Talk:Lady Byron

TAGS

The "cleanup" tag

The article needs to be partitioned and indexed, to make it easier to digest. --Benn M. 19:21, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

It also needs all the Annabella familiarity cleaned out. Septentrionalis 00:01, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Note to those wondering why there is a big fat honking "cleanup" tag dirtying up the article: Benn M. doesn't like the way it's particitoned. - Nunh-huh 21:16, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

The "neutrality" tag

This is one story of what happened; there are at least two other versions, which should be mentioned from time to time. Septentrionalis 04:51, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

• This is the narrative: "It was Byron's fault". There is also:
• "It was Lady Byron's fault; Byron was a Hero."
• And "It was the Noels' fault; she loved him anyway."

As the phrasing will suggest, I have problems with all of these, but the literature divides between them. All should be represented. Septentrionalis 21:08, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Note to those wondering why there is a big fat honking "neutrality" tag on the article: Septentrionalis thinks the article is one-sided in attributing the "fault" (for something unspecified) to Lord Byron. - Nunh-huh 21:16, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

For the breakup of the marriage, and most of the rest of the lives of the two participants. Telling all three narratives is on my to-do list, but someone who has read, rather than skimmed, the literature will do it faster, easier, and more reliably. Septentrionalis 21:23, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Note to those who think the article should be "fixed", in distinction to those who merely want to decorate it: please add further comments on how you think the problems can be remedied here on the talk page. - Nunh-huh 21:16, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Name

Lady Byron's name is a difficult subject, but the following is all attested,

• When her mother died, Byron and his wife both took the surname of Noel only. (Complete Peerage, II, p.457 Byron of Rochdale, XII, ii, p.512 Wentworth.)
  • They both, of course, retained the title Byron.
• The ODNB lists her under Anne Isabella Noel
  • Leslie Stephen DNB VIII, p. 140. calls her Anne Isabella Milbanke (This is the article on the poet, of course.
  • Cokayne, equally of course, also uses Anne Isabella.
• Her mother wrote a letter to the Prince Regent, proposing that "Sir Ralph and Lady Noel be enabled to called their insulted and injured daughter by another title than that of Byron, viz. by the title of Wentworth, Lady Noel waiving her claim." (E. C. Mayne: Life of Lady Byron (London, 1929) p. 280)
  • Nothing came of this (It was found in the Lovelace papers, so it may not have been sent), and she declined to use Lady Wentworth when she inherited. (loc cit..)
  • Miss Caroenter's school set up an inscription calls her "Anne Isabella Noel, Dowager Lady Byron." (op.cit. p.297)
  • Her funeral inscription calls her "Ann Isabella Noel Byron" [sic, no mark of title]. (Pierson: The Real Lady Byron p.310)
  • Pierson also notes several letters (and her mother's gravestone) which use A.I. Noel Byron.
• She was also nicknamed Nancy; Byron called her Bell.

In short, the present position of this article is calling its subject by

• her nickname
• a surname she abandoned
• a title she did not use
  • The last two of which she was never entitled to use together.

The present text is also in error: Byron changed his surname to Noel; when Byron signed himself "Noel Byron" (not Noel-Byron) that was his then surname plus his title.

• Now fixed. Septentrionalis 23:41, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm afraid I still don't buy this. I've never seen any other example in history of a peer signing "Surname Title". "Noel Byron" with the meaning you suggest would be the equivalent of "Cavendish Devonshire" or "Gascoyne-Cecil Salisbury", and would be immensely odd. Proteus (Talk) 22:34, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

I do not see much distinction between unjustified and unsourced reversion and vandalism. Septentrionalis 23:04, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Requested move

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 to Anne Isabella Byron, Baroness Byron. —Nightstallion (?) ^{Seen this already?} 09:10, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

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Add *Support or *Oppose followed by an optional one-sentence explanation, then sign your opinion with ~~~~

Annabella Byron, 11th Baroness Wentworth → Anne Isabella Noel, 11th Baroness Wentworth … Rationale: The subject of this article is unquestionably best known as Lady Byron; but this is unfortunately too informal for WP. The present name of the article consists of one of her nicknames, used by her intimate friends and gushing and partisan biographers; a surname she gave up in 1822; and a title she inherited 34 years later.

• Support for the reasons in the section above. If we are going to call her Baroness Wentworth, we should at least use the name she then employed. Nominator vote. Septentrionalis 23:37, 6 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Second thought:After the model of Frederick North, Lord North: Anne Isabella Byron, Baroness Byron.

