Talk:List of former national capitals

message: 1. Hmm... UK 1940-1990 Government in Exile? Is there some sensible point behind this, some strange legality, or it just silliness?
2. Would England's various capitals (Winchester, York, etc.) and the capitals of the former kingdoms (Repton the capital of Mercia, Colchester the capital of the Iceni)  qualify?
195.137.95.70
Ah. I see. These are capitals of Poland, not the United Kingdom and France. I will edit this to reflect the change
195.137.95.70 1519GMT 28i05. I think I should go and get an account now.
That thing about Poland is so odd! I solved the problem on Portugal issued in Portugal article. -Pedro 12:27, 8 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  UK 

message: What does it mean when it says in the last column that Vienna "became in" the Austro-Hungarian empire or elsewhere - does that mean it "became the capital in"? Right now it doesn't make any sense. - DavidWBrooks 13:07, 21 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: It still doesn't make any sense, six months later. I'm going to change it to ENglish. - DavidWBrooks 11:17, 31 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Vienna 

message: It seems to me that this list will be more useful if it is moved to List of historical capital cities, or some such.  That way there's less need to worry about the dependent territory issue. john k 21:14, 9 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  National capitals? 

message: It appears that a couple cells are missing, needing either names and/or dates.  Paploo 18:28, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Iranian/Persian capitals

message: The dates which indicates the period, in which Roskilde was the capital of Denmark, are hardly correct. It's a fact, that Copenhagen replaced Roskilde, and become the capital of Denmark, shortly after the reformation in 1536. Furthermore, Roskilde was the capital of Denmark since the twelfth century, contemporary with the Danish archbishop Absalon. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 83.91.175.157 (talk) 13:55, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Roskilde in Denmark

message: Is it not vastly inaccurate to have the flag of Israel situated with the kingdom of Jerusalem?85.220.81.78 23:52, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The flags seem to be based on the current country the cities are in, rather than the one they were in at the t ime.  Still lame, though. john k 01:44, 9 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Especially as the city of Jerusalem that existed  from 1099-1187 was the Old City, which most of the world considers to be part of Palestine. john k 01:45, 9 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Kingdom of Jerusalem 

message: I've opened up a formal rfc [here]. For the benefit of new visitors, the summary is:
* No flags - reduced information content, but faster loading. The page with flags has been known to crash browsers running on older machines.
* current flags - flag images are easily available, but will produce anachronistic/misleading information, and in some cases (China/Taiwan) POV issues will arise.
* historical flags - images generally not available. In some cases, the flag changed during the city's tenure as cpital, creating more issues.
So far, both people with an opinion seem to be in favour of removing flags entirely, but I thought it best to open this up to a wider audience first. Rhialto 04:32, 3 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Unless I get feedback to the countrary, I can only assume that no one who has added flags can see sufficient justification to keep them. I have already added this page to the rfd sections in the wiki. Starting in about 2 weeks or so, I will begin removing the flags unless someone has a coherent objection. Rhialto 21:59, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I have only recently added a flag (Byzantine Empire) but I am, frankly, ambivalent about it.  I like the flags, but the concerns (e.g., using the Iranian flag for the Medes)are viable and I can't argue with the removal of the flags. Argos'Dad 04:35, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: rfc on flags issue

message: :The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section. 
The result of the proposal was Move performed. --WoohookittyWoohoo! 10:23, 7 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Feel free to state your position on the renaming proposal by beginning a new line in this section with *Support or *Oppose, then sign your comment with ~~~~. Since polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account Wikipedia's naming conventions.
*Support - See my reasoning above.  Dr. Submillimeter 13:06, 4 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Survey

message: And yes, I know the official main component was still in Europe. But the list is sorted by city location, not by country. Rhialto 06:06, 29 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rio is in South America 

message: Melbourne was never the formal capital of Australia, not even a "temporary capital".  It was never so described in any contemporaneous documents I've ever seen, and we don't describe it as the "former capital" in its own page (well, sometimes editors say this but they get quickly reverted).  The situation was that the 6 British colonies decided to federate and form the Commonwealth of Australia, from 1 January 1901.  The former colonies became the 6 states of Australia.  The Constitution of Australia set out some rules about the "seat of government" - including being within New South Wales and not less than 100 miles from Sydney.  (Melbourne is not in NSW, but Victoria.)  It also said "The Parliament shall meet in Melbourne until it meet at the seat of Government" (s. 125).  So, while Melbourne became the meeting place of the Parliament of Australia and the focal point of the Government of Australia until 1927, Australia did not have an official capital until then.  Both Sydney and Melbourne could lay claim to being the economic/cultural capital from 1901-1927, but they could also both claim that to this day - and both do, vociferously, in a perpetual rivalry - because Canberra has only ever been the official capital, not the economic/cultural capital.  I don't know if this is a unique case, but baldly saying Melbourne preceded Canberra as the capital of Australia is misleading.  Any comments before I do some work on it?  --  JackofOz (talk) 23:27, 29 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: OK, I've moved it to a footnote, because many people have this misapprehension.  --  JackofOz (talk) 06:37, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

