Talk:Roman consul

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Duplication

Why are there two duplicate articles - Roman Consul and Consul - they should be merged! Mgoodyear (talk) 01:32, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. Weird it has not been merged by now. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:EmilePersaud 03:37, 9 July 2022 (UTC)

The word "consul" is used very differently now. Roman consuls are magistrates with substantial military and political duties. The word "consul" used today would refer to "an official appointed by a state to live in a foreign city and protect the state's citizens and interests there". "consul", Oxford Dictionary of English. These are not the same. Ifly6 (talk) 20:53, 9 July 2022 (UTC)

Tarquinius Superbus

To say that the expuslion of Tarquinius Superbus is "mythical" is, I think, I a bit much. The expulsion of the Tarquinian king may or may not be a legendary account, but it hasn't definately been proven to be mythical. I suggest "semi-legendary" as a suitable comprimise. Corbmobile 11:58, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Voting

Who would elect / vote for the consuls? In the pre-Empire era / late-Republic era, would they be elected by the Senate or by patricians / plebians directly?

--88.96.187.237 21:09, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Consulship as a Monarchic Element ?

David Shotter in his The Fall of the Roman Republic (Routledge, 2nd Ed.) says that "In the republic's 'mixed constitution' the monarchic element was represented by the magistracy (principally the consulship) [...]" (see pp. 6-7). How does one reconcile this statement with a yearly election of Consuls and the limited number of Consul reappointments ?

128.141.29.227 13:29, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Abolishment

This work [1] says the title was not abolished in 541. The successors of Justinian still declared themselves consuls January 1 each year and it was emperor Leo VI the Wise who banned the title. For example here [2] you can see a consular issue of a Tiberius II coin of 579 where he is depicted in a consular uniform.--Dojarca 12:52, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

I will change the table according this: [3]. Beginning with Justinian's successor, Justin II., each emperor took the office of consul on 1 January of the year following the year of accession. The years were then counted as "post-consular" years.--Dojarca 09:52, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Somewhat inconsistent

In fact the Byzantine equivalent to consul, hypatos was used long through Byzantine history and was always popular. It never fall out of use and never was unified with the emperor's office. Just the opposite, it was given to such a number of people that its prestige deraded. There were numerous hypatos'es at any ginen time in Byzantium. Several Italian duces also received the title from the Byzantine emperor. It seems that the title never was abolished.--Dojarca (talk) 19:05, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Edits by Hiberniantears

Hiberniantears restored unsourced (for more than year!) sentence As a result, after the formal end of the Roman Empire in the West, many years would be named for only a single consul. This is not only unsourced, but also wrong: there was no formal end of the western Roman empire, after the commonly accepted date for the end of it, many times still were appointed two consuls, not only one. Constans II also was not the last to become consul and it is not evident that appointment of Charles Martell a consul would promote to a conflict with the emperor.--Dojarca (talk) 17:06, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

This is certainly a gray area, but there was in fact a de facto end of Roman Imperial authority in the west, even though the de jure end could be more open to debate. The article, in the version I reverted to, simply reflects the facts on the ground. Hiberniantears (talk) 17:26, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Under Theodoric and other ostrogothic rulers consuls were elected as usual. This is irrelevant to their dependance to the East. Boethius, Cassiodorus were consuls at that time. Theodoric choose both consuls of 915 - for East (Constantnople) and for the West (Rome). After Ostrogothgic upspring was over there were also consuls such as Belisarius, also in the West, under full imperial control.--Dojarca (talk) 17:45, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

These [4][5] sources say all emperors after Justinian bacame consuls until Leo VI, so Constans II was not the last consul.--Dojarca (talk) 17:53, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Please back your edits with sources.--Dojarca (talk) 17:53, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Dojarca/Certh sockpuppet

From our discussion about these edits on Dojarca's talk page:

What is more, from your edits, as well as a gap in editing during October and November, it is pretty clear to me that you're a sockpuppet of User:Certh, or Certh was a puppet of you. Stick with making the stronger edits you make which are not related to this tendentious consul hangup of your's. Just a little background: Dojarca departs from Wikipedia on October 16 after Certh opens a mediation cabal case to discuss/complain about my changing of the same content about which you are complaining to me today. In my first edit to that page, also on October 16, I note the similarity between Certh and Dojarca. Certh then gets himself blocked on November 4th, and Dojarca returns later that day. Hiberniantears (talk) 17:45, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Hopefully this lends some background to anyone happening upon this discussion. Hiberniantears (talk) 18:00, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Your accusations show you probably have weak position in the article's dispute.--Dojarca (talk) 18:02, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

My accusations show that you are about to get blocked. Hiberniantears (talk) 18:06, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

I am asking for third opinion as it seems you do not provide any sources in support of your version. I will not revert-war over this issue. I believe you after carefull analysis will find you're not right here. --Dojarca (talk) 18:11, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

It already has. Ad nauseum. Hiberniantears (talk) 18:12, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

There are several issues in this article. Can you comment on them separately below so we could know where we disagree and where we don't.--Dojarca (talk) 18:16, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Already have. With you. Hiberniantears (talk) 18:18, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

That dispute was about quite different questions. I see nothing that can be helpful here. If you do please point exact statements.--Dojarca (talk) 18:21, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Third opinion

Having looked into the matter, I see that the disputed content is indeed unsourced. Per Wikipedia:Verifiability, The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material. Uncited material is tolerable only when it is uncontroversial - to restore original research that has been removed for lack of citations is unacceptable. The disputed line had been marked as needing a reference since February 2007. There is no excuse for including it. Furthermore, when the factual accuracy of an article is clearly in dispute, it is extremely poor form to revert a user adding a {{disputed}} tag and label their doing so as vandalism. Dojarca (talk · contribs) may or may not be a sock, but until they are proven to be one, they ought to be treated with the respect all editors deserve, and switching the goalposts in a content dispute to focus on sockpuppetry is a cheap move. Frankly, administrator's are expected to conduct themselves better than this. Sincerely, the skomorokh 18:26, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm not moving the goalposts. That Dojarca is a sock adding a very tendentious reevaluation of commonly accepted history is my starting off point. I originally entered this content dispute as an administrator rolling back the edits as vandalism this past summer. Removing accurate but unsourced material, and replacing it with sourced, but wildly out of context alternate material is not constructive editing. Hiberniantears (talk) 18:31, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Can you provide your sources that it is commonly accepted that there was no consul in the West after 476/480? Can you provade sources that it is commonly accepted that Constans II was the last consul? Can you provide sources that appointment of Martell could lead to a conflict with the emperor? Is it commonly accepted?--Dojarca (talk) 18:35, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

The west did not exist after that point. End of story. Anyone using the term in the west thereafter is not a Roman in the historically contextual sense that we discuss it in an encyclopedia. We have discussed this, and a number of editors have weighed in with differing alternative solutions. History includes Roman and Byzantine periods for numerous reasons, some of which are admittedly arbitrary, but we as editors are not entitled to rewrite our preferred view of history here. Hiberniantears (talk) 18:41, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Can you please also comment on Constans II being allegedly the last consul and the issue about Martell?--Dojarca (talk) 18:45, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

"[A]ccurate but unsourced material"..."The west did not exist after that point. End of story". Are you serious? You know how Wikipedia works, Hiberniantears. If something is so obviously accurate, find a source for it - full stop. the skomorokh 18:50, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

The Western Roman Empire ceased to exist with a de facto and de jure date range between 476-480: Fall of Rome. Does Wikipedia work differently? W're just making things up now? Hiberniantears (talk) 18:58, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

This is an encyclopaedia, not a collection of "things that are obvious to Hiberniantears". WP:V is a policy which applies to all claims in articles. If you cannot back up what you say with reliable sources, it doesn't go in the article. I don't know how this can be made any clearer. the skomorokh 19:02, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

What's with the hostility from you? You're arguing with me for towing the Roman/Byzantine delineation. That's not just obvious to me. It is obvious to the historical record and modern scholarship. That the Byzantines are also part of the Roman legacy is not the point of this dispute. The Western Roman Empire ended. Full stop. Sources? Here:

• Alexander Demandt (1984). Der Fall Roms: Die Auflösung des römischen Reiches im Urteil der Nachwelt. ISBN 3-406-09598-4
• Edward Gibbon. "General Observations on the Fall of the Roman Empire in the West", from the Internet Medieval Sourcebook. Brief excerpts of Gibbon's theories.
• William Carroll Bark (1958). Origins of the Medieval World. ISBN 0-8047-0514-3

Sources, served right. I'm not arguing that this article isn't broken. It clearly needs some work. However, creating a fantasy article on something that is well known, but ill sourced, is an example of taking wiki-lawyering a bit too far. Hiberniantears (talk) 19:14, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

End of the Western Roman empire did not mean end of niether senate, nor consulship. Or you would have to change information in many articles such as Boethius, Cassiodorus, Belisarius and others.--Dojarca (talk) 19:09, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Catholic Encyclopedia [6] says Cassiodorus was consul in 514 and Eutharic - in 519.--Dojarca (talk) 19:12, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

In which case, you should be discussing them under Consul, an article that allows you to put the civic context in the historical narrative that includes the title as it is discussed in this article. We have discussed this. Hiberniantears (talk) 19:17, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

So you insist he was consul but not Roman consul, do I understand correctly? Boethius consul in 510 [7] (Britalnnica)--Dojarca (talk) 19:21, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Boethius was appointed Roman consul [8] Wayne P. Pomerleau. Twelve Great Philosophers --Dojarca (talk) 19:26, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Boethius was Roman consul [9] David C. Lindberg. Science in the Middle Ages --Dojarca (talk) 19:28, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Cassiodorus was a Roman consul [10] Louis Gaussen. The Canon of the Holy Scriptures from the Double Point of View of Science --Dojarca (talk) 19:30, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

I already discussed this with Certh. You can either go back to being him and remember that, or just accept that you are also wrong in so far as you are taking a technical truth and tendentiously using it to redefine the historical record. Your evidence is neither new, nor irrelevant, but merely out of context in this article. Consul is where you want to be. Hiberniantears (talk) 19:32, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Do you have any source that they were not Roman consuls? You insert in this article a claim that after 476 only one consul was appointed, it is not true. Do you need more sources? I can easily provide.--Dojarca (talk) 19:39, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Feel free to create an article called "Byzantine consul", or "Medieval consuls of the City of Rome", or expand the Hypatus. Hiberniantears (talk) 19:43, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

So in this sentence As a result, after the formal end of the Roman Empire in the West, many years would be named for only a single consul you consider the one appointed in Constantinople "Roman consul"? Be consistent - either both were Roman consuls or none of them.--Dojarca (talk) 19:49, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

For example, in 915 Theodoric choose both consuls - so you insist that one of the selected was Roman consul, and the other choosen was not?--Dojarca (talk) 19:51, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Or of two sons of Boethius who were named co-consuls in 522 [11] only one was Roman consul? --Dojarca (talk) 19:55, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Okay. Let's by instances.

• That after the fall of the empire in the West there was only one consul - factually wrong. After that at least 50 years were appointed consuls in the West. Any objections? Please provide if you wish.

• That Constans II was the last consul - please sources.

• That appointment of Martell would lead to the conflict - also please sources.

• Deletion of the material about revival of the title - any objections against return of this information?--Dojarca (talk) 18:01, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

RFC responses

• I come to this article knowing little of the subject. Where there are factual disputes in WP, the usual answer is that one of the editors is wrong and producing WP:OR or is relying on old sources that have been overtaken by more recent scholarship. Occasionally, there will be two rival scholarly views, in which case the article should set them both out. Ideally, it should explain their respective strengths, but that may be asking too much and may itslef constitute original research. The answer to this difficulty is for the editor who has WP:RS to ensure that he cites his (or her) sources, with in-line citations. I observe that the present statements appear to fit approximately with the list of consuls, linked at the end of the article. This suggests to me that the list are reliable, but no sources seem to be provided, and they must be. One answer to the problem may be to to add a further section dealing with appointments made in later periods, after the conventional enbd of an annual consulship. Peterkingiron (talk) 23:27, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

