Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/King of Wales

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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was no consensus‎. The proposals to merge or redirect to Titles in medieval Wales cannot be currently implemented, as that article does not currently exist (although a draft does). I recommend restarting a merger or redirection discussion on the talk page once the target article exists and is stable. Sandstein 14:58, 14 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

King of Wales[edit]

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King of Wales (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)
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There is really only one contender for the title of King of Wales and that is Gruffydd ap Llywelyn, although he was not called King of Wales in his lifetime. There are sources that refer to him thus. For instance [1]. So this page makes a subject where none exists. The information about Gruffydd ap Llywelyn is on his page and should be there. This page could redirect there as this was the only real contender for the title. Other UK home nations do not have pages describing the concept of a king of the nation, despite more clearly having kings (England and Scotland particularly). There is no encyclopaedic subject of King of Wales outside of Gruffyd ap Llywelyn. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 00:05, 30 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Draftify / KEEP. After a protracted debate for over 2 months, there has been no compromise as to the full potential of the article. The previous edition gave detailed information about the monarchs named in Brut y Tywysogion in list form. An adapted article using primary sources has been discussed (Talk:King of Wales#Missing King of Wales claimants) to create a prose paragraph style work listing Kings named rulers of Wales from the middle ages, however, the issue of mythology has been raised in regard of the listing of individuals bringing WP:RS into contention. I suggest in keeping a rewrite the article and using the existing listing of Gruffudd ap Llywelyn but adding a more detailed segment about the rulers prior to and after the one individual listed from a potential dozen Kings of Wales. You just have to look at the fellow Celtic nations' lists: List of legendary rulers of Cornwall, List of High Kings of Ireland and Legendary kings of Scotland to better understand the article's potential. Cltjames (talk) 00:31, 30 November 2023 (UTC) I think @Richard Keatinge: took the right initiative. As in, the bulk of the work about the King of Wales should be kept, but the title will be better explained with reference to the other medieval titles, e.g. Rex, Brenin, Princeps. Cltjames (talk) 18:31, 4 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The list articles are not comparable to what we have here, and we have the comparable article in List of rulers in Wales. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 07:54, 30 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep, but this should be a disambiguation page. I don't think the argument about the other UK home nations makes sense, since we do have redirects with obvious targets for those. See King of England and King of Scotland. For this article we have a real problem since someone searching for "king of wales" probably isn't looking for the article on Gruffydd ap Llywelyn. A dab page with some (extremely minimal) explanations makes sense here. You'd probably want Prince of Wales linked in a hatnote. I don't think draftifying makes sense - if there hasn't been consensus in two months on the talk page, why would it transpire over six months of draftification? -- asilvering (talk) 00:39, 30 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    I think creation of a DAB would be a sensible outcome. Thanks. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 07:55, 30 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Move to "King of Wales title" or similar - focused on the historical use of the title rather than territorial rule of all Wales. Titus Gold (talk) 01:06, 30 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    @Cltjames if you want to create a page of fictional kings e.g Legendary Kings of Wales / Fictional Kings of Wales, that's a separate matter I think. This page should remain historical. Titus Gold (talk) 01:06, 30 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Royalty and nobility-related deletion discussions. WCQuidditch ☎ ✎ 01:24, 30 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Move to "King of Wales title" or similar, since that is what the article is about. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 01:35, 30 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    There has never really been a King of Wales title though. Gruffydd ap Llywelyn did not use it of himself. After him, Owain Gwynedd, who did not rule the whole polity, once described himself as "king of the Waleses" in a letter to the French king, but he did not do that consistently, and the letter was very much occasioned. It was not a title bestowed on him. Anyone looking to learn about "King of Wales" either wants to know about the princes or else about Gruffydd ap Llywelyn. There never was a title of King of Wales. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 08:08, 30 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep and do not move. An article about a title can be at that title. Compare King of Kings or King of the Goths. The article should be about the title. The article currently says nothing about Orderic's reference to a rex Guallorum or to Rhys as rex Walensium. I found these in a few minutes of googling. I just think it needs a lot of work, but deletion can't accomplish that. Srnec (talk) 02:12, 30 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    Orderic refers, it is presumed, retrospectively to Gruffudd ap Cynan. Rhys ap Gruffydd is on the page as it stands, called head of Wales on his death. Where are you finding the reference to rex Walensium? If the Robert of Torigny primary source collated in Monumenta Germaniae Historica we should note that this is not a title Rhys took for himself. He twice styled himself prince of the Welsh, and the reasons for that are discussed by, e.g. Turvey (2002) as being in direct opposition to the use of king. Turvey cites chronicler usage that retained "rex" but also the styling of Welsh rulers as "regulus", a use of the Latin diminuative in mockery of the "little kings". His theory, then is that the Welsh thus chose to style their rulers as princes. He says:

