Talk:County Palatine of Durham

Palatine Courts

For a description of the Palatine Courts, see:

http://www.dur.ac.uk/library/asc/collection_information/cldload/?collno=112

Recent changes

@User:A.D.Hope:I must protest at this. Your version is much worse, and you are edit warring to reinstate large quantities factually inaccurate and unreferenced material. James500 (talk) 00:10, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

Not to be harsh, but the article as it stood before my edits was not well-presented. The language was quite antiquated and gave the impression of being copied verbatim from its sources, the layout didn't make much sense and there were three top-level headings for single paragraphs, and the lead didn't give an adequate overview of the subject. I think that any reasonable, uninvolved editor would agree that my edits to these aspects of the article are an improvement.

Unfortunately, because you rely so heavily on references which I cannot easily access I have had to rely on your text and citations when editing. To my knowledge I haven't changed the facts as you presented them, and I've been careful to keep references attached to text I've reworded. However, as I'm not working from the sources I'm not surprised that I've made a few mistakes. Since you do have access to the sources I'd be grateful if you could check my edits. A.D.Hope (talk) 00:20, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

No, you inserted completely new claims that were unreferenced and/or inaccurate. The article did not claim that the palatinate was the liberty; it did not claim the palatinate was created it 1293 (Holdsworth says before 1229); it not claim the palatinate ceased in 1836 (it technically continued until 1972); it did not claim the exchequer is the only surviving medieval administrative building (and that is just in the first paragraph of the article); it did not claim that "four Acts of Parliament . . . effectively abolished the county palatine as a separate jurisduction"; and so on and so on.

You have added citation needed tags to material that is already referenced and cited to Britannica.

Your presentation is incomprehensible. What has the tax exemption got to do with "Early History"? IIRC, it lasted till the 17th century. Why have you removed the finance section altogether? If you want an article about the government, you should be splitting the article into sections for the branches of that government, not vague ambiguous nebulous meaningless headings such as "Early History".

The language of the article was accurate, and gave the impression of being written by someone who has the competence necessary to write an article that does not include inaccurate or unverifiable claims.

Then there is the POV. You complained there was too much reliance on Lapsley (before I had a chance to add other historians), and then contradicted yourself by systematically removing views opposing Lapsley (eg Round, Scammell, Barlow, Offler). (Caveat: I am under the impression that certain of Lapsley's views are still the most widely accepted).

Then there are the indiscriminate removals. Eg why have you removed the microcosm theory? It appears important to the historiography. I should point out that certain removals appear to violate WP:PRESERVE.

There is no way I can be reasonably expected to check two edits making more than 11kB of changes that look mostly very unsatisfactory. WP:V and WP:NOR are mandatory on Wikipedia. Fancy presentation is not. To correct the errors etc in this article, I would have to revert to my last version and improve the presentation of that version myself. James500 (talk) 01:12, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

My aim with the layout was to present the history and administration of the palatinate roughly chronologically. Based on what was written it seemed logical to have three main sections — how the palatinate was formed, how its administration was set up and worked in its early days, and its late administration and eventual dissolution. The section on St Cuthbert also seems to be warranted, as it's a unique feature of the palatinate. I'm not averse to having separate 'finance', 'court', or 'martial' sections, but I don't think the article is ready for that yet.

As it was the article did imply that the palatinate began in 1293: "The crown still regarded Durham as falling within Northumberland until the late 13th century. Matters came to a head in 1293...' It also conflated the liberty and palatinate:

'The arguments appear to have been accepted, as by the 14th century Durham was accepted as a liberty which received royal mandates direct. In effect it was a private shire, with the bishop appointing his own sheriff. The area eventually became known as the "County Palatine of Durham".'

It also implied that the palatinate ended in 1836: '[the palatinate] continued with much the same power until 5 July 1836, when the Durham (County Palatine) Act 1836 provided that the palatine jurisdiction should in future be vested in the Crown.' The sentence about the Acts of Parliament was an honest mistake and has now been clarified, and the claim about the exchequer is true and now sourced, so no problems there. What I hope this illustrates is that, while the article contained a lot of good information, it was not presented as clearly as you seem to think.

I've placed citation tags where a sentence makes a statement without a citation to back it up. I'm sure the statements are true and in one of the sources, but I have no way of checking which because of the lack of citation. I'm not sure if I've said this before, but this isn't a criticism of your sourcing in general. The 'reference' section is very thorough, you've put a lot of work into it.

