Talk:Chernorizets Hrabar

An Account of Letters

I would suggest to move the artcle to An Account of Letters, since what is all content is about. The only information about the person it that he was the author of the work, and the name may well be a pseudonym. So at the moment an improtance of the manuscript is higher than that of the name. mikka (t) 2 July 2005 18:13 (UTC)

There is no official (or better said, known) data that confirm that Hrabar was Bulgarian nor some other nationality. Gee, I wonder from where did the Bulgarians digged up this? Huh, this article is full of incorrect information and in this version, certainly is not for Wikipedia... Bomac 15:49, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

Can you be more specific, please? "Full of nonsense" is hardly helpful comment. mikka (t) 16:34, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

Name

I moved the article back to its proper English title, because, as far as I can see, the subject has no established name in English. Google church for "chernorizets Hrabar" discoveres pages either mirroring the Wikipedia content or referring to the Varna Chernorizets Hrabar Free University, which is hardly a criterion to establish which name should be preferred. --Ghirla | talk 09:01, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, but no. Here is a search that excluded "varna", "VFU" and "wikipedia". It has a total of 384 results in English that include various spellings of Hrabar. The search for "chernorizets" with the same criteria has another 246.

The search for "Hrabar the Monk" with "wikipedia" excluded has practically no results, except for some "The Brave Monk" translation stuff that is preceded by the real name.

Besides, if there is no established name in English (although there is one in this case), you shouldn't attempt on coining in new names, but rather use the most popular one, which is apparently the most widespread transliteration — Chernorizets Hrabar. And Hrabar the Brave is not the or even a proper name in English, it's only a partial translation that sounds weird, at least to me. → Тодор Божинов / Todor Bozhinov → 10:52, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Please don't deify the google search. Chernorizets is the Slavic word for monk. To use it as a proper name is downright silly. We don't have Letopisets Nestor, do we? Why should we have Chernorizets Hrabar? --Ghirla | talk 11:09, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Probably because it's the most popular name used? Plus, you were the one that tried to provide evidence through Google search, I just proved you wrong, it wasn't me that chose the method. Google search is only a factor here, if you in any way prove Hrabar the Monk is the form that's prevalent in English, I would agree with the moving of the article to this name. But, as I already said, coining in new terms out of nowhere isn't the policy.

Additionally, how do you know what was what? Hrabar was almost certainly not his first name, but rather part of the pseudonym and has a meaning (brave), why do you translate only the chernorizets part? It's not like I would support a wholy-translated version or a translation of any kind, but the current name is as bad as it could be. → Тодор Божинов / Todor Bozhinov → 12:05, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Your notion that I "coined" the current name is wrong. I just attempted to translate a Slavic noun. If the issue is important for you and you believe that I was wrong, you are free to move the article back. I will not interfere now that you explained yourself. --Ghirla | talk 12:14, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the understanding. It really is quite important. What I meant by "coin" is "try to introduce terms that have not been in use before", not "invent new words". → Тодор Божинов / Todor Bozhinov → 12:46, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Comment

You are insane. Chernorizec Hrabar was not Bulgarian He was Macedonian —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.110.67.19 (talk • contribs)

Oops, my fault.

1. There was no Macedonia, Macedonians or Macedonian language back then. And until a lot later.
2. There is no evidence whatsoever that Cherorizsets Hrabar has ever visited what we today call Macedonia (not that Macedonia).
3. In fact, the only thing that is known is that he worked in the Preslav Literary School in modern northeastern Bulgaria for the First Bulgarian Empire. Todor→Bozhinov 15:02, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Ethnicity and the rest...

