Talk:House of Burnett

message: There is a Clan Burnett article and a Burnett of Leys article I suggest we merge the two into the Clan Burnett article.QuintusPetillius (talk) 15:55, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Both need work. The Burnett of Leys family (not clan) is the only Burnett family on the Standing Council of Scottish Chiefs. The article in the Scottish Clan & Family Encyclopedia is written from that viewpoint, not the family as a whole with all branches. Also, the current “Chief of the Name of Burnett”, James C. A. Burnett of Leys (note, not a clan chief), represents the House of Burnett in its entirety. I’d suggest this article, Clan Burnett, or properly House of Burnett, should represent the other major branches: Burnetts of Barns, Burnett of Leys, Burnetts of Kemnay, Burnetts of Crimond, Burnetts of Monbodo, and the Ramsays of Balmain (paternally Burnetts). The article Burnett of Leys can reflect the chiefly (albeit junior) branch, the house of Burnett of Leys only. Bearpatch (talk) 20:12, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

text: I think the merger should go ahead. The section on the Burnets of Leys is not that much different or larger from the article; the exception being a large section on heraldry, but that in my view should be taken to this page where the heraldry of the other branches can be included (and compared), and I look forward to doing their shields some time in the future. An interesting point, a clan chiefs owns a clan, i.e. it is his property so it would be unthinkable to not place the history of the chiefs in the main article and any branches that need extra room have to seek it in separate articles, e.g. Clan Campbell. What happens in a "House" I have no idea, to be honest, I am somewhat confused by the term "chiefly (albeit junior) branch." In clans: chiefs are always senior. Houses are not my forté. Yours ever, Czar Brodie (talk) 17:00, 22 May 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Two articles

message: I noticed this in the heading: The chiefly branch is the Burnett of Leys family although the senior branch is Burnett of Barns. I do not want to get into a long discussion like the one above, but is there really a difference between senior and chiefly? As it stands it looks confusing. Yours ever, Czar Brodie (talk)
:Yes there is a difference. The senior branch of a family is one claiming, or who has established in the past to be the main stem of the family which other cadet lines of a family branch from (or are junior to). It can also mean a branch created earlier than other branches. For example, when compared to the branch of Burnett of Monboddo, Burnett of Leys is senior. In 1550 Burnet of Burnetland petitioned the Lyon for rights to the motto Virescit Vulnere Virtus, then in use by Burnett of Leys. They apparently succeeded as they began using it requiring Burnett of Leys to change to a new motto. So the inference here is that the Lord Lyon recognized Burnet of Burnetland as senior to Burnett of Leys. Burnet of Barns claimed to be the successor to Burnet of Burnetland and claimed the seniority of the family as a whole. But, the current representative of the family of Burnett is also the head of Burnett of Leys, who is now recognized by the Lyon as the chief of name of Burnet(t). A chiefly branch is literally the branch the current chief of the name belongs to. As a general rule the chief of the name would normally be of the main stem or senior line making such a distinction unnecessary.  So the use of the term chiefly branch usually implies an exception to the general rule exists with a particular family (name or house) or clan. Bearpatch (talk) 15:58, 23 May 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: all very odd and amusing. The motto is registered in Scotland (unlike England), but having the same motto or crest as another family is not unusual. Mottoes can also be changed on reregistration. When one family has the same motto and crest as another, it usually implies they are closely related. for example, in this case, the Burnetts of Shetchokaly, of Leys and Barns all had the same crest and motto Verescit Vulnere Virtus and the Burnetts of Innerleith and Wariston both had the same crest and motto Virtute Cresco.  Perhaps Burnetland was saying they are closely related by taking the same motto, and Leys implies, by changing his motto, that they were not. Who knows. This is not very important to the article, or, as you put it, is just "inference". In Clans the chief is not a branch. To continue with the analogy of trees, the chief is the trunk, branches form when the chief has younger sons. Both the trunk and the branches form what is the clan, the chief is head of the whole tree. The Burnetts of Burn saying that they are the rightful chiefs seems well documented, but given that the Lyon registered Leys as chief of the Name and Arms the matter seems decided. I think the Burn claim should be mentioned in the article, but not in the opening paragraph. It appears that the Leys have gone through the female line at some point (given that the male heir to the baronetcy of Leys is Sir Alexander William Burnett Ramsay bt.). This would be be important to include in the article under a ref that explains where this happened. Yours ever, Czar Brodie (talk) 18:57, 23 May 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: chiefly versus senior

