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Archive 1

There is a page named

Heir Presumptive


yet the link here to

heir presumptive

does not go to it.

However, should Heir Presumptive be capitalized? I have not capitalized it here pending resolution of this point.

Songwriter 17:43 4 Jul 2003 (UTC)

As it is a formal title, it is capitalised when used as a formal title, in lower case when written generically. As this article is talking about the Heir Presumptive, not about a heir presumptive, it is capitalised here. (Just as one talks about presidents but President of the United States, a queen but Queen of the United Kingdom.) FearÉIREANN

Aren't there several Princesses named Victoria? RickK 19:27 4 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Shouldn't this page be at Victoria, Princess Royal? --Jiang 22:00 4 Jul 2003 (UTC)

I have moved it to Princess Victoria of the United Kingdom to follow royal naming conventiions. I would love to use the PR title but as there are a number of PRs with the same name and they lack ordinals to distinguish between them, using [[name, Princess Royal]] is too problematic and so should be reserved for the current Princess Royal. It is a problem that was discussed at length. Using the basic royal title also matches general naming conventions in terms of reverting dead royal brides to their maiden title (Catherine of Aragon, etc). The convention agreed was that unless a royal had a peerage, they would be entered as Princess of whatever state they came from (or linked to title if relevant, in this case the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. (Hence Princess Margaret of the United Kingdom, Prince William of Wales, Princess Beatrice of York, etc.) BTW I have also set up a redirect from her marital title which also existed. FearÉIREANN 22:43 4 Jul 2003 (UTC)

There were two princess of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland (excluding Queen Victoria before her ascension) who were officially known as "Victoria": (1) Victoria, Princess Royal and later Empress Friedrich (1842-1901), the eldest daughter of Victoria of the United Kingdom; and (2) Princess Victoria (1868-1935), the unmarried second daugther of Edward VII of the United Kingdom. I am considering contributing an article on the second Princess Victoria (nicknamed "Toria"). However, if I used the naming convention Princess Victoria of the United Kingdom it would create a conflict with the existing article dealing with Victoria, Princess Royal. Do you have any suggestions? Also, since 4 Jul 2003, I have added the article Louise, Princess Royal and Duchess of Fife and expanded the existing article Mary, Princess Royal.

Jeff 2:05 28 Sept 2003 (UTC)

=

To solve the problem I noted above, I renamed the article Princess Victoria of the United Kingdom as Victoria, Princess Royal and Empress Frederick. I then created a separate article for Princess Victoria Alexandra Olga Mary(1868-1935), the daughter of Edward VII, using the title Princess Victoria Alexandra of the United Kingdom.

Jeff 10:38 29 Sept 2003 (UTC)

heading, again

To use Princess Royal as her only distinguisher is an obvious anglocentric decision. Basically generic titles cannot in that way reserved to one country. She should be at her pre-marital location "firstname of countryshewasprincessof". I object strongly to this sort of use of title which causes more difficukties than solves anything.
And, to repeat Princess twice in the heading is something unspeakable - the heading does not need it even once. 217.140.193.123 3 July 2005 20:50 (UTC)

requested move

  • Oppose. This article itself should not have been moved to a hybrid Victoria, Princess Royal and Empress Frederick (which is sadly not in accordance with any Naming Convention, and is a ridiculous bunching of two titularies) without move request. (I expect such move request would have been defeated.) The user who made the said move has in my opinion shown her ineptitude also by leaving this talkpage behind. Arrigo 08:36, 16 September 2005 (UTC)
Yes, but on the plus side, maybe no one will be able to find it to read your comments. Deb 17:27, 16 September 2005 (UTC)


There is now a discussion (and possibly a poll) ongoing regarding the location of the article itself, see Talk:Victoria, Princess Royal and Empress Frederick. I would hope that any moves of talkpages are not executed before the location of the article itself finds its ultimate location. 217.140.193.123 18:12, 17 September 2005 (UTC) PS: the ultimate location might be a bin, mightn't it :)

Marriage section

I added back in the links to Victoria's children: Sigismund, Waldemar and Sophie. Prsgoddess187 15:39, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

Requested move 2005

This article should not be located in this sort of hybrid name which besides contains too much titulary (i.e Victoria, Princess Royal and Empress Frederick). 217.140.193.123 19:06, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

Yes, it's a problem. When I adopted your suggestion to get rid of one of the duplicate articles, I put the other one at the title that was most linked-to by other articles. The person who had previously moved it to "Victoria Adelaide of the United Kingdom" hadn't bothered to clear up the double redirects. Anyhow, I suggest that people now make suggestions for alternative titles to move it to, while I finish fixing the links. Deb 22:39, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

Vote

As a result of talks below a (preliminary) short list of choices was developed, now proposed for the vote. This set of most likely choices will be added to the vote proposal at WP:RM.

This is an Approval vote as suggested by WP:RM (i.e. striving for at least 60% consensus on an option before a "move" to that option is operated). See Wikipedia:How_to_hold_a_consensus_vote#Third_choice:_Approval_voting for further guidance if not accustomed.

Here are the options. Vote for as many as you want. The option with the most votes is the consensus.

Allow me to add a new note as well. I looked at the German language version. It simply says "Kaiserin Victoria" so I would say, this whole Empress Frederick or Princess Victoria business would be confusing. I would propose:

so there can be no confusion with any other Victorias.

