Talk:Primus inter pares

Books

Which books, apart from Jeffrey Archer's?

To name a few:

First Among Equals: How to Manage a Group of Professionals by Patrick J. McKenna, David H. Maister

First Among Equals: The Supreme Court in American Life by Kenneth W. Starr

First Among Equals: The Role of the Chief Academic Officer by James Martin and James E. Samels

First among equals: The selection of NASA space science experiments (NASA SP) by John E Naugle

First Among Equals: Prime Ministers in Westminster Systems by Patrick Weller

A Short History of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople: "First Among Equals" in the Eastern Orthodox Church by Deno John Geanakoplos

Stale Donuts: A Gender First Among Equals by Christopher J Farmer

First Among Equals: Abraham Lincoln's Reputation During His Administration by Hans L. Trefousse

First among equals: California legislative leadership, 1964-1992 by Willie L Brown

First among equals: Great Britain and Venezuela, 1810-1910 (Dellplain Latin American studies) by George E Carl

Archbishop of Canterbury

I thought the Crown was head of the Anglican Communion? Archbishops are merely heads of their sees and there are senior archbishops among the sees, am I right? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.110.8.21 (talk) 15:49, 14 April 2007 (UTC).

Well, I added the reference, so its correct, as I took it straight from them. What this means for the relation to the Queen, I wouldn't really know...MadMaxDog 11:06, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

The British monarch is Supreme Governor of the Church of England, but not the other Anglican churches in the UK or worldwide (notably not those in Wales, Ireland or Scotland). You may be confusing this with the purely secular (and personal) position of Head of the Commonwealth. In many Anglican provinces there are primates. --Rumping (talk) 10:49, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

Animal Farm

Would the pigs in Animal Farm be considered Primus inter pares? 71.72.251.140 03:08, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

Probably, but then I haven't read the book, and couldn't reference it either.MadMaxDog 11:05, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

No. They would (and do) claim to be primi inter pares but would (and should) be considered a ruling class. The irony is very, very intentional. See also the Big Lie of The Republic. — LlywelynII 02:46, 12 August 2014 (UTC)

Some are more equal.

Does anyone know the origin of the quote "All/everyone is/are equal (in the state, under the law, within nature), but some are more equal than others."? That might deserve a mention in this article. Nagelfar 17:53, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

I only know that one from Animal Farm by George Orwell. Blarneytherinosaur ^gabby? 08:52, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

In the book Animal Farm, the animals revolt against the farmer and decide to create a utopian animal society. They define 7 laws, the first 6 meant to separate them from the hated humans (no animal shall wear clothes, no animal shall sleep in a bed, no animal shall kill another animal, etc.) and the most important law, the 7th, is simply "all animals are equal". Then, the pigs start to take control, and start breaking the rules one by one (e.g., they start wearing clothes), until finally they simply replace all seven laws by one law: All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others. This is of course an ironic phrase, whose ending nullify its utopic beginning. Personally, I never understood this idiom "more equal" (see http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/more_equal), which has little meaning in English. Interestingly, in my native tongue, Hebrew, one word, שווה, means both "equal" and "worth", so "more equal" could also be read as "worth more" making this idiom more understandable. I wonder if Orwell also had a different language in mind when he made up this idiom. Nyh (talk) 12:41, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Not at all. Obviously you've moved on and probably won't see this but you're right that it carries a clear sense of not-quite-working. That was intentional and had nothing to do with other languages. As 1984 made abundantly clear, Orwell was very aware of and concerned with the mangling of language being undertaken to get people to go along with totalitarian regimes. Just like how your Hebrew word equates "equal treatment" with "having worth", Orwell's phrase is colored by the English expression "equal under the law". Obviously the effect of some being "more equal under the law" is that the law is inequal... just like "first among equals" is a prima facie oxymoron. Nonetheless, both expressions are used: "more equal" because it pays lip service to equality on its way to granting real privileges; "primus inter pares" because it pays lip service to a peer's higher status without giving him (m)any privileges to go with it. — LlywelynII 02:43, 12 August 2014 (UTC)

Ancient Greek

Is there any reason to include this at all? Even if the Romans did borrow the term from the Greeks initially (somewhat dubious), surely the English usage is entirely Latin and based on its appearance in the old Republic. Does the Greek use have any importance to English or is it as superfluous as including the French, Spanish, and Mandarin Chinese forms of the phrase? — LlywelynII 02:22, 12 August 2014 (UTC)

[Scanning the page... if this is here only because of the Patriarch of Constantinople's title, that's cool but it should be moved down the page to discussion of him.] — LlywelynII 02:25, 12 August 2014 (UTC)

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