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Archive 1Archive 2

Hereford and Worcester

Hereford and Worcester both appear in the list of cities recognised by "ancient prescriptive right" (in other words from time immemorial) isued by the Home Office in 1927 per Beckett p.12. Having had a look at what the 1189 charters say (relying on info on the web) they don't seem to have granted city status. In fact the concept of "city status" would not have existed in the 12th century, AFAIK. Lozleader (talk) 09:49, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Bath is on the list too: the 1590 date refers to is charter of incorporation. Lozleader (talk) 09:51, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
For the sake of completeness here is the list of cities recognised by "ancient prescriptive right" in 1927:
  1. Bath
  2. Canterbury
  3. Carlisle
  4. Chichester
  5. Coventry
  6. Durham
  7. Ely
  8. Exeter
  9. Hereford
  10. Lichfield
  11. Lincoln
  12. London
  13. Norwich
  14. Rochester
  15. Salisbury
  16. Wells
  17. Winchester
  18. Worcester
  19. York
  20. Bangor
(PRO HO 286/40 cited by Beckett (2005), p12) Notably absent are St Asaph, St David's and Llandaff, presumably because they had no corporation? Lozleader (talk) 10:01, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Hmm, taht reference doesn't seem to be correct, it actually refers to Guildford's request for city status in 1961. David Underdown (talk) 11:27, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Might be HO 45/16995, still refers to Guidlford, but the date is 1927-37. David Underdown (talk) 11:31, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Hmmm. Checked Beckett again and that's the ref. In the "references and bibliography" it only lists "Honours Records, Department of constitution Affairs" (sic). The book only states that this is a list of cities by APR in 1927, not that the list was made in 1927. I suppose it is possible that such a list was included in the 1961 file as "evidence against". I wonder if it has anything to do with the memorandum produced by the Home Office in 1927 for the Royal Commission as mentioned here? [1] I suspect it does, and they dusted it off. 1927 was also the year Guildford became the see of a bishop, just to make things more complicated/coincidental! Somebody needs to to Kew.... Lozleader (talk) 13:03, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
I think my theory may be correct. On looking at p.76 of Beckett, it states that A.L. Dixon of the Home Office gave evidence to the royal commission about city status. In the footnote it states "Dixon's evidence is given in PRO HO 286/40" Lozleader (talk) 13:35, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
Added to which the 1927 memorandum was apparently issued following an equiry by the commission's chairman, the Earl of Onslow about guildford's status.Lozleader (talk) 13:39, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
That seems to make some sort of sense. David Underdown (talk) 13:41, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

New Table(s)

I was just looking at editing the current table in order to identify precisely which body holds the status, and it's hideously complex. Should we have one big table (as is the case at present), or separate tables for the separate grantees (to towns, to boroughs and so on)? I'd also move "Lord Mayor" to a different table.

I see something like the following:

City Current city status grantee Year first granted city status (Diocesan) Cathedral (pre-1888) Prior holders of status
English Cities
Bath town TI Bath Abbey
Birmingham metropolitan borough 1889 not applicable County Borough of Birmingham
(until 1974)
Bradford metropolitan borough 1897 not applicable County Borough of Bradford
(until 1974)

or alternatively something like;

City Constituent Country Year first granted city status (Diocesan) Cathedral (pre-1888) Prior holders of status
City status granted to the settlement
Bath England TI Bath Abbey
Lichfield England TI Lichfield Cathedral
Stirling Scotland 2002 not applicable
City status granted to the local government district
Birmingham England 1889 not applicable County Borough of Birmingham
(until 1974)
Bradford England 1897 not applicable County Borough of Bradford
(until 1974)

Fingerpuppet (talk) 10:01, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

I think something like this would be more user-friendly:

City Current city status holder Year granted city status Cathedral (pre-1888)
English Cities
Bath town TI Bath Abbey
Birmingham metropolitan borough 1889 not applicable
Bradford metropolitan borough 1897 not applicable

Note the following:

1. The entity holding city status (when we have a separate article on it) is now linked from the current holder (better name than grantee, because a grant implies the giving of a right which did not exist before the grant), instead of from the "City" column - this deals with the paradox of saying that the City of Bradford was first granted city status in 1897 when the current City of Bradford did not exist then.

2. "Year granted city status" not "Year first granted city status" - otherwise we would have to put TI for St. David's and Armagh for example. Leaving out "first" allows us to give the date the current incarnation of the status was granted but footnote that city status had previously been held.

3. I have deleted "(Diocesan)" from before "Cathedral". It is an unnecessary detail in this situation, and, as it happens, is also superfluous in every single case where it is mentioned here.

4. I prefer the arrangement by constituent country rather than by current holder, mainly because of the paradox outlined in (1).

5. A "Previous holders" column is unnecessary detail in the main table. Perhaps a supplementary table further down in the article would be better.

Comments?GSTQ (talk) 01:24, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

I would agree that constituent country is a better break-down of the table than the category of status holder, which is fairly technical. Also the mayoralty should go somwhere else: probably its own article/list altogether as it generates a lot of footnotes, of which there are an awful lot. I still wonder if some of the stuff in the footnotes (eg dates of letters patent)couldn't be integrated into the table? Lozleader (talk) 09:01, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
Another thing that occured to me: a chronological list of grants of city status... as a different article I guess, and could include an "occasion" column which would note the rationale etc for the grant: eg creation of diocese, jubilee competition etc. It might allow for some of the detail to be taken out of the parent city status in the United Kingdom article which is rather long and dense. Lozleader (talk) 09:08, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
Okay, I have created List of lord mayoralties and lord provostships in the United Kingdom which includes all the info from the "mayor" column. Quite a few dates turned out to be wrong, on checking. Tommorrow I shall demolish the mayor column and weed the footnotes.Lozleader (talk) 22:27, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Corporate Bodies

Just a query about the column. We have established that there are several grants of city status to towns rather than districts - which means, for example, that the district of Preston does not hold that status, nor does the Principal Area of Newport. In each case it is the town that holds that status.