The language of the article was very difficult to follow, especially for a reader with no prior understanding of the topic. The 'finance' section in particular was dense and used archaic language, and I'd question using Latin legal terms in the lead when plain English can convey the same concept. Using them in the body, where they can be more fully explained, would be a better option.

The reason I removed the in-text references to authors is that it's generally better to summarise and cite their arguments. Sometimes the level of detail was also higher than necessary, for example explaining Henry II's actions over the Assize of Clarendon; all we really need to note is that Henry acting was a rare example of direct royal intervention in the palatinate, which none of the sources appear to disagree on. I would comment on the microcosm theory, but I'm not sure what you're referring to. If it's important then add it back in, by all means.

As I say, I've done my best to improve the overall standard of the article while preserving your citations. It won't be perfect, but I do think the article is now in a much better state to receive new sections and be expanded upon, whether by yourself or other editors. If you disagree then I really think we should ask for a third party opinion, because I don't want this to drag out. A.D.Hope (talk) 02:04, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

For the avoidance of doubt only (since I am now leaving this talk page and this article):

A roughly chronological order for the whole article makes the article difficult to understand. The material about the tax exemption is not a chronological story about "early history", it is about the tax exemption.

Much of the material on "Ranulf the a tax gatherer" is primarily about the tax exemption, not the role of Cuthbert. Lapsley's comment on the local notion of the Bishop's privilege comes from a discussion of the tax exemption, not a discussion of the role of Cuthbert. Moving it to the section on Cuthbert is taking it out of its original context. Its relevance to the new context could be explained with Thorton (who cites Lapsley on this point), but no such explanation is provided.

The article did not imply that the palatinate began in 1293. The opinion of the crown at any given time is not (necessarily) the law or historical fact. That the matter had to be settled by a court case in Parliament may imply that the crown's opinion was wrong.

The article did not imply the palatine ended in 1836. It implied that the crown became the palatine lord in 1836, or something like that.

You have not summarised the sources, you have on a number of occasions twisted them. For example, Lapsley did not say that the palatinate was not subject to the Saladin tithe because Pudsey pledged to go on crusade. He said something to the effect that we don't know what would have happened if Pudsey had not taken the cross. (The palatinate might have been exempt anyway on grounds of general immunity from royal taxes.) Nor does Lapsley say that the charters relate to a wide range of taxes on p 296. He expresses no opinion about the "width".

Round disagrees about the Assize of Clarendon. You removed Round's book and G V Scammell's comments on it. (Hunard also disagrees about the Assize of Clarendon, though what she says is disputed by G V Scammell and Stenton. And you have removed all reference to that as well, by deleting the relevant footnote.)

The material on the microcosm theory was included in the section referring to a "miniature kingdom".

You have added citation needed tags to paragraphs of the article that are already correctly cited to this. Where all of the material in a entire paragraph comes from single source, it is not necessary to repeat that citation after every single sentence of that paragraph.

You have not preserved my citations. You have, for example, mistakenly removed at least several references to entire pages of Lapsley in favour of references to footnotes of Lapsley on those pages that do not fully support the the text of this article. Similarly you have cited Davis and Whitwell in support of the wrong charters (the two charters of Henry II from Scriptores Tres (xxxiv & xxxv) [1] [2] discussed in Lapsley on p 296), and removed the two precepts about the geld to which Davis and Whitwell actually relates. Likewise footnote 31 to this wikipedia article is about the geld. That is why it was in the tax section of the article. It includes the source "Thornton, Fifteenth Century Durham, p 89, footnote 34". That source has no connection to Cuthbert at all. It should not have been moved to the section on Cuthbert at all.

The article continues to claim that the Acts of 1836 to 1889 "effectively abolished the county palatine as a separate jurisduction". That is not what they did. You have not corrected that mistake.

You have made large numbers of mistakes (too many for me to list) by attempting to rewrite material on a technical subject you do not fully understand, referenced to sources you have not read. James500 (talk) 07:05, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

And the material about tourism is of questionable relevance and makes the article look like a tourist advert.

I can see that, while some mistakes have now been corrected, other unreferenced material has been introduced. What is the source for "an exceptionally wide range of powers" [3]? What exceptional powers did the Bishop of Durham have that the Duke of Lancaster or the Earl of Chester did not? It could be true, but what is the source?

As for "exceptionally wide range of ... independence", do you realise there is a body of literature arguing about how much independence the Bishop really had? Eg some historians point to the fact that the Bishop was appointed by the King.