1. You should provide a source where he identifies as Bulgarian and don't be sly and use "Bulgarian" EDIT: Oops! I forgot, you can't. =P
2. I've added his name in OCS. Why do we need the Bulgarian translation?
3. I added a note on transliterating his name, giving the transliterated Macedonian and Serbian forms (the former being quite common in English-language texts while the latter was given so as not too sound to Macedonistic =D)

--Hegumen (talk) 03:59, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

That's a joke. Macedonistic? The man worked in Preslav - pretty far away even for you to claim him as an Ethnic Macedonian. I've left the OCS version, but the bg one is as relevant as it can get. Well, I imagine the Bulgarian ruler would identify as Bulgarian, wouldn't he? And you keep on removing the bg name just cause you don't like seeing it - some constructive work. And stop with the qualifiers like sly - it's pretty close to a personal attack. --Laveol ^T 21:08, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

You know what I meant about the Macedonistic thing, I didn't want to be too much like you. The Bulgarian language as we know it today wasn't around back then, "you're pushing a modern term into this". We don't know if he would have identified as Bulgarian, Wikipedia isn't about guessing and filling gaps. I keep removing the Bulgarian translation because it has little relevance to this article. --Hegumen (talk) 04:32, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Little relevance? Ok, what are you failing to get here. This was a Bulgarian monk, who wrote about Bulgaria in his works, and was most probably the Bulgarian ruler. This is not some peasant, but someone who actually did know what Bulgarian meant and used it accordingly. It is part of the Bulgarian literature. And no, Bulgarian is not that kind of a modern term, since it was used back then and it is used now to refer to the thing back then. --Laveol ^T 09:10, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Probably, probably, probably. We can't assume anything. It's already mentioned in the article that some believe he could have been Tsar Simeon. It doesn't matter what other writers said/thought, what's important is his own ethnic identity. Isn't that the reasoning you've used in the past with people from Macedonia? The source you provided doesn't say much about his ethnicity, in fact it doesn't say anything about his ethnicity. It lists him along with some other medieval Slavic writers as being "old Bulgarians". Even then, that's the opinion of one man, who also happens to be Bulgarian. Surprised? I'm not. I don't doubt he considered himself Bulgarian, the problem is that Wikipedia can't make such assumptions. Is that "scientific" enough for you? --Hegumen (talk) 15:33, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

You're starting to lack the sense in your comments. We're not assuming he worked in Bulgaria, we know that. And, what you didn't address was the fact that in his own writings he speaks about Bulgaria and Bulgarians. It means he identified as it, doesn't it? And the sentence you nailed it with is: I don't doubt he considered himself Bulgarian - what's the problem now? You said the problem was that you didn't agree with this and now you say this is not the case. --Laveol ^T 19:43, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

No, you want the article to assume he was an ethnic Bulgarian because he lived in Bulgaria and wrote in OCS. And yes, that probably does mean he identified as Bulgarian but we can't make those assumptions. Why? Because he never claimed to be such. He talks about people of "Slavic descent", the "Slavic race", "Slavic letters", "Slavic books", the "Slavic language" and "Slavic writers". The only mention of the word Bulgarian is in reference to Tsar Boris. Read the modern Bulgarian translation here. --Hegumen (talk) 04:57, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Read another Bulgarian translation here if you want. --Hegumen (talk) 05:00, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

He lived in a country called Bulgaria and is therefore connected to the Bulgarian history. In your logic all names of the Bulgarian rulers in Bulgarian should be removed which is ridiculous. The Bulgarian name stays. We know perfectly well that he did not speak modern Bulgarian so didn't all Bulgarians since the early 20th century. And if you don't know or prefer to forget, the modern Bulgarian people began its formation in 9th century. We have the Bulgarian name of Georgi Terter even though he was most probably of Cuman, not of Bulgarian origin. Tsar Ferdinand or Knyaz Alexander Batenberg were not Bulgarians as well but only their Bulgarian name stays here. So I will return the Bulgarian name of Chernorizets Hrabar.--Gligan (talk) 08:19, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

One of most important sentences in this entire article is, "no biographical information is available about him". Who are we to label an obscure medieval Slavic writer (who only ever wrote a few hundred words at most) as "Bulgarian" or anything else for that matter? This shouldn't even be an issue of ethnicity. My version mentions, in the intro, that he was from Bulgaria. He never identified as Bulgarian let alone mention the word (the exception being his reference to Tsar Boris). He wrote in OCS, not modern Bulgarian and his name should be given in OCS accordingly. The name stays? Who the fuck made you Jimbo Wales? --Hegumen (talk) 10:22, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