How about simple

  1. fourth choice, and would require an explicit statement in the header that she was consort, not reigning Empress. Septentrionalis 15:29, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

Vote count result, 9 days after start of vote

In total 4 persons voted (Arrigo, Gryffindor, Francis, Septentrionalis). The option with the highest number of votes (2 votes, Gryffindor and Septentrionalis) supported a move to Empress Victoria of Germany, summary:

  • 2 votes out of 4 supporting a move to "Empress Victoria of Germany" = 50% < 60%, not enough for a move.

As it seems unlikely that this discussion will result in a clear consensus anywhere in the foreseeable future, keeping it this listed on WP:RM for prolonged voting seems not advised, so I implement the present NO MOVE vote result, and remove the listing of the request from WP:RM, helping out with the backlog there. --Francis Schonken 08:49, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

Comments

Comments for the voting

"Empress Frederick" and "Empress Frederick of Germany" are untenable choices, as they do not even include her own name. To me, it is unthinkable to put a biographical article about a female under the heading that says only her husband's name. Arrigo 16:52, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

You have a long row to hoe; starting with Princess Michael of Kent. Septentrionalis 17:04, 19 September 2005 (UTC)
"Princess Michael of Kent" is not yet deceased, thus she could be an exception, as for living, here is some tolerance to formulations they themselves use in formal protocol. However, I oppose also her naming. As she is living, and besides is not a consort of any monarch, she is a false example for naming Vicky, who is supposed to conform with NC for deceased monarchical consorts. Arrigo 17:34, 19 September 2005 (UTC)
Well, to those who are keeping all formalities (such as the style by husband's name and other paraphernalia in accordance with male privileges) I would suggest one technically very correct form: Victoria of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. See, she was her father's daughter, and as such her mother's realm should have no effect to how male-stylists regard her. Arrigo 20:08, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

I oppose strongly the use of "Princess Royal" as her only disambiguator. In my opinion, that continues a certain trend of "political" anglocentrism here, pushing British-view POV to material which is supposed to be international and NPOV. Arrigo 16:52, 19 September 2005 (UTC) P.S. Anyway, she certainly was not known as "Princess Royal" during the biggest part of her life. The idea of consort naming is not to endorse girlhood titulary to all eternity, but to disambiguate between consorts of the same first name by using preferentially a territorial designation. As deceased monarchical consort, she should thus not have any titulary in her heading (if any titulary were to used it should be her highest title, i.e Empress, but all titularies are against NC). I repeat: no titulary. Arrigo 16:52, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

She actually was not "Empress of Germany", she was German Empress. The first-mentioned formulation obviously is from someone who does not even know the facts of the case. Arrigo 16:52, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

Oh, I include, and will accept it, only in deference to the people who insisted that we must have Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden and not Gustavus Adolphus. It's wrong, but better than the present title. Septentrionalis 17:04, 19 September 2005 (UTC)
As my little research of yesterday pointed out, the second given name is never mentioned without also adding the third. The sequence of the three first given names occurs not so often as the sequence of all four given names, but, at least it exists. So, if following the Alexandra example, in this case it would involve three names. So I added that more obvious choice too in the list above, but would not vote for it (for reasons given below): just pointing out it is more likely than exclusively the first two given names + "of the United Kingdom". --Francis Schonken 20:48, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

Some choices

Victoria the Empress

Victoria, German Empress

Victoria Adelaide of the United Kingdom

Victoria, Empress Frederick - included in short list for vote

Victoria of the United Kingdom (Vicky)

Victoria of the United Kingdom (1840-1901)

Victoria, Princess Royal - included in short list for vote

Princess Victoria, Princess Royal

requested move

The chief problem, as always, lies of course in the fact that there have been at least four individuals with some stake to the simple and nice name Victoria of the United Kingdom. Some disambiguation is thus needed. The three worthy persons were Queen Victoria, who is now located at Victoria of the United Kingdom, her eldest daughter Vicky, the German empress, who could be at Victoria Adelaide of the United Kingdom and the second granddaughter of the first-mentioned queen, Princess Toria, who currently is located at Princess Victoria Alexandra of the United Kingdom. Additionally, another granddaughter could also have a stake, but fortunately she can be located at Princess Victoria of Edinburgh (and I am certainly not suggesting her move at this time). This mess has made me think again and again that we possibly should not have a prohibition against using the ordinal ("I") of monarchs who were the only so-named in their monarchies, as the first Victoria could then be at Victoria I of the United Kingdom which at least hints that she was not only a princess or a consort.... Arrigo 09:17, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

This paragraph would be much easier to follow if the four choices were divided by semicolons or bullets. Arrigo, please consider either doing this or else consenting to it's being done. Septentrionalis 16:28, 17 September 2005 (UTC)
Whut? they are not choices (at least for heading of this biography), at least the paragraph of 17.9.2005 09:17. There is just listing basically of other persons who have also a stake to same or similar headings. Septentrionalis, is your question an error, or what do you mean? Arrigo 21:06, 19 September 2005 (UTC)
I would prefer not to see Victoria I of the United Kingdom because it will not be used either as a search or in running text. Her present location is at least possible. Septentrionalis 16:28, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

My opinion: Victoria, Princess Royal and Empress Frederick as the current heading of the article is a horrible abomination, it is against all naming conventions. It has two epithets which were never used simultaneously. It defines her with her husband's name, which IMO is almost always a bad way. It has as many as two titularies in a case where a heading is possible (and recommended by NC) without even one titulary - titularies in headings taste somewhat unencyclopedic, and two such in one heading could be regarded as ridiculous sycophancy by our some readers, which tends to make this encyclopedia seem ridiculous. It has "Princess Royal" as one epithet, although that sort of use can be regarded as anglocentric POV by several. Arrigo 09:01, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

I would at this stage prefer Victoria Adelaide of the United Kingdom as it at least is disambiguated and follows the same idea that has created her niece's article at Princess Victoria Alexandra of the United Kingdom. Let's have a thorough discussion. Arrigo 09:17, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

Not voting

I'm wary of all these votes triggered without the flimsiest evidence of prior research to sort out the most likely alternative(s), nor any attempt to create consensus prior to triggering a vote.

