Klingon Imperial Empire Again

[Orphalesion]

So is the "United Kingdom," and yet.

Uh...no. Not at all.
That name makes sense because it's the union of formerly independent kingdoms/crowns.
Union/United describes something entirely different from Kingdom.
The United Kingdom, is a union of Kingdoms.

However Union/United and Federation, when it comes to statehood, are pretty similar and exchangeable in meaning.
The United Federation is like saying United Union/Federative Federation.

 

[Sci]

Uh...no. Not at all.
That name makes sense because it's the union of formerly independent kingdoms/crowns.
Union/United describes something entirely different from Kingdom.
The United Kingdom, is a union of Kingdoms.

A kingdom is by definition already united as a legal entity. The U.K. is called such for political reasons -- to emphasize that its constituent countries used to be separate kingdoms but are now united under one kingdom. The name is redundant but it serves a political purpose of emphasizing the unity of formerly independent states.

Presumably that's the same reason the United Federation of Planets chose its name -- to emphasize that the formerly independent, rival worlds of Earth, Vulcan, Andor, and Tellar (and, if you go by the novels, Alpha Centauri) were now united in a single federation.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

I agree with @Orphalesion.

Kingdoms are necessarily ruled by sovereigns. Kingdoms are not necessarily subdivided into counties or other local administrative units. Not all unions are kingdoms.

On the other hand, a federation is necessarily a union (of multiple constituent quasi-independent states).

Ergo, the name United Kingdom is not redundant in the same way the name United Federation is.

 

[dupersuper]

I mean, isn't the bigger problem with this that they don't have an emperor?
If you call yourself an imperial empire you should have an emperor.

They got Kahless' clone...

 

[at Quark's]

Well, I suppose it's technically possible to be an empire but without an emperor (i.e. officially having an 'emperor' spot in your state apparatus but vacant or dormant- without actually appointing someone there after the death of the last one).

 

[Orphalesion]

A kingdom is by definition already united as a legal entity. The U.K. is called such for political reasons -- to emphasize that its constituent countries used to be separate kingdoms but are now united under one kingdom. The name is redundant but it serves a political purpose of emphasizing the unity of formerly independent states.

No. As @CorporalCaptain already said a Kingdom is a political entity while a Federation/Union describes an entity comprised of smaller entities that sometimes have varying degrees of autonomy.

Presumably that's the same reason the United Federation of Planets chose its name -- to emphasize that the formerly independent, rival worlds of Earth, Vulcan, Andor, and Tellarwere now united in a single federation.

It's more redundant in my opinion because Union and Federation mean essentially the same thing. Like it it suppose to be a Federation of Federations? No it's a Federation of Planets that already describes the union of formerly independent and possibly somewhat autonomous smaller entities.

(and, if you go by the novels)

I don't.

 

[Mojochi]

.
It's more redundant in my opinion because Union and Federation mean essentially the same thing. Like it it suppose to be a Federation of Federations? No it's a Federation of Planets that already describes the union of formerly independent and possibly somewhat autonomous smaller entities.

Yup, I'm with you on this. I think we'd be far more noticing of it, were they to have called it the Federated Union of Planets. (Essentially the same thing)

I probably might scoff at the initial notion of joining something called the FUP though lol

 

[CorporalCaptain]

I'd imagine that the "United" in front of the UFP was there specifically to make 1960s American viewers identify with the UFP as the good guys (cf United States of America). I'm not aware of a citation to support (or refute) that, so I can only imagine and guess regarding that aspect of the origin of the name, but I think it's a good guess.

 

[at Quark's]

No, I'd rather join the Federation Union of Coordinated Kingdoms, then.

 

[TommyR01D]

What about "United Paramount Network"?

I mean, isn't the bigger problem with this that they don't have an emperor?
If you call yourself an imperial empire you should have an emperor.

Well, I suppose it's technically possible to be an empire but without an emperor (i.e. officially having an 'emperor' spot in your state apparatus but vacant or dormant- without actually appointing someone there after the death of the last one).