Presumably, therefore, this column needs correcting to "borough", "district" or "town" (or perhaps "urban area") as appropriate, as well as the column heading to something like "holder of status" or similar. Fingerpuppet (talk) 08:34, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

I would suggest something like "Status held by" or "Status granted to" as the column heading, and the description of the entity as given in the letters patent in the column, eg "Borough of Manchester", "Town of Inverness" etcetera... Lozleader (talk) 08:41, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
O.K., I think it's bad enough having some cities redirect to the city councils and others redirecting to the cities. Are we actually being consistent with the entities holding the status? I find it hard to believe that the City of Canterbury has held city status since time immemorial, especially since it was only formed in 1974. Surely it is Canterbury which has held that status since then.GSTQ (talk) 06:49, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
This is a problem - however all we can do is talk about the current holders of that status, so for example City of Wakefield rather than Wakefield as the entire borough holds the status, despite it not being a "city" in the normal sense of the word; and despite the fact that Wakefield (the settlement) held that status prior to 1974. Fingerpuppet (talk) 08:44, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Part of the problem is that, in addition to the variety of units which hold city status, on Wikipedia some cities have different articles for the historic core and another for the wider district; and the remainder have just one article. This lists the situation for English cities and hopefully explains the perceived inconsistency:

District has city status (and we have a settlement article)

Settlement has city status (within a same-named district)

Settlement has city status (within a differently-named district)

District has city status (we have one article)

Hope this helps. MRSC • Talk 17:16, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately, this isn't quite true - there are several "districts" on your list where it's the settlement that holds that status - Wolverhampton and Preston to name two. However, in all those cases there are single articles that cover both the settlement and the local government district. Bizarrely, it's the "Towns of Brighton and Hove" that hold the status of "A City" rather than the local government district - though I'd argue that in that case it clearly means the district. Fingerpuppet (talk) 18:12, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

I propose we have all links in this article to the settlement, i.e. Canterbury instead of City of Canterbury. After all, the Canterury article begins: "Canterbury is a city...". Unless anybody is going to contend this is inaccurate and go through all the settlement articles and change them to "Canterbury is a town in Kent, and the seat of the City of Canterbury", which sounds like nonsense, we ought to be able to have links which are consistent with the settlement articles. We should include the links to the City of Canterbury and other such entities in the "City status grantee" column in List of cities in the United Kingdom. A number of exceptions to this general rule seem justified to me: the City of London, the City of Westminster and Brighton & Hove. Doesn't this seem more consistent and less messy?GSTQ (talk) 03:07, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Um, has anybody anything to say in response to my last post?GSTQ (talk) 07:38, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes, though it's hard to explain.
I'll take Leeds as my example. In British English, the word "city" means a large town, preferably one which holds city status, although you do get references to "city" used for large towns, such as Milton Keynes. I have seen Pathe News newsreel that refers to "Wolverhampton Wanderers bringing the FA Cup back to the Midlands city", which is clearly inaccurate for the time it was made. Therefore, in the standard usage of English, Leeds is a city. However, the City Status was reawarded in 1974 to the Metropolitan Borough of Leeds, in other words, City of Leeds - being Leeds itself, the surrounding rural areas and other towns such as Garforth. We are therefore left with the problem that Leeds is a city (colloquial), whilst City of Leeds is a City (official).
The real problem is that the whole thing is somewhat messy and inconsistent. We have city status awarded to settlements, and city status awarded to local government units. It's indicative of the confusion that Preston (the settlement) holds the status and not Preston Borough, yet the local council calls itself "Preston City Council", even though an non-negligible area of the Borough is not part of the city. Equally Wolverhampton (the settlement) holds that status, but Wolverhampton City Council don't cover the entire settlement. Of course, it helps in both those cases that Wikipedia only has one article for each place.
Therefore all that we can do here is (as this is a list of "official" cities) is to link to the best article for the body that holds that status, be it the local government district article or the settlement article. We also need to accept the use of the word "city" in its more colloquial form within articles, as long as city status has been conferred on the settlement at some point.
I hope that makes some sense somewhere! Fingerpuppet (talk) 22:16, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes, thank you for your exposition, but it doesn't answer my proposal that the links to the councils as opposed to the settlements be included in the "City status grantee" column instead of the city column.GSTQ (talk) 05:02, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Actually, it does, just badly! My opinion is that the city column should be linked to the best article for the body that holds that status, be it the local government district article or the settlement article. The Grantee column should simply state "local government district" or "settlement" as appropriate, with some suitable wording for Brighton & Hove. Fingerpuppet (talk) 08:57, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