I seriously suggest you refer from such expressions. Didn't I change it from Bulgarians to Bulgaria according to your concerns? What more do you want - we do know he worked in Bulgaria and for Bulgaria. This is enough and you're starting to rant now. --Laveol ^T 10:28, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

That's what you've reduced me to. Знај, ова е само почеток. --Hegumen (talk) 10:45, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Почеток? --Laveol ^T 10:54, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Казвам, че това е само начало. Отговарям на въпроса следващия път. Надявам се, че това добре съм написал. --Hegumen (talk) 18:10, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Горе-долу. But keep it in English not to get in trouble. --Laveol ^T 19:55, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Are you satisfied with the article now? --Hegumen (talk) 07:42, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

I am not sure why such an obsolete statements about Chernorizetc Hraber are taken by some guy that obviously has problems with history (referring to Hegumen)... Please note that we are talking about the Medieval times... 9-10 century ?? Are you insane? Do you thing that he was an englishmen getting the plane to come ans work in Bulgaria? Or perhaps he had a time machine and he was a macedonian who came to Bulgarian after 10-11 century travell back in time? Please note the following:

- He lived in BULGARIA - In the town Preslav - And wrote in Old bulgarian/slavonic

So the logical conclusion is that he was bulgarian. There are no evidence about the opposite of that, but still we have the above mentioned. Due to that fact it should be added again.. I will thing about the proper way of adding it, so that it would not be misleading. PLease feel free to discuss this... And make suggestion. As for now I will edit it in order to gather the attention of the sober thinking contributors (i do that due to the fact that the comments are pretty old). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.90.0.97 (talk) 20:08, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Renaming

The clumsy title is still an issue. There's no reason to suppose "Hrabar" was anything but a given name. He's known as Hrabar the Monk on Google Books and elsewhere. The current title is frankly misleading. --Ghirla^-трёп- 14:19, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

A name is a name, the name of the guy was 'Chernorizets Hrabar'; nothing clumsy about that, and names are not translated. Apcbg (talk) 17:09, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

It's actually only assumed that Hrabrъ was his given name on account of črьnorizьcь being a rank (formula: [rank] [name]). As for Wikipedia policy: "Wikipedia does not necessarily use the subject's "official" name as an article title; it instead uses the name which is most frequently used to refer to the subject in English-language reliable sources." If "Hrabar the Monk" is indeed the most common name as Ghirla states, a rename would be in order. --124.148.192.108 (talk) 20:21, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Indeed, other variants do appear to be more common (though none more so than another). Thoughts? --124.148.192.108 (talk) 20:28, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

The issue of modern languages

It has come to my attention that several users are attempting to hijack this article with the intent of presenting the subject as being a contributor to a modern language; namely, a translation of his name in Bulgarian is listed alongside that of the language he wrote in (OCS). I am removing the Bulgarian translation because such a language did not emerge until at very least a century after the death of the subject. --124.168.240.187 (talk) 06:17, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

If one should argue that this person features prominently in Bulgarian-language literature, then the argument can be made that a multitude of other translations should be given. However, the real problem here is a POV popular in Bulgaria which states that OCS was the direct predecessor of the modern Bulgarian language. --124.168.240.187 (talk) 06:23, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Then remove every inscription in Macedonian language from every name in the articles about a persons, born in Macedonia, who died before 1945, and identified themselves as Bulgarians, please. Jingby (talk) 10:46, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

You obviously don't understand the concept of standard languages. Either way, I personally wouldn't object. --124.169.58.162 (talk) 16:15, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Hmm, what's the problem if sources are clear that he contributed to the development of Bulgarian literature? --Laveol ^T 20:02, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

That would in be a contradiction as he contributed to OCS, not a modern language. --124.169.58.162 (talk) 02:49, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

Bulgarian literature?

The source states: that Slavo-Bulgarian, or as we shall call it henceforth, Bulgarian... . This is a clear reference to Old Church Slavonic and not the Bulgarian language. --124.150.62.117 (talk) 03:48, 17 April 2011 (UTC)