Talk:King of the Britons

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[edit] More kings to include

The following rulers all assumed the title "King/Empereror of Britain/the Britons" (or related):

And yet are not on the list, presumably because - although they ruled over the Britons - they were not Britons themselves (though, in all fairness, Allectus may have been - we simply don't know).

But why, therefore, is Cunobelin on the list? He was a member of the Belgae ethnic group, and as such is just as likely to have been a speaker of a Germanic language as a Celtic language.

The basic question is this - is this list intended to be ethnically exclusive, or will it include all those who held a title equivalent to "King of the Britons"? TharkunColl 08:51, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

As the one who put up the new Kings of the Britons article, I guess I should respond. There are a couple of points:
  1. 'King/Emperor of Britain' is not the same as 'King of the Britons'. The former is geographical, the latter ethnic. The only time they would have been identical is when all inhabitants of Britain were identified as Britons. That is, they would not be identical at any time after the Roman Conquest. Carausius and Allectus were rulers of part of the Roman Empire, not rulers of a nation (the Britons).
    This kind of distinction is complete nonsense for the early Medieval period, when such distinctions were rarely made. john k 14:29, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
    I beg to differ. Please point out a single instance where "king of the Britons" and "king of Britain" were used synonymously in near-contemporary records.
  2. Cunobelin and his countrymen were regarded as Britons, regardless of their supposed origins. (Note: when Caesar said the Belgae had Germanic origins he probably just meant they originally came from east of the Rhine).
  3. I include 'Prince/King of Wales' as related to 'King of the Britons' because (by that time) Wales mean that part of Britain inhabited by the Welsh i.e. the Britons.
  4. I do not include non-Brythonic kings who claimed to be King of the Britons in addition to King of the Angles or whatever. I do already say that: 'The title King of the Britons was often used by, or bestowed (often retrospectively) upon, the most powerful ruler among the Britons'. I guess I could add a sentence saying that it was sometimes also claimed by non-Britons, and that these do not appear in the table. Do you have a list of non-Brythonic monarch who claimed (or were attributed) the title 'King of the Britons'?

Vortimer 21:06, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Problems with Links intended for List of legendary kings of Britain

We do not want to lose this article, so I have reverted the redirect. I have also requested that Vortimer rework the links to this article ASAP. Please be patient. Walgamanus 13:26, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

(Moved from User_talk:Walgamanus). At first, it was indeed the case that I did not realise there was a problem with the linked articles. When I became aware of the large number of linked articles, I put up the front-matter (for want of a better word) to King of the Britons, stating "Links to this article were formerly redirected to List of legendary kings of Britain. If you are looking ...". I had hoped that this would be acceptable, as it only requires the reader to make one click to find the article they were meant to be directed to, and on the way they also find the King of the Britons article, which in some cases may be more appropriate anyway. Vortimer 00:12, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

You should redirect all the links. There are hundreds of them, and it's your responsibility. If you had wanted to create a new article, you should have given it a new name, rather than hijack hundreds of links from elsewhere. I shall continue redirecting until you have made the appropriate changes, because you created the article in March and should have done it long before now. I would also suggest you think about the Wikipedia policies against POV and original research, and rethink your article accordingly. TharkunColl 00:15, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
I did not create the article in March. TharkunColl, please check your facts before making accusations. I never edited anything on wikipedia until 2 months ago when I removed the automatic redirect which I believed (and still believe) was inappropriate because the article named "Kings of the Britons" should contain information about Kings of the Britons (information which was nowhere else). I have no idea why you would think my article does not present a neutral POV. I'm less sure about your "original research" objection, but Walgamanus and others obviously think my article is appropriate in content and I respect their opinion. If you want to discuss that, start a new subject on it. Meawhile, you have once again "vandalised" my page (to use the expression of Walgamanus). You should have raised the problem here first, and you should now show a bit of patience, and make constructive suggestions about how to fix the problem. As is obvious from what I wrote before in User_talk:Walgamanus, I would be happy for all the links you are concerned about to be fixed, and am just trying to determine how it could be done in the most efficient manner. Vortimer 01:58, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
Why do you call it "my page" if you did not create it? Anyway, whatever the case, the easiest way is what I suggested above: create a new page name that has not been used before, shift the contents to that, and restore the redirect on this one. TharkunColl 08:23, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
Well, we obviously have two rather polarised points of view here. Personally, I think it better to have the information still available while links are being fixed, even if this may cause some confusion in the short term. Francis Schonken's suggested merge notice will certainly alert readers to a possible problem however. I can only suggest that concentrating our efforts on getting the links fixed ASAP will be much more productive than starting an edit war and I would encourage anyone with an interest in both/either of these articles to lend a hand. Please note, however, that all linked articles need individual examination as not every instance of the link needs changing. Walgamanus 16:15, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
OK, so I got to it before anyone else. I have fixed all the links and altered the dab statements on each article. I hope the situation is now acceptable to all parties. Walgamanus 17:54, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
It's certainly acceptable to me. Thank you very much for doing this. I hope you had some quick way of doing it rather than editing each page individually! I changed two of the cases where you had made the link go to List of legendary kings of Britain back to going to King of the Britons, because I thought it was more appropriate. They were Prince of Wales and List of rulers of Wales. If anyone thinks these pages should also link to legendary kings, they could add a new link. Vortimer 23:39, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] evolved in to Prince of Wales?

"From the 12th century onwards the title evolved into that of the Prince of Wales" - I'd dispute that. A king, one of several local kings who probably came from the original Britons went on to proclaim himself Prince of Wales. But I don't think that's an evolution of the title - he was called King of Gwynedd, not King of [the] Briton[s]. Your phrase suggests that a line of title proceeded but this was all really down to local feuding. Pbhj (talk) 02:12, 7 May 2008 (UTC)