Article snapshot taken from Wikipedia with creative commons attribution-sharealike license.
Give it a read and then ask your questions in the chat.
We can research this topic together.
*See ]. Not a formal proposal but comments on change to Canute between 2015 and 2019. ] (]) 16:42, 2 July 2023 (UTC)
*See ]. Not a formal proposal but comments on change to Canute between 2015 and 2019. ] (]) 16:42, 2 July 2023 (UTC)
**Point taken, but that was just a brief informal discussion rather than a formal move request, and it didn't seem to come to a clear consensus. ] (]) 17:09, 2 July 2023 (UTC)
**Point taken, but that was just a brief informal discussion rather than a formal move request, and it didn't seem to come to a clear consensus. ] (]) 17:09, 2 July 2023 (UTC)
*Even the Royal Mint spells his name as Canute on its thousandth anniversary commemorative coin, and if there exists such a thing as an "official" source, that's it. ] (]) 18:31, 2 July 2023 (UTC)
*Even the Royal Mint spells his name as Canute on its thousandth anniversary commemorative coin, and if there exists such a thing as an "official" source, that's it. ] (]) 18:31, 2 July 2023 (UTC)
Revision as of 18:37, 2 July 2023
This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Cnut article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.
This article has not yet been rated on Misplaced Pages's content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects:
Template:Vital article
Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details.
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
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 within the scope of WikiProject Denmark, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Denmark 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.DenmarkWikipedia:WikiProject DenmarkTemplate:WikiProject DenmarkDenmark
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Norway, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Norway 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.NorwayWikipedia:WikiProject NorwayTemplate:WikiProject NorwayNorway
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Norse history and culture, a WikiProject related to all activities of the NorthGermanic peoples, both in Scandinavia and abroad, prior to the formation of the Kalmar Union in 1397. If you would like to participate, you can edit the article attached to this page, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion.Norse history and cultureWikipedia:WikiProject Norse history and cultureTemplate:WikiProject Norse history and cultureNorse history and culture
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
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
This article has been checked against the following criteria for B-class status:
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
Graphs are unavailable due to technical issues. Updates on reimplementing the Graph extension, which will be known as the Chart extension, can be found on Phabricator and on MediaWiki.org.
I never saw the phrase "Cnut the Great" until I saw this article a few years ago. I grew up learning that only Alfred had this designation. Indeed Alfred, the savior of his country and his people, seems to merit this epithet better than Cnut.
Alfred understood that his people needed history to remind them of their loyalties. So he instituted a chronicle, a record of current events, unique in Europe. The saviour of the English language, he was also the founder of English prose. No other English monarch is remembered as "Great". "The Story of English", McNeil, Cran & McCrumb, 1986.
A separate section on nomenclature is typical in Misplaced Pages and this change, if it indeed is an accepted change, should be mentioned somewhere in the article.68.196.10.68 (talk) 16:46, 27 December 2021 (UTC)captcrisis
That is an interesting question and one I have sometimes wondered about. Among modern historians the term seems to be mainly used by Timothy Bolton - it is the title of his well regarded biography. I have looked to see whether he discusses the term, and presumably he does but I cannot see where without reading the whole book. Dudley Miles (talk) 17:41, 27 December 2021 (UTC)
Designations might change over time. Cnut the Great was "Emperor of the North" and founder of the shortlived "Northsea Empire". In Danish he has 'always' been refered to as Knud den Store = Cnut the Great (or Magnus when latin is used). Perhaps it's a characteristic of our time, that we in some connections seek to sort of synchronize the expressions used in various langauges? But to use the designation "the Great" can some times be a fairly modern phenomenon. Take the Danish King Godfred/Gudfred (c. 804-810), until the 1980'ies no one ever called him "den Store" and untill around 2010 this expression was only rarely used, but since then it has become more common to use and perhaps in another decade or two he will predominantly be refered to as "Godfred den Store"? Oleryhlolsson (talk) 18:47, 27 December 2021 (UTC)
Cnut being one of 'the Great's is by merit of being a king of multiple kingdoms. Alfred being the only English monarch called the great is true, because Cnut was Danish not English, whereas all other kings were English/British or the group they were from became English/British, like the normans Kind Regards, NotAnotherNameGuy (talk) 19:53, 20 April 2022 (UTC)
"Cnut the Great"?
