Talk:Scotland: Difference between revisions

Content deleted Content added

Inline

Revision as of 21:01, 16 October 2015

Discussions on this page often lead to previous arguments being restated. Please read recent comments, look in the archives, and review the FAQ before commenting.

This article is written in Scottish English, which has its own spelling conventions (colour, realise, travelled) and some terms that are used in it may be different or absent from other varieties of English. According to the relevant style guide, this should not be changed without broad consensus.

view · edit

Frequently asked questions

Introduction

Issues relating to the geography and politics of the United Kingdom and nearby territories can be surprisingly complex and controversial, and the subjects raised in this FAQ regarding the Scotland article are best understood in this context. We aim to be enyclopaedic and neutral. We also recognise that reconciling diverse views can be hard work as common phrases are sometimes interpreted in different ways in different cultures. We ask that editors new to this page read the following with an open mind. Where necessary, please research the facts rather than simply jumping to conclusions based on what you "know to be true".

Lead section

Q1: Is Scotland a "country"?

A1: Numerous reliable sources support the view that Scotland is a country—see for example the article entitled Countries of the United Kingdom, and a table of references at Talk:Countries of the United Kingdom/refs. This view is shared with other reputable encyclopedias. There has been a long-standing consensus to describe Scotland in this way.

This is one of the most frequent questions raised by visitors to this talk page. However, in the absence of a formal British constitution, and owing to a convoluted history of the formation of the United Kingdom, a variety of terms exist which are used to refer to Scotland,^[1] England, Northern Ireland, Wales and the UK itself. Reliable and official sources support use of the word "countries", and this term has broadly won preference amongst the editing community. Note however, that a country is not the same as a "sovereign state", and that "constituent country" is also used in other parts of Wikipedia. The community endeavours to achieve an atmosphere of neutrality, compromise, and camaraderie on this issue.

Q2: Why don't we refer to Scotland as a "nation"?

A2: Widespread confusion surrounds the use of the word "nation". In standard British English, and in academic language, a nation is defined as a social group and not a division of land. This is also the approach taken in the article entitled nation, across Wikipedia and in other major encyclopedias (for example, the Scottish people and the Québécois are described as "nations"). The term Home Nations is generally used only in sporting contexts. It is not used in major reputable sources outside of sport.

Infobox-related issues

Q3: Why are two flags used?

A3: There have been extremely complex discussion about these matters. The Royal Standard of Scotland (commonly referred to as the "Lion Rampant") was used by the King of Scots until 1603. Today, its correct use is restricted to official representatives of The Monarch.^[2] The blue and white Saltire is the flag of Scotland and is widely used by national and local government offices and in numerous other less official capacities. As with other issues described here this outcome is to some extent a compromise solution that seems to suit all parties in that it identifies symbols of Scotland as an entity in its own right, whilst also emphasising the importance of the relationship with the United Kingdom.

Q4: Isn't Flower of Scotland the national anthem?

A4: There is no official Scottish national anthem. Although there is no doubt that Flower of Scotland is currently amongst the most popular unofficial national anthems in Scotland, it is not the only one, nor even the longest established.

Q5: What is the reference to the "Scots language" about?

A5: Scots is spoken by 30% of the Scottish population (approximately 1.5 million individuals) according to the 1996 estimate of the General Register Office for Scotland.^[3] It is recognised by the European Union's European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages.^[4] By contrast, Scottish English is a variation of standard British English. Whilst the distinction is by no means clear cut, Wikipedia policy permits the use of Scottish English words and phrases where appropriate. Scots, on the other hand, has its own site: see the Scots Wikipedia.

Q6: Wasn't Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom the first Queen Elizabeth to reign over Scotland?

A6: Yes, but "Elizabeth II" is her legal title, as resolved in Scots law in the legal action entitled MacCormick v. Lord Advocate.

Related issues

Q7: What is the difference between "Great Britain" and the "United Kingdom"?

A7: See the article entitled "Terminology of the British Isles". Great Britain is the name of the largest island that the UK encompasses, and is not generally used in source material as the name of the sovereign state.

Q8: Isn't Northern Ireland a province, and Wales a principality?