This is what I found:

1

Clarification by Google test in this case near to impossible, while so many pages telling something about Vicky, also mention Queen Victoria (and mention attributes like "of England", "of Germany" and the like) - so there appears no reliable way to separate the one from the other by web search engine.

The only thing I learnt from the google test is that "Adelaide" is, as far as I can see, never the "only" mentioned middle name for Vicky: either at least also her second middle name "Mary" is mentioned, but seemingly even more often the full set, including her 3rd middle name "Louize" is mentioned (that is, if any of the middle names is mentioned).

2

On the other hand, I found this list of books about (or partly by in the case of letters) Vicky:

  • Empress Frederick, Daughter of Queen Victoria, by Richard Barkeley (1956)
  • The Empress Frederick Writes to Sophie, Her Daughter, Crown Princess and later Queen of the Hellenes: Letters, 1889-1901, edited by Arthur S. Gould Lee (1955)
  • The English Empress: A Study in the Relations Between Queen Victoria and Her Eldest Daughter, Empress Frederick of Germany, by Egon Caesar Conte Corti (1957)
  • Letters of the Empress Frederick, edited by Sir Frederick Ponsonby (1928)
  • The Other Victoria, by Andrew Sinclair (1981)
  • Royal Web: The Story of Princess Victoria & Frederick of Prussia, by Ladislas Farago & Andrew Sinclair (1982)
  • An Uncommon Woman: The Empress Frederick, Daughter of Queen Victoria, Wife of the Crown Prince of Prussia, Mother of Kaiser Wilhelm, by Hannah Pakula (1995)
  • Vicky, Princess Royal of England and German Empress, by Daphne Bennett (1971)

-> I don't know about how correct/exhaustive this list is, so feel free to complete/check it, and inform your fellow wikipedians.

-> Apart from "Other Victoria" and "Daughter of..." which are too ambiguous for a wikipedia page title on a person, and the "Wife of..." and "Mother of ..." that wikipedia likewise tries to avoid in page names:

  • 5 publications refer to her as "Empress Frederick" in the title;
  • 2 publications refer to her as "Princess", and then in two variants 1 x ", Princess Royal"; 1 x "Princess Victoria", so that would not be the same page name in wikipedia;
  • 1 "Vicky"
  • 1 "German Empress", and 1 "of Germany"
  • only 2 mention her first name "Victoria" (the other 2 Victorias mentioned in the book titles refer to the UK Queen)
  • only one names English as an epithet, and one other of England: "of the United Kingdom" nowhere mentioned in these titles.

-> Taken together it seems to me that:

  • Empress Frederick seems unavoidable in the page name;
  • Middle names not usual.
  • Princess Royal, unnecessary (the only book mentioning this appears to go through great lenghts of adding less evident qualifiers, seemingly only to avoid the "Frederick")
  • Princess not necessary
  • Victoria, not needed from a "disambiguation" perspective, might be added while habitual at Wikipedia.
  • of the United Kingdom, unusual, doesn't solve anything of the ambiguity with her mother either.
  • of Germany or German, likewise unusual, and doesn't *exactly* solve the ambiguity with her mother, with her "German" pedigree (allthough, true, in general perception the "Queen"-also-empress-of-India would be perceived less "of Germany" than the Empress-also-queen-of-Prussia)
3

For the supporters of the middle name(s), there's still Britannica, 1984 printed edition listing her under Victoria Adelaide Mary Louize

4

On-line encyclopedias: I found:

  • Victoria, empress of Germany in Bartleby
  • Britannica has both mother and daughter under the same header "Victoria" in the members section; the "Free" section has only the UK Queen under, also, "Victoria". Britannica's inadequate way of handling disambiguation and search (possibly linked to their inadequate page naming) was already commented before by me, John K. agreeing if I remember well (see Talk:Frederick II of Prussia).
In sum

None of the English encyclop(a)edias appear to be mentioning "Empress Frederick" in the title (and even only one mentions "Empress" at all). Noneteless all mention "Victoria" in the article title; so "Victoria" seems sort of unavoidable too.

Victoria, Empress Frederick appears the most likely choice to me at this point. Try and convince me otherwise, I would say! --Francis Schonken 16:04, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

A poll would be evil, if a minor evil; but discussing the various possibilities under separate heads might be useful.
This is a choice between bad and worse. Unfortunately, the present title is one of the worse. I would suggest one of the three titles by which she was actually known:
Given the license of translation, the first may include the second. I am not drawn to the hybrid Victoria, Empress Frederick which is not usage, and (I hope) will not appear in running text.
I continue not to understand what exactly Arrigo means by anglocentric. It sometimes sounds like he is opposed to the English wikipedia being anglophone, which is both policy and unavoidable. I wish he would explain. Septentrionalis 16:43, 17 September 2005 (UTC)
Added something to the "conclusion" of my searches, see above: from an encyclopedia viewpoint "Victoria" as part of the name appears sort of unavoidable too, IMHO.
If we could limit the obvious alternatives to these five, that would be OK to me:
If considering these five possibilities, the first two I would throw out would be "Victoria, Crown Princess of Prussia" and "Empress Frederick of Germany".
For "Victoria, Empress Frederick" I support keeping it in, notwithstanding the "unusual" aspect mentioned by Septentrionalis.
Can we agree to reduce the list of 5 to a list of 3 according to this proposal? In other words, is anybody, at this point, adamant that either "Victoria, Crown Princess of Prussia" or "Empress Frederick of Germany" should be kept in as a "likely alternative"? --Francis Schonken 17:08, 17 September 2005 (UTC)
Keep Empress Frederick of Germany. There's enough sentiment that royalty must have a country label that someone will probably support it; if no-one does, it won't be a problem. Septentrionalis 18:18, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

