Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 03:16, 11 September 2021

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Ecgberht, King of Wessex article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic. New to Misplaced Pages? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help. Assume good faith Be polite and avoid personal attacks Be welcoming to newcomers Seek dispute resolution if needed Article policies Neutral point of view No original research Verifiability

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Archives: 1, 2Auto-archiving period: 6 months

	Ecgberht, King of Wessex is a featured article; it (or a previous version of it) has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Misplaced Pages community. Even so, if you can update or improve it, please do so.
	This article appeared on Misplaced Pages's Main Page as Today's featured article on December 19, 2011.
Article milestones Date Process Result September 17, 2007 Featured article candidate Promoted

This article has not yet been rated on Misplaced Pages's content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects:

Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details. Biography: Royalty and Nobility This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography, a collaborative effort to create, develop and organize Misplaced Pages's articles about people. All interested editors are invited to join the project and contribute to the discussion. For instructions on how to use this banner, please refer to the documentation.BiographyWikipedia:WikiProject BiographyTemplate:WikiProject Biographybiography This article is supported by WikiProject Royalty and Nobility (assessed as Low-importance). Military history: British / European / Medieval This article is within the scope of the Military history WikiProject. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks. To use this banner, please see the full instructions.Military historyWikipedia:WikiProject Military historyTemplate:WikiProject Military historymilitary history Associated task forces: /  British military history task force European military history task force Medieval warfare task force (c. 500 – c. 1500) Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details. Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms Top‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms on Misplaced Pages. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Anglo-Saxon KingdomsWikipedia:WikiProject Anglo-Saxon KingdomsTemplate:WikiProject Anglo-Saxon KingdomsAnglo-Saxon Kingdoms Top This article has been rated as Top-importance on the project's importance scale. Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details. Middle Ages Mid‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Middle Ages, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of the Middle Ages on Misplaced Pages. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Middle AgesWikipedia:WikiProject Middle AgesTemplate:WikiProject Middle AgesMiddle Ages Mid This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale. Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details. English Royalty Top‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject English Royalty. For more information, visit the project page.English RoyaltyWikipedia:WikiProject English RoyaltyTemplate:WikiProject English RoyaltyEnglish royalty Top This article has been rated as Top-importance on the project's importance scale. Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details. Politics Low‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Politics, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of politics on Misplaced Pages. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.PoliticsWikipedia:WikiProject PoliticsTemplate:WikiProject Politicspolitics Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale. Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details. Hampshire High‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Hampshire, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Hampshire on Misplaced Pages. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.HampshireWikipedia:WikiProject HampshireTemplate:WikiProject HampshireHampshire High This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale.

First King of England

Yes, I know, he really wasn't the first king of England, but in the High Middle Ages he was often considered the first (he or Alfred). By the modern era, I believe, Egbert was indisputably treated as the first king of England. It might be worth mentioning this and clarifying why it was so. 98.143.78.114 (talk) 15:58, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

Can you give a source for this? I didn't see anything like that in the sources I list in the article; I don't think it's the sort of thing that modern historians pay a lot of attention to, to be honest. But if you have a good secondary source for this we can discuss it. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 16:14, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

Olivier de Laborderie, "The First King of England? Egbert and the Foundations of Royal Legitimacy in Thirteenth-Century Historiography". I have not read this (beyond a few snippets), but it seems to exactly fit the bill. My childhood almanac treated Egbert as first king of England and I was surprised that this article nowhere mentions this once common view. 98.143.78.114 (talk) 17:30, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

That's an academic paper, not really an ideal source for this sort of thing, but I don't have access to it either, so can't comment. I'm pinging Ealdgyth, a user who's much more knowledgeable than I am about this sort of discussion. Personally I'd like to see a statement in a secondary source such as "Egbert is often considered the first king of England", or something along those lines. Ealdgyth, what do you think? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 18:08, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

I think we're both well before my main period of interest and well after it .. weirdly enough. 13th century historiography is a bit past me... and Egbert's a bit before. Ealdgyth - Talk 18:30, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

