Talk:Charlemagne/Archive 2

message: What is up with wikipedia? the article rating system is not working. how can this article be only "good". this has got to one of, if not the best, articles of charlemagne on the internet, yet apparently "other encyclopedias could do better". i would say this is the same with countless other articles (the amazing french revolution article is "b-class"?). something needs to be doneYoungKeta 23:45, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  ???? 

message: Does anyone know what language he spoke? He was king of the Franks when they were still a Germanic tribe and the French and Germans both maintain their own names for him. Both names may just be the Latin translation, but his biographer's name, Einhard, is decidedly German. Anybody know?
:Well, nobody knows for sure what Charlemagnes native language was, but it was most likely wasn't Frankish as Charlemagne was born in 742 or 747 and Frankishj went extinct during the early 7th century.
:It's most likely he was born in Liege, that could indicate that he spoke Old Low Franconian (or less accurately Old Dutch) nativly. Some also suggest he was born in or around Aachen, but that would have not made a difference linguistically at that time.
Rex 11:00, 27 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Language?

message: This Article is extremley long (87 kilobytes) and much of the information is a history of Charlemage's empire not about him. The article took about 5 mins. to load on My computer, Therefore for tecnical and practical reasons i thik it should be split into a no. of smaller articles. (Ken 20:50, 13 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually 57 Kb. Perhaps it is long, but most of the article (as far as I can tell) is about Charles himself and his actions personally, not about the state of his kingdom. Also, most of it has its own articles already, but some information must appear here as well. Finally, your computer must be old! Loads in a second or two on mine. Srnec 22:20, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

text: I guess you must have dialup and/or an old PC, loads in about 3 secs including pictures here. Arniep 23:39, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

text: How should it be split? It is shorter than both the Napoleon and Alexander the Great articles. What do you mean by Germanic tribes? Srnec 15:10, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

text: I agree that the article has, by comparison with others, very few referencing. The majority of the narrative text describing his career was written by me from various sources. What sources should be noted when many sources give all the available information? This is not obscure or controversial stuff. Some of the stuff in the sections other than "Life" needs footnoting, the "Imperial coronation" section does have Harvard references, and the "Life" section could use more scholarly references, but of whom? Srnec 22:19, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Length

message: The single year dates were all de-linked recently: is this proper, it seems unusual by the standards of most other history articles? I could find nothing at WP:DATE about it. Srnec 18:06, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Absolutely. Srnec 18:59, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Dates

