Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (royalty and nobility)/Archive 9

Just to summarise previous discussions on the subject, "Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother" is not a unique title. It would also be contrary to the convention which states that people should be known by the highest title they have held, hers being "Queen Elizabeth" -- even further from being unique. But the most telling argument for using maiden names is that that's what the history books use. She just hasn't been dead long enough yet for it to kick in. But it will. Deb 16:52 17 May 2003 (UTC)

And I forgot to add... What you say about male consorts needing to be worked out on a case by case basis is perfectly true, and that's exactly the point I was making. There are clear rules for naming female consorts. It just happens that they are unhelpful for naming wikipedia articles. Deb 16:55 17 May 2003 (UTC)

How are they unhelpful? They use her married title, unless she is the consort of the reigning monarch, in which case they use her consort name? The vast majority of people using wiki and the vast majority of potential users using wiki wouldn't have an iota of a clue what someone's maiden name was. You might as well translate them into chinese as use maiden names because living royals are barely recognisable by maiden name except possibly in their own state. The present system produces references that are reasonably accurate, clearly understandable and which can be have redirects set up if their official name is not straight-forward. Maiden names would be the equivalent of what happened when Taku renamed all the Japanese emperors; the result was a mess that only those with expert knowledge could follow. As regards the QM, I think a logical approach to when someone shifts from their last title (in her case, QE the QM) to the historical standard of maidn name is to ask, when would a first time voter (aged 18) cease to recognise that person by their last used name? When that occurs, you can safely say they have passed from a contemporary figure to a figure in history and can be renamed accordingly. Personally I think it would be more accurate to use QE the QM as the title right now as that is how she is known by 99.9% of people. Her recognition factor by that title will decline, with a new generation not knowing of her. When that occurs, then she should be named using the standard historical conventions. But I personally think it is way to early to do that yet. FearÉÍREANN 19:12 17 May 2003 (UTC)

You misunderstand (sigh!). Female royals' titles are unhelpful simply because they are not unique - whereas male royals' titles almost always are individual to them. Deb 21:54 17 May 2003 (UTC)

Sorry if we were working at crossed purposes. It is a fair point. I think the best solution is to apply the name, title to the current holder perhaps with a reversion to maiden name for past figures. Though that may be unfair to commoners who marry royalty though that might be unfair to them as they (unlike Catherine of Aragon) have no past title to revert back to. It may be great being Princess of Wales, but it may be unfair then to demote that PoW back to Biddy Murphy after her death! Who says royal titles are easy!!! But at least (and this we can be very proud of) wikipedia's use of royal titles are on the whole first class. You and I am some others took an unholy mess and made a logical stab at sorting it out. OK so we haven't solved all the problems. That is the nature of royal nomenclature and encyclopædias. But at least we have made things nearly right. There are a lot of other places on wiki that could do with such clarity and accuracy. :-) FearÉÍREANN 22:31 17 May 2003 (UTC)~

Just to note that "Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother" is a unique *style*. Furthermore, I can only think of one other woman who might possibly have been called that, Elizabeth Woodville. I would further imagine that "Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother" is a far more unique name/style/title than "Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon". Just looking at http://pages.prodigy.net/ptheroff/gotha/strathmore.html, a genealogy of the descendants of the 13th Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne, the late Queen Mother's grandfather, one finds the following:

1) Elizabeth Cator, who married the Hon. Michael Bowes-Lyon, the Queen Mother's older brother.

2) Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon (now Lady Elizabeth Leeming), sister of the present Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne.

3) the late Queen Mother herself

4) Elizabeth Colville, who married James Bowes-Lyon

5) Elizabeth Rodier, who married David Bowes-Lyon

Presumably, there have been others.... so the uniqueness defense seems hardly appropriate. In fact, with a pretty high percentage of names, there's going to be a lack of uniqueness. So I'm not sure that objection stands. On the other hand, that it violates the "highest title held" position seems plausible. But I still tend to think that royals by marriage who were commoners by birth should not be referred to by their maiden names. Especially someone like the late Queen Mother, who had an almost uniquely identifying style that she bore for most of the last 50 years. So I would propose that royals-by-marriage who were commoners by birth should be referred to by their married name. "Crown Princess Mette-Marit of Norway" "Queen Sonja of Norway", etc. Any other individuals with the same name could be either linked away to their own articles, or described separately within the same article. For the late Queen Mother, "Queen Elizabeth of the United Kingdom" could be used, with a link to Elizabeth II, if you want to go by highest title. (Again, that title, "Queen Elizabeth of the United Kingdom" can refer to precisely two people, and is thus relatively close to unique - one might note that even royal/semi-royal borns like Queen Alexandra and Queen Mary are relatively unique in that name - There has only been one Queen Alexandra of the UK, and one Queen Mary of the UK. This compared to at least one other Princess Mary of Teck, and probably several other Princesses Alexandra of Denmark, although I'm uncertain of that. There have also been only one Queen Charlotte of the UK, one Queen Caroline of the UK, and one Queen Adelaide of the UK, for that matter...the uniqueness argument doesn't really hold water, I don't think).