I wouldn't have a problem with that, except for the absurd results it appears to lead to, thereby potentially confusing the reader. As I've said, the City of Canterbury has not held city status since time immemorial, but this table appears to state that it has. Secondly, we shouldn't be giving links to the city councils rather than the cities whose names appear in the table without a satisfactory explanation which is immediately clear to the reader. "City of Canterbury" does not appear in the table, merely "Canterbury", and that is what I as a reader would expect the link to go to. Perhaps the table should be re-arranged as the table above has been arranged (the one in MRSC's comment) to make this apparently random assortment of links clear to the reader. And we should also demystify the reader as to the apparent paradox of a council created in 1974 having borne city status since time immemorial.GSTQ (talk) 00:11, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Right, I've finally changed the table to state whether the local government district (which may or may not hold borough status etc), or the settlement holds the City Status. Can someone double-check I've got it right before I start thinking about a column for "previous status holders" or the like where we refer to pre-1974 districts? Fingerpuppet (talk) 10:58, 14 November 2008 (UTC)
That's grand: I have altered "settlement" to civil parish/community where this is what the letters patent implies, and unparished area where there are charter trustees. In these cases, I think there are defined boundaries (which can change as local government boundaries change). I think Durham will be changing to "unparished area" and Salisbury to "civil parish" next year. If Hereford and Lichfield are precedents, Salisbury will need new letters patent.
This leaves "settlement" for places like Preston and Newport where it is unclear exactly what the city is. And the Scottish/Northern Ireland ones. Lozleader (talk) 11:17, 14 November 2008 (UTC)
I'm aware this may be my ignorance talking, but here goes. How do we know that certain civil parishes/unparished areas etc hold the status? I'm thinking about Lichfield specifically, where the 1980 award was to "The Town of Lichfield", without any mention of civil parishes that I can see; and also to St. David's where the 1994 award was to "The Town of St. David's". I appreciate that they translate to pretty much the same thing, I'm just looking for clarity. Fingerpuppet (talk) 12:00, 14 November 2008 (UTC)
Hmmm. Good question. Well, legally "town" can mean a civil parish or community per the Local Government Act 1972:
Section 245 (6) The council of a parish or community which is not grouped with any other parish or community may resolve that the parish or community shall have the status of a town and thereupon—
  • (a) the council of the parish or community shall bear the name of the council of the town;
  • (b) the chairman and vice-chairman of the council shall be respectively entitled to the style of town mayor and deputy town mayor;
  • (c) the parish meeting or a community meeting shall have the style of town meeting.
I believe that some at least of the letters patent that refer to granting the status to a "town" mean a town in this sense. The following were granted Letters Patent on April 1, 1974 (listed in the London Gazette of April 4, 1974):
  • The Parish of Wells shall have the status of a City.
  • The Town of Bangor shall have the status of a City.
  • The Town of Chichester shall have the status of a City.
  • The Town of Ely shall have the status of a City.
  • The Town of Ripon shall have the status of a City.
  • The Town of Truro shall have the status of a City.
From which I would infer that Wells parish council had not resolved to becomer a "town", but the others had.
As far as unparished areas are concerned, this is from section 246 of LGA 1972
  • (4) Where by virtue of Part I or II of this Act the area of an existing city or borough on 1st April 1974 becomes wholly comprised in a district not having the status, or entitled to the style, of a borough by virtue of subsection (1) or (4) of section 245 above and that city or borough does not on that date become a parish in England or a community in Wales having a separate community council—
    • (a) there shall as from that date be a body corporate by the name of ‘the Charter Trustees of the City’ or ‘the Charter Trustees of the Town’, as the case may be, with the addition of the name of the existing city or borough, consisting of the district councillors for the wards wholly or partly comprising the area of the city or borough or, if the number of those councillors is less than three, consisting of those councillors and such number of local government electors for that area appointed by the district council as will make the number of charter trustees up to three
The effect of which was that the pre-1974 city status continued to apply to the (unparished) area of the former city, if the wider district was not a city. However, if a parish was formed then the trustees and the status would be extinguished, which is why Lichfield and Hereford town councils had to apply for new letters patent.
In summary, my understanding is that pre the 1990s, (up to 1996?) letters patent were granted to either 1.) districts or 2.) civil parishes/communities/towns, or the status was retained in some unparished areas having charter trustees.
It is hard to know what to make of the more recent grants, although they do seem to give the borough councils within which the cities lie the right to be called "city council", they don't extend to the whole district.
There is always a problem with city grants in that there is an official resistance to define limits to royal prerogative. I imagine HM can declare someone's garden shed a city if she so wishes!Lozleader (talk) 12:58, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for all that - I think I follow it! My understanding of the recent grants are that they are effectively to the named urban area (which is especially noticeable in the case of Newport), and the local authorities can call themselves anything they like (such as the Blackburn -> Blackburn with Darwen change) - hence the "city council" name is neither here nor there. As I've mentioned before, the really interesting one is Wolverhampton, as the Urban Sub-division extends outside the local authority boundaries so the city could well be larger than the district. Fingerpuppet (talk) 13:22, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

"City council" rather than "Current City status holder"

Given Lozleader's point that "There is always a problem with city grants in that there is an official resistance to define limits to royal prerogative" wouldn't it make more sense to list those things which can be defined, i.e. those bodies that are called "city councils"? Having things like "settlement" seems awfully woolly. A column that listed city council (parish), city council (district), city council (metropolitan district), city council (unitary district), charter trustees, none, &c. seems to me to be far more useful. Owain (talk) 09:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Because that's the exact problem with city status grants - sometimes they are "woolly". What would you suggest for, say, Wolverhampton where the council that covers the vast majority of the settlement calls itself "Wolverhampton City Council", and refers to its area as "the city", but the simple fact is that the grant states "The Town of Wolverhampton", not "The Borough of Wolverhampton" - the wording used for all other places within Metropolitan Counties. Newport's is even clearer - it's awarded to "The Town of Newport within the County Borough of Newport", in other words specifically stating that it isn't awarded to the local government district. Hence, the status holder is specifically only granted to the settlement in each of those cases. Fingerpuppet (talk) 14:14, 7 March 2009 (UTC)
It doesn't specifically say anything of the sort. The "town" could be coterminous with the borough, it just doesn't say. The wording in the grant for Wolverhampton and Newport may be different from previous grants but the end result is the same - the district ends up having the status. People appear to be jumping to conclusions in equating "town" with what the ONS definition of urban area is. Just because the ONS defined the "town" of Wolverhampton to extend beyond the borough boundaries doesn't mean that's the definition of "town" that was meant in the city status award. Given that a corporate body has to exist to be awarded the status of city, the end result is the same - the district ends up having the status. Given the ambiguities that the present column presents it should be replaced with a "city council" column, which is indisputable. Owain (talk) 20:04, 7 March 2009 (UTC)
I'd also like to add that any quasi-legal interpretation of the wording is WP:OR in any case. Given the agreed-upon woolliness in the wording let's try not to read anything into it other than what the end result is - i.e. the district ends up having the status. Owain (talk) 20:07, 7 March 2009 (UTC)
Sorry, I've obviously not made myself clear! The point about having the wording as "settlement" is exactly because it's unclear which definition was meant within the grant. This contrasts with other places, where the definition of what constitutes the city (for example, where the status was awarded to a borough) is clear. According to an editor on Talk:City Status in the United Kingdom, the official response of Wolverhampton CC to just that question was: "The award of City status on 31 January 2001 was to Wolverhampton as a place and not to the council and therefore the title of the Council did not change automatically. The legal status of the Council is as a metropolitan borough council under the Local Government Act 1972, which is technically what we became in 1974 when the 1972 Act came into force and still are, as is Coventry, Manchester, Birmingham etc. Councils can choose what to call themselves. (I know that Wigan in Greater Manchester used the title Wigan Metro, with no reference to Council.) After the grant of City Status, the Council passed a resolution at the next full meeting on 14 February 2001 to change its title from Wolverhampton Metropolitan Borough Council to Wolverhampton City Council. It was open to the Council to decide to call itself the "City Council of Wolverhampton" or not make any change at all."
The other problem is that as councils can decide what to call themselves, so there's absolutely no reason that, say, Reading Borough Council couldn't suddenly decide to call itself Reading City Council. It would make no difference to the legal position that Reading is a town, not a city but you'd get an anomalous name.
You also have the difficulty that Inverness and Stirling are places that don't have a council at all, and neither do they appear to have Charter Trustees - though if anyone could show that they do, I'd appreciate it! Fingerpuppet (talk) 10:08, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
No, I understand perfectly well that the wording is different, but (sorry to keep repeating myself here) the end result is the same. Regardless of the phrasing that the status is given to the "town" that is not actually possible, it must be awarded to a corporate body. The legal status of Wolverhampton as a metropolitan borough is no different to that of Birmingham in this regard, as WCC have pointed out. I'm not entirely sure what they mean by "the title of the Council did not change automatically", as they never do, it is up to a resolution of the council to decide what to call itself. Having the "Current City status holder" column as it is is a legal interpretation and therefore original research. I think this whole problem has been caused by Inverness and Stirling not having corporate bodies to award the status to which is possibly why the wording was changed. After all, if you don't have a corporation, you don't have city status - just ask Rochester. Owain (talk) 10:50, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
I think Owain's suggestion is a pretty good one, and agree that is better to define what we can verify rather than theorizing on what might have been implied in the wording of letters patent.
Even though the grant was to the "town" of Wolverhampton, the borough became a city as is clear from this [2] which states at footnote 4 "The metropolitan district of Wolverhampton has the status of a city", and throughout use the term "city" to mean the district. so the city of Wolverhampton = the district of Wolverhampton. Simliarly here [3] at footnote 2 "The non-metropolitan district of Brighton and Hove has the status of a city", and here [4] at footnote d on page 1 "The non-metropolitan district of Preston has the status of a city."
While councils can choose to rename their district (ie change Blackburn to Blackburn with Darwen or West Norfolk to King's Lynn and West Norfolk) and use variations of their title (eg X district council, district council of X or council of the district of X) I don't think Reading (or Swindon, or wherever) could get away with changing their status i.e. claiming to the council of a city, when they aren't. My interpretation of the Wolverhampton statement is that they continue to be a metropolitan borough council but can choose to call themselves a city council if they so choose, by virtue of the letters patent. But they don't have to. They can call themselves Wolverhampton District or Borough or City Council if they choose. Reading has a "Borough Council" (as they have a charter granting that status), but they can call themselves Reading District Council if they wish. A district council is under no obligation to use all its dignities: for a number of years Liverpool did without a lord mayor, they had a chairman instead.
Lozleader (talk) 20:50, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