This accords well with the view that Rhys and his fellow rulers, at the behest of Henry II, set aside all pretensions to regal status in return for confirmation of their landholdings. It seems that during the twelfth century the native chroniclers were tending increasingly to acclaim only their greatest rulers brenin or rex and then only as an epithet of greatness to be dispensed at death as a mark of respect and for past deeds should they warrant titular distinction. By the thirteenth century this practice had ceased completely

  • Turvey, R. (2002) The Welsh Princes: The Native Rulers of Wales 1063-1283 Routledge.
Thus neither of these ruled the polity, and retrospective claims do not speak to a title. Also, where is the evidence in sources that (unlike King of Kings or King of the Goths) the term "King of Wales" has any notability apart from reference to Gruffydd ap Llywelyn? Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 08:28, 30 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
What "polity"? There was no kingdom of Wales. But the title "King of Wales" existed nevertheless, both arrogated and attributed. How it was used, by and of whom, is a question best answered by this article. Rulership in medieval Wales would be a broader but equally valid topic. This article could be expanded and moved, but I see no good reason to nix it. There are enough sources that discuss the title "king of Wales/Waleses/the Welsh". For example, the paper "From Rex Wallie to Princeps Wallie" in The Medieval State: Essays Presented to James Campbell or "Gruffudd ap Cynan and the Medieval Welsh Polity" in Gruffudd ap Cynan: A Collaborative Biography. Srnec (talk) 02:17, 1 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, the lack of kingdom of Wales is the point. The title "King of Wales" did not exist in any unambiguous and meaningful way, because there was no kingdom of Wales, except arguably under one man for a brief period from 1057-1063. But the confusion of that period with other singular and occasioned descriptions of people who were not kings of any such kingdom, makes this article unworkable asis. If there was a king of Wales, it was Gruffudd. But you suggest we could used Rulership in medieval Wales. DeCausa, on the article talk page yesterday, suggested Titles of Welsh rulers. You are both quite right. A better article is possible in which we dispense with the attempts merely to list names of people that have at some point been called something, as though one thing is equivalent to another. The better article answers the question, and it is a very good question, "why did Wales have princes?" It would look at the development of the concept of Wales and the usage of a range of terms, and the influence of England in that development. (See also DeCausa's message on talk [2]). If we want to move this article and make it the basis of that, I do not mind. We just need to firm up the move target. I tend to think it is actually a different article, but I can see that starting from a base may be quicker than starting from scratch. This suggestion also has the very important policy argument behind it: we have good secondary sources that demonstrate notability for this subject. You provide some, and we have Turvey above and plenty more. This is not the case for an article on the King of Wales. No sources have been presented that demonstrate that this page, as it is, is notable. The sources are guiding us: Titles of Welsh rulers or Rulership in medieval Wales would be the encyclopaedic article here. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 07:53, 1 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I have cited such sources. Deleting this article does not get us closer to an ideal article, but further. I think it is a completely mistaken assumption that "King of Wales" must mean what you take it to mean rather than whatever the primary sources that use it took it to mean. Srnec (talk) 21:02, 1 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Move to King of Wales (title) as suggested above, to clarify that this is about the term/title, not specific historical rulers, with a top link to Gruffydd ap Llywelyn. Cortador (talk) 10:34, 30 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep with no strong views on the naming. If you follow the link to Wales in this article, it takes you to Wales in the Middle Ages, where the lead is very short:

    "Wales in the Middle Ages covers the history of the country that is now called Wales, from the departure of the Romans in the early fifth century to the annexation of Wales into the Kingdom of England in the early sixteenth century. This period of about 1,000 years saw the development of regional Welsh kingdoms, Celtic conflict with the Anglo-Saxons, reducing Celtic territories, and conflict between the Welsh and the Anglo-Normans from the 11th century."

    Since this text explicitly refers to the kingdom of England and Welsh kingdoms, it's reasonable for a reader not well-versed in the history of the UK or Wales to want to know about the concept of kingship in Wales, a constituent country of the United Kingdom with a particularly rich history, and to understand if there has been a "King of Wales", and if so, who he might have been. This article is a useful general discussion of the concept, and an informative read. Elemimele (talk) 13:19, 30 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete I agree with @Sirfurboy. The only rulers significantly associated with the title are Gruffydd ap Llywelyn and Owain Gwynedd, and in each case their articles are the most appropriate place to cover this. The use of the title could also be covered at Prince of Wales. A.D.Hope (talk) 14:33, 30 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete - I've never heard or read of Wales ever being a kingdom. GoodDay (talk) 15:16, 30 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