message: We seem to be going in a circle. This is how I see events. First you move the page to House of Burnett, I question this, you argue that Burnett is not a clan, you give this as reference. I argue against but finally agree. My reasoning at this point is that if Burnett is not a clan then it should not be listed as a clan. I remove Burnett from the various clan lists and take the clan info box and nav box off the page. You then re add the clan infobox saying that it should remain until a House infobox can be built. I add a House infobox noting that this House infobox is the standard one used by Houses on Wikipedia. You then remove the house info box and place the clan info box back saying that the House infobox is for English Houses (and is presumably inappropriate for Scottish Houses). I re add the House infobox noting that it is used for European houses (not just English). You then say that family and clan are the same thing. I presume you now accept Burnett is therefore a Clan and move the page back to "Clan Burnett". We go through an edit war where you disagree with my edits that start the article (now called Clan Burnett) with the words 
:"Clan Burnett, also known as the House of Burnett" 
You delete my edits and references and move the article to "House of Burnett" complete with clan infobox. You continue to argue that family and clan are the same thing. Yet you also argue that "Clan Burnett or House of Burnett" is not a compromise, it's a contradiction in terms and would only serve to introduce ambiguity into an article. The problem here is that you are also saying that Burnett is not a clan, never was a clan. Yet you are also saying Clan and House are the same thing. As far as I can see it all depends which references we give more credence to. If we rely of the Standing Council of Scottish Chiefs web site, we say Burnett is a clan and list it accordingly. In this case I see this version (titled "Clan Burnett") as being the best and it includes a compromise that notes a family web site that calls it a House. However, if we rely on the Burnett web Question and Answer page as the best source, then we should have this version (Titled "House of Burnett") in my view. I can accept either of those two last versions, but I can not accept the article as it stands. Yours ever, Czar Brodie (talk) 23:53, 31 May 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: I support Czar Brodie on this one.QuintusPetillius (talk) 11:34, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: OK, a recap then. You agreed to the name House of Burnett based on this being what the Chief of the Name choses to call the family. You agreed that even the Lord Lyon does not have the power to change that. I’ll quote you from your message of 13:58, 25 May 2013:  “It is in the purview of a chief to declare what he is chief of. Leys, who we know is chief, declares that Burnett is not a Clan, so it is not a clan. He declares it is a House, so it is a House.” Your words and I agreed and still agree. So that part would seem to be settled. Moving on, you removed Burnett from the List of Scottish Clans. I only made the comment: “Wouldn't it be a much simpler and a more elegant solution to rename the page “List of Scottish Clans & Families”? Because otherwise there needs to be a separate page for Scottish Families and someone needs to remove a lot of names from that clan list because they also are families” (15:58, 24 May 2013). Note, I did not object or ask you to replace it. I only pointed out an alternative. I also pointed out the irony in using ‘’The Scottish Clan & Family Encyclopedia” for a list of Scottish Clans only, and you indicated you saw that too. Then on the point of clans and families being the same under law but different in structure, I quoted ‘’The Clans, Septs & Regiments of the Scottish Highlands’’ (pp. 152-53) from the message I posted on 17:59, 18 May 2013 and have repeated myself twice since. It’s plain to see from the above that I have been very consistent and patiently making the same points throughout the extended conversations. Characterize it any way you like, the evidence of what was said is directly above. It’s in black and white and each conversation, taken in context, is there to show if anyone has flip-flopped, who that might be, and over what issues. The sticking point seems to be the lack of understanding of how clans and families differ, but in some situations are treated the same. You’ve yet to ask for more valid sources to further clarify the point. I reverted your edits based on the consensus this was the House of Burnett. As you correctly pointed out I agreed to remove the clan infobox once a suitable replacement was available even though if we are to separate clans from families, which you indicated you wanted earlier, any replacement infobox would virtually the same in appearance. Is there some pressing issue as to why the infobox cannot remain until a near-identical box is ready? The fact it works as well for families as clans attests to a good design. Bearpatch (talk) 20:30, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: recap

message: The fact that one of her 10x great-grandmothers was daughter of Thomas Burnett, 1st Baronet of Leys (as can be seen here- http://ourancestraltree.com/our-family-connection-to-diana-princess-of-wales-sources/#/ - with numerous sources listed) seems to be of questionable encyclopaedic value and the section appears shoehorned in. She is not in any meaningful sense a member of this family, so her inclusion- and that of her two sons- seems gratuitous and frankly strange. It does not appear the contributor has gone to all the other articles for families from whom Diana was similarly distantly descended and added equivalent content, so one questions the necessity of it here.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.109.203.140 (talk) 22:25, 28 October 2021 (UTC)
thread_title: Diana, Princess of Wales