A8: This view is supported by some sources, but the current consensus amongst the editing community is aligned to a greater body of work which describes both Northern Ireland and Wales as countries. However, the terms are not all mutually exclusive: a country can also be a principality or a province, and these terms are mentioned throughout Wikipedia as alternative names in afternotes.

References

^ Scottish Parliament. "Your Scotland questions; Is Scotland a country?". Scottish Parliament. Retrieved 2008-08-01. As the UK has no written constitution in the usual sense, constitutional terminology is fraught with difficulties of interpretation and it is common usage nowadays to describe the four constituent parts of the UK (Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland) as 'countries'.
^ The "Lion Rampant" Flag The Court of the Lord Lyon. Retrieved on 10 October 2008.
^ "Scotland's Languages" University of Glasgow. Retrieved 7 December 2008. The proportion is said to rise to 90% in the North East.
^ Both Scots and Scottish Gaelic are officially recognised as autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. See "European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages" Scottish Government. Retrieved 27 September 2007.

Template:Outline of knowledge coverage

Scotland has been listed as one of the Geography and places good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.

Article milestones
Date	Process	Result
April 14, 2006	Good article nominee	Listed
August 12, 2006	Peer review	Reviewed
December 29, 2006	Good article reassessment	Kept
May 12, 2007	Featured article candidate	Not promoted
October 2, 2007	Good article reassessment	Kept
January 25, 2008	Peer review	Reviewed
January 13, 2009	Good article reassessment	Kept
Current status: Good article

Template:Vital article

Countries GA‑class

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Countries, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of countries on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.CountriesWikipedia:WikiProject CountriesTemplate:WikiProject Countriescountry articles

GA

This article has been rated as GA-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.

WikiProject Countries to-do list:

Here are some tasks awaiting attention:

Article requests : Check out the article alerts; see if anything catches your fancy.
Cleanup : clean-up listing for Countries
Stubs : de-stub articles in Category:Stubs by region.
Other : add {{WPCountries}} to talk pages of related articles, and assess.

Scotland GA‑class Top‑importance

	Scotland portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Scotland, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Scotland and Scotland-related topics on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.ScotlandWikipedia:WikiProject ScotlandTemplate:WikiProject ScotlandScotland articles
GA	This article has been rated as GA-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.
Top	This article has been rated as Top-importance on the project's importance scale.

UK geography GA‑class Top‑importance

	United Kingdom portal This article falls within the scope of WikiProject UK geography, a user-group dedicated to building a comprehensive and quality guide to places in the United Kingdom on Wikipedia. If you wish to participate, share ideas or merely get tips you can join us at the project page where there are resources, to do lists and guidelines on how to write about settlements.UK geographyWikipedia:WikiProject UK geographyTemplate:WikiProject UK geographyUK geography articles
GA	This article has been rated as GA-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.
Top	This article has been rated as Top-importance on the project's importance scale.

Celts GA‑class

	Scotland is within the scope of WikiProject Celts, a collaborative effort to improve Wikipedia's coverage of the ancient Celts and the modern day Celtic nations. If you would like to participate, you can edit this article or you can visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks or take part in the discussion. Please Join, Create, and Assess.CeltsWikipedia:WikiProject CeltsTemplate:WikiProject CeltsCelts articles
GA	This article has been rated as GA-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.
???	This article has not yet received a rating on the project's importance scale.

Template:WP1.0

	Scotland notice board
	Regional Notice Boards

Archives

Index

Archive 1	Archive 2	Archive 3
Archive 4	Archive 5	Archive 6
Archive 7	Archive 8	Archive 9
Archive 10	Archive 11	Archive 12
Archive 13	Archive 14	Archive 15
Archive 16	Archive 17	Archive 18
Archive 19	Archive 20	Archive 21
Archive 22	Archive 23	Archive 24
Archive 25	Archive 26	Archive 27
Archive 28	Archive 29	Archive 30
Archive 31	Archive 32

This page has archives. Sections older than 90 days may be automatically archived by when more than 5 sections are present.