* Delete per Sirfurboy and others. Separately, I support De Causa's (and, I think, Elemimele's) idea of a page on mediaeval Welsh titles, in which the information currently presented here might, subject to consensus, be very briefly mentioned. Richard Keatinge (talk) 08:02, 1 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I still find no encyclopedic use for a page that retrojects later concepts and claims onto un-systematized historical usage. Such an approach is suitable only for fringe websites and the like. Richard Keatinge (talk) 14:48, 3 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

  • Keep as it is easier to have a page to explain the concept, while simply stating that only Gruffydd ap Llywelyn had the title symbolically from modern historians like Davies. When a page refer to other titles, it becomes very confusing and we the reader don't even bother to click on it, as it more work for our brain. From the start, the page states that there was no kingdom and no political unity and was used only on a handful of occasions. Why not simply including in the current page the titles of King of the Welsh, Head of all Wales, etc and explain how these titles were used by Welsh rulers and explain why they were different, and maybe explain also why Wales had only princes.Academia45 (talk) 13:21, 2 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Not an encyclopedic topic in its own right, so redirect to Titles in medieval Wales. Llwyld (talk) 06:23, 4 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Redirect, I think that keep is in favour, but like is being spoken about, King of Wales is not an encyclopedia topic because Wales was never officially a Kingdom. And that the titles range greatly between acknowledged Rex titular owners and Gruffudd ap Llywelyn who soley conquered Wales by warfare. Therefore, I believe the concept of creating a redirect and simply creating sub paragraphs, e.g. Rex Wallie (Brenin) King of Wales etc. would be a better idea with a sort of king list showing the title holders that @Titus Gold: produced in Talk:King of Wales. Are we on board to simply move the text from one article to another, and create a redirect. Again, to reiterate, I'm thinking King of Wales simple article is not enough bulk and could be better explained with references to other titles. Cltjames (talk) 18:25, 4 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Redirect to Titles in medieval Wales per above. DankJae 23:31, 4 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    edit: article since been deleted, Keep per above instead. DankJae 16:05, 10 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Article has been draftified, now more appropriately at Draft:Titles in medieval Wales. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Richard Keatinge (talk • contribs) 19:19, 10 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
you can't redirect to a draft, and no guarantee that the article would leave draft, so keep over a soft deletion. A merger could be discussed at a later time. DankJae 21:37, 10 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Right now, I'm seeing a big divide and no consensus. We have Delete, Keep, Move and Redirect advocates all in about the same numbers and so far, the discussion has focused on the position of Wales as an entity, not rooted in any poicy guideiines.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz Read! Talk! 07:00, 7 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