OK, I'm convinced. I now have no objections to the proposed change. Fingerpuppet (talk) 09:23, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Sort fixes

I've changed the dates somewhat:

  1. Expanded TI to time immemorial. The column is wide enough anyway, so why use an abbreviation?
  2. Sorted time immemorial first instead of last, using {{ntsh}}. I was going to use 1189 as the date as per time immemorial, but that put Aberdeen first. So I've used 1066. I might as easily have used 0.
  3. Sort Scots by royal burgh date instead of official date. It doesn't make sense to sort Edinburgh as 1329 and Dundee as 1889; either sort Dundee as 1191 (as I've done) or remove Edinburgh to a separate table of "royal burghs never officially confirmed as cities".
jnestorius(talk) 21:17, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

Rochester

Shouldn't we mention Rochester somewhere in this article? It was a city until 1998, and likely will be again at some point. john k (talk) 12:43, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

I doubt it frankly. David (talk) 18:35, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

Why not include RC Cathedrals?

I am interested to find out why Roman Catholic Cathedrals are not listed? In Nottingham the Roman Catholic Cathedral is referred to as 'the Cathedral' or 'Nottingham Cathedral' even by people that are not Catholic. 79.73.26.171 (talk) 14:37, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

Because they have no bearing on city status. As is explained in the article, prior to 1888 the presence of an Anglican cathedral entitled a place to be called a city. After that it was awarded for various other reasons. So the article lists the pre-1888 Anglican cathedrals but not the post 1888 ones or the cathedrals of any other denomination.Lozleader (talk) 16:42, 29 May 2011 (UTC)


Southwell in Nottinghamshire has had an Anglican Cathedral since 1884. I am not aware of it ever being referred to as a City. Therefore is this an oversight or is 1888 the correct cut off date to be using? 79.73.26.171 (talk) 13:05, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

It's all explained in City status in the United Kingdom. And I quote:

The Manchester case established a precedent that any municipal borough in which an Anglican see was established was entitled to petition for city status. Accordingly, Truro, St Albans, Liverpool, Newcastle upon Tyne and Wakefield were all officially designated as cities between 1877 and 1888. This was not without opposition from the Home Office, who dismissed St Albans as "a fourth or fifth rate market town" and objected to Wakefield's elevation on grounds of population. In one new diocese, Southwell, a city was not created, because Southwell was a village without a borough corporation and therefore could not petition the Queen. The diocese covered the counties of Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire, and the boroughs of Derby and Nottingham were disappointed that they would not be able to claim the title of city.

And apparently Southwell has been called a city (in error):

However, well into the twentieth century it was often assumed that the presence of a cathedral was sufficient to elevate a town to city status, and that for cathedral cities the city charters were recognising its city status rather than granting it. On this basis, the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica said that Southwell and St Asaph were cities.

Lozleader (talk) 13:38, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

When will the new Jubilee cities exist?

All the sources say words to the effect that a town will acquire city status, implying it hasn't actually happened yet. So when will the new Jubilee cities officially come into existence? -- Dr Greg  talk  01:27, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

Population

Should there be a population column? That is quite an important thing about a city. Frodomacdowell (talk) 17:17, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

Well some of them have no formal boundaries, therefore no population figures (Stirling, Newry, Inverness)Lozleader (talk) 21:20, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

London's population figures are incorrect... I bet there are some zeros missing. ;) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.222.203.29 (talk) 16:01, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

No, there are no zeros missing. The City of London covers a very small area, and is largely made up of commercial buildings, with very few people living there. What most people think of as London is the area of the former Greater London Council, which equates to the ceremonial counties of Greater London and City of London, and also to the government region of London, which is now governed by the Mayor of London and London Assembly. The City of London is governed by the Lord Mayor of London and City of London Corporation. Greater London, in addition to the City of London, also includes the City of Westminster and 32 London boroughs, at least two of which have unsuccessfully applied for city status themselves: Croydon and Southwark. Skinsmoke (talk) 02:40, 2 August 2012 (UTC)

Royal Burgh - Perth and Scottish cities

Perth was a Royal burgh, granted in 1210. Many of the other cities in the Scottish section have their date of Royal burgh status even though these were abolished in 1975. Why shouldn't Perth have its date cited? --Bob247 (talk) 05:04, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

Good point, it does look inconsistent. I think that the royal burgh dates were added to Edinburgh and Glasgow as they have no formal date of city grant, but have a long civic history, and have enjoyed city status for a long unbroken period of time.
On the other hand Inverness and Stirling were royal burghs pre 1975 but this does not get a mention.
Perth is a unique case in that it is a restoration of a status once enjoyed by the extinct royal burgh. So there is a break and the link to the former burgh is less relevant.
However it might be an idea to note that the status was formerly held by the extinct burgh in a footnote. This would probably cover all the angles/bases. 12:02, 14 October 2012 (UTC)
Had a go Lozleader (talk) 12:38, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

London

I'm sure this has been raised (potentially many times) before, but why is London as a whole not on the list, rather than just the City of London and Westminster? It might not be a city in the traditional royal charter sense but then neither are Glasgow or Edinburgh, yet they remain on the list. They are on the list I suspect because while they may not have any official status as a city, they are self-evidently very large cities, Glasgow especially, when taking into account its suburbs (which I am aware are no within the remit of this page).