To my memory this is exactly what happened with the Klingons - the office of Emperor was left vacant until the Kahless clone was put there. In real life the French continued to have an empire well into the twentieth century despite no emperor. The British Empire continued after the loss of India (the only place where the title of Emperor was actually used). It wasn't the legal name of the state though.

I mean the Untied Federation"of Planets is already pretty redundant.

So is the "United Kingdom," and yet.

References to "the Untied Kingdom" have been depressingly common since 2014.

"United Kingdom of the Netherlands" was used as an unofficial name for the Dutch state between 1815 and 1839, the United Kingdom of Libya from 1951 to 1963, the United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil and the Algarves from 1815 to 1825, and a few others.

Tolkien gives us the Reunited Kingdom of Gondor & Arnor.

 

[at Quark's]

To my memory this is exactly what happened with the Klingons - the office of Emperor was left vacant until the Kahless clone was put there. In real life the French continued to have an empire well into the twentieth century despite no emperor. The British Empire continued after the loss of India (the only place where the title of Emperor was actually used). It wasn't the legal name of the state though.

I was mostly thinking of real-world applications. There's a certain 'polish' to the term empire you'd probably like to retain for a while even when you've factually done away with the emperor and really don't want him back for all practical intents and purposes.

"United Kingdom of the Netherlands" was used as an unofficial name for the Dutch state between 1815 and 1839

They must have been prescient, 'United' supposedly (*) meaning the unification with those later-to-be-apostate-Belgian regions (the current official designation is 'Kingdom of the Netherlands', and they never were a Kingdom in their own right before 1815).

(*) Not really: United was added by historians retrospectively to easily distinguish between the then Kingom of the Netherlands (including current Belgian territory) and the current Kingdom of the Netherlands.

 

[Orphalesion]

Plus didn't the Netherlands spend centuries split up between different factions? I seem to recall something about "Spanish Netherlands" owned by the Spanish branch of the Habsburgs.
And I think the general area of the modern Netherlands unified from various counties, places etc. in the HRE.

 

[Sci]

No. As @CorporalCaptain already said a Kingdom is a political entity while a Federation/Union describes an entity comprised of smaller entities that sometimes have varying degrees of autonomy.

But that's exactly the point -- if a federal state is comprised of smaller polities with different degrees of autonomy but a kingdom is a unity state, then that makes it more redundant to call it a "United Kingdom," since a kingdom is by definition more united than a federal union.

It's more redundant in my opinion because Union and Federation mean essentially the same thing.

So does "United" and "Kingdom;" the "united" part is inherent to being a kingdom, legally-speaking. The point of calling it the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is to emphasize that its formerly-independent constituent countries are now united together as a single kingdom. Similarly, the point of calling it the United Federation of Planets is to emphasize that its formerly-independent constituent planets are now united together as a single federation.

I don't.

I do and I will continue to consider Alpha Centauri as the fifth founding Federation Member State until the canon explicitly contradicts the idea.

Yup, I'm with you on this. I think we'd be far more noticing of it, were they to have called it the Federated Union of Planets. (Essentially the same thing)

Except that actually makes perfect sense. A union is not inherently a federal system. The United Kingdom is often called "the Union" -- for example, this article from the Guardian from shortly before the 2014 Scottish independence referendum, when it appeared that Scotland might vote to secede, is entitled "We Have 10 Days to Find a Settlement to Save the Union." Yet the United Kingdom is very decidedly not a federal union -- it is a unity state wherein all legislative authority is ultimately vested in the Westminster Parliament. The Scottish Parliament and First Minister, the Welsh Senedd and First Minister, the London Assembly and Mayor, the Northern Ireland Assembly and First Minister & deputy First Minister, the local councils and local governments -- these are all devolved organs that gain their right to govern from legislation passed by the Westminster Parliament and whose existence could legally be revoked by that same Westminster Parliament at any time. So it makes perfect sense to distinguish between unions that are unity states, like the U.K., and federal unions like the U.S. or Germany.

