Talk:List of monarchs of Mercia

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 It has been suggested that Icel (person), Cnebba , Cynewald , Creoda of Mercia , Pybba of Mercia , Cearl of Mercia and Ceolwald of Mercia be merged into this page or section. (Discuss)

Contents

[edit] Irish sources of charecter '7'?

"The character '7' was used as the ampersand '&' in contemporary Anglo-Saxon writings. The era pre-dates the emergence of forms of writing accepted today, notably minuscule, and the letters 'W' and 'U'. Where W was followed by U this was generally rendered as 'VV' (which was also used for 'W' alone)."

Just wished to note that we still use the above charecter for the word "agus" (and) in Irish. Since early Irish monks spread the Christian faith among the Anglo-Saxons, could this be where that charecter came from? Fergananim 5th August 2005.

[edit] Flag

I'm changing the shade of blue of the St. Albans cross from the blue of the flag of Scotland to a more accurate one. Cdh1984 11:22, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Apologies, but...

Apologies for using rollback on good faith edits by User:Java13690, no implication intended, just hit the wrong button. However, I did mean to revert. The article was and is right to say that eth and thorn are not distinguishable in A-S contexts: "The word 'that' was written as þæt or ðæt...þ and ð were used interchangeably for th in 'that' or 'thin'" (Mitchell, Intro to Old English, §1). And why stop at eth and thorn: where is wynn (ƿ) and the ʒ-like g? Angus McLellan (Talk) 17:54, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Query

In Buckingham Palace there is a (presumably) 18th century painting by "B. West, Historical Painter to His Majesty", entitled Alfred III, King of Mercia. Who is this? I can't work it out from the lists on the article page. David Lauder 08:44, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

I have no idea. Mercia never had a king named Alfred, and nor did it ever have three kings with the same name as each other. TharkunColl 09:04, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
Was this a print of West's 1778 William de Albanac Presents his Three Daughters to Alfred III, King of Mercia? Simon Keynes' list says the original painting was lost in a fire in 1816. The scene was also painted by Henry Fuseli and someone named Shee. Apparently this was a medieval legend, but I've no idea of the content. Alfred III would, if the date of 734 is right, perhaps be King Æthelbald. No, I don't know either how we can get from Æthelbald to Alfred. Æthelred I could understand. Angus McLellan (Talk) 09:50, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
Many thanks for your replies. It is a large engraving of the painting, dated 9th November 1782. Regards, David Lauder 12:23, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Beornred

Is there a reference for Beornred's death? It does not match what Miller says on Anglo-Saxons.net, or the Chronicle of Melrose, or Symeon's Gesta Regum. They all appear to state that the "tyrant" who burned Catterick in 769 and died the same year was one Earnred. Angus McLellan (Talk) 16:33, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

There's this, for example [1], and quite a few that give Beornred's death as 769 (e.g. [2], [3]). Perhaps "Earnred" is actually Beornred? I've altered the wording to reflect the uncertainty. TharkunColl 18:02, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
Dear old Roger of Wendover. If you were to use primary sources John of Worcester is best. He had access to lots of Mercian material now lost. But really the dates should come from "reliable sources", secondary ones mainly, or subject-specific tertiary ones. The Peerage is of doubtful reliability when it comes to pre-modern stuff. The PASE, on the other hand, is the dog's bollocks for Anglo-Saxoncruft, although it could be improved by adding S. of D. and J. of W. (and maybe even William of Malmesbury, who seems to have had some now-lost info on Mercia). It's well done and free, as is Sean Miller's anglo-saxons.net. Both are reliable in the Wiki sense.
Next best are reliable, non-free stuff like Yorke's Kings and Kingdoms, Kirby's Earliest English Kings, and the collective efforts: The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Anglo-Saxon England, Æthelbald and Offa, the 2004 Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, and Mercia: An Anglo-Saxon Kingdom in Europe. Any big library should have all of those, and if you're in Mercia they'll likely have Dornier's Mercian Studies as well. Ian Walker isn't a historian, but I believe that his Mercia and the Making of England got good reviews from the professionals. I liked it. Angus McLellan (Talk) 18:56, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
Thanks - some pretty useful resources there. TharkunColl 08:50, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Merger proposal

The six earliest kings, plus Ceolwald, have almost no information about them. I suggest we merge them to here and add a preface discussing the sources, such as the Anglian collection, that mention them. Mike Christie (talk) 02:24, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

I'd prefer to keep Cearl separate, and Ceolwald also. There's enough in Higham's Midland History paper to write something reasonable on Cearl. Ceolwald and Beornred form part of a series. The others before Cearl I think are too sketchy, a permanent temptation to add original research or poor quality made up stuff from some dreadfully unreliable book, so yes, do merge those. If you really feel that you must merge Ceolwald, I'd prefer a merge with Ceolred. Angus McLellan (Talk) 02:59, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
OK, that paper does look like enough to do something on Cearl. (I knew he was marginal.) For Ceolwald though I thought that all there was was a single mention of his name in the Chronicle of Evesham. Is there more? And what's the connection with Beornred? Mike Christie (talk) 03:13, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
That's all I am aware of. Except that the ASC comment on Beornred is rather more trustworthy, there is more or less the same to be said about both. But I don't see the advantage in having a series of articles, but missing one out just because it will always be short. Linking to lists is unreliable if you want to take the reader to a particular point in the list. If you don't, you'll risk them just not bothering to hunt through the page for the information. Angus McLellan (Talk) 03:51, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
What's the point in merging? It will only confuse people following links to those individuals, and their articles are by no means the shortest on Wikipedia. TharkunColl (talk) 16:54, 16 March 2008 (UTC)