Unless there is a drastic improvement, I think that WP:TNT still applies. James500 (talk) 02:01, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

Lead sections don't generally need sourcing if the article can back them up, and I believe the article does back up the lead as I've written it — the bishops of Durham did have a wide range of powers compared to other jurisdictions within England. If you think the wording needs tweaking just do it. The sentence about the tourism slogan is neutral and doesn't read like an advert at all.

No, I did not realise that there was a large body of literature arguing about independence. It isn't really mentioned in the article, and you're the one with access to the extensive offline sources. I'm working with what you've written and summarising it for the lead.

WP:TNT is for articles which are useless and beyond repair. Whatever you might think of my edits this article clearly isn't either of those things, and reverting everything I've done would be an overreaction. A.D.Hope (talk) 02:09, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

In its present form I cannot expand this article, or add new sections to this article, or otherwise improve this article. The article is now too incoherent and contains too many errors for me to fix it. If you are not prepared to allow this article to be reverted to a previous version per WP:BRD, any expansion or addition or improvement would have to be done by someone other than me. I do not think this article is important enough to go to WP:3O for, so my inclination is to stop editing the article for the time being on grounds that the article is such a mess now that there is nothing I else can do.

Accordingly, I will now leave this article and talk page.

[What offline sources? Most of the sources are in Google Books and the Internet Archive, and they can be read online for free. Most of those are linked in the article. Even the JSTOR sources (not added by me) are not offline.] James500 (talk) 07:08, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

I don't understand why, having identified sources which need correcting, you've complained about them but done no editing to fix the issue. I'm asking for a third opinion. A.D.Hope (talk) 08:13, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

For the benefit of the editor giving the third opinion: this topic has also been discussed at the merge request on the County Durham talk page, and here is the permanent link to the article as it was immediately before my edits. Thank you for your time. A.D.Hope (talk) 08:21, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

Non-Third Opinion

A Third Opinion has been requested. Will one of the editors please provide a summary question, in no more than 200 words? Robert McClenon (talk) 16:49, 12 June 2023 (UTC)

Hello! The question is simply whether the article is better as it currently is (i.e in the form it's taken since my edit on 7 June), or whether it was better as it was (i.e. at this edit on 4 June).

The gist of the discussion above is that I thought the page needed a major revision as (among other things) the formatting and structure were poor, and James500 thought that my revision was inaccurate and made the page significantly worse. If I understand James500 correctly, this was primarily because of my handling of the sources and because they thought the article as I revised it was 'full of mistakes'. The discussion has really been ongoing since I opened the merge request at County Durham on 26 May.

James500 has since said that they no longer want to edit the page, but if you don't mind doing so it would still be helpful if you could assess the changes. A.D.Hope (talk) 17:01, 12 June 2023 (UTC)

The relisting of this at Third Opinion has been removed (that is, declined) since there is no longer a dispute between editors, the other editor in the dispute having withdrawn. Third Opinion is not a general help venue, it's for dispute resolution. Since you're still a relative newcomer, you can probably get generalized editing help at the Wikipedia Teahouse. — TransporterMan (TALK) 15:00, 20 June 2023 (UTC) (Third Opinion Volunteer)

The third opinion page states that 'if the second editor disagrees with this process, the first editor still has the right to receive a third opinion'. Taking James500's actions as disagreement with the process, I would still like that opinion as the quality of my edits has been disputed and is still in question as no agreement was reached.

As a side note, I'm not a newcomer as I've been editing on-and-off since 2017, and I don't think the treehouse would be the most appropriate place the raise this. A.D.Hope (talk) 15:11, 20 June 2023 (UTC)

That's for the situation in which two editors are still involved in the dispute, but one does not wish to participate in the 3O process. In this case, only one editor is still involved in the dispute. And though you have, indeed, been around for awhile, you only have 1,800 edits. — TransporterMan (TALK) 18:42, 21 June 2023 (UTC)

No problem, I understand what you mean. I've persisted because James500 felt that they had to leave the article because of my edits, which saddens me. I hoped that the 3O process, besides assessing the changes, might help us reconcile, but I appreciate that's not really what it's for. I'm sorry that I've been pushy and arrogant as a result.

Interestingly, 1,800 edits apparently puts an editor in the top 0.01% of users. I'm certainly not claiming any mandate from that, but it's a fun statistic, isn't it? A.D.Hope (talk) 21:02, 21 June 2023 (UTC)