Similarly, London is self-evidently a city, indeed it is the largest in the EU. Is it not just not included for a pedantic reason? Very few in this country or around the world would dispute that London is a city and practically no-one who lives in London would deny it either. There is no formal criteria laid out in the article but I guess that the list is taken straight from the official government list, which states 'London' but doesn't specify which it refers to (The City or Greater London). --ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 03:27, 18 November 2012 (UTC)

Glasgow and Edinburgh ARE recognised as cities with status awarded by the Crown: see the official list: [5] In each case the city status is for the unitary authority area and not the wider conutrbation.
This list article was originally split out from City status in the United Kingdom where it was taking up too much space. That article should hopefully answer your questions.Lozleader (talk) 16:37, 18 November 2012 (UTC)

Population Lists: Why not just the United Kingdom & Rankings?

Hello, I was just wondering why Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland are in seperate lists instead of one list (United Kingdom)? I believe that they should be in the same list, as the United Kingdom is a soveriegn state and it makes a much easier comparison between other cities - eg Glasgow and Manchester or Cardiff and Londonderry (Derry). Thanks, 31.53.2.52 (talk) 17:01, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

I also think that Ranks should be added in a seperate column - as it makes comparing cities much easier. 31.53.2.52 (talk) 17:03, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

I agree, the United Kingdom is a soveriegn state, why must Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland have seperate tables simply because they are Constituent Countries? It's like seperating states into differing tables in the United States. Italay90 (talk) 15:22, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

Disagree. Considering each country individually is common practice on many UK articles and works perfectly well here. Regards Fishiehelper2 (talk) 15:40, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

I had to revert changes by User:Italay90 as they completely broke the page. I don't think there was any consensus for such a major change in any case.Lozleader (talk) 16:30, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

PS here is a screenshot of how the broken page [6] looked:

Lozleader (talk) 16:44, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

Oh I fixed the page -- if you simply looked at the previous article you would have noticed the miss typing of " - - ! >" which should have been "- - >" (causing the table to break). Italay90 (talk) 15:42, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

Consensus on whether the article should be "United Kingdom" or "Scotland","England","Wales" and "Northern Ireland"

PS: The reason I believe it should be one table is because articles already exist consisting of seperate tables (eg - Scotland). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Italay90 (talk • contribs) 15:45, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

Oppose, per Fishiehelper2. Please gain consensus here first before making unnecessary changes to the longstanding consensus of this article. Daicaregos (talk) 16:47, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
Okay, well I'm for it - which means only 3 people have given their opinion on the matter yet Lozleader appears to be against merging the table. Italay90 (talk) 17:02, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
Oppose, per Lozleader, Fishiehelper2 and Daicaregos. 4-1. Ghmyrtle (talk) 17:19, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
4-2 (Oppose: Fishiehelper2, Ghmyrtle, Daicaregos, Lozleader(assumed) For: Italay90, User:31.53.2.52 (assumed))
Italay90 (talk) 16:17, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
Er, to be honest I'd remove the population column altogether - especially as some places eg Inverness and Stirling and Newry don't really have any formal boundaries. We seem to have found some sort of figures but that is veering towards original research. The Northern Ireland figures don't have references either. I see I already discussed this above some years ago! The column was introduced by an anonymous IP in July 2011, who plucked population figures out of the air.
As far as the list broken up into countries, I don't see any problem with it, HM Government seems to make the distinction eg here [phttp://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/+/http://www.dca.gov.uk/constitution/city/citygj.htm] and they have been very careful to make sure they give out something to a place in each of the four territories in the last few competitions.
The guiding principle should of course be to convey information in a clear form, backed up with reliable references. Other than that I'm not pushed.
I actually assumed that User:Italay90 and User:312.53.32.52 were the same person, given their identical spelling errors ("soveriegn" and "seperate"). I apologise, although they can hardly be considered a major editor (2 anonymous edits to a talk page).Lozleader (talk) 18:30, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Oppose. This is not a list of population centres in the United Kingdom. It is a list of cities. The jurisdictions of England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland have separate histories of what constitutes a city, as to which see City status in the United Kingdom. It makes sense to list them separately. It might be more logical to combine the lists for England and Wales, but I don't think one list for the whole United Kingdom is warranted or helpful to the reader.GSTQ (talk) 03:32, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

  • Comment - Whilst perfectly good reasons have been given above for why there are separate lists, I don't think we should assume that uninformed readers will necessarily know that the countries of the UK have differences. If we are not going to merge the lists then this needs to be highlighted in the lead, where at the moment there isn't a clear explanation. Green Giant (talk) 00:43, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Population/London note

Just thinking about the average person using this list: it seems rather odd that when you sort the list by population descending, London is nowhere to be found. I understand that this relates to the technical definition of "city" and so on, but still. Even when you go to the entry for Birmingham you are informed that it's the second largest city in England, but on this list it's certainly #1.

Is it possible to put a short paragraph in the introduction explaining why this is? I think it's confusing and liable to confuse other users who can't puzzle out the reason. I don't want to just add some text myself because I don't really know what to say. 71.198.222.71 (talk) 04:54, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

Fair comment: this list was split out from the article City status in the United Kingdom which explains the situation in more detail. Will have a think and see what can be done... Lozleader (talk) 09:21, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

Brighton & Hove and Wolverhampton

If these cities were not ordained until the letters patent of 31 January 2001 why is 2000 given as the date city status was granted? (BigTurnip (talk) 13:23, 22 June 2011 (UTC))

See the conversation at Talk:City status in the United Kingdom#Inverness — when was it granted city status? Lozleader (talk) 19:25, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Because they were Cities for the Millenium by Royal Charter, but the paperwork took a year or more to be completed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 145.30.124.14 (talk) 12:19, 13 November 2013 (UTC)

