Talk:Harris (surname)

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Proposed change to Harris primary topic

Resolved

At present if you type "Harris" into the wikipedia search box you are taken to the Isle of Harrises entry! As there are many uses of the word Harris it has been proposed to change this so that when you type "Harris" you are taken to the Harris (disambiguation) page instead.

If you support/oppose this move or have any comments please add your input to the Harris Talk page.

Thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by WickerWiki (talk • contribs) 18:47, 29 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree.--EchetusXe (talk) 17:13, 1 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Harris now is a disambiguation page. --Una Smith (talk) 19:38, 8 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Great!--EchetusXe (talk) 20:38, 8 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Son of Harry

This page continues to refer to "son of Harry" as the origin of the name with no reference. The name appears in other languages and cultures. It is a common Jewish name originating in Poland, for instance. The article needs amendment to delete this reference as the name is not solely British nor is their any evidence to suggest it is a corruption of "son of Harry". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 31.209.102.105 (talk) 14:21, 21 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

There is no reference to support the statement that Harris means "son of Harry". The article later says that Henri means "home ruler". This comes from the Germanic "Heinrich" from "hein" which is similar to the Scots "hame" and "rich" for "king", which is simply a Scots pronunciation of the old English "heorth" which means "place of fire", the "th" being a suffix denoting "place" or "condition of". This suggests that Harris may be an Old English word for "fire lord/ruler" rather than "home lord/ruler" from "heorþ" and "rix".Burdenedwithtruth (talk) 09:11, 14 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

From Wiktionary:

heorþ

Etymology

From Proto-Germanic *herþaz, from Proto-Indo-European *ker- (“heat; fire”). Cognate with Old Frisian herth, hirth (West Frisian hurd), Old Saxon herth, herþ, Dutch haard, Old High German herd, hert (German Herd); the Germanic root is also reflected in Old Norse hyrr ‘fire’, Gothic 𐌷𐌰𐌿𐍂𐌹 (hauri) ‘coal’.

rix

Etymology

From Middle English rixen, from Old English rīxian, rīcsian (“to exercise or have power, rule, bear rule, govern, reign, domineer, dominate, tyrannize, exercise violence, prevail”), from Proto-Germanic *rīkisōną (“to rule”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₃reǵ- (“chief, king”). Cognate with Middle High German richsen (“to reign”), Lithuanian rikis (“knight”). More at riche.Burdenedwithtruth (talk) 15:52, 25 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I have removed the section entitled "Meaning" until proper sources can be provided. There is no source for the suggestion that Harris means son of Harry or that it was a name introduced by the Normans. As the rest of the article shows, it is a name which has variations in other Indo-European languages where it is not derived from Henri. See, for instance, the William name page which describes the Germanic origin of that name.Burdenedwithtruth (talk) 19:37, 12 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Well said...

"This suggests that Harris may be an Old English word for "fire lord/ruler" rather than "home lord/ruler" from "heorþ" and "rix""

And indeed, 'fire lord ruler' is codified my the NWO in the name "Bomber HARRIS" and his HARRYING (burnt offering) of Dresden. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.1.69.20 (talk) 04:50, 20 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Your edits at Harris (surname)

Relocated from User talk:William Harris to this Talk page, as being the appropriate place for discussion.

User:William Harris, You need to stop adding dubious and poorly-sourced information to the Harris surname page. Firstly, the page relates to the family name. Second, there are several origins of the family name, which I dealt with in the etymology section. Thirdly, the name is not exclusively Scottish (nor is it even common among Scots) so please do not edit the infobox to suggest such a thing.

Several of the sources you cite refer to Harris as a place-name (see Isle of Harris), not as a family name, therefore they are strictly unwelcome here.

The allusion to Ancestry.com refers only to user contributions, and not to items added by Ancestry themselves sourced from books on family names.

Your edits will be reversed. JoeyofScotia (talk) 13:19, 5 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

JoeyofScotia, the appropriate Wikipedia policy WP:BRD is called "BOLD, revert, discuss" and not "BOLD, revert, you revert, discuss" -were you aware of that? William Harris (talk) 11:53, 6 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed it is called BRD and not BRRD, but the page had been relatively stable for a year before you completely rewrote it beginning in May. As such, that is the appropriate starting point for BRD to be invoked, not the point after your changes but before the pushback against them. Agricolae (talk) 13:07, 6 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Agricolae:, your position is not clear. Are you stating that my rewrite was the Bold, and some time later JoeyofScotia provided the Revert? William Harris (talk) 11:24, 7 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I am saying that an editor does not get to competely change the focus and content of a previously-stable article unilatterally, and then insist that anyone wanting to bring it back in line with what was there before must first achieve consensus through discussion. The frame of reference for BRD is the previous stable version, not 'My changes, but then no one else's'. Agricolae (talk) 13:04, 7 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

