert war going on here between the new coat of arms and the old one. It should be made clear now the destinction between coat of arms and logo which seems to be causing headache's for all involved. a Coat of Arms is the blazon (the textual discription of the shield) that is included in this article and similarly on all the other Oxford Colleges. The representation of the blazon is subject to the artists interpretation but given the poor quality of the previous svg and the updates to ALL the other articles with similar SVG's it was decided to equally update Trinity's Coat of Arms to match these. The new one is niether incorrect nor out of place. Neither the old or new CoA are "Logo's" as the liscensing suggests and a simple google of the difference will produce the answer to this. The new one both matches the set of all the colleges and is provided completely free without a fair use or any other such policy so from the POV of wikipedia is valued higher. If a decent reason is proposed and a consensus within this discussion reached then the revert to the older CoA will be allowed but for now the newer one stands as the better choice. ChevronTango (talk) 19:05, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

Surely it would make more sense to use a coat of arms which resembles more closely the coat used by the college itself and by the university website to avoid confusion? (See http://www.trinity.ox.ac.uk/ and http://www.ox.ac.uk/colleges/colleges_and_halls_az/trinity.html) This could be achieved by changing the gryphon to make it more in line with the gryphon design used by the college, see: which appears to be exactly how the college themselves use the blazon. The problem is that I have seen a number of publications recently use your blazon design assuming that it is the same as the one use by the college itself. If it were to be used, it needs to be noted that it is not the "logo"/style used by the college itself. It should also be noted that, technically, the aforementioned file should have the copyright/logo notice removed from it as, like you say, it is not actually a copyrighted image per se. --163.1.62.24 (talk) 21:47, 21 May 2012 (UTC)


 * I tend to agree with anon IPer above. Although it's perfectly true that a coat of arms is not a logo, and that the definitive version is the blazon and not any particular artistic rendition of it, it surely makes sense when illustrating an article on an individual or institution to use a rendition which is as-near-as-dammit to the one they themselves use: see, for example, the numerous Wikipedia articles on members of the royal family. The version of the arms in use by Trinity is a bit bland and "vanilla", but it's a literal interpretation of the blazon. The version produced by User:ChevronTango certainly isn't wrong – in fact as a piece of heraldic art it's very good – but it's quite a "personal" and idiosyncratic interpretation. The features that jump out are (i) the variable shading of the field – in particular, the azure towards the sinister edge, which becomes almost turquoise; (ii) the fact that the griffins' heads seem disproportionately large in relation to the chevron; and (iii) the fact that the erased necks of the griffins aren't defined by black lines. I'd suggest that if these aspects were tweaked to produce a compromise between the two versions, that might satisfy all parties. GrindtXX (talk) 22:39, 21 May 2012 (UTC)


 * As a PS to the above, I'd also point out that the version of the arms used by the college has been in use for many years, I think since the quartocentenary of 1955, if not earlier; and so it's almost certain that Michael Maclagan, fellow of the college 1939-81, Portcullis Pursuivant 1970-80, and Richmond Herald 1980-89, had a hand in designing it, or at least approving it. That, to my mind, gives it a certain authority which isn't possessed by the rather garbled and poorly rendered versions of arms in use by some colleges. GrindtXX (talk) 22:53, 21 May 2012 (UTC)


 * For what it's worth, I thought I might add my opinion on the matter. Firstly, ChevronTango and 163.1.62.24 make a good point about the licensing of my version of the blazon Trinity_College,_Oxford.svg - I have now amended the licensing so that it is a free, using CC BY-SA 3.0. My version was intended to be heavily based on the version used by the college itself for two reasons: (1) user will expect to see an image which is close or the same as the one used by the college itself; (2) to establish a "brand identity" - many users such as student newspaper editors, and other organisations, will use the logo on Wiki for their own projects when writing about the college. If the blazon is significantly different (as is currently the case) this could cause confusion. Whilst I accept that my version of the image is not as visually appealing, this is because it is directly based on the version used by the college. As GrindtXX has correctly pointed out, the version used by the college currently does have a well-established history and, therefore, there is a lot of weight to the argument that we should "use a rendition which is as-near-as-dammit". Personally, I think we should strive to represent the griffins in a way more similar to how the college does themselves. On a side note, the stain glass windows in the college chapel portray an older version of the blazon which also renders the griffins in a way much like I have done in my version. --Austin Wellbelove (talk) 11:09, 22 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Ammending the griffin's can easily be achieved, and I'll happily do so in the coming days. Are the gradients also distasteful?


 * The issue that seems to be neglected thus far is that this new one in shape and size matches the other college arms used on wikipedia. I'd be keen to ammend the new one to better represent the older one, than the straight revert, particularly as its begun to have its use filter throughout other wiki pages and changes would be slow to permiate otherwise but mostly because then all the colleges would "match" to a certain degree, which is to everyone's benefit both in the short and long term. It would be to this article's detriment to stand out with a different styling. (as an aside blazon and emblazon are being confused in this discussion. The blazon is not in question, the emblazon is). ChevronTango (talk) 14:18, 22 May 2012 (UTC)


 * I have no strong views on the gradients: my only opinion on the chevron on ChevronTango's version is that it (the chevron, and therefore the fleurs-de-lys as well) look a bit small in relation to the griffins' heads – which is really what I meant when I said the griffins' heads looked too large. More generally, I don't really see anything wrong with Austin Wellbelove's version, and (now that it's free) I don't see any compelling reason to replace it. I assume when you talk about the colleges "matching" you mean in terms of fairly trivial aspects like shield shape etc. My own vote between the two versions as they currently stand is for Austin Wellbelove's, simply because it's much closer to what the college itself uses. However, the argument is really now just about personal heraldic taste, and so I'm posting a note over on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Heraldry and vexillology in the hope that some informed heraldists may contribute their views, and perhaps we can come to a wider consensus. GrindtXX (talk) 23:30, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, although I won't suggest a particular way forward, I would note that it is very rare (I don't recall ever seeing another example) to use a internal gradient (sometimes an overall one is applied for a "3d" feel but this isn't). On other points, there is a very strong preference towards the interpretation actually used by the country/city/person/other group involved: it is not rare to have a technically vague blazon. If consistency is wanted or needed, perhaps amendments should be made. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 08:44, 23 May 2012 (UTC)