I probably might scoff at the initial notion of joining something called the FUP though lol

 

[Sci]

Re: Empires. It's very common in real life for empires in the past couple of centuries to not even use the word "empire" in their formal state name. The U.K. never officially changed its name to "the British Empire;" the French Republic never changed their name to "the French Empire;" etc. So you can have empires that aren't called empires de jure. And then there was India under Britain, which was officially called "the Indian Empire" because it had supposedly been united under the reign of the Emperor/Empress of India -- who happened to simultaneously reign as Monarch of the United Kingdom, and was styled as "King-Emperor" or "Queen-Emperor." Yet obviously the Indian Empire was actually a colony of the U.K.

The French leader never styled himself as Emperor after Napoleon III's reign ended in 1870.

And, of course, many people today argue that the United States's system of international alliances, client states, military protections, economic domination, and acts of political domination constitutes a de facto but not de jure American Empire -- yet the American leader remains known as the President of the United States, not the American Emperor.

You can also apparently have states that do use the word "empire" or its equivalent but do not have an emperor. The German word reich -- in spite of its post-WW2 association with Nazism -- historically means either "empire" or "realm," depending on how you translate it. When Germany was first united under Wilhelm I in 1871, the new state's German name, Deutsches Reich, was typically translated into English as "German Empire." Germany during the period from 1871 to Wilhelm II's abdication is still typically called the "German Empire" in English. When Wilhelm II abdicated and the Wiemar Republic was established, the German state continued to legally be known as the Deutsches Reich, even though the office of German Emperor (Deutscher Kaiser) had been abolished and replaced with a President (Reichspräsident). Admittedly this gets a bit fuzzy, since a fuller translation of reich would be "realm" and the word empire would probably be best translated as Kaiserreich -- "realm of the emperor" or "imperial realm." But reich is indeed often used in German for historical empires -- the Roman Empire (Römisches Reich), the Persian Empire (Perserreich), the Russian Empire (Zarenreich -- literally "realm of the tsar"), etc. So the principle does indeed seem to remain, that a state can legally entitle itself an empire yet have no de jure emperor.

You can also have the opposite -- an emperor with no empire. The Emperor of Japan -- the Tennō, literally the "Heavenly Sovereign" -- still reigns, but the official English name of the state is just "Japan;" in Japanese, the state is called Nippon-koku or Nihon-koku, which literally mean "the State of Japan" rather than Dai Nippon Teikoku or Dai Nihon Teikoku ("the Empire of Japan"). So the Tennō has no teikoku.

I think these questions of translation speak to the broader question about just what word it is that's being translated from Klingonese into English as "empire." The Klingon Wiki identifies the word as wo' -- the Klingon Empire being known in its native language as tlhIngan wo'. So just what connotations and legal meanings does wo' have in Klingonese? Can you have a wo' without a ta' or voDleH?

 

[TommyR01D]

Re: Empires. It's very common in real life for empires in the past couple of centuries to not even use the word "empire" in their formal state name. The U.K. never officially changed its name to "the British Empire;" the French Republic never changed their name to "the French Empire;" etc. So you can have empires that aren't called empires de jure. And then there was India under Britain, which was officially called "the Indian Empire" because it had supposedly been united under the reign of the Emperor/Empress of India -- who happened to simultaneously reign as Monarch of the United Kingdom, and was styled as "King-Emperor" or "Queen-Emperor." Yet obviously the Indian Empire was actually a colony of the U.K.

The French leader never styled himself as Emperor after Napoleon III's reign ended in 1870.

And, of course, many people today argue that the United States's system of international alliances, client states, military protections, economic domination, and acts of political domination constitutes a de facto but not de jure American Empire -- yet the American leader remains known as the President of the United States, not the American Emperor.

