GEN-MEDIEVAL-L ArchivesArchiver > GEN-MEDIEVAL > 2006-09 > 1159054824
From: "Peter Stewart" <>
Subject: Re: use of word, "pretender"
Date: Sat, 23 Sep 2006 23:42:07 GMT
References: <VN-dnbVBzd4Gs4nYRVny2Q@bt.com><006201c6df1b$44b40f80$6401a8c0@HP> <email@example.com>
<> wrote in message
> Actually, I differ from Chris's point of view. The word Pretender can
> in some circumstances be used simply to describe someone who would be
> king if circumstances were different and who maintains (or has not
> renounced) his claim. When I talk about the French Pretender [not that
> I often get the occasion to, but you know what I mean], I mean the head
> of the Orleanist house, whose claims to me seem the best of the bunch.
> I don't do this in a derogatory sense, but because it's the easiest way
> to refer to him. I wouldn't call him The King of France or the de-jure
> king or somesuch, because he isn't a king - he's merely a claimant to a
> (no longer existant) throne.
Is he? Last I heard he was living as a citizen of the French Republic, a
condition that practically - and morally - negates any claim be sovereign of
If he does maintain a bogus claim and you refer to him as "the French
Pretender" in the context described, rather than, say, "the Orleanist
pretender", you risk being misinterpreted, since others might assume you
mean the Bonapartist or the Bourbon counterpart. I doubt whether supporters
of the Prince Napoleon or the duke of Anjou would understand the count of
Paris to be "the French Pretender" without your explaining the preference.
These three don't exactly make a "bunch" either.
|Re: use of word, "pretender" by "Peter Stewart" <>|