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Talk:Drapier's Letters

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Misplaced Pages condraticts itself as to the value of Wood's Irish coinage

According to the entry taken from the Wiki article on Wood (see below) the coins were not inferior, nor was the coinage a scam. Swift's attack on it may have gained him fame and approbation in Ireland as a patriot and saviour, but was it truly based. Has it just been assumed that Swift's accusations were accurate? Was the accusation of a debased coinage merely the 'conventional wisdom' or a popular myth at the time in Ireland (smarting under English rule and from secondary status) and, indeed even accepted today as fact without evidence, or was there proof positive of an attempt to debase the coinage for profit and at the disadvantage of Ireland? Might Swift have been deceived or self deceived on the matter, and so his rightous indignation, combined with his skill with the pen, found a facile target, and an outlet for his frustrated and devastating vehemance.

Wood’s Halfpence William hoped to make a profit producing coins for use in Ireland and America. During the first half of 1722 the king's mistress, the Duchess of Kendal, obtained a patent from the Earl of Sunderland for coining copper money for Ireland. Wood thought this would be a profitable enterprise so he purchased the royal patent from the duchess for £10,000. In his indenture from George I dated June 16, 1722 Wood was authorized to produce up to 360 tons of halfpence and farthings for Ireland at 30 pence to the pound over a period of fourteen years for an annual fee of £800 paid to the king. These Hibernia coins were heavier and thus intrinsically more valuable than the coppers then circulating in Ireland. They were certainly less profitable for Wood to mint than his lighter weight Rosa Americana issues. (Hibernia's weighed sixty halfpence to the pound as compared to 120 Rosa Americana halfpence to the pound!). When including the costs of production and the £10,000 fee paid to the Duchess of Kendal, Mossman has calculated Wood would have lost £4,871 over the fourteen years of the patent. Thus from Wood's standpoint the Hibernia coin specifications were too generous based on the cost of production.

Wood's coinage was extremely unpopular in Ireland as a result of the publication of Jonathan Swift's The Drapier's Letters, so these were recalled. Among other things, Swift suggested that the coins were of inferior quality, but assays carried out by Sir Isaac Newton, at that time Master of the Mint, showed that the copper “was of the same goodness and value with that which was coined for England. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 4.178.21.37 (talk) 18:50, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

This results from the fact that Wood never minted his coin in the amount that would be necessary, therefore, one could never know. And Newton's assay didn't state what the assay in the English Privy Council's release stated, so there was some propaganda and exaggeration going on on both sides. Ottava Rima (talk) 13:37, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Correct title?

Which is the correct full title? The article name suggests "The Drapier's Letters", but the article is inconsistant but generally uses just "Drapier's Letters" TheRedPenOfDoom (talk) 01:20, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

The title is "Drapier's Letters". The article name has an article that, if it wasn't at the beginning, would be lowercase. Ehrenpreis, Ferguson, Smith, and Scott all refer to the work as Drapier's Letters or an individual piece as a Drapier's letter. This labeling is used by the Oxford Authors and Oxford World's Classics edition of Swift's works. Herbert Davis is the only one to introduce "the" into the title, and his title is The Drapier's Letters to the People of Ireland. Swift did not name the work, except for the individual letters. The naming of this work is similar to The Battle of the Books and Gulliver's Travels, which were changed after the fact. According to standard scholarly usage, it is "Drapier's Letter I" or "the first Drapier's letter". Ottava Rima (talk) 06:09, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
Then shouldn't the article name be changed to the actual name of the work? TheRedPenOfDoom (talk) 14:39, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
That would be something difficult. Which name do you use? It was originally printed as the original titles, or collected as "Fraud Detected"/Fraud Detected. Is it known by that title? Probably not. The original letter titles are used quite often. It is known as "the Drapier's Letters", but "the" cannot be properly italicized since it is not in a literary title except for one instance. Ottava Rima (talk) 16:12, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
Since WP:MOS#Article titles prefers that we avoid 'The', except for proper names, as in The Hague, why not rename this page? When I Google for 'The Drapier's Letters' the top hit is this Misplaced Pages article, which is a bad sign. We are evidently the main online authority that believes 'The' is part of the name. We should reflect the most common usage, not pioneer our own. EdJohnston (talk) 17:02, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
I am for a change if it will not interfere with the FAC review process. Ottava Rima (talk) 18:57, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
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