Talk:Eadbald of Kent

message: I'm not convinced the new tree is an improvement, though I understand the old one was a little small and hard to read.  I guess I'll wait and see if anyone else has a preference.
If we're going to keep the new one, there are a couple of errors on it that do need fixing, and a couple of stylistic changes I'd suggest.
*"Anna King of East Anglia" -- I would suggest a comma after "Anna"; I think that's the usual way to do it.
*"Eomenred" should be "Eormenred"
*"Seaxbufh" should be "Seaxburh"
*"Hlother" should be "Hlothhere"
*"Eormenhil" should be "Eormenhild"
Personally I would also suggest making the background white, instead of that checkered grey and white.  I also think it would be better to make the text upper and lower case, instead of all upper case.  Just my two cents. Mike Christie (talk) 02:31, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: It's not "checkered". It's transparent, and thus show the background image (which is indeed checkered, a tradition borrowed from graphic editing program). I asked for a SVG version because tehse resize more easily (and gifs are notorious for quirky resizes). I'll ask  to make the corrections. Circeus (talk) 17:08, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for explaining the apparent checkered effect.  I'd wondered about that; I saw it in another image and was baffled when I realized it didn't show up in the article display.  Good point on the resizes -- I have seen that problem and I agree it's worth fixing.  One other question: do you think it adds value to have the lines blue and the text black?  I find it a bit distracting, but that may just be because I made the old image so I have preset expectations.  Mike Christie (talk) 00:03, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Got the spelling changes.  Actually I expected some sooner.  White background is easy.  All caps is a little easier to read in a small image/thumbnail. Look at "of"   Not a big deal to change, basically typing, but typing isn't my thing.  You'd want to proof read it carefully again.  Or give me a list so I can cut and paste.  Blue vs black, another easy change, it just looked kind of boring to me in all black.  (Family Colors, perhaps?) 
What about:ANNA,KING OFEAST ANGLIA (different line break placement?) Let me know.   Sagredo⊙☿♀♁♂♃♄ 01:19, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

text: My graphics ability is pretty much zero, and I have no visual sense, so I think we should go with whatever you think looks best.  Thanks for doing this, by the way.  And I really like your user name; I used that handle myself on LambdaMOO, once, a long time ago, and found myself talking to a chair of a university philosophy department as a result.  Mike Christie (talk) 01:23, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I looked at the article and realized that it should match the other diagram, and so changed it to all black.  Some do use color.  Sagredo⊙☿♀♁♂♃♄ 06:23, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  New family tree 

message: I believe it was his father Æthelberht the first one as it states in its wiki page. If he wasn't the one of the two pages is wrong and should be corrected. Please discuss.
190.195.112.29 (talk) 12:03, 29 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: You're right, but the lead does say that.  It says Æthelberht "made Kent the dominant force in England during his reign and became the first Anglo-Saxon king to convert to Christianity".  I think you're reading the second half of that sentence as if it referred to Eadbald.  Can you think of a better way to phrase it? Mike Christie (talk – library) 12:08, 29 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  First to convert? 

message: This edit made three sets of changes.  Do we really need to mention Charibert in the lead?  It's not something the sources emphasize particularly so I think it would be OK to relegate it to the body.  If we keep it I suggest we tweak it a bit: there's now no mention of Charibert in the body, and there should be if we mention him in the lead.  Adding that back to the body would also allow us to move the citation back down into the body, which is cleaner-looking for the reader.
The second part of the edit adds a mention of the church's consternation at Eadbald marrying his stepmother; this is already in the article, in the section on his accession.  Right now it just says the consanguinity meant it was forbidden by the church; if we need to mention the church's reaction we can do that in the second section though I don't recall offhand what Bede says about the church's response.  I don't see a need to raise the question of the church at the first mention of his re-marriage if it's covered later.
I'm also concerned about the part of the edit that states that it was Laurence who converted Eadbald.  That's certainly what Bede says but Kirby makes a case that it was Justus, and the article gives the case for both.  I think we should be less definite.
Any objections to me doing a revision based on these comments? Mike Christie (talk - contribs -  library) 16:42, 23 July 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I can't speak for the editor who made the changes, but according to me all your proposals seem reasonable; I agree in particular with keeping the mention of Charibert in the body and avoid being too definite regarding Eadbald's conversion, unless modern sources are unanimous on the issue.Aldux (talk) 13:07, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: There's a family tree on p.36 that shows Aduluald/Aethelwald listed with a dotted line as a son of Aethelberht.  I think that's enough, though I agree it would be easier to cite if she had discussed it in the text. Mike Christie (talk - contribs -  library) 22:36, 30 July 2011 (UTC)

text: One further point. I added that historians think Hengist was probably mythical as I did not think he should be mentioned without that qualification, but I think it would be better to delete the reference to him altogether as irrelevant to the article. Dudley Miles 20:40, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd like to hear another opinion on this -- I partly agree, but Bede is worth citing and Yorke starts by mentioning the genealogical information he gives, and mentions Hengist and Horsa.  Even if it's only to dismiss it I think it should be mentioned.  I was hoping "legendary" was enough to cast doubt on their historicity; I didn't want to make it stronger than that because some historians do think they may have existed. Mike Christie (talk - contribs -  library) 22:36, 30 July 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Recent edits 

message: A comment was just added about this; here's what Kirby says (this is visible in Google Books): "It is possible that Eorcenberht shared royal power with his brother, Eormenred, and the claim in the Mildrith legend that Eadbald left the kingdom wholly to Eorcenberht, his younger son, thereby effectively disinheriting Eormenred, may have been part of a later attempt to discredit royal claimants from this branch of the family." (top of p. 37).  Mike Christie (talk - contribs -  library) 18:24, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Kirby on Eorcenberht 

message: I recently reverted to an old version of a paragraph about Eadbald's repudiation of Christianity, and you've restored essentially the same text.  The main changes are:
* the use of "inspired" instead of "persuaded" to describe Eadbald's conversion
* the long quote from Bede
* the mention of the founding of the church
* mentioning that his fits appear to have stopped
The source given is Kirby, pp 37-42; this is the section of that chapter subtitled "The pagan reaction under Eadbald".  I think Kirby's language doesn't support "inspired"; in fact he makes it clear that he regards Bede's account as pious but unlikely to reflect the political realities.  To me that's a good reason not to use the quote, and to revert to "persuaded".  The mention of the church is OK, but we'd need a source for it -- once we're agreed on the rest of this paragraph I can find a source for that if you don't.  I don't think we can mention his fits having disappeared without a secondary source making the same point.  I'd like to revert these changes. Mike Christie (talk - contribs -  library) 06:22, 22 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd prefer not to mention the fits ending, because that gives credence to the idea that the fits had anything to do with his conversion.  Phrased as a comment on Bede's preference for a pious explanation it would be OK, but that would require a secondary source, since we'd be making an editorial comment about Bede.  So I think it needs to be removed. Mike Christie (talk - contribs -  library) 06:56, 22 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: To my surprise I can't quickly find a secondary source for Eadbald founding St. Mary's; I see it in Rollason's Mildrith Legend, but he's only reciting what the primary source says, not commenting on it.  I'll remove this tomorrow if I can't find a source, but I would think it can be re-added soon as I am confident a source exists. Mike Christie (talk - contribs -  library) 07:08, 22 May 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Recent revert