Capitalization of Names

[Hunter]

How do you capitalize

 

Farmer John

 

Richard the Rooster

 

Are just John and Richard the names, or are all the words considered part of the name? "the" isn't capitalized?

 

In Aesop I noticed Hare and Tortoise were capitalized, but I can't remember about "the". I can't find my workbook, though :-0

[Ellie]

How do you capitalize

 

Farmer John

 

Richard the Rooster

 

Are just John and Richard the names, or are all the words considered part of the name? "the" isn't capitalized?

 

In Aesop I noticed Hare and Tortoise were capitalized, but I can't remember about "the". I can't find my workbook, though :-0

It depends on context.

 

I would say that Farmer John is properly capitalized. Richard the Rooster is probably capitalized because of the context. In a story where it is used in just that way every time, then it is a proper name, and so we would capitalize it.

 

We don't usually capitalize "the" unless it is at the beginning of a sentence or a name/title.

[zenjenn]

In the case of Farmer John, Farmer is capitalized because it is used in this context as a title. Queen Elizabeth, King George, Doctor Dolittle, Captain Kangaroo, Farmer John. Same with Richard the Rooster, I'd think. It's a title. Whether it's Richard the Roster or Pooh-Bah the First Lord of the Treasury, Lord Chief Justice, Archbishop of Titipu, Lord Mayor and Lord High Everything Else.

 

I've always been a bit perplexed by the capitalization of nouns in in the case of the Tortoise in fables and whatnot, but I've seen it frequently enough that I assume it is correct to capitalize a noun in the case where it refers to a specific character. What I've been curious about is if it's also correct to NOT capitalize in these situations? I mean it is a fine line to try to determine if the rabbit in my particular story plays a large enough role to be worth of being the rabbit with a capital R.

 

Regardless, "the" is not capitalized.

Edited August 15, 2011 by zenjenn

[NanceXToo]

Farmer John is a title, just like Mister Smith or Doctor Jones, so that is correct.

 

Richard the Rooster is probably being used as its full name in the story.

 

Hare and Tortoise I assume are being used like their first names? If it says (for example) "After lunch, the Hare went out to play" that would be wrong technically, but if it says "After lunch, Hare went out to play"- that's just being used as its name and therefore properly capitalized.

[zenjenn]

If it says (for example) "After lunch, the Hare went out to play" that would be wrong technically.

 

That's what I am inclined to think, yet virtually everything I read (all of Aesop's Fables, for example), if "the Hare" is a primary character, it is capitalized.

[Hunter]

Thanks! It's hard to iron out the RULES. Often books do things, and I'm not sure if they are doing it "the" way, or just in an acceptable way, or even the "wrong" way. It's especially hard when 2 books are doing it different ways.

 

I'm learning so much by forcing myself to work through these K-3 materials! It's humbling to realize how much I don't know, when I am called upon to do it.

 

I try to remember if I ever knew these things, before the memory loss kicked in, but honestly don't know if I did. Maybe when I taught my boys high school we never tried to write "Farmer Brown" or the equivalent. Or maybe we were so overwhelmed with the volume of work we thought they NEEDED to complete, we just glossed over what seemed an insignificant detail.

 

I guess all that matters though is the present, and learning it--or relearning it--now. And making sure I save what I am learning in some organized way so that I can easily review if I lose this memory.

 

Thanks again!