BTW, what is the rule for naming articles about German princesses who became, through marriage, Russian Grand Duchesses? Alexander III's wife is listed under her maiden name "Dagmar of Denmark", but the last empress is "Alexandra of Hesse", which is rather wrong, as her name was actually "Alix". Alexandra was only her orthodox baptism name... Sigh, this whole thing is such a mess. john 06:47 18 May 2003 (UTC)

Not such a mess surely??? :-) Actually those names were put in to correct the instance of another person that all Russian royal names be in Russian, which led to an edit war - all of wiki versus one person! To be honest, I didn't use Alix because I was not sure if that was her actual name or a family name (some sources I came across said it was a sort of 'pet' name.) But if it should be Alix then by all means change it.

The point is not that there have been no other women called "Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon", but that none of them merit a wikipedia article. On the other hand, every "Queen Elizabeth", "Queen Mary", etc, is going to have an article. That's where the problem starts. And believe me, we have Queen Marys coming out of our ears. We also have two Queen Carolines, five Queen Annes, three Queen Eleanors, two Queen Isabellas and four Elizabeths. And that's just the British ones. Still want to argue the toss? Deb 14:47 18 May 2003 (UTC)

...nearly forgot the three Queen Catherines...

I agree that royal-borns deserve to be called by their maiden names, because it would be confusing, and because they are frequently called by that. "Catherine of Aragon", "Isabella of France" (although there's two of those), etc. are usually called that. Commoner queens from earlier times are also usually called by maiden names... "Elizabeth Woodville", "Anne Boleyn", "Catherine Howard", etc. The late Queen Mother was not usually called "Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon". Nor is Queen Sonja of Norway normally called "Sonja Haraldsen". Furthermore, I think princess names are just as likely to repeat. How many Infanta Maria Teresas of Spain were there? A whole lot. Only one Queen Marie-Therese of France (and Navarre), though. And, as I pointed out, besides Elizabeth, there have been no duplications in the names of Queens of the United Kingdom (excluding here Queens of Great Britain and Queens of England). And "Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother" is about as unique a name as you're likely to find. On the other hand, this can also be problematic, as you've pointed out. So I'm not sure. john 19:44 18 May 2003 (UTC)

Well, of course there are arguments on both sides. But I'd resist any changes to the existing convention unless there's some evidence that the change would be an improvement. Deb 20:57 18 May 2003 (UTC)

On the whole, simply because it is encyclopædic and historical convention (not because it would be my choice), I think using maiden name for deceased former consorts of monarchs is OK. But in the case of QE the QM I do think it is premature. That change should only occur when she is no longer a contemporary figure. She has only recently died and 99.9% of people think of her with only one name, QE the QM. I think Alexandra of Denmark is preferable to Queen Alexandra because the that form normally indicates a queen regnant, not a queen consort. Similarly Mary of Teck is preferable to Queen Mary because that would make her seem like the Mary III. Yes I totally agree about the difference between England, Scotland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom. I was the one who stopped people writing about Queen Elizabeth II of England. But unfortunately our wonderful British friends (sarcasm aimed at the race, most definitely not at our genuinely wonderful Deb!) use ordinals for UK and GB monarchs that continued from English monarchs (though curiously not Scottish ones). So while there has only ever has been one reigning Queen Elizabeth of the United Kingdom and no Queen Mary, when there is a Queen Mary, she will be Mary III (even though the first and second were of England, and they call the actual Elizabeth I of the United Kingdom Elizabeth II! If the British can't get their ordinals right, what hope has wikipedia?