Portsmouth - wrong picture

The picture of Portsmouth is not of Portsmouth. Although you can see the Spinnaker Tower in the background, the foreground, including the lake, flats and church are all in Gosport which is a separate town on the western side of Portsmouth Harbour. I know that elsewhere it is argued that Gosport is part of the greater Portsmouth area, but there really should be a picture of Portsmouth proper here. Could someone not use one from the Portsmouth-related pages? DewiMR (talk) 11:20, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

I fully agree Dewi, but it doesn't appear to have been changed in the 2 years since you mentioned it. Interesting that Portsmouth has a Catholic Catherdral to add into the discussion on city status. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 145.30.124.14 (talk) 12:28, 13 November 2013 (UTC)

Northern Ireland

The districts of Northern Ireland will be changing (and reducing to 11 in number) in 2015. Don't know if this will affect the cities of Northern Ireland? Perhaps the article will have to be updated in some way? Argovian (talk) 20:15, 23 March 2014 (UTC)

Reform of local government in Northern Ireland#Second scheme: eleven districts Argovian (talk) 20:30, 23 March 2014 (UTC)
Well, it looks like the City of Belfast will be gaining area and population, some of which (c. 27,000 people/4.2 square miles) will be at the expense of the City of Lisburn.[1]Lozleader (talk) 13:23, 17 May 2014 (UTC)
On further investigation, although Lisburn is to retain its city status, it looks very much like it will cease to have any formal boundaries:

Lisburn City and Castlereagh Borough Council (which is also losing areas to Belfast City Council) will merge together later this year and will form a new Shadow Council. Lisburn will retain its city status, which was granted by Her Majesty the Queen as part of her Golden Jubilee Celebrations in 2001. The name of the new council is set out as Lisburn City and Castlereagh District Council.[2]

Lozleader (talk) 13:29, 17 May 2014 (UTC)

  1. ^ "Local government reform". Belfast City Council. Retrieved 17 May 2014.
  2. ^ "Review of Public Administration". Lisburn City Council. Retrieved 17 May 2014.

Merging Articles & London population

I'd like to repost the idea of merging the "Scotland", "England", "Wales" and "Northern Ireland" sections, as, I think it will offer readers a better comparison of city populations, which currently, is difficult to do between all areas of the United Kingdom (eg. Glasgow/Birmingham, Edinburgh/Cardiff, Belfast/Swansea). It would also give a clearer idea of which cities in the United Kingdom are largest/smallest which again, is awkward to do. Also, separate articles of settlement listings have already been made for all regions in the United Kingdom respectively, which provide information on the city-status of each settlement, rendering this article virtually pointless.

I understand this article is a sub-article of City status in the United Kingdom, but it has also replaced the article listing all city populations of the United Kingdom - It annoys me of the arrogance of whoever made this article, as they seemed to assume that "City Status in the United Kingdom" was more important than the old article, which in fact listed London's proper population (approximately 8 million). I see no reason for this article, it is only an extension of another article... (Content boxes do exist).

London's population is another issue for me. It's listed in a number of articles as the population found on the London article which is 8,308,369. I realise this has been talked about before, but the article prior to this used this population. It maybe formally not recognised as a city but the majority of people in the United Kingdom would name it a city - and the London article itself defines London as a city frequently which is contradictory to this article and the City Status of the United Kingdom article. Italay90 (talk) 14:46, 6 September 2013 (UTC) No response for 6 months, I have decided therefore to change the article as I am the only participant of this chat. Italay90 (talk) 11:03, 17 May 2014 (UTC)

Ah well, the talk page went unnoticed. I think the article you want is List of urban areas in the United Kingdom. There is actually a note at the top of the list pointing to that article but perhaps it needs to be more explicit. One could also make a case for renaming the current list as "List of places holding city status in the United Kingdom" or something but then one gets caught in a sort of weird loop of linguistic logic. And if we do that to London (eliminating the City and Westminster) then we shall find ourselves merging Birmingham with Wolverhampton, Manchester with Salford, Leeds with Bradford.
Personally I think we could do without the population column at all. Where city status is specifically granted to a local government district or civil parish/community then we should be able to find something in the census, but some cities such as Newry and Inverness have no formal boundaries and therefore I'm not sure where the population figures can come from. Lozleader (talk) 13:15, 17 May 2014 (UTC)
I totally disagree and believe that you shouldn't undo my entire editing because you disagree with one aspect of it? Italay90 (talk) 13:32, 17 May 2014 (UTC)
This page also overwrite another page which listed London as a city, and despite it not having offical recognition as being a city it is often regarded as being so by the people of the UK and the international community - is it not regarded as the "capital" of the UK? If so how can it not be regarded as a city? Italay90 (talk) 13:37, 17 May 2014 (UTC)
I have reverted Italay90's recent changes. My position is simple: I came to this page seeking information about the relative sizes of the City of Westminster and the City of London, and when I couldn't find the information came to the "Talk" page to complain. Instead, I found this discussion going on.
I'd like to remind other editors that no editor owns any Wikipedia page. It is not only against our practices to mark an edit "DO NOT REVERT" in angry capitals, it is rude. Italay90 is right that large-scale changes to a page should ideally be discussed by interested editors on Talk pages, but it is often the case that talk pages are ignored, and only a change to the content of an article will actually get the debate under way. This is clearly what has happened here.
There is, however, an additional point. Italay90 has been disingenuous in seeking to re-start a debate that was, in fact, settled a few months before his posting above. Italay90 was active in that earlier debate, and clearly understood the outcome. To keep arguing simply because you don't like the outcome of a debate is not acceptable: it goes against community standards, and makes it difficult to assume good faith. If there had been a material change in the content of the article, or if a longer time had passed, it would be reasonable to re-assess the situation then, but this is not the case here.
As for the article itself: it seems to me obvious that it should include separate entries of the Cities of London and Westminster. Yes, we sometimes call the whole conurbation "London", but the truth is that this is a metonym: "London" is made up of the City of London, the City of Westminster, The Borough (which has its own cathedral, but isn't a city(not to mention another cathedral, but one that customarily does not convey city status)), Camden, Chelsea, Hackney, Islington, and the rest, and various urban districts and customary villages. Further, it seems natural to me to keep the article divided by country. The United Kingdom is a unique country, in that we are not a single state, but are made up of parts, each with its own rights and privileges stretching back for thousands of years. We are "better together", but what makes us better is our ability to acknowledge our diversity. RomanSpa (talk) 05:02, 18 May 2014 (UTC)
Yet this article has no true purpose, it replaced a previous article which listed city proper populations in the United Kingdom.
As for dividing each table into each segment of the UK - the information is already in existence on wikipedia and easily available for each separate part of the UK? (See: City status in the United Kingdom#List of officially designated cities,List of towns and cities in Scotland by population, List of localities in Northern Ireland by population, List of localities in England by population & List of localities in Wales by population). If we do not merge the tables then this article is frankly rendered pointless. Merging them provides us with a comparison of each city in the United Kingdom and makes it more convenient. Populations do not equal 'culture', there are listings for Europe, the European Union, the world - are you telling me they all deserve separate listings for 'cultural' reasons? Why, even Spain has a better approach to us despite it's numeriois cultural divides. Italay90 (talk) 08:35, 18 May 2014 (UTC)
I have no strong feelings for or against merging the lists, but we have to use the official definition of "city"; we can't just guess at an unofficial definition. It's already been mentioned that there are lists such as List of localities in England by population, etc, and these "localities", I think, more closely resemble the popular, unofficial notion of "city". I suppose one option would be to add an extra column to this article's tables listing the population of the settlement that has the same name as the city, but we would have to agree on an unambiguous source-backed definition for that column. -- Dr Greg  talk  14:13, 18 May 2014 (UTC)
It's worth noting, per our article at city proper, that the UK "do not report City Proper data" (to the UN). RomanSpa (talk) 14:58, 18 May 2014 (UTC)

