Talk:Henry I Sinclair, Earl of Orkney

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Say something about Frederick J. Pohl identifying Sinclair as Glooscap in Prince Henry Sinclair Kwantus 20:12, 2005 Apr 10 (UTC)

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[edit] 1st Earl of Orkney?

Besides being just wrong, it's not usual to style Norwegian nobles that way Fornadan (t) 14:37, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

- Indeed, this system is nonsensical in any case. Calgacus 03:51, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

-The system of numbering is British (Scottish in this case). The number’s follow the direct line of family inheritance from being granted (by the King). So that the fist Sinclair to hold Orkney is the 1st Earl and the last Sinclair is the 3rd Earl. When the Earldom was re-created and given to another family the numbers started from one again. The system makes sense to me :-)

It’s not the correct style for Norwegian Nobles. The Sinclair’s being a Scottish family, albeit vassals of Norway adopted the Scottish system….or at least they did latter on.

The family numbering system is later invention of British Heralds and is not (as far as I am aware) “official”.

Jalipa

[edit] Merge with La Merika

There is a great overlap of material between this article and La Merika. I suggest a merge here. Blueboar 22:12, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

Disagree. Henry of Orkney was a historical person whose life & actions frankly are not very well covered by this article. It concentrates on an unproved theory that the Zeno brother’s writings (which are also suspect) are referring to him.
These writings are quite possibly forgeries. Also it is just theory that their “Prince Zichmni” is Henry Sinclair. (A theory based on a possible forgery!?)
However, I think there is a case for merging the “Zichmni” article with “La Merika” article. Naturally, there should be mention & a link on this page.
What this article really needs is more verifiable historical information on Henry Sinclair, his clan and tenure as Earl of Orkney rather than Dan Brownesque fantasy. Jalipa 23:36, 30 October 2006 (UTC)
Yes, I would not support a merger of these two articles. My preference would be to restrict this article to largely factual information about Henry, and simply direct readers to the La Merika article with a link and passing reference if they want to read about that theory.--Caliga10 12:52, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
Caliga10, just to clarify ... what you discribe is not a merge. In a merge, one article is folded into another. Some of the material from one article (in this case La Merika) is cut and pasted into another (ie this article) and the first article would be deleted with a redirect to the second.
Jalipa, I fully agree... however, most of the links to this article in other articles are in reference to the "Sinclair voyaged to America" stuff. That is what makes him notable rather than just another long dead Scottish nobleman. I agree that the voyage theory is absolute clap trap, but it does need to be discussed - if only to disprove it. By the way, if the merge does not happen, there is some good refutation info at the La Merika article that could be included here. Blueboar 13:37, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
Yes, I know I'm not describing a merge. I'm describing what I would like to see happen, which isn't a merge. :)--Caliga10 13:40, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
I have merged, as per the above discussion. I am not completely happy with the way I linked the two articles... but it is a start. Blueboar 20:25, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
Oh, Jesus H. Christ, Blue. You just couldn't wait for me to get my copy of Hiram Key, could you? Well I've got it back, now. And I was right, you were wrong: MULTIPLE mentions of "La MeriCa." The most notable is just around an illustration of the templar knight rock:
"We cannot be sure from the surviving evidence, but stories persist of Templar ships going to Scotland and to Portugal. The fleet could have visited both refuges in turn, but it seems more probable to us that they divided as soon as they left port, with one section headed towards Scotland and the remainder sailing to the northern tip of friendly Portugal to stock up with provisions. From there, they set out on a voyage that had often been discussed but, due to commitments in the Holy Land, had never been undertaken. They pointed their bows exactly due west and set sail on what is now the fourty-second parallel in search of the land marked by the star they knew from the Nasorean scrolls was called Merica, which these French knights referred to as 'la Merica', a name that later became simply America. They almost certainly landed in the Cape Cod or Rhode Island area of New England in the early weeks of 1308, setting foot on the New World nearly a century and a half before Christopher Columbus was even born."
_The Hiram Key_, Christopher Knight and Robert Lomas, p. 288.
"Before leaving the subject of the first European landings in the New World, we would like to explain why it became our firm conviction that the continent of America took its name, not from the 'also-ran' explorer Amerigo Vespucci, but from the star of the west called Merika, which the Nasoreans believed was the marker of a perfect land across the ocean of the setting sun. Not only did we have the evidence of the true source of the name; we found that the old explanation is easy to disprove.
The standard historical line that is routinely trotted out for the origin of the name of the New World, comes entirely from a silly misunderstanding by an obscure clergyman who never ventured more than a few miles from the monastsery of St. Deodatus in the Vosges Mountains in the Duchy of Lorraine on the French/German border. This very enthusiastic priest had a passion for geography and for deeply meaningful names. He gave himself the highly imaginative psuedonym of "Hylacomylus', from the Greek word for 'wood', the Latin for 'lake' and the Greek for 'mill', which was eventually translated back to his native German to create the family name of Waldseemüller. This slightly eccentric man led a small team who had access to a printing press and they gathered what information they could about the world including the inspiring discoveries of the great and mysterious continent across the western ocean. The little group produced and printed a 103-page volume in April 1507 that they called Cosmographiae Introductio. It covered the traditional principles of cosmography, including the divisions of the planet, distances between key locations and details of winds and climates, but it was also the source of a mistake that would make anamateur navigator famous for all time. Waldseemüller had found a number of references by various sailors to a general landmass of the great continent to the west, describing it as 'America', and he also found a glowing account of the travels of an Italian explorer by the name of Amerigo Vespucci. He erroneously married the two pieces of unconnected information and wrote:
'Now these parts of the Earth (Europe, Africa, Asia) have been more extensively explored and a fourth part has been discovered by Amerigo Vespucci (as will be described in what follows). Insomuch as both Europe and Asia received their names from women, I see no reason why reason why anyone should justly object to calling this part Amerige (from the Greek "ge" meaning "land of"), i.e. the land of Amerigo, or America, after Amerigo, its discoverer, a man of great ability.'"
_The Hiram Key_, Knight and Lomas, p. 290-291
The chapter goes on to describe how, once printed, there was no taking it back, and so the explaination stuck. Anyway, how is it again that you claim that the La Merica topic was never discussed in Hiram Key? As you may have noticed, it is spelled both ways, at least once with a "C" and at least once with a "K." So even if my previous guess that you were searching an E-Text was right, you still should have caught it. You've clearly been trying to derail the La Merica page since you found it; going from a failed deletion request, to telling me that Knight/Lomas's book never mentions it (again, falsely), and now you're merging it despite my requests to just wait and I would fix it once I had the resources.
So here's my idea: Now that I've done the hard work for you to prove that the theory is based on a real publication (like you asked), could you PLEASE put this on its own page? You clearly know much more about Wikipedia than I do, and I clearly know more about the La Merica theory than you do. Can we work together and do something more people would be happy with? If you want to relate these two articles, sure. I can see a basis for that. But they're clearly not the same topic. (it'd be like redirecting the Revolutionary War to George Washington. Sure, he had a leadership role, but that's not the issue.)
Though, since you seem interested in the connection, (and in the interest of full disclosure) there's another excerpt from The Hiram Key:
"[The Reverend Janet Dyer] continued her helpful commentary by referring to the documented evidence that Prince Henry Sinclair, the first St Clair Jarl (Earl) of the Orkneys had, thanks to Templar money, commissioned a fleet of twelve ships for a voyage to the 'New World'. The fleet under Antonio Zeno landed in Nova Scotia and explored the eastern seaboard of what is now the United States of America prior to 1400. The date is certain because Henry Sinclair was murdered upon his return in that year."
_The Hiram Key_, Knight and Lomas, p. 302.
Sorry about the long post, but I've had so much resistance since the beginning of this whole thing that I'd rather just let BlueBoar sort out his own version of the truth based on the information available. No other version will quite do, no matter how many people object. *sigh* Please fix this, Blue. I'm real sorry if the page has been an eye sore, but as you can see, I'm willing to help just as soon as I know my contributions won't just dissappear, like the La Merica page itself.
-Luke 67.173.165.18 02:54, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
Well... OK, it does seem that I was mistaken about The Hiram Key. However, I still think the merge was the right thing to do... it all works better as part of this article. The Hiram Key is highly speculative pseudo-history (a lot of "it is possible" and "it could be that")... when you compare Knight and Lomas's speculation with the scholarly research by REAL historians, it all comes down to the question of "was Henry Sinclair a Knight Templar? And if so did he sail to America?"... Thus, any discussion about "La Merica" works better on this page. Blueboar 14:01, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Problem with Dates, and Templars

