Naming conventions of rulers encode the shift from monarchy to citizen-republic

Evidence

Notice the displacement in rulers’ nomenclature that corresponds to this transformation. Schoolchildren remember monarchs by their first names (what was William the Conqueror’s surname?), presidents by their last (what was Ebert’s Christian name?). In a world of citizens, all of whom are theoretically eligible for the presidency, the limited pool of ‘Christian’ names makes them inadequate as specifying designators. In monarchies, however, where rule is reserved for a single surname, it is necessarily ‘Christian’ names, with numbers, or sobriquets, that supply the requisite distinctions. — Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities, 130

Categorization

• CANDY: The William-the-Conqueror surname / Ebert’s Christian name puzzle is a light, memorable observation anyone can retell.
• XREF: connects to: Renaming colonized subjects is a political act that declares a new epoch — Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on…, 723; Writing shifted from commemorating rulers to documenting the ruled — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 297; A monarch’s identity can be owned by those who embody it — Hilary Mantel, A Memoir of My Former Self- A Life in…, 698 (+2 more)

Related

• The name Caesar transitioned from a Roman family name into a universal monarchical title (similarity 0.81)
• Renaming colonized subjects is a political act that declares a new epoch (similarity 0.80)

Broader Connections

• The name Caesar transitioned from a Roman family name into a universal monarchical title #exemplifies (1.00) — Stephen Kershaw, A Brief History of the Roman Empire, 530
• Writing shifted from commemorating rulers to documenting the ruled #exemplifies (0.85) — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 297
• A monarch’s identity can be owned by those who embody it #expands (0.80) — Hilary Mantel, A Memoir of My Former Self- A Life in…, 698
• An ethnic name became a moral category encoded in language #exemplifies (0.80)