Talk:Gustav III of Sweden

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An event mentioned in this article is an August 21 selected anniversary.

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[edit] Last comment inserted at the bottom

Why is it confusing to put all dates into the Gregorian calendar after its first adoption in the 16th century? When trying to synchronize events in the Catholic World with those in the Protestant, doesn't it make more sense to just convert everything to the Gregorian calendar? In any event, this strikes me as a "POV" comment. Also, that remark about war and theater is just silly. john 07:58 Apr 30, 2003 (UTC)

It's confusing to quote a proleptic date without stating it's proleptic. It always makes sense to state the calendar that is being used when there is room for doubt: to silently change a Julian date to a Gregorian date without stating you have done so clearly leads to confusion, as can be seen by searching for Gustav's birthdate on the web. -- Someone else 21:19 Apr 30, 2003 (UTC)

Yes, I agree with that. It should be stated which calendar is being used. But there's no need for a rant about it in an article about a King of Sweden, is there? Just change the dates to indicate which calendar is used. john 23:21 Apr 30, 2003 (UTC)

The rant -- an unfair characterization -- is there to prevent people from erroneously "fixing" the date. Again. Do what you like with it. -- Someone else 23:39 Apr 30, 2003 (UTC)

Well, it's a bit of a rant, but perhaps I was unfair. It's more that it seems out of place. Why not just say Born: Such and such (Old style), Such and such (new style). Then nobody can possibly be confused, and you don't need to be snide about people "correcting" dates? And again, should an encyclopedia article about a king of sweden use up a portion of its space talking about, essentially, the incorrect beliefs of other contributors? john 02:12 May 1, 2003 (UTC)

The correct date is not a belief. And you are also unfair in your assessment of snideness. The dates have been erroneously corrected several times. But with the interpolation of the 1911 material the note on dates is now quite some distance from the dates themselves, and will probably be without effect. Delete it if you like. -- Someone else 02:29 May 1, 2003 (UTC)

Well, this is getting rather more hostile than I intended. The correct date, of course, is not a "belief". On the other hand, Somebody living in Italy at the time, asking the date of Gustavus III's birth, would be given the new style date. Furthermore, we here in the US celebrate George Washington's birth on February 23. This is the new style date of his birth, despite the fact that he was born before the adoption of the new calendar. Furthermore, in western accounts of Russian history before 1918, it is fairly common (although not universal, of course), to just convert everything to new style dates. So I don't think the issues is as cut and dry as you suggest. But that wasn't really my point. Your note originally mentioned a confusing tendency of "some" to try to "incorrectly correct" dates. But then, above, you indicated that what you meant by some was not "some scholars" or some such, but "some wikipedia contributors", and I don't think that an encyclopedia article should include statements about how other contributors are wrong. I apologize for using the word snide, that was unfair, and I really didn't mean to make this a personal attack. I think that, as is, it should be protected from people "correcting" the date to the Gregorian date. No hard feelings, I hope? john 02:51 May 1, 2003 (UTC)

I have none. I have changed the markup of the dates to that which has been used in similar circumstances. -- Someone else 02:58 May 1, 2003 (UTC)

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I appreciate the work by Mic very much. But here the long quote from Encyclopedia Britanica of 1911 strikes me as allienating and not very neutral in tone. Maybe the 100 years old style is the problem. I'm not used to it, and the oddities hampers my perception?

But it's likely a matter of taste. ...I mean, john above questions the remark, of an earlier version, about "effort in war and theater" which I found almost brilliant: in a few words depicturing an impression which otherwise had demanded dozens of lines to express.

Maybe an editing according to the idea of Most Important Things First would be good?

Ruhrjung 17:45 Apr 30, 2003 (UTC)

The remark about war and theater was clever. But not particularly informative. If the war link had linked to an article about the Russo-Swedish War of 1788-1790, that would have made sense, but as it was, it was somewhat mystifying. So, it'd be a clever bon mot in an actual work of history, but I don't think it's a good thing for an encyclopedia john 23:36 Apr 30, 2003 (UTC)

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The following comment was added by anon user 156.34.223.188 who is suspected of vandalism on another page. Please provide an authoritative source for this comment before re-adding it. Rossami 18:46, 6 Aug 2004 (UTC)

He ordered abolished, in 1772, the Cave of Roses where an array of lizards were kept for the purpuse of torturing criminals.

• It's unlikely he'll find one, for reasons given in my nomination for deletion of that page. (G3 did indeed abolish torture, though this is already mentioned) BTW; I can't see what the current NPOV-tag is for. The person who added it didn't follow the guideline by not giving any reason on this page, much less any specific complaint. I'm removing the tag. --BluePlatypus 19:40, 8 October 2006 (UTC)