text: In common speech, isn't a capital, er where the parliament and government is located.  Maybe Melbourne wasn't The Capital of Australia, but it was certainly the capital of Australia.  Certainly the issue is complicated - the Hague is the de facto capital of the Netherlands, for instance, even though Amsterdam is the official capital, but I think it's a fair question to ask whether a capital is something which is defined by function, or whether it is defined by prescriptive direction of the state in question. john k (talk) 01:07, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, that is indeed a fair question.  Even Canberra has never, to my knowledge, been formally declared to be "the capital", merely "the seat of government".  But there's abundant evidence that it has universally been considered to be the capital since 9 May 1927.  Apart from the Parliament, there's a host of other national institutions, foreign embassies etc based there, and it was purpose-built as the capital.  The Constitution was quite clear in relation to Melbourne.  It described the then unnamed Canberra as "the seat of government", and said that the Parliament would meet in Melbourne until such time as the then unnamed Canberra was built.  It did not say that Melbourne would be "the seat of government" or "the temporary seat of government", much less "the capital" or "the temporary capital".  I would be prepared to acknowledge that Melbourne, between 1901 and 1927, was the de facto but not de jure seat of government, or even the temporary seat of government.  But I would not be prepared to say it was any kind of capital, because, apart from the parliament, there was nothing about Melbourne that made it capital-like, other than being capital of Victoria.  The parliament did not even have its own building; it borrowed the Victorian State Parliament's home for 27 years.  Melbourne was not regarded or described as the capital at the time, and it should not be so described now, retrospectively.  --  JackofOz (talk) 07:37, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Melbourne's status seems rather similar to the status of New York and Philadelphia before the institution of Washington as capital in 2000.  Those cities are, however, described as capitals.  Melbourne was the de facto capital in that the government was located there for more than a quarter century.  But this is basically an argument about semantics, so I won't take it much further.  Of much greater concern is that this article is, for the most part, utterly abominable. john k (talk) 19:54, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Melbourne, Australia

message: The list of former Japanese capitals looks very incomplete. See Successive capitals of Japan--189.121.183.72 (talk) 20:58, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, this is why the section in this article only lists the most notable examples (by major historical events and/or duration), then gives a link to an article that goes into more depth. The CSA and Ancient Egypt have similar issues. Rhialto (talk) 07:04, 2 April 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Japan 

message: Should Dar es Salaam included in the list? ApprenticeFan talk contribs 13:22, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Dar es Salaam 

message: What is Đại Việt-Bắc Triều in English? No disrespect to Vietnam and its people, but this copy of wikipedia s meant to be written in English. Rhialto (talk) 08:36, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  English Language 

message: On this article, there must be something about the capital of the Roman Empire and the capital of the Western Roman Empire... Rome, Nicomedia, Constantinople, Nicaea (İznik), Ravenna, Milan, what else? Böri (talk) 16:37, 30 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Trier and Antioch were semi-permanent imperial seats.  Maybe Arles and York? john k (talk) 05:22, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Capital of the Roman Empire 

message: Germany belongs to Central Europe according to the most actual classifications. Also historywise Germany was seen as Central Europae, with the exception of the ealry 90s, when some enzyclopedias (in UK and US - but for example not in Germany) did not. --> See also the Wikipedia article over Central Europe. While Bonn or Aachen may be acceptable also as part of Western Europe, "East Berlin" is defintly not. In fact in its time it was considered Eastern Europe. So Central Europe is the perfect classification for Germany. 59.63.13.6 (talk) 04:19, 28 August 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I think within Europe it would be sensible to group by modern-day country rather than by these arbitrary classifications. --Colapeninsula (talk) 17:14, 22 April 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Central Europe 

message: Why is Vienna included as capital of the Austrian Empire and Austria-Hungary? By that logic the list could include London as capital of England (pre-1707), of Great Britain (prior to the union with Ireland), and possibly of the British Empire or of England and Wales. And Rome the capital of the Kingdom of Italy? Do you want people listing all the capitals of former monarchies that are now republics?
Where a state was renamed, split, or combined, but the same city remained capital of the obvious successor state, it should not be listed. --Colapeninsula (talk) 17:13, 22 April 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: Austrian Empire was 1804-1867. Austria-Hungary was 1867-1918. They were significantly different political entities. A-H was formed from a union of Austria and Hungary, in much the same manner that the UK was formed from a union of England and Scotland. Rhialto (talk) 14:23, 24 November 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Same capital different state 

message: Versailles was the capital of France (and not Paris) between 1682 and 1789 and between 1871 and 1879.----Bancki (talk) 11:43, 29 April 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  France: Versailles