This is indeed a choice between bad and worse. And those of us who knew her in advance, were aware of that - it is no surprise to those who are experts in royalty, genealogy etc (thus, anyone who shows being surprised, demonstrates his/her unfamiliarity with the substance in these questions). The sad move history of this article is evidence of what happens when choices are all more or less bad. However, as this is so bad, here we therefore can almost discard the principle "best known as" because we will never get any NC-acceptable result by that. I understand that the current NC were written partly to direct the formulation for just these sort of cases where any ready answer is not available. Another editor, imo quite acceptably, solved the same problem with her niece resulting in a "never-used-irl" Princess Victoria Alexandra of the United Kingdom, which is afaik just an application of NC, and not to be found anywhere else. 217.140.193.123 17:57, 17 September 2005 (UTC) - Hey Arrigo, as you say in this paragraph this is a somewhat more complex case. Taking part in the discussion with two different signatures is, of course, not making it simpler. Especially as you take different stances with each of the two signatures. --Francis Schonken 18:25, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

Who's surprised? I expected this.
I think "best known as" is clear: Empress Frederick, with Victoria, Princess Royal as runner-up. The problem with Empress Frederick is the number of readers, especially from republics, who will be bewildered by the use of a male name for her. I'm not sure how serious a problem this is, but it is one; one of the guidelines for naming is to avoid surprise. Septentrionalis 18:18, 17 September 2005 (UTC)
So, if I understand, this "short list":
Thus far, Septentrionalis wants the first two to be kept on the short list, Francis wants the third choice to be kept on the short list. --Francis Schonken 18:25, 17 September 2005 (UTC)
copied these three options up for the vote. --Francis Schonken 09:10, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
Oops, just noticed Septentrionalis inserted a comment higher that he wants to keep Empress Frederick of Germany as an option at this point too. Will add that. --Francis Schonken 09:24, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
  • I agree that those are the best three to start with. None of them are my favorite so far, but we need a place to start, and if someone comes up with something better, that is good too. Prsgoddess187 15:23, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

German Empress Frederick

In the titles and styles section, it gives her dowager title and style as Her Imperial Majesty The German Empress Frederick. Does anyone know for certain if she adopted the style of the German Empress Frederick or just the Empress Frederick? The latter seems to me the most logical style, although if the other was what she had adopted, then that is fine. I want to change it to The Empress Frederick, but I will wait for discussion. Charles 01:21, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

I've never heard her referred to as "The German Empress Frederick." john k 04:05, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
"German Empress Frederick" OR "German Empress Friedrich" gives 305 Google results, while "Empress Frederick" OR "Empress Friedrich" gives 22 500... I think it's safe for me to change it then. Charles 04:53, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
When her husband was alive she was called "The German Empress", but when her husband died she was called "The Empress Frederick/Friedrich". The "rule" is, I think, proved by the small (1.5%) number of exceptions cited by Charles. Noel S McFerran 14:27, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
I have never heard of "German Empress Frederick" as a title per se. I just checked the German version, it says she was "Ihre Majestät Kaiserin Victoria des Deutschen Reichs". Which means she was not "German Empress" but "Her Majesty Empress Victoria of the German Empire". I cannot find a reliable source saying that her title was indeed "German Empress Victoria" or "German Empress Frederick". This whole "Empress Frederick" business is a bit of a mess I think, the article should be renamed anyways. Gryffindor 15:42, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
What do you think would be a good name? Without reading the extensive mess above, I would root for Victoria, Princess Royal. Are there other Princesses Royal who became consorts? I think the problem with the initial move request was that too many hybrid choices were presented. Charles 18:41, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
I just checked and Queen Charlotte of Württemberg is at Charlotte, Princess Royal. Charles 18:50, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
This naming game is a complete nitemare sometimes. I think it should probably revert to the first name before it was moved under "Princess Victoria, Princess Royal". The "Charlotte, Princess Royal" is an interesting case, because wouldn't this be in violation of the Naming conventions? hm, because in that case this shouldn't this be something like "Victoria Adelaide of the United Kingdom", no? Gryffindor 20:13, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
I think we still have Frederick, Prince of Wales, Henry Fredrick, Prince of Wales and Arthur, Prince of Wales though... Each case is a substantive title that each held by grant of a sovereign (although it was a specific title akin to crown prince... hmm). Indeed, it would be Victoria's pre-marital title. I am against Victoria Adelaide of the United Kingdom... I don't think she ever used Adelaide. She was also the Princess Royal for almost her entire life and certainly before her marriage. Charles 21:03, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure what your point is with the Princes of Wales. "Prince of Wales" was the highest title held by all of them. The problem with Vicky (and Charlotte) is that they were Princess Royal, but they also held a higher title (Queen of Württemberg/Empress of the German Empire). Officially, we're supposed to remove any "Princess" title from royal consorts. Thus, we have Mary of Teck, not Princess Mary of Teck; Alexandra of Denmark, not Princess Alexandra of Denmark, and so forth. john k 07:36, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Princess Royal isn't "just" another title though. It is a substantive title. Charles 17:37, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
Yes, remove all Princess titles, and what do we get? Victoria of the United Kingdom. just grand. That's why I was proposing to add her second name in order to avoid confusion (I would like to avoid any of that when-she-lived-in-brackets format (1840–1901), that really is messy looking. Or go with "Victoria, Princess Royal"... or something like that. Gryffindor 18:26, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
I'm for Victoria, Princess Royal. It's short, concise and matches up with Queen Charlotte of Württemberg, another Princess Royal who became a consort. Charles 18:46, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
I just checked the other Princesses Royal. I could agree with that as well. Gryffindor 21:37, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
I will post it up on Requested Moves. Charles 19:37, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