But if it was up to me, I would put QE the QM at that title for the time being and only revert her to the standard nomenclature when she is no longer seen as contemporary but as historical, and that won't happen for at least a decade. As I said before, a good cut off point is when first time registered voters ask the question who? when you say Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother. Right now, everyone would simply say 'ah, her! whereas if you say Elizabeth Bowes Lyon most people (except the very oldest who remember her before 1936 to even before 1922) would say who? Similarly people in the 1920s and 1930s would still recognise Queen Alexandra or her later title, Queen Alexandra the Queen Mother. It was only by the late 1930s at the earliest that she had declined enough in public memory to be treated as Alexandra of Denmark. Ditto with Queen Mary, who was known as one of three titles, "Queen Mary", "Queen Mary the Queen Mother" or "Queen Mary the Dowager Queen Mother" right through the 1950s and much of the 1960s, even though she died in 1953. Even today, some people recognise her as that, though they are either (a) elderly, (b) royal fans, or (b) royal naming anoraks like ourselves! :-)

Personally I would suggest that the naming conventions be amended to say that for up to a decade after the death of a royal consort, or a former royal consort who lived a good proportion of her life under a subsequent title, they should continue to be referred to by their most commonly recognised form of name. Only when at least a decade has gone by and they have begun to decline in contemporary awareness should they be treated as a historical figure and have standard history naming techniques applied to her. FearÉÍREANN 01:09 19 May 2003 (UTC)

Hmm, this page should be archived...it's getting too large. I generally think JTD's thoughts are fairly on point on this. I agree that "Queen Alexandra of the UK" would be weird. However, I would note that while Queen Alexandra and Queen Mary may have been the mothers of a king, and thus theoretically been "Queen-Mother", they were not usually styled as such. I believe Queen Alexandra was "HM Queen Alexandra", and Queen Mary was "HM Queen Mary", even after their husbands' deaths. (or, possibly HM Dowager Queen Mary", in the latter case, for at least part of her widowhood). The late QM was only called that as to distinguish her from her like-named daughter. john 05:17 19 May 2003 (UTC)

A couple of points here. As I've said before (more than once!), if you want to put the most recent Queen Mother at "Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother", you will have to include disambiguation, noting that Elizabeth Woodville also held the title.

I believe (though I'm not sure) that it would be incorrect to describe a queen consort as "Queen XXX of the UK", because she isn't Queen of the UK, she is just Queen. Prince Philip isn't called Prince Philip of the UK, is he?

On principle, I think it would be inadvisable to change (or de-standardise) a convention in this way, particularly by adding a rider that the title of an article can be changed back at some future date when it is arbitrarily decided that enough time has elapsed.

And I've decided I'm not going to be British any more, I'm just going to be Welsh. Deb 16:58 19 May 2003 (UTC)

In 1945 the President of Ireland, Sean T. O'Kelly used a former state coach used in Ireland by Queen Alexandra to travel to and from his inauguration in Dublin Castle. In the archives she was described as "the late Queen Alexandra the Queen Mother". Queen Mary was clearly styled Queen Mother following the death of her husband. However because she didn't work as QM, (unlike QE the QM who was still hosting receptions aged 100! A journalist friend who covered one engagement - and he is forty-one) said that she arrived for one engagement, stayed three times as long as originally planned, charmed everyone in the room and exhausted them!) and as new queen was of a different name, she was often still called Queen Mary. But she was styled Queen Mother, and after the death of George VI, when his widow became Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, Queen Mary the Queen Mother became Queen Mary the Dowager Queen Mother. As to Prince Philip, as far as I know he is a Prince of the United Kingdom and was so created. I am not sure was it by King George VI or by his wife when she became queen. FearÉÍREANN 19:45 19 May 2003 (UTC)

Yes, of course you're right on the Queen Mother title. It goes back a long long way. I know that Augusta of Saxe-Gotha asked her son, George III, to make her Queen Mother, because she didn't understand that she had to have been a queen to qualify. (I reckon it's only a matter of time before Buck House are ringing you to find out what their titles are.

Still not sure about the "of the UK" though. Deb 20:38 19 May 2003 (UTC)

Heh heh. If they want to find out facts, they should start reading wikipedia. Re Philip, all princes created since 1801 are as far as I know Princes of the United Kingdom. FearÉÍREANN 22:01 19 May 2003 (UTC)

Not exactly. Until 1958, I think, he was an HRH without being a Prince of anywhere. Then he was created Prince of the UK. There were also the matter of Princess Helena's daughters Helena and Marie Louise, who had been Princesses of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Augustenburg (and in the latter case, also of Anhalt, through marriage), but who became, after 1917, princesses of nothing.

