Talk:Dumfries: Difference between revisions – Wikipedia

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“Threave Castle in Castle Douglas, home to the Douglas Clan of James Douglas who fought with Robert the Bruce”

This statement is fairly good nonsense. The source link is dead. The castle is a ruin and was simply a stronghold of the Earls of Douglas in the 14th and 15th centuries. The historic centre of the Douglas family was, not surprisingly, Douglas in Lanarkshire. “home to the Douglas clan” is fairly meaningless in this context. I am substituting an amended version of the opening lines of the linked article on Threave. “Built in the 1370s by Archibald the Grim, it was a stronghold of the “Black Douglases”, Earls of Douglas and Lords of Galloway, until their fall in 1455.

JF42 (talk) 13:41, 26 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I notice that under notable people there is no mention of Robert McVitie. The founder of McVities biscuits. He was born in Dumfries in 1809 and served an apprenticeship in the town before moving to Edinburgh age 25 where he opened a bakery and went on to be as well known as it is today. 2A02:C7C:7675:6F00:6081:CEAA:36E7:15C5 (talk) 19:43, 17 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

References? Murgatroyd49 (talk) 20:13, 17 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McVitie’s?wprov=sfti1# 2A02:C7C:7675:6F00:6081:CEAA:36E7:15C5 (talk) 21:31, 17 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry not a good link for reference but on McVities Wikipedia page under history it gives a little info 2A02:C7C:7675:6F00:6081:CEAA:36E7:15C5 (talk) 21:34, 17 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I had previously removed “Scots: Dumfries” as it was exactly the same as the English. That edit was later reverted with the comment “no-one will know it’s the same in English and Scots if both aren’t listed”.
I disagree with that because it should be a case of *unless otherwise stated* they’re the same. The endonym (in this case, the Scots name) is assumed to be the same as the name in bold, the English name. The general practice is not to name the endonym separately if the same but instead apply that language tag to the pronounciation. So here it should probably read:

Dumfries (Scots: /dʌmˈfriːs/ ⓘ dum-FREESS…) Gallovidisk (talk) 09:04, 27 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed Murgatroyd49 (talk) 12:19, 27 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I’ll adjust it accordingly unless anybody expresses objection within the coming week or so. Gallovidisk (talk) 09:51, 29 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]