message: I want to elaborate on the issue of why the Treaty of Verdun represents the formation of Germany. The treaty established a specific geographic region under one king (one state within a larger empire). This state was a sovereign and independent state in fact (and practically in law as well, the concept of empire being rather vague). It was the first state of its kind in history. No single state ever corresponded to its territory (basically the four duchies of Swabia, Saxony, Bavaria, and Franconia) before and there is no separate regnal line before the establishment of Louis the German on the throne there: it was a new polity. Later on it absorbed some territories over time and some territories were lost, just as in the history of all nations and states. The state continued until 1806 with major and minor changes on the way, just like all nations and states. What it did retain was a continuity of rule (a continuous succession of governments) and a territory based on the same duchies. This was legally shattered in 1806 with the abdication of the title "Holy Roman Emperor" and all its subsidiary titles which basically made the separate states of the federation independent. This independence was ruined by the reunion of these states (with modifications) in 1871. This formed the German Empire, which lasted until 1943. In 1989, Germany as we know it was created. It is a reincarnation of the old German Empire (Weimar Republic), which is itself a new state, but based on the older idea of German nationhood, which had existed since at least the eleventh century. Historians speak of Germany all the time before 1871 and the Holy Roman Emperors were also kings of Germany. This is established fact. East Francia is regularly referred to as Germany after the breakup of Charles the Fat's empire in 887 and especially after Henry the Fowler's accession in 919. Srnec 18:48, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It should be noted that "FranconiaA" was not a distinct duchy, but merely the part of the Frankish homeland (Austrasia) which was inherited by Louis the German.  The rest of Austrasia was inherited by Lothar, and became Lotharingia.  I would just add a couple of things about the 19th century - the elimination fo the Holy Roman Empire was far from popular in Germany, and at the Congress of Vienna there were serious interests that wanted to restore it and give the title back to the Habsburgs.  Metternich was not interested, but a different Austrian foreign minister (Stadion, for instance) might easily have pursued it.  Second, before 1871 the idea of a German Empire was always seen as a restoration of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation, even if the structure would be completely different.  The Frankfurt Diet, which first proclaimed a German Reich, appointed a Habsburg, Archduke John, to be "Imperial Vicar" - a title deriving from the old title held by the Electors of Saxony and Palatinate during an interregnum.  The Grossdeutsch idea, in particular, was pretty closely tied to the old Reich, but the Kleindeutsch also looked back to the Holy Roman Empire to an extent.  Recall also that the Empire founded in 1871 was referred to as the "Second Reich," clearly indicating an attempt to claim continuity with the old Reich.  A last point is that the German States were not fully independent during the period from 1815-1866.  The German Confederation represented genuine restrictions on the sovereignty of the member states.  Aside from Prussia and Austria, who had territory outside the Bund (and also, I suppose the King of Denmark and the King of the Netherlands, who were members of the Confederation in their roles as Duke of Holstein and Grand Duke of Luxembourg), it's my understanding that the German Confederation members really had no leeway to pursue alliances of their own outside the bounds of the Bund, or to conduct very much diplomacy in general.  If anything, the member states had considerably less freedom to do this than they had in the 18th century, if only because small states in general had less freedom in the 19th than the 18th century.  In the 18th century we see states like Bavaria and Saxony allying with France or Russia against one or both of the German powers.  This simply doesn't happen in the 19th century, because, for most of this period, Austria and Prussia worked together to manage Germany.  Even when they were competing, the result was generally inaction on the part of the Bund.  I can't think of any real instances where the middle states had any real leeway to conduct an independent foreign policy in the way that the middle states of the old Reich did.  Obviously, the German Confederation was not an Empire, but it was a genuine polity in its own right. john k 23:39, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: What is Germany

message: Shouldn't the German variant of his name, Karl der Grosse, also be mentioned before the Latin derivation in the beginning?
Sca 16:49, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Karl der Grosse

message: There's no source (and no good reason) for Herstal (only: "where his father was born ")   84.168.161.125 22:53, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Date and place of birth

message: In the children's section, tThere are two way we can do it. Either we mention the sons' titles or we just leave them to their respective articles, with of course the exception of Louis's eventual succession to Charlemagne. However, we should do it correctly. Pippin was not ever ever King of the Lombards - Charlemagne was the last of that title, all successors are King of Italy. Str1977 (smile back) 00:18, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Charlemagne was King of Franks until 814.  Charles the Younger died in 811.  Please do not make this change again. — ERcheck (talk) 02:48, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Sons and titles

message: I've started an approach that may apply to Wikipedia's Core Biography articles: creating a branching list page based on in popular culture information.  I started that last year while I raised Joan of Arc to featured article when I created Cultural depictions of Joan of Arc, which has become a featured list.  Recently I also created Cultural depictions of Alexander the Great out of material that had been deleted from the biography article.  Since cultural references sometimes get deleted without discussion, I'd like to suggest this approach as a model for the editors here.  Regards, Durova 17:20, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Cultural depictions of Charlemagne]] 

message: Charlemagne meant Charles the Great (no duh!) Well was this his name or a later given name? So could he have been born Charles or whatever? Jim Bart 23:12, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: His name is Charles. Charlemagne is a compound of name and sobriquet. Srnec 03:30, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

text: But "Charles" is a French name.. and "Carolus" is Latin.  What was Charlemagne's Frankish name?  If you had lived in the year 775 and made reference to him, what would you have called him? Nan Hawthorne hathorn@ drizzle.com http://blueladytavern.blogsoft.com  1i November 2006.
I propose that this page be moved to Charles I, Holy Roman Emperor, considering that (1) his name in English is Charles, and this is the English-Language Wiki, and that (2) he was the first ruler of that name which ruled the H.R.E, and is commonly and often known to have begun that empire.--The Gonz 09:05, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  name? 