Map

Here's a map I made using the information on the page. Perhaps someone with more patience than me can fix the labels so they don't overlap and disambiguate links where necessary. Stevvers (talk) 08:06, 22 August 2014 (UTC)

You should make a request at Wikipedia:Graphics Lab/Map workshop. Ghmyrtle (talk) 08:53, 22 August 2014 (UTC)
class=notpageimage|
Location of cities in the United Kingdom
Hello, lovely map - I've attempted to fix it but I am not sure about how readable it is. I decided to use "unofficial" names for Stoke-upon-Trent, the City of London and the City of Westminster so that names do not intersect (I assume this is okay considering you have used Derry instead of the official name "Londonderry"?).
class=notpageimage|
Location of cities in the United Kingdom

Italay90 (talk) 18:52, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

I will add this to the article, towards the bottom. Argovian (talk) 12:52, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

Wells 1205

Where did this date for Wells becoming a city come from? Looking through the article history, someone added it unreferenced about twelve years ago and it has since stuck (and has been repeated elsewhere on Wikipedia and indeed other websites). But I can't discover what it could refer to..?? Argovian (talk) 17:18, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

Looking into it a lot more, I still can't find where the 1205 date comes from, with the city becoming the principal seat of the Bishop of Bath and Wells from 1245 (it had previously been the seat of the Bishop of Wells from 909 to 1090). Several other cities with similar early/unclear city status dates have been described as time immemorial - and quite a few have changed in this article from a given date to this description (looking through the history) presumably because of an uncertain (or simply pre-1066) 'first' date - so I'm wondering if Wells should also be given that description? If not, 1245 would be my second choice... but 1205 seems to be "made up", unless someone can point out otherwise! Argovian (talk) 18:22, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

Carlisle

On a similar note, Carlisle's date should surely be 1133, when the diocese was formed and the church became a cathedral? Argovian (talk) 17:22, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

Smallest cities list - needs update

Would be great if we could get List of smallest cities in the United Kingdom updated with 2011 (or more recent even) populations. Argovian (talk) 12:50, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

I have all the latest populations for cities in England and Wales compiled in this article (haven't updated the "Smallest cities" article yet, which still uses only 2001 figures) - but will leave Scotland and Northern Ireland for others to look into. The latter is perhaps problematic due to 2014/5 changes to the districts there?
In any case, England & Wales is sorted and reveals that Ely has surged ahead of Ripon and Truro. Argovian (talk) 18:37, 14 March 2015 (UTC)

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Bradford Cathedral

Why is Bradford's Cathedral (https://wiki.riteme.site/wiki/Bradford_Cathedral) not mentioned next to Bradford? It's Church of England according to the Wikipedia link here. It's been there since "time immemorial". Just an error or some complicated reason?

188.29.164.115 (talk) 22:38, 8 March 2016 (UTC)

Presumably because the cathedral column is for pre-1888 cathedrals whereas Bradford only became a cathedral city in 1919. Keith D (talk) 00:03, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

Advertising Standards Authority?

It seems rather weird to me that: "Elevations to city status are now won through competitions and pretenders to the status are rebuked by the Advertising Standards Authority." The ASA granting City Status? Could someone look into this, it is highly dubious and illogical. That is why I added the "citation needed" template. It makes no sense, maybe the ASA might punish non-cities advertising themselves as cities. But even that seems dubious.Jtrrs0 (talk) 21:15, 5 June 2016 (UTC)  Done

post-1066 cities

I have given dates for post-1066 cities rather than describing their beginnings as "time immemorial" - these are the dates when the Diocesan See is recorded as having moved to that place, making it a city. This leaves a handful of cities that date their status to before the Norman conquest as described as time immemorial. Sumorsǣte (talk) 18:23, 7 October 2016 (UTC)

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Cathedrals in the table

May I open a discussion on this - there's been a recent edit in the article where cathedrals Anglican and Roman Catholic, and Scottish kirks of all years have been added to the list - it's confusing to the casual reader as of course since 1888 any new cathedrals didn't apply to decisions involving a new city. There is a note in the table about the status applying only before that year, but I think if you want see a list of current cathedrals, go to the Cathedrals article. Ideally we should really have consensus on what is best for the table, list them all and highlight/italic pre-1888 ones, or simply remove all bar the ones that applied towards city status. Could we have some arguments regarding that table column.

The Equalizer (talk) 02:23, 6 October 2018 (UTC)

I think we should remove all the post-1888 cathedrals. But to dissuade other editors from putting them back, the heading for the column should be made more explicit e.g. "Anglican Cathredral (pre-1888 cities only)" or something similar (not just hidden in a footnote), and maybe for emphasis an explanatory sentence immediately above the table. --  Dr Greg  talk  13:13, 6 October 2018 (UTC)
After leaving this for 2 weeks with only the above response from Dr Greg, and also taking advice from Keith D on his talk page (thanks both), I have now removed from the table post-1888 cathedrals in England/Wales, any from Northern Ireland/Scotland, and added a simple explanatory note above it. Regards --The Equalizer (talk) 17:52, 19 October 2018 (UTC)
I should add that I left off the term 'Anglican' to the Cathedral table heading because the Church of England was affiliated originally to Roman Catholicism before Henry VIII's English Reformation, and could confuse further as some may construe that the Anglican period is from 1534 to present day only (or am I overthinking it?). --The Equalizer (talk) 13:11, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

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Derry/Londonderry

The official name of Derry is Londonderry according to the article. Can we at least put AKA Londonderry in this article? Op47 (talk) 13:12, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

See WP:DERRY, no Stroke City style constructions. FDW777 (talk) 13:52, 31 August 2020 (UTC)
Ok Op47 (talk) 20:38, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

Revert of collapsible option

I had a review of that change here and am of the thinking that it could be a stroke of genius. The table of cities is lengthy, and having that collapsible option does mean:

  • the remaining portion of the article below it can be reached with one click
  • on first view of the article the full table is displayed anyway. A specific reader collapsing the table within their browser for their convenience does not affect this default view of the article for other viewers.