  • Redirect to Titles in medieval Wales, per above. The current title is imprecise and unencyclopedic, and the topic itself + any disambiguation required can be covered in the redirect target page, which gives context to the title itself. sawyer / talk 07:19, 7 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Liz - I am not sure that the equal numbers is quite right. I (delete) and Academia45 (keep) both stated we were content with a redirect to Titles in medieval Wales - a target that emerged during the discussion. Isn't there an emerging consensus for that? (6 !votes if you count me and Academia45) [edit conflict, now 7]. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 07:13, 7 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Well, to be honest, when I review these AFDs, I don't do a head count. I read all of the comments, the comments to the comments, the relevant policy pages, etc. and offer my impression of the totality of the discussion. Most admins don't include any remarks when they relist a discussion (and often don't say anything when they close the discussion, either) but I like to give a brief statement on where I think the discussion stands. But it's not uncommon for discussions to be closed before a relisting period ends, in fact, looking over relisted discussions is how I happened to see your comment. I haven't had any objections (so far) to my relisting comments but if they are seen as unhelpful, I might just let them be and not insert my point-of-view on the state of the debate. Liz Read! Talk! 04:04, 9 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, I was not suggesting the relisting comments are unhelpful. Indeed, when you ask editors to focus on, e.g., the appropriate redirect target, or you focus on where the lack of consensus lies (e.g. between deletion or merge) the comments are very helpful. You asked for editors familiar with GEOLAND to comment once which was also very helpful. I was merely pointing out that in this comment, you say about the same numbers. Thus my comment. In any case the relist has precipitated A.D.Hope's comments, which are useful to the discussion, inasmuch as regardless of outcome, they indicate how discussion should proceed on Titles in medieval Wales. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 07:36, 9 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
If all these titles aren't notable enough, then a fortiori just one of them can't be. Would you agree to make the redirect from this article, pending possible consensus on further redirection to the articles that you mention? Richard Keatinge (talk) 22:55, 7 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I wouldn't agree; consensus should be gained before the redirect is created. I also disagree on notability, as one title being notable doesn't mean another is. 'Prince of Wales' is notable enough for an article, for example, but 'prince of Gwynedd' is covered by Kingdom of Gwynedd. A.D.Hope (talk) 23:40, 7 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
As well as prince of Wales as an article, there is clearly a notable topic on the Welsh princes. E.g. (Turvey, 2002) (quoted above). Note that this is a different, wider topic, looking at the princes of the various kingdoms. However the term prince developed from earlier usages of Brenin, Rhi, Rex. Hywel Dda was a king of Deheubarth, and also an important part of the story owing to the codifying of law. Davies (1994), for instance, covers that and is by no means alone in doing so. A reading of Turvey, or Davies (2001) (that is RR Davies, not J Davies) would, for instance, demonstrate that an article on a development of titles in medieval Wales is notable and distinct from a prince of Wales article (which is properly about that specific title). One could argue over the naming (always!) but I believe such an article is clearly notable based on not just these sources, but many more. Indeed, One thing that we should do is seek to restrict it so that we don't shoehorn in the likes of (Carr, 2017). But this also demonstrates that the study of the development of titles is an academic one and notable.
You also suggest the history of Wales articles as potential targets. Those articles are on my todo list (in the "one day" category) because they are a mess owing to the indiscriminate copy/paste of material from one to another so they are highly duplicated. The idea of them is that they drill down in detail so that the various middle ages articles pick out detail from the more general history of Wales article. At the moment they don't. They are, as I say, full of copy/pastes. Assuming they were fixed, they would be a poor target for this material. The individual articles would be too focussed on their target periods, so the discussion would need to be in the general History of Wales. But what is envisaged here is too detailed for the general history, so this new article would sit in the hierarchy as detail pointed to by the parent history article. Indeed, as topical history, it would sit better than divvying up the history along (sometimes arbitrary) dates.
The one thing that does not fit anywhere in that hierarchy, of course, is a "king of Wales" article - for all the reasons above. That would be ahistorical.
  • Carr A.D. (2017) The Gentry of North Wales in the Later Middle Ages. Cardiff: University of Wales.
  • Davies, J. (1994) A History of Wales. London: Penguin.
  • Davies, R.R. (2001) Age of Conquest Wales 1063-1415. Oxford:OUP.
  • Turvey, R. (2002) The Welsh Princes: The Native Rulers of Wales 1063-1283 Routledge.
Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 08:16, 8 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
For now I'm going to stand by my original suggestion of merging the relevant parts of this article with Gruffudd ap Llywelyn and Owain Gwynedd and deleting the remainder. It solves the immediate issue of this article's topic not being encyclopaedic. I'm not convinced that Turvey, Davies, and Davies prove the notability of medieval Welsh titles as a distinct topic; having had a look through each they mention titles as part of wider discussions of Welsh leadership, and it would be sensible for us to adopt the same approach.
There's clearly a wider issue with the group of articles on Welsh history being badly organised, as you note, but it's beyond the scope of this deletion discussion to address. My preference would be to perform the merger/deletion here and then open a new discussion at WP:WALES about the general structure and content of the Welsh history articles. That would also be a better place to discuss a potential 'medieval Welsh leadership (and titles)' article. A.D.Hope (talk) 12:15, 8 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Good points here, thanks. I have followed A.D.Hope's suggestion and merged the relevant bits of this article into Gruffudd ap Llywelyn and Owain Gwynedd, and I would support redirecting this article to Gruffudd ap Llywelyn. For further discussion elsewhere I suggest improvements to Titles in medieval Wales per Sirfurboy above, and I also support reorganization of the articles on Welsh history per A.D.Hope. Richard Keatinge (talk) 12:30, 9 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry for not responding sooner, Richard. I appreciate the work you've put in to take action on the suggestions here and see how they work in practice, as that's often the hardest part! Given 'Titles in medieval Wales' is now a draft I would suggest opening any discussions at WP:WALES or similar, just because it's a more visible space. All the best A.D.Hope (talk) 16:47, 13 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Redirect or delete, whichever expunges this from the project most easierly. It is an ahistorical concept; it was almost never used, and was never considered representative of Wales the political entity. I'm sure either Geraldus or the 1533 Act would have jumped on it had it ever been anything close to recognisable. ——Serial 14:08, 9 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    "King of Wales", "King of the Waleses", "King of the Welsh"—all titles you can find in Latin in contemporary sources. What is ahistorical about it? I think a lot of modern readers are reading a "concept" into it that just isn't there. Srnec (talk) 21:53, 10 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Remove somehow - The Latin rex is occasionally used for Welsh princes, but I do not think that justifies having this article. My preference would be redirecting or merging to an article on the medieval princes of Wales, since the title normally used in English is prince. Peterkingiron (talk) 17:53, 9 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
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