Talk:Owen Tudor
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[edit] Name
There is no such thing as "Owen Tudor"! His name was Owen ap Tudor, ie Owen son of Tudor. The Wealsh didn't adopt last names until Henry VIII forced them to. DelftUser 14:29, 2005 July 14 (UTC)
- Maybe we should change it then? Do you have a citation, I wouldn't want to change it if it was wrong, though I do agree with you. Souldn't it be Owain ap Tudor.
I did look into it further and found that he was known as Owen Tudor from 1500 onward, thus I think it should stay with a paragraph explaining that this name is historical and not actual. --DelftUser 14:17, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
So a little checking and we are both wrong!!! According to my copy of Owain Glyn Dŵr & the War of Independence in the Welsh Borders (Geoffery Hodges, Logaston Press 1995: ISBN 1873827245), Owen was the son of Maredudd ap Tudur of Anglesey. His mother is given as either the sister or cousin of Elen, Owain Glyn Dŵr's mother; I don't know how his mother's ancestry here squares with the book. It seems to me to be unlikely that the sister of Owain Glyn Dŵr's mother could have been of child bearing age in 1400, Owain Glyn Dŵr was born between 1356 and 1359. It may be that the author of the book is wrong because Owen's father, Maredudd, is also given as Owain Glyn Dŵr's maternal cousin [1]. Be that as it may, Owen's father seems to be Maredudd. So he would be Owen ap Maredudd, not Owen ap Tudur. At best he would be Owen ap Maredudd ap Tudur (google gives quite a few hits for him using this name). It also says in the book that it was Owen who changed the spelling to Tudor from Tudur. So maybe he took his grandfather’s given name as a family name? Did you find out what he is called before 1500? He was probably Owain ap Meredudd ap Tudur in Wales. The question really is did he take it as a surname when he changed Tudur to Tudor? I can't find any information about the name Owen Tudor only being used after 1500, do you remember your source? Wikipedia policy is sketchy on this sort of point. Probably it would be best to use the name for which he is best know, and mention his Welsh name in the article. My guess is that it was Owen who started to use Tudor as a family name rather than a given name, maybe he anglicised Owain to Owen at the same time?Alun 16:59, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
- The book: The Wars of the Roses: And the Lives of Five Men and Women in the Fifteenth Century by Desmond Seward lists him, in the family trees, as: Owen ap Maredudd ap Tudur (Owen Tudor). I now that the Welsh had to use family names in the reign of Henry VIII (they were forced!), maybe from that time he became known as Owen Tudor, but I don't really know. You seem to know much more than me on this subject, but my opinion is to keep the page name as it is. --DelftUser 20:20, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
- I think understand what you are saying, but I am wondering if a Welsh nobleman who was married to/living with the Dowager Queen, and who had dynastic aspirations in the English court, might have found it to his advantage to anglicise his name by both changing the spelling (and probably pronunciation) and giving himself an English style surname. No coersion would be necessary for someone in Owain/Owen's position. The different names for him in your source might just be due to the differences between Welsh and English sources. I have no evidence for this, but it could explain why he might have been happy to change his name.Alun 08:06, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
- I don't know how reliable this source is, but at least it's a citation!!
- I think understand what you are saying, but I am wondering if a Welsh nobleman who was married to/living with the Dowager Queen, and who had dynastic aspirations in the English court, might have found it to his advantage to anglicise his name by both changing the spelling (and probably pronunciation) and giving himself an English style surname. No coersion would be necessary for someone in Owain/Owen's position. The different names for him in your source might just be due to the differences between Welsh and English sources. I have no evidence for this, but it could explain why he might have been happy to change his name.Alun 08:06, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
One more thing; our Owain ap Maredudd ap Tudur decided to adopt an English style surname. The obvious choice would have been for him to have anglicised his patronymic and become 'Owain Maredudd' or 'Meredith', as indeed did many subsequent 'ap Maredudds'. But for reasons only known to himself, Owain rejected this option and selected his grandfather's name 'Tudur' and therefore became 'Owen Tudor'.[2]
Alun 09:56, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
- The convention for names is here Wikipedia:Naming conventions. It sais this: Convention: Use the most common name of a person or thing that does not conflict with the names of other people or things. So Owen Tudor is correct for the title.Alun 15:45, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
[edit] No citations or Bibliography
This article has no citations or bibliography. Can we have some please?Alun 15:45, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Standard Welsh spelling please
Another thing, what's with the verch stuff? My Welsh may be rusty as it's 20 years since I left school (Ysgol Gyfun Llanhari, Morgannwg Ganol), but it is surely ferch. Actually merch mutated to ferch. If you are going to start using non-standard Welsh spellings then surely Ednyfed Fychan should become Ednyved Vychan, which just looks silly (as does verch to a Welsh speaker).Alun 06:00, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Marriage
While no documentation of Owen and Catherine's marriage survives, nobody at the time, even people hostile to them, disputed that they were married. Surely we can thus take it as read that they were? Jess Cully 14:47, 15 July 2007 (UTC)
