Talk:Kassi (wife of Suleyman of Mali)

Spelling and title

This article almost certainly needs to be renamed, for several reasons.

The spelling of the subject of the article should be Qasa, not Kassi. The original Arabic spelling of this name/title, as reported by Ibn Battuta, appears to be قاسا. This is what I get when I use the explanation of transliteration given by Levtzion and Hopkins to convert their spelling Qāsā to Arabic script, and this is the spelling that is used in this Arabic edition of Ibn Battuta. The strict transliteration of قاسا is Qāsā, and the basic transcription is Qasa. As per WP:MOSAR, unless there is a different WP:COMMONNAME, the basic transcription should generally be used for the article title. With the exception of the general encyclopedias about women in history currently cited in this article, the majority of sources I am aware of use the spelling Qasa (e.g. Levzion 1963, Bell 1972, Gomez 2018, Canós-Donnay 2019), though not all (Conrad 2010 uses Kasa).

A challenge to choosing a title to this article is that Qasa may be a title rather than a proper name. Quoth Ibn Battuta (translated by Levtzion and Hopkins 2000):

It happened during my sojourn at Mālī that the sultan was displeased with his chief wife, the daughter of his maternal uncle, called Qāsā. The meaning of qāsā with them is "queen". She was his partner in rule according to the custom of the Sūdān, and her name was mentioned with his from the pulpit.

Levtzion (1963) takes the view that Qasa is her title, not her proper name, and says "this is also the meaning of the word in modern Mandinke". However, various dictionaries I have encountered only seem to give the word mansamuso (literally "king-woman") for "queen",[1][2] so I'm not altogether sure of what the situation there is.

Recently, Aciram moved this page from Kassi (empress) to Kassi (wife of Suleyman of Mali) without discussion. While I agree that Kassi (empress) is not an ideal title—mansa is fairly consistently translated as "king" by reliable sources, not "emperor", so "empress" is an inaccurate title for a consort of the mansa as well as an inaccurate translation of her name/title—calling her a "wife of Sulayman" would seem to downplay her importance, given that Qasa "was [Sulayman's] partner in rule" and her title/name is "queen". It seems generally accepted by historians that the chief consort of the mansa exercised some power, e.g. Bell 1972: "Thus it is reasonable to conclude that the queens of Mali were entrusted with unusual political power", Gomez 2018: "Ibn Baṭṭūṭa had mentioned the queen’s name was included in the khuṭba, suggesting she once wielded real power, strengthening this possibility. Qāsā may have also served as regent." As such, referring to her as merely "a wife" seems inappropriate.

A natural disambiguation would be preferable to a parenthetical one for the title, per WP:TITLEDAB. WP:CONSORTS would be the most natural policy to refer to, but doesn't really offer any clear solution. "Qasa of Mali" may be confused with Mansa Qasa (or Qanba) ibn Sulayman, who may or may not be her son. "Queen Qasa of Mali" would be unambiguous but slightly redundant; similar problems would apply to "Qasa, queen of Mali", and both would seem to go against a strict interpretation of WP:NCROY. Thoughts? Ornithopsis (talk) 05:32, 9 April 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedia must be consistent in their naming conventions: that means, that she same rule must bu used for all articles in Wikipedia, no exceptions. It is clear that Kassi/Qasa had a great deal of political importance, but unless she was Formally the co-regent of her spouse, then she was still a queen consort/empress consort/sultan consort, that is, a wife of a ruler, and not a ruler herself. The wives of rulers are customarily called "Name (Wife of X)" on Wikipedia, unless they had a name longer than just one name (such as it is here), in which case they would simply have their entire name spelled out. Look for example of the Byzantine empresses: they are in several cases called "Name (Wife of X)". The reason to why I moved it without discussion, is because I simply followed an established name convention. I have no information about the culture in question: if she was indeed Formally the co-regent of her spouse, then she can be called "Kassi/Qasa, Queen of Mali" (provided the title is translated to queen in English), since that would be established wikipedia custom. --Aciram (talk) 13:24, 9 April 2022 (UTC)

It seems to me that (wife of X) is most often used where it's the most effective disambiguation. For instance, Theodora (Byzantine empress) could refer to a great many people, so it makes sense to clarify which Theodora by naming their spouse. There are only two Malians of note named Qasa (possibly only one, as Mansa Qasa ibn Sulayman may actually be named Qanba), and indeed Qasa is currently a redirect to this page, so there is no need to distinguish her from any other queens named Qasa (...although if Qasa is indeed her title and not her name, every Malian queen would be called Qasa, but we don't know that for sure, and she's the only notable one anyway—the Arabic historians we get most of this information on didn't typically note others). Because historians generally seem to accept Ibn Battuta's claim that Qasa "was his partner in rule" (though obviously subordinate to him, given that she could be dismissed from that position), and that her name means "queen", I think calling her a queen, rather than a wife of the mansa, is appropriate. Ornithopsis (talk) 19:28, 9 April 2022 (UTC)