How about Victoria of the United Kingdom (German empress)? disambiguating her maiden name by her most notable achievement.

I suppose some will worry that someone will imagine that she belonged to that empty class, German empresses-regnant? Please answer one question: who exactly will fall into this error, and why shouldn't we disambuse them in the first paragraph? Septentrionalis 20:02, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Requested move 2006

The following discussion is an archived debate 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 debate was move. —Nightstallion (?) Seen this already? 19:10, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

Victoria, Princess Royal and Empress Frederick → Victoria, Princess Royal - This follows all present guidelines for the naming of royal and imperial consorts. The practice is in place with Charlotte, Princess Royal who was queen of Württemberg. All other Princesses Royal held peerage titles via husbands or are named as to disambiguate them from Princesses Royal of the same forename. Such is not needed for Victoria. Charles 19:50, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

  • Support. See above and below for my comments. Charles 19:50, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Oppose. This issue was exhaustively discussed as recently as September and I don't see that anything has changed (except for a unilateral campaign to ignore 1. previous discussions and 2. NC mandating "Best known name in English" for all monarchs and their spouses, which is being rapidly replicated throughout WP). I would prefer Victoria, Empress Frederick based on the extensive review of comparative usage conducted and reported in last year's discussion by Francis Schonken on 17 September 2005.Lethiere 14:37, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Support Although I can share some of Lethiere's concerns, rules are the rules at the moment, otherwise we would have no order in the naming in the end. Unless rules are changed, I will support this move. Gryffindor 17:05, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
hi Francis Schonken. What happened? I changed my mind. Charles did a good job at convincing me during our discussion and how this should be named. Since this topic was so controversial and no agreement could be found (which you can evidently see below) I am supporting the option which seems to come closest to current Wikipedia rules. As I have stated above, I do have my personal reservations of course, but the rules are the rules and should be respected, regardless what my personal viewpoint is. I agree also with Prsgoddess187 that we should work with the rules we have at the moment, until they get changed. But that's another topic and needs to be discussed elsewhere. Gryffindor 11:01, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
Regarding this dubious interpretation of what "the rules" are, see my vote justification below. If other wikipedians convinced you of an erroneous interpretation of what the rules are, well, err, shame on them. It doesn't justify however you making the same error. --Francis Schonken 12:16, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Support - I too do have some concerns, but I see Charles' point, this would distinguish Victoria from her mother and her niece quite nicely. In the future, there could be other naming conventions that would take precedence, but for now this is what we have. Prsgoddess187 21:46, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Support WP:NC spells it out quite nicely:
"Past Royal Consorts" (in this case our Victoria here) "are referred to by their pre-marital name or pre-marital title, not by their consort name, as without an ordinal (which they lack) it is difficult to distinguish various consorts; eg, as there have been many queen consorts called Catherine, use Catherine of Aragon not Queen Catherine." (emphasis added)
"Existing Royal Consorts are referred to by their consort name, eg. Queen Sofia of Spain. But when she dies, she will revert to her pre-marital title, ie, Sofia of Greece & Denmark. As widow, some appropriate addition (usually announced by the country in question) will be amended to (such as Queen Dowager or Queen Mother), with the new Queen of Spain being referred to by the consort designation. The same rule applies to male royal consorts." (emphasis added)
If a mandate existed to use the best known name in English for royal consorts the second rule in the WP:NCs would be superfluous and wasted ink (or bits and bytes in our case) as freshly deceased royals would clearly always be best known by their consort titles. Along the same line, there is clearly no justification for the strange convolution of titles currently found in this page name. Furthermore, the use of two titles in this page name indicates in and by itself that there is no "best known name in English" for this lady. For these reasons, the argument brought by User:Lethiere|Lethiere]] doesn't hold up, and because there is a clear directive in the WP:NCs to use a consort's title before marriage for past consorts the page should be moved to "Victoria, Princess Royal". --Mmounties (Talk) 01:11, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
  • Oppose per the earlier discussion (conserved below on this page). "Princess Royal" is UK-centered POV, and nearly not recognised outside the UK. Maybe for the British it will always be so that the fact that she was "Princess Royal" is more important than the fact that she was Empress-consort in Germany. But generally, worldwide among English speakers, the point of recognition is rather having been Empress in Germany. So, the present name (far from being ideal) tries to get a good recognition for both British and other English speakers (while referring both to the "Princess Royal" and the "Empress" function).
    @Gryffindor: "rules are the rules at the moment": the rule (as in official policy) is presently: "Generally, article naming should give priority to what the majority of English speakers would most easily recognize, with a reasonable minimum of ambiguity, while at the same time making linking to those articles easy and second nature." ("policy in a nutshell" formulation of the wikipedia:naming conventions policy, my bolding) – rules of thumb given at wikipedia:naming conventions (names and titles) (or its talk page) do not supersede the official policy. --Francis Schonken 10:18, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