With no edits to the article since September 2020, apart from one IP and your revert of it in April, then my edits in May, I must concede to you that the article was stable. JoeyofScotia did not revert the article back to how it was in April, he made selective edits to parts of the article, and some parts that I have placed there remain. Therefore, BRD applies and your position is rebutted on the facts. William Harris (talk) 11:19, 8 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Drop the Wikilawyering. Nobody else is impressed. The last stable version (April) and the current version are both superior to the August intermediate that I would have reverted had I noticed, so if you push this BRD issue with JoeyofScotia, I am just going to take it back to April and we can start again. In the end, it will end up looking a lot more like the current page than the August version, so let's just save everyone the hastle and work with what we have. Agricolae (talk) 05:22, 9 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I find it fascinating that you were the one that raised a slippery take on the facts that could not be supported, then when challenged you resort to claiming that others are Wikilawyering. It was a case of WP:BRD, plain and simple. As for your proposed changes, I remind you that the page is still under discussion between Joey and I. There is no rule that says you cannot edit, but it is poor etiquette to my mind. As for your comment of "I am just going to take it back to April", WP:OWN William Harris (talk) 10:56, 9 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

There is no such rule of etiquitte that lets an editor wanting to completely change a page to pick one other editor to face off against and exclude everyone else. Anyhow, you may not think you are done with JoeyofScotia, but they seem to be done with you, particularly since all you are doing is harping on an issue that has been resolved already (there are no Ancestry references on the page at present). As to OWN, get real. You show up out of the blue, completely rewrite the page, suggest that BRD prevents the first editor who pushes back from making changes to your preferred version, while etiquitte prevents any other editors from making changes, so it will just have to stay the way you want it to be and anyoen who says otherwise is tryong to OWN the page? Here is the thing. Everything JoeyofScotia found fault with was indeed faulty. Books about Scottish placenames are not relevant sources for surnames (it is at best WP:SYNTH to apply them as such, if not full-blown WP:OR); it isn't relevant whether Harrison appears as a surname in Domesday even were it true (probably not) because Harrison is only related in the sense that it arose by an analogous process, as did every other patronymic surname; and most importantly, the article shouldn't follow the quirky self-published opinion of a 19th-century North-England diletant instead of the more generally-accepted origin found in a 21st century WP:RS. It is not OWNing an article to agree with another editor that such changes were not an improvement. Agricolae (talk) 17:37, 9 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@JoeyofScotia:, I will take my non-answered question to you above as "no", which might explain why you chose to comment on my talk page rather than the article page per WP:BRDDISCUSS, where other editors would find it difficult to discuss.

Regarding your comment of "The allusion to Ancestry.com refers only to user contributions, and not to items added by Ancestry themselves sourced from books on family names", after this supporting statement you then removed it as a reference. Can you explain this contradiction, please? William Harris (talk) 11:24, 7 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I understand that you are an intermittent user such as myself; my question can wait for your return. I am in no rush. William Harris (talk) 11:25, 8 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Welsh origin of Irish surname and Plantation of Ulster

Following edits made by User:Zacwill which assert that the name in Ireland is "largely as a result of the Plantation of Ulster". This is sourced from Hanks' Dictionary of American Family names which by design is not a holistic discussion of the names origins. As such, my subsequent edit incorporated this but was again removed 1263227124 on the basis that "Harris is not only or primarily a "Welsh surname" and its presence in Ireland has nothing to do with the "Cambro-Norman invasion", again citing the Dictionary of American Family names.

I have added a source which specifically states that while Harris was popular in both England and Wales at the time of the invasion (and therefore) it's origin as either English or Welsh is debated, it was indeed brought to Ireland in the Cambro-Norman invasion. Cymrogogoch (talk) 15:47, 16 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Cymrogogoch: There are a few problems with your version of the article. Firstly, your lead states that Harris is a "Welsh patronymic surname" – as I understand it, the name arose in England first and only later came to be used in Wales, as an anglicization of the Welsh ap Harri. Secondly, the Victorian source appears to be junk. I cannot find any suggestion elsewhere that the name arose from Old Norse, Dutch, or Flemish. Thirdly, your new source is very equivocal about whether the presence of the name in Ireland has anything to do with medieval Welshmen settling there. Harris is included in a list of names which are "too rare in Wales or too common in England to be a clear indicator of Welshness". Zacwill (talk) 15:45, 17 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]