Talk:Chapter

Chapterhouse vs. Chapter

This case is not straightforward. The term Chapterhouse is used, for instance, in Lungbarrow. Thus, the basis for the rename should be discussed in more detail. Amorkuz ☎ 21:25, October 27, 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, but there's more to it than that. I guess I should've expected that someone would counter the speedy rename with Lungbarrow, since that's the oft-cited only appearance of the word "chapterhouse" in reference to the organisations that have elsewhere been called, in everything from TV: The Deadly Assassin to TV: Extremis, "Chapters". But I'm going to go out on a total limb and label that as a common misconception, since Lungbarrow happens to also feature such quotes as

• "The thought chant was taken up by Councillors of the minor Dromeian and Cerulean Chapters on the opposite galleries and on the Patrexean circle lower in."
• "Suddenly, there was a squad of guards before him, splendid in the ceremonial scarlet of the President's chapter-colours."
• "Unless an appeal is lodged within five days, the aforementioned House of Lungbarrow and all its appurtenances will, under the ancient laws subscribed by the founding triumvirate of the New Time, be excommunicated from the Matrix and the Prydonian Chapter."
• "Furthermore, the excommunication of the House will be revoked and the Family reinstated in the Prydonian Chapter."

When "chapterhouse" is used in Lungbarrow, it's always specifically in reference to the building used by a Chapter as its headquarters. For instance:

• "It was reported that the House of Lungbarrow was on the agenda at an emergency session of the Council of Cardinals at Prydon Chapterhouse."
• "Hooded in a black cloak, he pushed the scroll into the open beak of the great stone owl that guarded the Chapterhouse gate."
• "He sent the signal that would transmat him back to Prydon Chapterhouse."

Now, there are some quotes that seem to imply that the Prydonian Chapter is called the "Prydon Chapterhouse". After searching through Lungbarrow's 19 uses of "chapterhouse" and one use of "chapter-house", I've found them all:

• "All records of this mission have been expunged by order of the Prydon Chapterhouse."
• "If the Chapterhouse read those papers, Lungbarrow will be a laughing stock."

... and that's it! Those are really the only two quotes that use "chapterhouse" in this way and can't be understood at face value as references to buildings. (Feel free to verify in your own copy!) Of course, these two quotes aren't some inexplicable discrepancy; they're clear usages of metonymy: "A place is often used as a metonym for a government or other official institutions, for example, Brussels for the institutions of the European Union ..." In this case, the official institution identified by Lungbarrow itself as "the Prydonian Chapter" is referred to, via metonymy, as the name of its physical headquarters, the Prydon Chapterhouse.

And meanwhile, PROSE: The Book of the War also discusses several times the chapterhouses of the Great Houses, defined in that book as "the ancient, stately buildings where those bloodlines keep their reproductive technologies, complex anchors in time designed to firmly root their children in the soil and the history of the Homeworld." Lungbarrrow and The Book of the War agree: on Gallifrey, a "chapterhouse" is a physical building, not an organisation.

Of course, by the way the wiki currently stands, "chapterhouses of the Great Houses" doesn't make much sense: while in The Book of the War the phrase refers to a bloodline or family of people on the Homeworld, our article "Great House" discusses the physical buildings featured in Lungbarrow ... despite the fact that the phrase "Great House" never appears once in that novel. Seriously. It surprised me too. PROSE: Cat's Cradle: Time's Crucible is actually the first story to use "Great House", and it explicitly uses the phrase to refer to a bloodline:

• "The need to survive created the concept of rationalized families, born through their own genetic looms, that would stabilize the decimated population. Thus were founded the Great Houses of Gallifrey that we know today."

This usage is also echoed in PROSE: Blood Harvest:

• "Many of the Great Houses bore the taint of vampirism."

This is really confusing, because, as you might know, the Faction Paradox series refers to Time Lord society as the "Great Houses". Right now, if someone reads a story and goes, "Oh, what's a Great House?" and turns to the Tardis Wiki, they'd be told that it's a sentient building on Gallifrey, which is completely unhelpful. I could fix this by ripping apart Great House, but instead I've tried to set up a system of rename templates: Chapterhouse should be renamed to Chapter, since the organisations described on this page are called Chapters; Great House should be renamed to Chapterhouse, since the sentient houses that it describes are called "chapterhouses" in Lungbarrow, The Book of the War, and Against Nature; and User:NateBumber/Sandbox2 should get copy/pasted or moved to Great House. And then the wiki will have taken a giant step forward in accomodating the Faction Paradox series.

In conclusion ... wow, this was a lot longer than I expected when I started writing. You're right that I shouldn't have made it a speedy rename, but rename templates aren't exactly reliable when it comes to getting a page moved: just look at the Gateway, where a rename template sat for eightish months before I turned it into a speedy rename and, viola, it was moved within a week. I guess I looked at this page -- which has had a rename template (including a reason, and moved links!) since early July -- and figured it could benefit from the same treatment. Thanks for the correction, and I hope this can end with this page and Great House finally being moved to the locations they deserve. – N8 ☎ 19:23, October 28, 2017 (UTC)