Talk:County Durham

Rename wiki content from Durham to County Durham
I propose that the wiki content relating to County Durham be renamed to include the word "County" in the title. For example this page would become "County Durham", and examples of other pages:- "County Durham Parishes", "Darlington, County Durham" etc. --Steve 11:43, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

As a result of recent edit and discussion, I realise that I should add some further points to clarify my proposal.

Firstly, although I have started the discussion on this page, my proposal is to move ALL content concerning County Durham, meaning that it would include not only this main county page, but all parishes and other topic pages about the county. For example Darlington, Durham would be renamed Darlington, County Durham.

The reason for adding the template to this page is because this is the talk page about the county and due to the proposal having an impact on many pages, I thought it would be better to keep the discussion focused in one place.

Why rename Durham to County Durham, but not Dorset to County Dorset? County Durham is unique in England in that the county town and county share the same name, but the county is not commonly known as a "shire", but rather County Durham (abbreviated to Co. Durham). It can be referenced as just Durham where the context is clear that it is the county and not the town that is being referred to. Whenever it is not clear then rather than add shire, the county is referred to as County Durham.

I know that this proposal may not make sense to the wider international audience, but I believe it would be supported by local researchers (see DUR-NBL-L). --Steve 08:26, 28 April 2012 (UTC)