message: I have a theory that he is the ancestor of Eadric Streona but the title Ancestor of the Germans is Doubtful--24.21.74.77 23:23, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Ancestor of the Germans? 

message: Could we add something about Charlemagne's canonization?  The article at present does not mention that he is a Saint.  Lostcaesar 23:44, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The article mentions it. The canonisation was made by an antipope and is not official. Srnec 04:34, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: My apologies - I searched for the american spelling of "canonization" rather than the British "canonisation".  I just moved to this wonderful isle and I am still getting used to these things.  Thanks.  Lostcaesar 08:22, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Canonization 

message: Why is there no Biography infobox in this page?--Eukesh 01:56, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Because infoboxes are hideous when all they list is descendants and ancestors and dates etc. Srnec 19:02, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Infobox

message: This appeared on the main page in "On this day...": "800 - Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne emperor, a title that had been out of use in the West since the abdication of Romulus Augustulus in 476." I was wondering what "the West" was referring to - "Western Europe", "Western Roman Empire" or "Europe", - and whether it includes areas under the rule of the Eastern Roman Empire, as areas like Iberia and Italia had been at some time under the rule of the Eastern Roman Empire (for instance, during Justinian I's reign). This would mean that the title "emperor" had indeed been used in some parts of "the West" since 476. Aran|heru|nar 04:07, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: "The West" in this context refers to the Western Roman Empire.  To be technical, the title Emperor of the West had been out of use since the abdication of Augustulus.  There is some question over whether Charlemagne was in fact emperor only of the West: one of the many reasons why Leo III crowned Charlemagne as emperor was that Empress Irene was ruling from Byzantium, and Western Europeans denied the legitimacy of a female Emperor. Slac speak up! 05:00, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: That makes sense. Which means the linking on the main page is wrong. "the West" in that link was to "Western world". Aran|heru|nar 05:19, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  The title "Emperor" 

message: The Economist has a collum on the developments in Euroupe, called Charlemange. Should that be included?
ODR 06:55, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, this information deserves a place in the article. Thankyou, please add it. Srnec 19:02, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I actually added a comment on The Ecconomist before reading the above. Hopre it meets with your approval. Epeeist smudge 10:44, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: You don't need anyone's approval :) CyrilleDunant 13:24, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  But we do like consensuss! ;-) Epeeist smudge 19:23, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

text:  Even when we can't spell it Epeeist smudge 19:25, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Economist

message: Having a reference to the pronounciation of "Charlemagne" could help non-English speakers. I know it'd help me. --Kizor 09:25, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Spoken version of the name? 

message: Someone who knows for sure should clarify this section.  When I read it he had either three wives, five concubines, and seventeen children, or five wives, or no children by his second and last wife (or should that read "second and last wives"?71.98.119.200 17:11, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Charlemagne's family 

message: Clearly, "Charlemagne" is used in the English speaking world almost exclusively and "Charles the Great" is merely forced and formulaic.  The Latin "Carolus Magnus" is much more appropriate up top.  Evidence the title of this article, AND the oddity of having an "English translation" follow the proper (in English) name on the English Wikipedia.  Carolus Mangnus is widely used.  István 03:33, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: ([[Latin]]: ''Carolus Magnus'') or ([[English language|English]]: ''Charles the Great'')

message: Under the section "Date and place of birth" is the sentence "In that year, April 1 is Easter."
I would be very interested in knowing how this date is known to be Easter in the Carolingian era. Did someone try to calculate this date (how?), or is there a written reference of this date being celebrated as Easter from the year 747? I found this section to be really interesting BTWAquitanus 13:40, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Under Which/Whose Calendar Was Easter = April 1st in 747? 