This is not the sort of thing that would be difficult to source. It also would not be the end of the world if Wikipedia said nothing until someone gets a source.Dejvid (talk) 10:49, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree that sources should be provided for the disputed comments; if they are suitably verifiable this shouldn't be too difficult. Either omission or tags would be appropriate until this is done. HTH. Richard Keatinge (talk) 18:21, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

confusion about age requirements and patricii

The following statement is confused: "Under the laws of the Republic, the minimum age of election to consul for patricians was 41 years of age. (This is because only patricians were allowed to be consuls)." How is being a patrician related to age? The age requirement has a separate history pertaining to the cursus honorum and was probably affected in the Late Republic by the "reforms" of Sulla. I moved the age reference to the section on the career track; the history of plebeian consuls is addressed elsewhere. In general, the article has a confused and often strangely non-neutral stance on long-dead political issues: "monopolized by a political elite" betrays a certain resentment. I could be mistaken, but I seem to recall that the change of law meant one consul each year had to be a plebeian, with the result that in many years, especially as the patriciate waned in the Late Republic, both consuls were plebeians. Cynwolfe (talk) 16:46, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Thucydides reference

I removed this, the final sentence of the intro:

"This political office was not unique to the Roman Republic; in fact, Thucydides (c. 460 B.C. – c. 395 B.C.) narrates, in the History of the Peloponnesian War, about the Caoni, "a people who don't recognize the authority of a king, that was ruled, in accordance of a year lasting office, by Fozio and Nicarone, member of a dominant family" (book II, 80)." (The ref would be clearer with three figures: 2.80.5)

The quote is a bit of a mistranslation (and with Italian versions for the names: Chaonians, Photios, Nicanor): rather than "were ruled by" Thuc talks of a Chaonian contingent being "lead by" i.e. on that occason: it is not framed as a constitutional overview but explains the status of the commanders. Probably a summary extracting the wanted information would be better than a quote: direct quotation should not be recast to suit its new context. Anyway I don't think it belongs in the intro. Parallel institutions from other Italian cities would be more relevant. If that was discussed the Thuc. passage could be brought in, but by itself it's a bit of a sore thumb. (Thuc. says the two men come from an "archikon genos", a ruling clan/family, which sounds rather different from the Roman situation.) Flounderer (talk) 05:13, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Confusing statement

I find this confusing: "Holding the consulship was a great honor and the office was the major symbol of the still republican constitution." A situation can't be republican and imperial at the same time, or what is meant by "still"? JMK (talk) 20:33, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Consular dating abolished in the 6th AND 9th Centuries?

, with Anicius Faustus Albinus Basilius. Consular dating had already been abolished in 537, when Justinian introduced dating by the emperor's regnal year and the indiction.[4] The appointment to consulship became a part of the rite of proclamation of a new emperor from Justin II (r. 565–578) on, and is last attested in the proclamation of the future Constans II (r. 641–668) as consul in 632.[5] In the early 9th century, when Emperor Leo the Wise (r. 886–912) finally abolished consular dating with Novel 94.

• Which is it? Was consular dating abolished in 537 by Justinian or in the early 9th C. by Leo the Wise?

• Also, do we have a link to the hierarchy of Imperial court ranks discussed?--Doug.^{(talk • contribs)} 11:45, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Praetor

This article says: In 305 BC the name of the office was changed to consul. / I think, it is WRONG! Wikipedia also says: The praetorship was created in around 367–366 BC to take over part of the duties of the consuls. (on Praetor article)/ And here it says: Expulsion of the monarchy results in creation of the joint offices of consul. (Originally titled praetor and re-identified as consul with the introduction of the newly defined office of praetor in 367 BC). http://www.unrv.com/government/legal-institutional-chronology.php Böri (talk) 10:44, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Reorganisation

I think the article should be reorganised chronologically rather than functionally. Currently, it has a History section first, then the powers and responsibilities section divided by period. This should be flipped. It should be Republican role, then Imperial role, then history. What is important in the article is understanding what the consulship was. Doing this will also require some – probably major – rewrites. Ifly6 (talk) 16:42, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

Consuls Prior and Posterior

At some point the redirect from junior consul here got its content entirely deleted. Fair enough if it overstated the case but we need something on the minor difference between the prior/senior/chief consul and the posterior/junior/second consul, even if it's just cut-and-pasting the content and sources from List of Roman consuls. — LlywelynII 04:25, 17 January 2024 (UTC)