As far as the term "Queen Mother," here's some stuff from alt.talk.royalty [link]. Basically, Alexandra was sometimes called HM Queen Alexandra, and sometimes HM Alexandra, the Queen Mother. Queen Mary was, in her widowhood, HM Queen Mary, and specifically not HM Queen Mary the Queen Mother, or Queen Mary the Dowager Queen, or what not. So, while both of them *were* the Queen Mother, Mary was not officially styled as such, and Alexandra was only occasionally styled as such. john 22:40 19 May 2003 (UTC)

I haven't got my notes in front of me but I did read where Queen Mary was explicitly referred to as Queen Mother though generally did not use the appendage. Certainly when Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother became QM, if my memory is correct it was explicitly announced that Queen Mary the Queen Mother would henceforth be called Queen Mary the Dowager Queen Mother to make it clear that while she was the mother of a sovereign, she was not the mother of the current sovereign and so one generation behind. I do remember some writer got into hot water in 1952 for saying that Mary should have been called Queen Mary the Queen Grandmother. From what I remember the official response was to say, rather stiffily, there is no such title but that calling Queen Mary the DQM was in effect in this instance the same thing. FearÉÍREANN 23:45 19 May 2003 (UTC)

hmm... I recall that after her second son's death, Queen Mary was to be called "Dowager Queen Mary", or some such, but no mention of "Queen Mother." I'm not completely sure of this, though. Getting back to the original subject, I'd just like to note that the style "Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother" was almost surely never used by Elizabeth Woodville (although if a contemporary instance of this can be adduced, I'd be happy to withdraw this contention), and that, further, she'd only have been Queen Mother for a matter of months, and, at that, might not have been considered such, since I'm not sure if Edward V was actually considered to be properly King except retroactively. john 23:58 19 May 2003 (UTC)

If you'll forgive me saying so, John, I think you're confusing the issue. What matters is not whether the "Queen Mother" part belongs within the person's official title, but whether the person named in the article was acknowledged as having the role of queen mother. The average reader (who could easily come across a book referring to Elizabeth Woodville or Mary of Teck as "the Queen Mother") won't differentiate, and will require disambiguation. It's all very well us hunting around for obscure facts and disputing minor points, but it doesn't alter the fact that there is an existing agreed convention for the naming of articles -- which has been debated numerous times -- and that you need to produce a sound reason if you want it changed. So far you don't seem to be coming up with any new arguments, or any that inherently outweigh the arguments for keeping the status quo. Deb 17:40 20 May 2003 (UTC)

A book would likely refer to Queen Mary as Queen Mary, not as "the Queen Mother". Elizabeth Woodville would likely be referred to as "the Queen" for the period of her son's reign, or as "Queen Elizabeth". And the late Queen Mother's official style was "Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother", which was not the case for the others. Queen Mary, during the period when she was Queen Mother, was usually referred to as "Queen Mary". Queen Alexandra was mostly referred to as "Queen Alexandra", although occasionally as "Queen Mother". The present Queen's mother, however, was always referred to as "Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother" or "the Queen Mother". In any event, at this point I'm perfectly fine with keeping "Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon" as the main article for the queen mother, since it seems like we're never going to agree on this, so long as there's a redirect from "Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother", which there is. I would still say, though, that the latter name is a more unique and more identifiable name for the late queen mother, especially as her death was so recent. I think JTD's "use maiden name only after the person becomes a historical, rather than a contemporary, figure" idea is probably the fairest, but, whatever. john 21:05 20 May 2003 (UTC)

Just tried to look up the Britannica article for the Queen Mother... they have her under "Elizabeth"... :) john 02:49 24 May 2003 (UTC)

So does my Chambers Biographical Dictionary, viz.

Elizabeth, originally Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, Queen Mother, and queen-consort of Great Britain. [sic]

Royal and personal names at the start of articles

We seem to have many different methods of starting articles on royalty and popes. Some start with the personal name, followed by better known as . . . {royal nomenclature}. This I think is alkward and wrong. For popes we have a range of ways of mentioning their pre-papal name, none of them satisfactory. This confusion may date back to when wiki used a personal name rather than royal nomenclature as the article title. It is obvious that the royal name, given that it used in the title, should come first. But immediately following it by personal names can look alkward.