Discussion

A move to Victoria, Princess Royal will settle the issue of controversial naming, etc. It falls well within Wikipedia's guidelines for the naming of consorts, as is seen with the treatment of a queen of Württemberg at Charlotte, Princess Royal. The name of Victoria, Princess Royal distinguishes the German Empress from her mother, her niece and other ladies of the same forename and territorial designation. All Princesses Royal who were consorts are under articles titled such, with extra titles shown only for Princesses Royal who share the same forename. Such is not the case with Victoria. Charles 19:50, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
No, the proposed move is in no way something that would "settle" a controversial naming, see also my vote justification above (and my research efforts below, at the time of the previous WP:RM). --Francis Schonken 10:18, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
OF COURSE the *British* title of Princess Royal is *British* POV. It factually existed. There are people today who think calling Elizabeth II a queen is POV, but it is fact. The title of Princess Royal was a British honour for a British princess. Charles 18:55, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
Were you implying you have no intention to comply to Wikipedia:Describing points of view (that's the page I linked to when writing UK-centered POV above)? So maybe cut out all the nonsense about "we follow the rules". You've lost all decorum in that sense. You don't follow official policy (as I explained above), neither are you prepared to follow wikipedia's recommendations on avoiding POV. Makes it all clear. --Francis Schonken 00:13, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
Oh, the semantics of it all. What I meant is that the title of Princess Royal is as British POV as is the title Queen of the United Kingdom. Charles 00:28, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
That's where recognisability (as in official policy) comes in:
  • For Queen Victoria the point of recognition (worldwide, on average) is that she was monarch of the United Kingdom, not that she also was Empress of India - naming the article Victoria of India would be Indian POV in this case, even if there would be more English speakers from India than from the UK.
  • For Vicky the point of recognition (worldwide, on average, see the ample references below) is that she was Empress(-consort) to Frederick in Germany, not that in the UK she had the title of Princess Royal. "Princess Royal" is only a point of recognition in the UK – don't even know for the former colonies – so, if this important minority wants to keep this point of recognition in, we'll keep it too, alongside with what the majority of English speakers would most easily recognize (as official policy requires).
--Francis Schonken 09:03, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
Francis I am slightly confused now. So what exactly is your proposal? And under which rule would your proposal be covered under? I still think Charles solution so far comes closest to being in compliance.... Gryffindor 14:59, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Titles from Prince Albert

Just wondering, did Victoria (and by extension, her siblings) receive any titles from their father? This passage from her mother's page says that the Queen would have been a Princess of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha and Duchess in Saxony as Prince Albert's wife, but of course the title of Queen would outrank those. Prsgoddess187 13:22, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Yes, Victoria, as the daughter of a Prince of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, was a Princess of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha and Duchess in Saxony, in addition to any other titles held by the Wettins of that line. Charles 14:14, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
Thanks Charles, that's what I thought, but wasn't sure. Prsgoddess187 14:33, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Expansion of article

Although hardly a stub, it is still a bit bare bones and other pertinent info could be added. Vicky was a controversial figure in Germany as well as being involved in many contemporary events, from her patronage of the arts and sciences (eg Virchow) to her political clashes with Bismarck and later, her son Wilhelm. I'LL add what I can source adequately but this could use some expert attention too Plutonium27 (talk) 10:32, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Princess Louisa Inlet

The source of the naming of this inlet in British Columbia is uncertain as described in the article howver neither of those who are thought to be the ones it was named for have "Louisa" as part of their names, but rather "Louise". I mention it here in case anyone comes across a source that would indicate who this inlet was named for. --KenWalker | Talk 05:23, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Name revisited

Recent discussions at naming conventions mean that we have moved away from normally referring to queens and the like by their maiden name. However, actually referring to a woman by her husband's name sound artificial nowadays. I therefore propose "Victoria, Empress of Germany" as the best title. Another possibility is "Victoria, German Empress". PatGallacher (talk) 16:08, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

"Victoria, Empress of Germany" would be incorrect; there is a significant difference between the titles German Empress and Empress of Germany. Anyway, I don't think that we should ignore the most common name because some people find it artificial. We certainly don't do it in cases such as Princess Michael of Kent. The most common name appears to be Empress Frederick. Victoria, Princess Royal is, according to the 2005 move request, the second most common name, while Victoria, Empress Frederick is a compromise wich includes both her name and the title by which she is best known. All three options are fine by me. Surtsicna (talk) 16:32, 29 June 2010 (UTC

I agree with PatGallacher. I also agree with the point raised by Francis Schonken that "Princess Royal" is UK-centered POV. Victoria, Princess Royal is actually a horrible and very misleading article title. If we were to use her pre-marital "name", it would be the house name (Victoria of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha). "Princess Royal" is just one of several titles she held, and not widely understood outside the UK. I think her being the German Empress and Queen of Prussia is a lot more significant than the Princess Royal title in the UK. I like the idea above of simply Empress Victoria of Germany, analogous with Queen Sofía of Spain. I feel Empress Frederick is too old-fashioned and not in line with other similar article titles, also, this expression was only used when she was the Empress Dowager. Jolanak (talk) 06:55, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Title