References

Population

Sorry I tried to update the population figure but I mucked it up. Here's the new figure and the reference. 5,295,000 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-20754750

Country Status

I don't think Scottland should be refered to as a "Country". This would be like calling a individual state in the USA a country.

Footnotes

Head of State

Instead of edit warring, it would be better if the competing views are discussed here. DeCausa (talk) 21:52, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The statement that is being footnoted says that Scotland's mode of governance is a "devolved government within a constitutional monarchy". I think it would make sense to briefly state in its footnote what relationship the monarch bears to Scotland and who it currently is. Jmorrison230582 (talk) 21:57, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Seems reasonable. I suspect the difficulty is with the phrase "Scotland's head of state is..." which is a little misleading. DeCausa (talk) 22:01, 2 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

It already states who the monarch of the United Kingdom is adjacent to the "Monarch" field. Scotland is not a state so obviously cannot have a head of state.

The monarch of the United Kingdom and Scotland do not have a notable relationship and the monarch plays no role in local government in Scotland. This is because the UK is a unitary state, meaning sovereign powers have only been delegated to the UK Parliament which therefore possesses legislative supremacy.

Also, keep in mind the MOS regarding the purpose of an infobox: "to summarize key facts that appear in the article" and "The less information it contains, the more effectively it serves that purpose".

Rob984 (talk) 15:41, 3 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

"The monarch of the UK and Scotland do not have a notable relationship". I'm sorry, but that statement shows that you haven't got a clue what you are talking about. Jmorrison230582 (talk) 16:49, 3 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Er, Rob984, under section 45 of the Scotland Act the First Minister of Scotland is one of the handful of direct appointments by the monarch of a significant political office in the UK. Anyway, I don't see how anyone could object to this edit. Hopefully, that's an end to this. DeCausa (talk) 23:55, 3 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Latin Translation

I have changed the translations in the Etymology section as Scotia dose not translate to (land of the gaels). I suggest the editors go onto something as easy as Google translator, or read a book on Scottish/Roman history. Also the symbol of Scotland is in fact The Lion, our animal of choice is the unicorn, we defend this and the unattainable beast. We base this in our history on the fact the Roman empire could not conquered Scotland including England.

I find it highly offensive that members on Wikipedia who are not Scottish are editing Scottish history. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Angelo542 (talk • contribs)

Then you will have to live with the 'offence' there are no restrictions on who can edit. I put a full guide on how to edit wikipedia on your talk page which I suggest you read. In the mean time I have reverting those changes back to referenced material. ----Snowded ^TALK 11:24, 23 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I notice you have changed The Etymology again. (Scoti is the Latin name for the Gaels)???

This is incorrect information. Scoti translates to (Scots). The Roman's named different Gaelic tribes across Europe by different names, they did not name (the gaels) as a whole the Scoti!. Scoti was a name given to the Gaelic tribe that resided in lands the Romans named Scotia or (Hibernia).

Hibernia is Latin for Ireland and translates to Ireland.

Incorrect information will be removed from Wikipedia, so says Wikipedia. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Angelo542 (talk • contribs)

If it is that "easy", presumably you will be able to provide a reference. Please note that another Wikipedia article does not count (WP:CIRCULAR). Jmorrison230582 (talk) 13:57, 23 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

OK so, The Romans spoke Latin, in Latin (Scoti) translates to (Scots), (Scotia) translates to (Scotland). Where exactly dose Wikipedia find translations where Scoti translates to (The Gaels) n The land of the gaels?. Gael in Latin is the same in English.

In Italian history you find Romans named the Gaelic tribes across Europe with different names. They claim to have names Scotia after an Egyptian Princess that was a celebrity amongst the Romans, this you can find in any library across Britannia.

Now modern Irish simply do not like the fact they are descendants of Scots, not (The Scottish). There is many books written by Irish People who have claimed Scots came from Irish when in fact it was the other way around. However facts are facts and false or misleading information should not be tolerated on Wikipedia.