message: Other than: 
"Because of the number of languages spoken within his Empire, Charlemagne's name has been preserved in many different languages in different forms. The language of Charlemagne itself does not exist anymore, but evolved into the Franconian languages. "Charles" derives from a Germanic stem meaning "man" or "free man".[3] It is related to the English "churl". In many Slavic languages, the very word for "king" derives from Charles' Slavicised name."
is it necessary to include a list of Charlemagne's name in other languages?  All one need do is click on the respective article in the language sought.  
If it must be kept, maybe it could be moved to the end of the article.  
Overall, the list of names seems to detract from the otherwise smooth flow of the article. EboracumN 23:59, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Amen! Srnec 01:40, 4 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Names of Charlemagne

message: To Srnec:
Perhaps I should not have jumped in here so quickly.  Now I've been accused (not by you) of starting an edit war.  That was not my intention.  To clarify: I just noticed the inconsistency within the article in the spelling and nicknames for Pippin, and thought I would fix them.  Then I got the message from you explaining that you had changed my Pippin spelling back to Pepin because you initially thought I was only changing some of the Pepins to Pippin, while leaving other Pepins as Pepin. You added that you now saw that I was changing all of them, so I should feel free to revert.  So I did.  In the process I also reverted your reverts to my changes in the Pippin nicknames, not realizing that you had made these for a different reason.  Srnec, I'm sorry I didn't see that you had made two sets of changes instead of one.
Now that we've cleared that up, on to the substance.  I see what you mean that changing Pippin the Short to Pippin the Younger could result in confusion with Pippin of Herstal, who is also sometimes called Pippin the Younger.  The only reason I initiated the change was to be consistent with the "Carolingian Dynasty" table, where Pippin the Short is called Pippin the Younger.  I don't have any strong feelings about the appropriate name, I was just trying to go for consistency.  But if you'd prefer I'll just bow out.  I certainly didn't want to cause trouble.
Pip pip, cheerio.  :)
Aldrichio 04:11, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: As the party who "accused Aldrichio of starting an edit war," I wanted to chime in.  I was patrolling recent changes and observed his edits.  A glance at the history showed that he was adding content which was repeatedly being removed by another editor, Srnec.  I placed an appropriate warning template about 3RR and discussing changes on the article Talk page, and I resumed patrolling recent changes.  Aldrichio later took umbrageon my talk page, suggesting that I was "interfering" with his edits.  He's right, I was...and I would do it again in the same situation.  Most things that look like edit wars are edit wars.  There are several edits per second on Wikipedia.  At that speed, change patrollers don't always have the luxury of looking for the few exceptions.  If Aldrichio had made a similar post after the first time Srnec reverted him, the article's edit history wouldn't have caught my attention.  Best, Dppowell 15:36, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Pippin Nicknames

message: Srnec, I saw your question in the checkin comments
:does "constantinople to charles" make sense?
and wanted to answer you. I'm not exactly sure how you meant the question. I agree that the phrasing is a bit awkward. I was trying to be concise. Feel free to rephrase. I was simply pointing out (motivated by a link from another article) that whereas the popes had never challenged the validity of the emperors in Constantinople being called Imperator Romanorum, at this time Leo explicitly said that the Roman emperor was Charles and not anybody in Constantinople (and claimed that he had the right to do so). At that time, of course, the emperorship in Constantinople was somewhat in dispute so Leo took advantage of the situation to claim that there was no emperor at the moment with sovereignty over Rome and he was invoking his right to declare the next Emperor (and in so doing, of course, creating a situation where de facto control of Rome moved from the "Byzantines" to the Franks). I said "from Constantinople to 'Charles'" because it would be debatable if I tried to name a particular person it was transferred from since Leo claimed nobody was emperor at the time. So it seemed either I had to add more sentences or else use this awkward phrasing. Maybe more sentences are appropriate?
--Mcorazao 17:08, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I think more sentences might be appropriate and if I have the time, I might take a stab at rewording it. Thanks. Srnec 20:46, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Constantinople to Charles 