Shouldn't the title of the article read: "Victoria, German Empress"? HansNZL (talk) 08:34, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Requested move 2012

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: No consensus to move. Future discussions of what the title need to involve how the subject is referred to in the reliable sources. Cúchullain t/c 16:25, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

Victoria, Princess Royal → Victoria, German Empress – Comparatively recent discussions on the talk page seem to be heading in this direction. We are moving in the direction of referring to queens by their married not maiden title, see the discussion at Marie of Romania. She is more important for her role in Germany, where she spent most of her life, than in Britain. The current title is not very satisfactory since the title of Princess Royal is slightly obscure, only used in formal contexts, even in Britain most people think of the present holder as Princess Anne, and it is also biased since Portugal also had a Princess Royal for a time. Consulting Wikipedias in other languages is not much help since they use a wide range of titles but I have not found any which uses the exact equivalent of the current title. Relisted. BDD (talk) 21:33, 19 September 2012 (UTC) PatGallacher (talk) 10:14, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

  • Oppose If we're not going to apply the maiden name precedent in favor of what she's most known by, she was never called "Victoria, German Empress" or "Empress Victoria" at all: she is best known to history as "Empress Frederick". FactStraight (talk) 11:28, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
    • There is a tenable case for "Empress Frederick" but on balance I would be against it. Although this was her formal title during her widowhood I would be cautious about assuming that this was what everybody called her even then. As far as I can judge, histories of the period tend to call her "Vicky" to distinguish her from her mother. The German Wikipedia calls her "Victoria of Great Britain and Ireland (1840-1901)", other Wikipedias have a range of titles, but they are all some variant of Victoria, none call her Frederick. It now sounds awkward to refer to a woman by her husband's name in this way, even if it is her formal title, we should reserve this for cases where this really is how she is generally known e.g. Princess Michael of Kent. Also it would help to say where she was Empress of. PatGallacher (talk) 17:23, 26 August 2012 (UTC)
This is precisely the muddle we wade into by abandoning the time-honoured maiden name principle: the names of articles on royal women become unstable because no other rule is as prevalent. So we end up choosing what we like and rationalising it based on some obscure, never-to-be-applied-again premise. To wit, since nobody's suggesting putting this article at "The Princess Royal" there is no prospect of confusion with the current "Anne, Princess Royal" or any other holder of that title. Why is it relevant how common or rare "Princess Royal" is outside of English usage? Nor does anyone contend that Empress Frederick "was what everybody called her" since, as an encyclopedia, we shouldn't be trying to call her what "everybody" called her: NCROY leans toward maiden name, Wikipedia's general rule calls for the name best known to English-speakers. (Personally, I advocate for the most correct name & title used in English -- since "correctness" is what I think people turn to encyclopaedia to discover and where they expect articles to be located -- otherwise we are eventually defenceless against "Princess Di"). Alleging that it's awkward to call her "Empress Frederick" is simply a version of I just don't like it -- and that animus, directed against hereditary titles as well as sexism, seems to be gradually driving article titles toward "modernising" historical rulers to look like commoners because it is becoming "awkward" to allow class differences of yore to go un-retroactively corrected. If the rationale for changing this article's title is that Victoria, Princess Royal is not "what everybody called her" then the only move which makes sense is to one by which she was prevalently called by the handfull of relatives entitled to refer to her by a name at all: "Vicky". But the name "Victoria, German Empress" is completely fabricated and has neither the virtue of being prevalent nor accurate (and some would say that her mother has a better right to it, being an empress regnant who held the title far longer). FactStraight (talk) 05:42, 28 August 2012 (UTC)
To clarify, is it entirely fabricated. Was she not known, nationally and internationally, as the German Empress, during the year or so that she was? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 06:27, 28 August 2012 (UTC)
Yes, she was properly known as the German Empress Victoria -- for less than 100 days in 1888. From then until her death in 1901 she was known (in English) as Empress Frederick, and that is how she is most commonly called and remembered in history except when being referred to in the context of specific earlier periods of her life when she was exclusively Princess Royal (1841-1858), Princess Frederick (of Prussia) (1858-1861), Crown Princess (1861-1888) or Empress Victoria (March-June, 1888). Of course, bear in mind that only diplomats, academics and journalists actually called her "German Crown Princess" or "German Empress" at all: most people, in German and other languages, referred to her as the Crown Princess/Empress "of" Germany -- although this was incorrect, being a form of title explicitly rejected for political reasons when Germany formally became an empire in 1871. But if this encyclopedia insists on using what was common rather than what was correct, why should one more awkward "fact" be ignored -- merely because it was erroneous? FactStraight (talk) 21:47, 14 September 2012 (UTC)
To one who has been born and bred in England and her history, the question is: How does that tally with Hansard mentioned below, where the Prime Minister in 1901 speaks of "When the then Princess Royal, afterwards German Empress, left these shores in 1857..."? Qexigator (talk) 22:31, 14 September 2012 (UTC)
Historians invent titles all of the time, much of the numbering of monarchs is retrospective, several important people are known by names they were never called in their lifetime e.g. Julius Caesar, William the Conqueror, Kenneth MacAlpin, or it is doubtful if they were e.g. Matilda of Scotland, Mary Tudor, Queen of France. There is no longer a presumption in favour of maiden titles at NCROY. It was recognised that this could produce absurditites e.g. Marie Antionette would have to be "Maria Antonia of Austria", and it is doubtful if she was ever officially called "Marie Antionette", she would have been successively "la Dauphine", "la Reine", "Citoyenne Capet" and "Veuve Capet". As it happens Prince Phillip, Duke of Edinburgh was awarded this title on the morning of the day he married the Queen, but would it really have mattered for Wikipedia naming purposes if the king had waited only a few hours? Another glaring case is Diana, Princess of Wales, the maiden title rule would mean calling her "Lady Diana Spencer". What about Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge? Is this title formally correct, and what if she becomes queen, as she may well do? Does she revert to "Kate Middleton" at some point, even if only on death? There are similar issue with Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall. PatGallacher (talk) 12:09, 28 August 2012 (UTC)
  • Yes. Can we talk more about the COMMONNAME here? Does that mean, what was she usually called, overall, or at some specifici point. Or what she was called just after her death (I’ve not found a death notice, or the description from her tomb, can anyone else?). Do our sources suffer from our bias to use sources written in English? Looking at a few source, I see her called:
  • Princess Victoria of Great Britain [1]
  • Victoria Adelaide Mary Louisa Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Princess Royal of the United Kingdom or