The article states that Karen Ralls says Henry and William Sinclair testfied against the Templars. When did this happen? The trial of the Templars was in 1309, and Henry Sinclair was born around 1345. I'm confused, either Ralls is talking about a different set of Sinclairs or a different trial. --67.68.10.7 06:17, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

I think she is talking about a different trial. While the Templars were put on trial in France in 1309, the resulting papal bull disbanding them was not read out in Scotland until much later. I will have to check the reference, but it seems likely that Ralls is referring to another trial (one in Scotland, and at a later date.) Blueboar 15:25, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Unreliable source

I have cut the following:

  • The huge inheritance from his wife Joseline Sinclair and the political power of her brother ( his brother in arm in the first crusade) helped Hugh jumpstart his fraternity. It was known that 9 people established the fraternity but one stayed unknown (could the ninth be the Saint Claire and then his family line).<ref>[[http://www.angelfire.com/mi4/polcrt/KnightsTemplar1.html#pref]].</ref> .

and

  • The St. Clairs (Sinclairs) (from Normandy, France) were among the families that supported William the Conqueror in 1066 and this is how they received their holdings in Scotland. Shortly after moving, they changed their name to the Scottish Sinclair[[http://www.angelfire.com/mi4/polcrt/Sinclairs.html#pref]]

The angelfire sites are personal (self publised) websites that do not meet WP:RS. Feel free to add the info back if you can find better citations. Blueboar 14:43, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] WHO calls it the "La Merika/La Merica Theory"

I have raised this before, but need to raise it again. We say that the theory that Sinclair sailed to America is sometimes called the "La Merika Theory" (or "La Merica Theory"). I understand that we have sources to back the fact that a few loony authors claim that America was named after some sort of star by that name... I am not concerned about that. What I am concerned about is the lack of citation to show that anyone actually calls this idea by the exact name "La Merika Theory". Without a citation to back the fact that this phrasing is actually used by someone, I can only assume that it is a neologism created by an editor. That constitutes Original Research. Blueboar 16:36, 7 March 2007 (UTC)