I think in fact that it's a rather good idea to keep the option, a simple functionality change that does do some good.
I will notify the editor who removed it so that it can be discussed.
Regards,
--The Equalizer (talk) 02:02, 17 January 2021 (UTC)

Admittedly, I see one caveat with the option, you have to be at the top of the table to shrink it, bah...
--The Equalizer (talk) 02:25, 17 January 2021 (UTC)
I do see what you're saying, but people are coming to this article to see the details in that list so it just seems superfluous to me. Canterbury Tail talk 03:19, 17 January 2021 (UTC)

I've added a link for Stoke-on-Trent (note 28), following earlier editors examples for other cities. I assume most if not all the London Gazette pages are now on-line, so please can editors add some more. Thanks! John a s (talk) 11:41, 11 April 2021 (UTC)

"Church in Wales" in list of cities

I've changed the list header from "... dioceses of the Church of England and Church of Wales created up to 1888 ..." to "... Anglican dioceses in England and Wales created before 1889 ...".

There was no Church in Wales (or "Church of Wales") before 1920, so no dioceses could have been created for it before 1888. This wording is my way of suggesting what would now be the Church of England and Church in Wales without raising the subject of church history.

The article doesn't mention Gibraltar, so I think this is at least an accurate description of the list.

Does this make sense to people? Aoeuidhtns (talk) 12:32, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

Yes to me, though I have tweaked your wlinks a little to avoid WP:egg, so that it reads
  • In the Cathedral column in the table, only Anglican dioceses created before 1889 in England and Wales had an effect on city status.
  • created with In the Cathedral column in the table, only [[Anglican Communion|Anglican]] [[Historical development of Church of England dioceses#Details of cathedrals and their foundation|dioceses created before 1889]] in England and Wales [[City status in the United Kingdom#1889–1907|had an effect on city status]].
Better?
BTW, Gibraltar is irrelevant anyway because it is not in the UK. Ditto Isle of Man, Channel Islands etc. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 14:42, 17 May 2021 (UTC)
Thanks, it does flow better like that. And I only mentioned Gibraltar because it had a Church of England diocese in 1889 (and still does). Aoeuidhtns (talk) 18:20, 19 May 2021 (UTC)

Where do all the dates come from?

I was just looking at Ely, which I notice has 1109 as its year confirmed or granted city status. But the reference for Ely is just the 1974 Letters Patent, and WP's own article on Ely also states that Ely is considered a city by ancient prescriptive right, only confirmed as having city status in 1974. There is no reference in the article on Ely to anything happening in 1109 that might have influenced our view of its status. I don't think we should have random dates in this list page unless we can state what happened in that year to justify the date. I wouldn't mind the date if someone could point to a reference saying it's the earliest mention of Ely as a city, or something like that. I wouldn't mind it changing to 1974. But I object strongly to a random, unexplained "1109". The problem probably extends to other cities in the list too. Any thoughts? Elemimele (talk) 12:50, 26 March 2022 (UTC)

It's the date the cathedral/diocese was established. Older versions of the article just put the term Time Immemorial but a past editor has been putting some of the dates in. Have a read of the other city article, specifically this section City_status_in_the_United_Kingdom#City_status_conferment which explains why those older places were regarded as cities although not always explicitly granted as such. --The Equalizer (talk) 13:45, 26 March 2022 (UTC)
Just noticed that the prior editor explained their rationale further back up the page in the #post-1066_cities section. The Equalizer (talk) 14:01, 26 March 2022 (UTC)
Thanks, The Equalizer. A couple of comments: (1) If that is the rationale, then it would be helpful were it stated above the actual list, and not just here in the talk-page. But (2) I don't think it's a historically-true or logical rationale. The convention that a cathedral converted a town into a city didn't arise until centuries after 1109, centuries after Ely got its see, so it didn't become a city in 1109; instead, the fact it got its see in 1109 paved the way for it to be defined as a city much later. Logically, if we're going to pick the date that the See arrived as the date a place became a city because that was once the definition of a city, then for others we must also pick the date that a place with good local government and local metropolitan character acquired its 300,000th resident, as this is just as much a formal definition of a city as was having a cathedral (and in years to come, say 2043, if anyone decides to define a city as a place with an extraordinarily large Amazon depot, we'd have to define Dumferline retrospectively as having become a city in 2005 or whenever Amazon opened their warehouse there; if this definition ever gains traction, I think it would be more sensible as defining Dumferline as having become a city in 2043). (3) If we're going to have that date, then the column absolutely must have a different header. It's definitely not the "Year granted or confirmed". It's "Foundation of See, or legal grant of city status (as appropriate)". Sumorsǣte, any thoughts on what we should do to clarify? Sorry, I'm probably being horribly pedantic about this. Elemimele (talk) 19:51, 26 March 2022 (UTC)
The simplest thing would be to set the pre-Reformation dates back to Time Immemorial, as there were confirmations from government of those legacy cities long before the formal charters of the 1970's (in many cases they needed to be reissued regardless because of the local council reorganisations), and saves having a single table column having to explain multiple establishing definitions. --The Equalizer (talk) 21:59, 27 March 2022 (UTC)

Cathedrals or Minsters?

The column listed "Cathedral" sometimes says "Not applicable", as is the case for Kingston upon Hull. Should it not say that some of the places have a minster, which is the case for Hull? YTKJ (talk) 19:24, 1 April 2022 (UTC)

Not at all. Until 1888 only cathedrals counted in regards to city status so the column is focused on those, the sub heading stating (pre-1889 England & Wales only), Hull got its honour after that in 1897 on its own merit. Just checked the Hull article, the minster was only granted its title in 2013. Regards, --The Equalizer (talk) 23:07, 1 April 2022 (UTC)
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