I think it is true that Egbert used to be regarded as the first king of England and the belief survived in popular sources until quite recently. There is probably an article somewhere discussing the subject but I cannot trace one. A few sources: 1. Marie Elizabeth Budden True Stories from Modern History, 1834, heads Chapter 1 "EGBERT, THE FIRST KING OF ENGLAND". 2. R. H. Hodgkin, A History of the Anglo-Saxons, OUP, 1935, vol 2 p. 398: "We are often told nowadays that too much has been made of Egbert's victories. It is true that some nonsense has been written about the reign of Egbert marking the unification of England,..." 3. Whitaker's Almanac 1984, p. 210, starts its list of English kings and queens with "Egbert, King of Wessex and all England" 827-839. 4. Pears Cyclopedia, 90th ed, 1981, p. N3, starts its list of English monarchs with Egbert 827-839. It is curious that both Whitaker and Pears date his accession to 827. Any ideas why? Dudley Miles (talk) 19:46, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

No idea on the reason they use 827. If the belief that he was the first king of England was ridiculed in 1935, then I suspect that any modern source would be a popular history book. For now I'd oppose including anything along the lines the original poster suggested, unless we can see a source to support it. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 22:21, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

Sir William Blackstone called Egbert the first some king of England: . Blackstone is a prestigious source, but his view is not universally held, and he wasn't a historian. Richard75 (talk) 22:50, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

Popular culture section re-added

An editor has re-added the popular culture section that I removed last year, with a sentence about Egbert's characterization in a TV program. Currently it's uncited, though no doubt a cite could be added. My preference would be to only include popular culture mentions of Egbert if they are mentioned in secondary sources that are primarily about Egbert. This might be possible for Alfred the Great, for example, since there might be depictions of Alfred that have been discussed in the literature in the context of the popular image of Alfred over the last couple of centuries. I don't think it's likely to be true for Egbert. Any other opinions on whether this section should stay? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 12:00, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

I've removed it again. The TV show is notoriously inaccurate (Making Rollo the sibling of Ragnar Lodbrok is the most glaring example - since Rollo is circa 900 and Ragnar is circa 820 or so). It's trivia and we don't include that unless it tells us something about the historical person the article is about OR about how the wider culture sees the person - which would need to be based on secondary sources that discuss the depictions and how they fit into the wider view of history. This section does neither. Ealdgyth - Talk 12:23, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

I agree. It tells readers nothing about Egbert. Dudley Miles (talk) 12:55, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Me too. IMHO this is the best approach, and not only for historical people, which I believe is covered by WP:TRIVIA. Here, the TV show is not a reliable source for Egbert. It would be perfectly sensible to link an article on the TV show to Egbert, but I don't believe the reverse to be true. Nortonius (talk) 10:58, 10 March 2017 (UTC)

I think you're all wrong, but it looks like I'm outvoted.

Sardaka (talk) 09:00, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 11 April 2017

This edit request to Egbert of Wessex has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

Hoever, Redburga or Raedburh (788c-839) may have been the wife of king Egbert of Wessex and may have been the sister-in-law of Charlemagne as the sister of his fourth wife, Luitgard; other sources describe her as his sister (although Charlemagne's only sister was named Gisela) or his great-granddaughter (which would be difficult to accomplish in the forty-six years after Charlemagne's birth) or the daughter of his sister-in-law or his niece. Some genealogies identify her as the granddaughter of Pepin the Short and great-granddaughter of Charles Martel; other scholars doubt that she existed at all, other than as a name in a much later manuscript, her existence might been forged to link the early Kings of England to the great West Emperor.

She appears in a medieval manuscript from Oxford and is described as "regis Francorum sororia" which translates as "sister to the King of the Franks". More specifically, sororia means "pertaining to someone's sister", hence sister-in-law. Pwhiteco (talk) 12:24, 11 April 2017 (UTC)

On Misplaced Pages, we follow reliable sources, so any suggested edit needs to be accompanied by the sources that support the information. We also follow secondary sources, not primary sources such as medieval manuscripts. So the sources ideally will be modern historical works. Because this is a featured article, the sources also need to be high quality - so newspaper accounts or older historical works are less useful. Ealdgyth - Talk 12:31, 11 April 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 11 April 2017

This edit request to Egbert of Wessex has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

However, Redburga or Raedburh (788c-839) may have been the wife of king Egbert of Wessex and may have been the sister-in-law of Charlemagne as the sister of his fourth wife, Luitgard; other sources describe her as his sister (although Charlemagne's only sister was named Gisela) or his great-granddaughter (which would be difficult to accomplish in the forty-six years after Charlemagne's birth) or the daughter of his sister-in-law or his niece. Some genealogies identify her as the granddaughter of Pepin the Short and great-granddaughter of Charles Martel; other scholars doubt that she existed at all, other than as a name in a much later manuscript. Her existence might have been forged to link the early Kings of England to the great West Emperor.