This is incorrect >

"Scotland" comes from Scoti, the Latin name for the Gaels. The Late Latin word Scotia ("land of the Gaels") was initially used to refer to Ireland.[29] By the 11th century at the latest, Scotia was being used to refer to (Gaelic-speaking) Scotland north of the river Forth, alongside Albania or Albany, both derived from the Gaelic Alba.[30] The use of the words Scots and Scotland to encompass all of what is now Scotland became common in the Late Middle Ages.[18]

Here is the correct version >

"Scotland" comes from Scoti, the Latin name given by the Romans to name Gaelic tribe living in the land they named SCOTIA.. Land of the Scots. The Late Latin word Scotia ("land of the Scots") was initially used to refer to middle age Ireland, also known in latin as (Hibernia).[29] By the 11th century at the latest, Scotia was being used to refer to (Gaelic-speaking) Scotland north of the river Forth, alongside Albania or Albany, both derived from the Gaelic Alba.[30] The use of the words Scots and Scotland to encompass all of what is now Scotland became common in the Late Middle Ages.[18]

Scotia, land of the Scots was renamed Hibernia land of the Irish.

What I do not understand is why the admin wants to allow false and misleading information, AND WHY DOSE THE ADMIN CONTINUE TO REVERT CHANGES TO FALSE INFORMATION?. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Angelo542 (talk • contribs)

The people who inhabited what is now Ireland in the early Medieval period were Gaels. Gaels lived in what is now Ireland, Picts in northern Scotland, Britons in southern Scotland, Northern and Western England and Wales, and various Celtic groups including Britons in the south east. The Gaels, so the conventional history goes, spread into Argyll around the 5th century, founding the kingdom of Dál Riata. Prior to this, "Ireland" was the land of the Gaels. This is not controversial.

As far as what Ireland was called in that period... it's a little more complicated than you suggest:

Author	Year	Name
Rufus Festus Avienus	370	Sacram Insulam Gens. Hibernorum Colit
Claudius Claudianus	400	Ierne / Iernen
Stephanus Byzantinus	490	Ierun
Orosius	5th C	Hibernia
St Patrick	5th C	Hiberione/Hiberionem/Hiberia
Priscianus Periegeta	6th C	Iberus
Pope Gregory I	6th C	Hiberniam
Cogitosus	6th C	Scotia
Isidorus Hispalensis	600	Scotia / Hibernia
Anon	7th C	Hibernia Insula Scotorum
Bede	7th C	Hibernia / Scotia
Jonas	7th C	Hibernia / Scotia
Adamnan	7th C	Scotiam
Laurentius	7th C	Scotiam
Coelfrid	8th C	Scotiam
Nennius	9th C	Hyberniam / Hibernia / Iberniam
Raban Maur	9th C	Scotia / Hibernia
Alfred the Great	9th C	Scotland
Egilward	9th C	Scotia / Hibernia

The Scoti was what these authors called people who lived in Scotia, which was Ireland. They were Gaels. It did not refer to a particular kingdom or tribe (there were several). It referred to all Gaels.

Hope that helps. Catfish Jim and the soapdish 16:18, 24 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 12 external links on Scotland. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add {{cbignore}} after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add {{nobots|deny=InternetArchiveBot}} to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers. —^{cyberbot II}_{Talk to my owner:Online} 13:57, 27 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

[IsScotland?-1] Scottish Parliament. "Your Scotland questions; Is Scotland a country?". Scottish Parliament. Retrieved 2008-08-01. As the UK has no written constitution in the usual sense, constitutional terminology is fraught with difficulties of interpretation and it is common usage nowadays to describe the four constituent parts of the UK (Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland) as 'countries'.

[2] The "Lion Rampant" Flag The Court of the Lord Lyon. Retrieved on 10 October 2008.

[3] "Scotland's Languages" University of Glasgow. Retrieved 7 December 2008. The proportion is said to rise to 90% in the North East.

[4] Both Scots and Scottish Gaelic are officially recognised as autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. See "European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages" Scottish Government. Retrieved 27 September 2007.

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

@@ Line 74: / Line 74: @@
 Sorry I tried to update the population figure but I mucked it up. Here's the new figure and the reference. 5,295,000 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-20754750
+== Country Status ==
+I don't think Scottland should be refered to as a "Country". This would be like calling a individual state in the USA a country.
 ==Footnotes==