    Victoria Deutscher Kaiserin [2]

  • Victoria, Princess Royal, Empress of Germany (1840-1901) [3]
  • HRH Princess Victoria of the United Kingdom, The Princess Royal, German Empress & Queen of Prussia[4]
I think I'd be strongly influenced by whatever is written on her tomb, or at the top of her death notice. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 06:23, 29 August 2012 (UTC)
Her status as a British princess / Princess Royal appears in all the sources you have listed. The title of empress being subjectively "more important" in the eyes of individual Wikipedia editors is not enough to trump WP:COMMONNAME as it is used by historians. (And yes, we should and do focus on English language sources as this is the English Wikipedia.) --Jiang (talk) 06:57, 29 August 2012 (UTC)
This seems to be her death plaque. Will try to translate later. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 08:18, 29 August 2012 (UTC)
Transcription:

Dieses haus erbaute

In den jahren 1889 bis 1893
Victoria
Deutsche kaiserin und konigin von Preussen
Princess royal von grossbritannien und Irland
Geboren zu london am 21 november 1840

Gestorben hier am 5 august 1901]]

Translation:

This house was built

In the years 1889 to 1893
Victoria
German Empress and Queen of Prussia
Princess Royal of Great Britain and Ireland
Born London on 21 november 1840

Died here on 5 august 1901

--SmokeyJoe (talk) 00:27, 30 August 2012 (UTC)
This seems to be a close call, but I see "Victoria, German Empress" and the strongest claim for the page title. "Empress Frederick" is a nickname, and should be a redirect. "Victoria, Princess Royal" seems excessively English/English royal family POV; she has very little ongoing historical significance as Princess Royal, but a lot as German Empress. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 00:40, 30 August 2012 (UTC)
I'd suggest Victoria, German Empress consort to satisfy concern about non-regnancy, except I haven't seen it used once in a source. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 08:38, 9 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose. We should stick with the maiden name when an alternative is not obvious. I don't see how "Victoria, German Empress" is obvious, given that she was only known as this for about 90 days, and that's not standard for consorts, anyway. "Empress Frederick," by the way, was not a nickname. It was her formal style after her husband's death. john k (talk) 04:32, 30 August 2012 (UTC)
Qexigator raises a voice in favour of SmokeyJoe's observation "...a close call, but I see Victoria, German Empress... the strongest claim for the page title... little ongoing historical significance as Princess Royal, but a lot as German Empress."Qexigator (talk) 09:39, 30 August 2012 (UTC)
Her primary significance was as a German crown princess, and distinctly not as empress (which she only was for 90 days). john k (talk) 18:28, 30 August 2012 (UTC)
This is looking like a confused multi-candidate race. You oppose Victoria, German Empress because she was more significant as Victoria, Crown Princess of Prussia, and therefore support Victoria, Princess Royal? Could you please clarify? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 04:25, 14 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Support: The title German Empress implies her prior status as Crown Princess, just as Frederick, German Emperor suffices without Crown Prince (though a redirect would be helpful). Her survival of her husband Frederick, with the continuing title of Empress, was of continuing historic significance as mother of the reigning Emperor William, Frederick's successor.Qexigator (talk) 19:01, 30 August 2012 (UTC).(Revised by adding support. Qexigator (talk) 07:25, 9 September 2012 (UTC))
---Further: In the section "German Empress and Empress Frederick", footnote [2] cites Hansard which records the Prime Minister in 1901, proposing in the House of Lords an address to the King on the death of his sister, saying "When the then Princess Royal, afterwards German Empress, left these shores in 1857...". The full and formal title is also mentioned later, in the same paragraph as "William, German Emperor" (her son).Qexigator (talk) 06:55, 2 September 2012 (UTC)
Peterkingiron, is there anything in your extensive research (listed on your User page) which points to what you have here proposed, and would outweigh the PM's usage mentioned above (06:55, 2 September 2012)? Not all aspects can be covered in the article's title. It is unlikely that anyone would take it that she were Regnant rather than Consort, but it would be good to see something in the opening paragraph explicitly removing any ambiguity. Qexigator (talk) 19:17, 4 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose. The proposed title is not the most common name, which, in my opinion, would be the only valid reason to move the article. The proposed title, in fact, doesn't seem to be any improvement. The present title is unambigious, factually correct and consistent with titles of relevant articles. If nothing else, Victoria, German Empress might also refer to her own daughter-in-law, Augusta Victoria. Even having the article titled Empress Frederick would make more sense. Surtsicna (talk) 21:12, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.
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