She appears in a medieval manuscript from Oxford and is described as "regis Francorum sororia" which translates as "sister to the King of the Franks". More specifically, sororia means "pertaining to someone's sister", hence sister-in-law. Pwhiteco (talk) 12:33, 11 April 2017 (UTC)

You've just had this answered already. Richard75 (talk) 13:26, 11 April 2017 (UTC)

Name of article

Academic works are increasingly spelling his name Ecgberht, and I think the time may have come for us to follow suit. Stenton Anglo-Saxon England 1971, Abels, Alfred the Great 1998, and New Cambridge Medieval History II 1995 have Egbert, but Foot, Æthelstan 2011, Charles-Edwards, Wales and the Britons 2013, Blair, The Church in Anglo-Saxon Society 2005, Hart, The Danelaw 1992, Smyth, King Alfred the Great 1995, Pratt, The Political Thought of King Alfred the Great 2007, Handbook of British Chronology 3rd ed 1986, Wiley-Blackwell Encyclopedia 1999 and 2014 eds, Higham and Ryan, The Anglo-Saxon World, have Ecgberht. I suggest changing to "Ecgberht of Wessex", or better still "Ecgberht, King of Wessex". Dudley Miles (talk) 10:50, 2 August 2017 (UTC)

I'm not opposed, but I'd like to see what happens if we add a few more sources to the list. Sorting the ones you list, and splitting by line so we can sort by date or reliability if we want to, and also so we can see if an individual author has changed practice over time:

• Egbert
  • The Age of Bede 1965 (1988 revision) (only Egbert of Kent)
  • Stenton Anglo-Saxon England 1971
  • Anglo-Saxon England 5 1976 (uses Egbert for the king of Wessex and Ecgberht for others of that name)
  • Wood In Search of the Dark Ages 1981
  • Campbell The Anglo-Saxons 1982 (1991 edition)
  • Wormald et al ed. Ideal & Reality in Frankish & Anglo-Saxon Society 1983
  • Loyn The Governance of Anglo-Saxon England 1984
  • Yorke, Kings and Kingdoms 1990
  • New Cambridge Medieval History II 1995
  • Williams Wessex in the Early Middle Ages 1995
  • Abels, Alfred the Great 1998
  • Campbell The Anglo-Saxon State 2000
  • Walker Mercia 2000 (uses Egbert for the king of Wessex and Ecgberht for others of that name)
  • Keynes/Lapidge (Asser) Alfred the Great 1983, 2004 printing
• Ecgberht
  • Handbook of British Chronology 3rd ed 1986
  • Biographical Dictionary of Dark Age Britain 1991
  • Hart, The Danelaw 1992
  • Kirby, Earliest English Kings 1992
  • Smyth, King Alfred the Great 1995
  • John, Reassessing Anglo-Saxon England 1996
  • Wormald The Making of English Law 1999
  • Williams Kingship and Government in Pre-Conquest England 1999
  • Wiley-Blackwell Encyclopedia 1999 and 2014 eds,
  • Edwards, Dictionary of National Biography, 2004
  • Blair, The Church in Anglo-Saxon Society 2005
  • Pratt, The Political Thought of King Alfred the Great 2007
  • A Companion to the Early Middle Ages 2009
  • Foot, Æthelstan 2011
  • Roach, Kingship and Consent in Anglo-Saxon England 2013
  • Charles-Edwards, Wales and the Britons 2013
  • Higham and Ryan The Anglo-Saxon World 2013
  • Molyneux, The Formation of the English Kingdom in the Tenth Century 2015
• Ecgbert
  • Yorke, The Conversion of Britain, 2006
  • Woolf From Pictland to Alba 2007

I'll go through my refs and add some more, probably in a couple of days. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 11:21, 2 August 2017 (UTC)

Williams used Ecgberht in the Biographical Dictionary 1991, Egbert in Wessex in the Early Middle Ages 1995, and Ecgberht in Kingship and Government in Pre-Conquest England 1999. Dudley Miles (talk) 12:16, 2 August 2017 (UTC)

Added some more above. Zaluckyj Mercia 2001 doesn't mention our guy, but uses both spellings for others of that name; Higham, An English Empire, 1995 uses Egbert but only for others of that name. I don't think these can be counted as evidence in either direction. Overall it does like the tide is turning. Is this enough for a move of the title or should we wait a few more years? We're not an academic publication, and the redirects are there, after all. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 19:05, 5 August 2017 (UTC)