The lead now has the name "Cnut the Great" bold. Is he really widely known by that name? He is widely know as "Canute the Great", but Cnut the Great? --SergeWoodzing (talk) 23:31, 26 January 2022 (UTC)
Cnut is the spelling used by almost all modern academic historians and Cnut the Great is the title of the biography by Timothy Bolton in the Yale English Monarchs series. Dudley Miles (talk) 08:49, 27 January 2022 (UTC)
Possible editorialized line currently in the opening.
In the second paragraph of the opening, there is currently a sentence which reads "Cnut sought to keep this power-base by uniting Danes and English under cultural bonds of wealth and custom, as well as through sheer brutality." There is no source attached after the sentence, although there is a Swedish-language source attached later in the paragraph. If that is the source being used as justification for this sentence, I have so far been unable to find anything in it that supports the inclusion of the claim "as well as through sheer brutality." In light of that, this phrase currently seems like an unsourced opinion inserted into the rest of the paragraph. If there is a different source for that claim that is listed elsewhere in the article, it would be helpful to have it linked there as well. If anyone would like to take a look at the currently listed sources in that paragraph, it would be helpful to see if there's any justification for the current inclusion of that phrase there. If not, we should probably think about removing it. MojaveSummit (talk) 22:07, 19 April 2022 (UTC)
The standard rule is that the lead does not require referencing as it should be a summary of the referenced main text, but as with this article many editors do not know the rules and add referenced text to the lead. In this case I do not see anything in the main text to support "sheer brutality", so unless I have missed something I think the comment should be deleted - even though it is a truism that all kings survived by brutality. Dudley Miles (talk) 07:25, 20 April 2022 (UTC)
A bot will list this discussion on the requested moves current discussions subpage within an hour of this tag being placed. The discussion may be closed 7 days after being opened, if consensus has been reached (see the closing instructions). Please base arguments on article title policy, and keep discussion succinct and civil.
Cnut → Canute – A number of moves of this article have been discussed comparatively recently, but this one has not been discussed in the last decade. This remains his WP:COMMONNAME in English, see e.g. King Canute and the tide It is also used by some respectable sources like the Encyclopedia Britannica and the British monarchy website. It is also not what his own people would have called him, which would be "Knut" or "Knutr". PatGallacher (talk) 20:58, 1 July 2023 (UTC)
I agree with this. He is far better known in modern English as Canute, and is still remembered and spoken about under that name, if only for that business with the tide. As for being called "the great", he may well have been known as this in Denmark, but he is not traditionally known as this in English. TharkunColl (talk) 21:18, 1 July 2023 (UTC)
Oppose. This has been repeatedly raised, most recently in 2015. Cnut is the usual spelling in modern reliable sources, as can be seen in the bibliography, and this should be the basis of our spelling. Britannica is over a century old and the monarchy website is not a reliable source. Dudley Miles (talk) 22:51, 1 July 2023 (UTC)
Oppose. According to this Ngram, Cnut and Canute are very much on par. I don't believe there is a good reason to change the title. 〜 Festucalex • talk09:35, 2 July 2023 (UTC)
Support Though best move would be to Canute the Great. Pronunciation, if nothing else. Anyone adequately familiar with English phonetics can pronounce Canute with ease. I also believe there is practically no history on the term "Cnut the Great" (which we now have in bold type), lots on "Canute the Great". Those who continue to wanna make a nut out of this man (no offence) , should stop it. --SergeWoodzing (talk) 13:45, 2 July 2023 (UTC)
Oppose per the sources used in the article - every mention of the subject of the article in the titles is "Cnut" (only the ODNB mentions Canute, but that's an alternate name, with the actual title being "Cnut"), and with only the 1911 EB in the further reading using "Canute". Ealdgyth (talk) 13:53, 2 July 2023 (UTC)
Reply I have looked through the archives, and I cannot see where this possible move was discussed as recently as 2015. If you look at Canute (given name) you will see that there are several Scandinavian monarchs with names like this who we do anglicise to Canute. PatGallacher (talk) 15:01, 2 July 2023 (UTC)
Point taken, but that was just a brief informal discussion rather than a formal move request, and it didn't seem to come to a clear consensus. PatGallacher (talk) 17:09, 2 July 2023 (UTC)
Even the Royal Mint spells his name as Canute on its thousandth anniversary commemorative coin, and if there exists such a thing as an "official" source, that's it. TharkunColl (talk) 18:31, 2 July 2023 (UTC)