Discussion

Add any additional comments

The text of the article is also somewhat gushing and partisan, but that will be a longer project Septentrionalis 23:37, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

What policy or guideline suggests to you that Lady Byron is too informal? If she "is unquestionably best known as Lady Byron" then I believe that's where the page should move (assuming there aren't any questions of ambiguity). Ewlyahoocom 16:43, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Observation of the discussion at WP:PEER and Wikipedia:Naming conventions (names and titles) (especially their talk pages) has convinced me that there is a strong opinion in favor of formality, even fairly intense formality, in the treatment of the nobility. In particular, I think every English Baron is so styled, although it is not usage; consider for example Frederic Leighton, 1st Baron Leighton, whose peerage lasted 24 hours (admittedly, he is usually called Lord Leighton).

For my part I could live with any of the following:

1. Anne Isabella Byron, Baroness Byron.
2. Lady Byron.
3. Anne Isabella Noel, 11th Baroness Wentworth.

Right now, I prefer the first; I don't want to reopen the Style Wars. Septentrionalis 20:44, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Well, theoretically that could refer to any Baroness Byron, just as "Lord North" could refer to any Baron North. I'm afraid this stuff is a bit beyond me—I'd like to hear from some of the other Peerage contributors—but I like the second suggestion, analogous to the famous Lord North and Viscount Castlereagh, who were better known by courtesy titles than the peerage titles they eventually inherited. Choess 20:46, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

I grant that Lady Byron is ambiguous, but I think overwhelming primary usage may apply. (Byron's mother was never Lady Byron.) Note that the actual article on Lord North is at Frederick North, Lord North, hence the suggestion (1). Septentrionalis 20:55, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

You're right! (I guess I could never read past "Most general rule overall: use the most common form of the name used in English if none of the rules below cover a specific problem" without my eyes going all buggy.) Please excuse the intrusion. Ewlyahoocom 21:06, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

What intrusion? It was a valid question, and the insistence on formality could stand an opposing voice now and then. Septentrionalis 22:47, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Annabella Byron, Baroness Byron would be fine, if she is indeed better known by that title, but I still don't see what you've got against "Annabella". Obviously it's a nickname, rather than her formal name, but we generally have no problem with using nicknames in article titles (Rab Butler, Jeb Bush, Tony Blair, Caligula, large numbers of articles on pop stars and actors, etc.). Proteus (Talk) 16:27, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

These are all cases where the nickname was almost uniformly used for the person concerned, and used with the surname. Yhis is not, by my reading, true here; the use of Annabella is like moving Bertrand Russell to Bertie Russell, or C. S. Lewis to Jack Lewis. She did not use it herself as her full name; she signed "A. I. Noel Byron" (or whatever). Furthermore, she had other nicknames: Nancy and Bell (which Byron called her). Septentrionalis 20:32, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

But we don't base article naming on what people call (or called) themselves, but rather on what they are known by now. (To take an obvious example, Jesus would certainly never have called himself "Jesus", but that's where his article is.) In this case, "Annabella Byron" -Wikipedia gets 269 Google hits whilst "Anne Isabella Byron" -Wikipedia gets only 21. Proteus (Talk) 20:59, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

Because what she's called now is "Lady Byron", which gets 38,300 ghits - wikipedia. Septentrionalis 21:34, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

• To dispose of the possibility that these are the other baronesses, I added "1815"; 10,000 remained. I'm sure there are other hits that mean her, and don't mention the year of her marriage.
• "Anne Isabella, Lady Byron" (-wikipedia) gets 149 hits
• "Annabella, Lady Byron" ("") gets 11. Septentrionalis 21:41, 10 May 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.

Daughter

Where are the citations? "amassed considerable gambling debt" for instance. This section seems to be all conjecture and isn't neutral at all. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Echoica (talk • contribs) 06:34, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Unclear Line

" ...when Lady Byron made clear her suspicions that Byron's relationship with his half-sister Augusta was incestuous, which was not then illegal, and that he had had homosexual relationships and had sodomised her - Lady Byron - which acts were, he changed his mind."

This is really obtuse. Is this really meant to imply that "Lady Byron" was "suspicious" that she herself had been sodomized? That she was unsure and only suspected that she had been sodomized? Because that's what it is saying, and it would be a rather unusual thing to be merely "suspicious" of ("I'm not totally sure, but I suspect I've been sodomized!") Is the last "her" (the one who was sodomized) actually supposed to be referring to A) Augusta rather than Lady Byron, or B) was Lady Byron actually uncertain as to whether she'd personally been sodomized? As in, drugged unconscious and sodomized?