message: I notice the occassional case of providing references by directly including a source in the text, e.g.
:"...as Charles Oman described them ..."
I'd like to suggest that this is inappropriate. In the above particular example, there is nothing directly in the text to suggest who Oman is which makes it doubly inappropriate. That aside, it makes the article harder to read for a novice since one can become confused between the historical figures and the researches who are describing them. IMHO, an article should be about what its about, not about who researched it. If there is something particularly relevant about a researcher on the topic that bears explicit mention this should generally occur in a separate section of the article created for that purpose (one exception is cases where a particular aspect of history is hotly debated and a brief mention of the lack of scholarly consensus is required).
--Mcorazao 17:24, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I disagree, at least in part. I think that because Wikipedia is not about original research, all its articles are only about their subjects insofar as others have discussed them. I also think that the link to Oman allows andy interested reader to find out quickly who he is and why his opinion is present in the text. I think that sometimes a quotation is nice, but if you think the citation ought to go in the footnote, I can understand that. However, it doesn't seem to me that the quotation takes away from the reader's experience, though perhaps from the encyclopaedic tone. But then, I'm not exactly sure what Wikipedia's tone is supposed to be. Srnec 20:50, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Suggestion on referencing 

message: "Perhaps Pippin regarded Charlemagne as the better warrior, but Carloman may have regarded himself as the more deserving son, being the son, not of a mayor of the palace, but of a king." The second part is unclear. Weren't both of them sons to the same father? 89.138.13.59 16:22, 7 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: But Pippin's rank had increased between the fathering of Charles and of Carloman. Srnec 03:55, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Question

message: Shouldn't the German Name of a Person who was born in what is today Germany, died in what is today Germany, laid base to the German state and spoke a Germanic language be mentioned in the first sentence?
::I think the latest quarrel about that was here, resulting (I think) in this conclusion. --Van helsing 14:39, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That seems to be more a view held by user Rex. As France and Germany claim him as the founder of what would become Germany and France, by the way neither Germany nore France dispute the others right to do so, it would be more than natural to include his german name. The argument that it cant be mentioned because of readability is rather strange.--Tresckow (talk) 19:05, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  German Name 

message: Some authors ( e.g. "http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heribert_Illig" ) even claim, that Charlemagne was fictous, created by a process called "forgery of time". 
Anyhow since the 10th century, many people referenced to Charlemagne with fake documents to proove their faulty pretensions. Lately even it was said in the german news ( http://www.bild.de ) about Paris Hilton beeing a relative of Charlemagne, which is of course ridiculous.
hemmerling 04:43, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: How so?  It's established that people of European descent in this day and age can conceivably trace their ancestry back to Charlemagne.  As this article states, or used to. Slac speak up! 04:50, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Herbert Illig is what historians call a crank. If you believe is "hypothesis", I've got a novel by Dan Brown to sell you. Srnec 03:40, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Charlemagne is victim of many fake references since the Middle Age 

message: I have put disputed tag because wikipedia is having 2 different story about 1 event. In article Charlemagne is writen: "Emperor Michael I Rhangabes recognised his status as Emperor under the title of Imperator Romanorum gubernans imperium"
In article Michael I Rangabe is writen :"In 812 Michael I reopened negotiations with the Franks, and recognized Charlemagne as "basileus (emperor) of the Franks"
I now reading book Georg Ostrogorsky : Byzantische Geschichte 324 - 1453 which speak about 3rd version and I think that this version is speaking truth. In story from this book Byzantine envoys in 812 has called Charlemagne emperor (real title basileus) and nothing else. They have not called him Imperator Romanorum gubernans imperium but only basileus. After hearing this words Charlemagne has been thinking that they have accepted him for Imperator Romanorum gubernans imperium  but on other side in Byzantium Michael I is speaking that they have refused his demands to accept him for Roman emperor. In this solution nobody is defeated and everybody is happy. Simple this is politics ... I have put disputed tag in both articles.Rjecina 19:11, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: POV