As Egbert isn't actually wrong I'd just leave it as it is. Richard75 (talk) 23:08, 5 August 2017 (UTC)

I favour a change, but as there is no consensus, I will start a formal reqested move. Dudley Miles (talk) 09:02, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

Requested move 6 August 2017

The following is a closed 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: Moved to Ecgberht, King of Wessex per nom. No such user (talk) 09:59, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Egbert of Wessex → Ecgberht, King of Wessex – Misplaced Pages policy is that titles should reflect reliable sources, and the list of works above shows that, apart from one reprint, the spelling 'Egbert' has not been used in academic works since 2000. This is long enough to establish an academic consensus against the spelling, and Ecgberht is now much the most common spelling. This case is similar to the change from Canute to Cnut at . Adding "KIng of Wessex" is more informative than "of Wessex" for readers, as with Stephen, King of England, John, King of England and many others. Dudley Miles (talk) 09:17, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

I'd like to propose a move to Egbert, King of Wessex, as King of Wessex is obviously better, but Egbert isn't the wrong spelling (see discussion in above section). Richard75 (talk) 10:24, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

Support as nominator. For an example of the suggested spelling, see Ecgberht of Kent. Dudley Miles (talk) 16:48, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

• Weak support for the change to "Ecgberht"; I think it's clearly going that way and is likely to have to move eventually, if not now. For the "King of Wessex" part I'd like to see more evidence -- I think I've seen both. And would it better to make that part of the move a more global change to the whole set of AS kings? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 16:51, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

• Pre-Conquest kings are usually shown without their title. Two exceptions are Æthelberht, King of Wessex and Æthelbald, King of Wessex, both changed after moves I proposed, the latter with Mike Christie's support. Post-Conquest monarchs are generally shown without their title if they have a number, such as Elizabeth I of England, but with their title if they are unnumbered, as Anne, Queen of Great Britain. This seems reasonable as the number signals to the reader that the article is about a monarch, but x of y does not, and I would support a global proposal to bring pre-Conquest monarchs' titles in line with post-Conquest ones.

• The Wiley-Blackwell Encyclopedia and the Biographical Dictionary of Dark Age Britain both have 'Ecgberht, king of Wessex', whereas DNB has 'Ecgberht, king of the West Saxons'. These sources use lower case 'king', but I do not think we should go against the Misplaced Pages practice of capitalising titles. Dudley Miles (talk) 19:06, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

  I would support a global proposal to change the pre-Conquest names to include the title. I'm neutral on moving this one; there doesn't seem to be much point unless we do a global proposal. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 20:49, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

• Reversing what I said above, on reflection I doubt whether a global move is practical. There would be too many to change and too many issues with them. I have very little knowledge of the earlier kings, but taking the later ones, there would be many disagreements. There are some with well known names which should not be changed, such as Alfred the Great, Edward the Elder, Edward the Martyr and Æthelred the Unready. I would change Edgar the Peaceful to Edgar, King of England, but this might be opposed by other editors. I successfully proposed changing Æthelwulf of Wessex to Æthelwulf. Æthelwulf, King of Wessex would arguably be better, but I would be reluctant to re-open the discussion. I think each case has to be looked at individually. Dudley Miles (talk) 22:18, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

• Support.--Brianann MacAmhlaidh (talk) 00:43, 7 August 2017 (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.

gold coin

https://www.instagram.com/p/CAsaCvwH1F8/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.80.214.144 (talk) 16:09, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

• Misplaced Pages featured articles
• Featured articles that have appeared on the main page
• Featured articles that have appeared on the main page once
• All unassessed articles
• FA-Class biography articles
• FA-Class biography (royalty) articles
• Low-importance biography (royalty) articles
• Royalty work group articles
• WikiProject Biography articles
• FA-Class military history articles
• FA-Class British military history articles
• British military history task force articles
• FA-Class European military history articles
• European military history task force articles
• FA-Class Medieval warfare articles
• Medieval warfare task force articles
• FA-Class Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms articles
• Top-importance Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms articles
• All WikiProject Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms pages
• FA-Class Middle Ages articles
• Mid-importance Middle Ages articles
• FA-Class history articles
• All WikiProject Middle Ages pages
• FA-Class English royalty articles
• Top-importance English royalty articles
• WikiProject English Royalty articles
• FA-Class politics articles
• Low-importance politics articles
• WikiProject Politics articles
• FA-Class Hampshire articles
• High-importance Hampshire articles