Not only that, but the entire sentence structure is fairly torturous and obfuscatory; I think it would be much better to read either: A) " ...when Lady Byron made it clear to Byron that she suspected he was having an incestuous affair with, and had sodomized, his half-sister Augusta, and that he had also been in homosexual relationships, he changed his mind. The incestuous relationship was not illegal at the time, but sodomy and homosexual relationships were."

Or B) " ...when Lady Byron made it clear to Byron that she suspected he had sodomized her against her knowledge, that he was having an incestuous affair with his half-sister Augusta, and that he had also been in homosexual relationships, he changed his mind. The incestuous relationship was not illegal at the time, but sodomy and homosexual relationships were."

Depending on which meaning was intended (and also possibly using sodomised as opposed to sodomized, whichever spelling is standard for Wikipedia.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by RyokoMocha (talk • contribs) 03:34, 7 November 2014 (UTC)

@RyokoMocha: Ah, I wish I'd checked the page for this subject before I started looking at it myself. The sentence was added by Peter Entwisle (Talk) on 10 April 2012. Maybe he could straighten it out, and I'm pinging him, but he hasn't contributed in two years and I'm not very hopeful that he'll see it. Please {{Ping}} me to discuss. --Thnidu (talk) 04:32, 5 March 2016 (UTC)

makes no sense

"intercepted the letter, as she feared Byron would commit suicide if he knew of it." Now how could she know the letter would contain things that would impel Byron to suicide? She had to read it to know that, and she couldn't read it until after she intercepted it. Why did she intercept the letter, really? 108.18.136.147 (talk) 19:46, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

Requested move 18 August 2017

The following is a closed 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: moved - early closure considering clear consensus and backlog DrStrauss talk 19:25, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

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Annabella Byron, Baroness Byron → Lady Byron – "Lady Byron" is clearly the COMMONNAME, as this is the name almost universally used in literature and even our own article. In the previous discussion this name was dismissed as "too informal", but there is no prohibition against using informal names as article titles. Wikipedia should use whichever name is most recognized and likely to be searched for and linked from. For example, we use Lord Byron, not "George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron". We use Ada Lovelace, not "Augusta Ada King-Noel, Countess of Lovelace". We use Lady Gaga, not "Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta". Kaldari (talk) 17:59, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

• Support as WP:COMMONNAME — JFG ^talk 19:04, 18 August 2017 (UTC)
• Support per nom, esp. the Lord Byron example. Randy Kryn (talk) 00:36, 19 August 2017 (UTC)
• Support makes sense though the lead will need to be rewritten since it currently does not mention Lady Byron.--76.65.42.75 (talk) 00:17, 20 August 2017 (UTC)

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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.

Do you mean "After LADY BYRON's death" (not GEORGE)?

This section is confusing:

"Prior to her death, she shared the story of her marriage to Byron with Harriet Beecher Stowe, who encouraged her to remain silent. After George's death, Stowe published the account in 1869. It was the first time anyone had published suspicions of an incestuous relationship between Byron and his half-sister."

George Byron died in 1824. Lady Byron died in 1860. It is unclear why Harriet Beecher Stowe waited until 1869 to publish her account, but she definitely wasn't waiting for Lord or Lady Byron to die. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jibralta (talk • contribs) 17:05, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

Fair comment, Jibralta, I have edited this to say simply some years later. Moonraker (talk) 17:18, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

Mathematician?

The article states that Lady Byron was a mathematician, an ocupation which was quite unusal for a woman at the time, and therefore highly interesting IMHO. Unfortunately, the article does not report any of her works, but focuses almost exclusivly on her private life and there mainly on her relationship with her husband. So can anybody contribute information regarding her work as a mathematician, or will she remain being known as "Lord Byron's Wife"? 2A01:C23:5CD2:0:6073:E0F0:D437:2953 (talk) 00:01, 14 February 2022 (UTC)

I also wonder what justifies calling her a mathematician. Doing well studying mathematics with a tutor (or in school) does not make a person a mathematician. Some supporting evidence is needed. Zaslav (talk) 04:14, 18 April 2022 (UTC)

I was wondering the same thing. Boleslaw (talk) 10:18, 12 July 2022 (UTC)

I have deleted this claim. There's no evidence for it. It was added by Shreeveen in Revision as of 04:54, 8 June 2019. I also deleted related tags. If there's evidence for this claim, I'd be very happy to see it added. 86.159.18.215 (talk) 11:20, 15 September 2022 (UTC)

Separation

I might be unaware of some fine point of 19th-century English law, but "separation" is usually something else than "divorce". The passage "Soon after the dissolution of his marriage (...)", however, seems to suggest that Byron's separation somehow amounted to a divorce. 89.64.70.36 (talk) 22:05, 23 October 2022 (UTC)