You can also apparently have states that do use the word "empire" or its equivalent but do not have an emperor. The German word reich -- in spite of its post-WW2 association with Nazism -- historically means either "empire" or "realm," depending on how you translate it. When Germany was first united under Wilhelm I in 1871, the new state's German name, Deutsches Reich, was typically translated into English as "German Empire." Germany during the period from 1871 to Wilhelm II's abdication is still typically called the "German Empire" in English. When Wilhelm II abdicated and the Wiemar Republic was established, the German state continued to legally be known as the Deutsches Reich, even though the office of German Emperor (Deutscher Kaiser) had been abolished and replaced with a President (Reichspräsident). Admittedly this gets a bit fuzzy, since a fuller translation of reich would be "realm" and the word empire would probably be best translated as Kaiserreich -- "realm of the emperor" or "imperial realm." But reich is indeed often used in German for historical empires -- the Roman Empire (Römisches Reich), the Persian Empire (Perserreich), the Russian Empire (Zarenreich -- literally "realm of the tsar"), etc. So the principle does indeed seem to remain, that a state can legally entitle itself an empire yet have no de jure emperor.

You can also have the opposite -- an emperor with no empire. The Emperor of Japan -- the Tennō, literally the "Heavenly Sovereign" -- still reigns, but the official English name of the state is just "Japan;" in Japanese, the state is called Nippon-koku or Nihon-koku, which literally mean "the State of Japan" rather than Dai Nippon Teikoku or Dai Nihon Teikoku ("the Empire of Japan"). So the Tennō has no teikoku.

I think these questions of translation speak to the broader question about just what word it is that's being translated from Klingonese into English as "empire." The Klingon Wiki identifies the word as wo' -- the Klingon Empire being known in its native language as tlhIngan wo'. So just what connotations and legal meanings does wo' have in Klingonese? Can you have a wo' without a ta' or voDleH?

Part of the reason for declaring Victoria the Empress of India is that in the nineteenth century there was a lot of title inflation going on between the monarchs of the petty realms in Europe, including the King of Prussia becoming German Emperor. Queen Victoria's first daughter, also called Victoria, was married to the Crown Prince (later Frederick III) and Victoria the elder thought it absurd to be outranked by her own child, especially as the actual territorial extent of the German Empire (and so many others) was so much smaller than Britain's.

There had been some suggestion leading up to the Acts of Union 1800 that the British Isles counted as an empire in its own right (being the unification of the realms of England, Scotland and Ireland under one crown), but it never caught on and the Brits considered "Emperor" a foreign title associated with tyranny. It was allowed in India where such a style was grounded in historical precedent - the Mughal emperors having ruled there until not long before.

Going back further Henry VIII, when breaking from the Papacy, declared England to be an empire and his crown to be an imperial crown. He meant this in the sense of England being a legal order unto itself and not subordinate to any continental authority. He still styled himself as King, never Emperor.

 

[Falconer]

The founders of the UFP were probably Federations of Planets in their own right. Hence they joined to form the UNITED Federation of Planets.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

But that's exactly the point -- if a federal state is comprised of smaller polities with different degrees of autonomy but a kingdom is a unity state, then that makes it more redundant to call it a "United Kingdom," since a kingdom is by definition more united than a federal union.

Not at all. Look at your article, second sentence. It states precisely one of the points I made.

The central government may create (or abolish) administrative divisions (sub-national units).​

A kingdom might not even have administrative divisions. The word kingdom by itself is not enough to indicate when administrative divisions necessarily exist. The word united fixes that.

Additionally, the name "United Kingdom" tells a capsule history of the administrative divisions having once been (or belonging to) separated nations, but now being ruled by one sovereign. Even this perspective is absent in a "United Federation."

The founders of the UFP were probably Federations of Planets in their own right. Hence they joined to form the UNITED Federation of Planets.

But they dropped the s in Federations? Hrm.

 

[Falconer]

Just like the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Kingdom of Ireland joined to form the United Kingdom. Two kingdoms became a united kingdom. Get it?

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Just like the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Kingdom of Ireland joined to form the United Kingdom. Two kingdoms became a united kingdom. Get it?

Not really, no.

We're the United States, not the United State. The issue of how many kings we have is irrelevant, because we have no king. If you were to say "United Kingdoms," it would make sense only if you had multiple sovereign rulers.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

The Popular People's Republican Republic of Coridan.

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