Frederick III, German Emperor is a featured article; it (or a previous version of it) has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Wikipedia community. Even so, if you can update or improve it, please do so.
	This article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on February 28, 2011.
Article milestones Date Process Result October 6, 2008 Good article nominee Listed October 22, 2008 WikiProject A-class review Approved November 4, 2008 Peer review Reviewed December 14, 2008 Featured article candidate Promoted A fact from this article was featured on Wikipedia's Main Page in the " On this day..." column on June 15, 2019. Current status: Featured article

This article is rated FA-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects:

Biography: Military / Royalty and Nobility This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography, a collaborative effort to create, develop and organize Wikipedia's articles about people. All interested editors are invited to join the project and contribute to the discussion. For instructions on how to use this banner, please refer to the documentation.BiographyWikipedia:WikiProject BiographyTemplate:WikiProject Biographybiography articles This article is supported by the military biography work group (assessed as Mid-importance). This article is supported by WikiProject Royalty and Nobility (assessed as High-importance). Military history: Biography / European / German This article is within the scope of the Military history WikiProject. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks. To use this banner, please see the full instructions.Military historyWikipedia:WikiProject Military historyTemplate:WikiProject Military historymilitary history articles Associated task forces: /  Military biography task force European military history task force German military history task force Additional information: /  This article has passed an A-Class review. Germany: Prussia High‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Germany, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Germany on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.GermanyWikipedia:WikiProject GermanyTemplate:WikiProject GermanyGermany articles High This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale. This article is within the scope of WikiProject Prussia, a project which is currently considered to be inactive. Silesia ( inactive) This article is within the scope of WikiProject Silesia, a project which is currently considered to be inactive.SilesiaWikipedia:WikiProject SilesiaTemplate:WikiProject SilesiaSilesia articles Former countries: Prussia This article is within the scope of WikiProject Former countries, a collaborative effort to improve Wikipedia's coverage of defunct states and territories (and their subdivisions). If you would like to participate, please join the project.Former countriesWikipedia:WikiProject Former countriesTemplate:WikiProject Former countriesformer country articles This article is within the scope of WikiProject Prussia, a project which is currently considered to be inactive.

Archives

Archive 1

This page has archives. Sections older than 100 days may be automatically archived by Lowercase sigmabot III when more than 4 sections are present.

Surely Frederick was not the third German emperor named Frederick, which is what I would naturally assume from the title of this article? Sandpiper ( talk) 18:30, 8 October 2011 (UTC) reply

As the King of Prussia simultaneously held the title of German Emperor from 1871 on, it is the Prussian numbering that was used during the Second Reich. So Frederick was also King Frederick III of Prussia (number II being Frederick the Great). It's indeed a bit confusing with regards to the Empire as there already was a Holy Roman Emperor Frederick III during the 15th century. -- fdewaele, 8 October 2011, 20:40 CET.

My natural reaction reading the title is to asume that Frederick was the third german emperor with that name. That therefore he had been preceded by emperors Frederick I and II. Are you saying that at the time he was know as German emperor Frederick III? This seems rather unnatural. for example, James VI of Scotland was known as James I of England when acting in that capacity. The title of the article seems to be a confusion of two separate royal titles, which has to be incorrect?. Sandpiper ( talk) 17:47, 9 October 2011 (UTC) reply

Looking for Frederick's common name, it would appear that Frederick III is the most common usage. Looking at other Wikipedia projects, the French article and the German article also use Frederick III. Cheers. EricSerge ( talk) 19:34, 9 October 2011 (UTC) reply

The Holy Roman Empire and the German Empire are two distinct political entities, and the German Empire is not considered the legal successor of the HRE. Hence "Holy Roman Emperor" and "German Emperor" are also two distinct positions, as it is documented by the fact that there are Wikipedia articles for each of these two positions. According to the constitution of the German Empire, the King of Prussia held the position of German Emperor (I think the exact phrasing is that the King of Prussia assumes the "presidency" of the empire with the title of a "German Emperor"). This was the result of the German Empire's nature as a federation of various German monarchies. Constitutionally speaking, Frederick III was "King Frederick III of Prussia, German Emperor". - HCM, 22 April 2012

Exactly. De iure he had the title "Frederick III, King of Prussia" and held the office of "German Emperor". (The official style was the other way round, "German Emperor and King of Prussia"). Note that the emperor of the Holy Roman Empire of Geman Nation was styled "Roman Emperor".

His name was Freidrich. Presidentbalut ( talk) 22:16, 8 August 2013 (UTC) reply

Well, now that the expert has set us straight I guess we can all go home. (I explained all about our common name policy to this user on three other talk pages out of the dozen or so he decided to spam, so I am not going to bother repeating all that here).

Why is wikipedia's naming policy inconsistent then? Who decides what name is given to a historical character? Be it their own name or a different name? You should also sign your contributions. Presidentbalut ( talk) 16:46, 19 February 2014 (UTC) reply

Wow, talk about delayed reply. You are right that it looks like I did not sign here (surprised the bot did not pick it up); I responded to about a dozen of these requests that you spammed across wikipedia, so I was in a bit of a hurry and missed the signature here (by the way, if we are talking about things people should and should not do, you should not spam over a dozen pages with the same, often sarcastically worded, question). Anyway, to answer your question, our policy is laid out in WP:COMMONNAME, which I would encourage you to read. In short, we go with how a person is referred to in the majority of reliable English-language sources. This will create inconsistencies as you say, but we reflect the naming conventions in the larger scholarship, so any inconsistency is not of our own creation. If you have a problem with the names of German rulers being rendered in English, take it up with the leading scholars in the field. Conversely, if you have proof that the majority of sources use the German spelling, feel free to present your evidence, which would be duly considered by the community. Indrian ( talk) 18:08, 19 February 2014 (UTC) reply

This is frankly horrible. It seems to be a hodge-podge of copy-paste stuff. Can't somebody do a reasonable summary of the article? There is more than enough substantial material in it. Drow69 ( talk) 13:41, 27 April 2013 (UTC) reply

OK, the article clearly states that his name is "Friedrich". So...why is the article titled "Frederick"? All the other names are messed up as well. He never had a son named "William". Also, his father was not "William". What is going on here? Cultural genocide much? 68.45.174.58 ( talk) 04:17, 8 September 2016 (UTC) reply

I agree that this is an annoying issue...especially since the principles are not always consistently applied. However, see here Talk:Wilhelm II, German Emperor for past discussions of this very point. Drow69 ( talk) 11:18, 16 September 2016 (UTC) reply

It was common practice in most countries to translate the names of royalty, but current practice in many places is to mostly keep the original language name. It is a bit unclear where the cut-off point between both conventions lies. We try to consistently apply WP:COMMONNAME, which makes us as inconsistent other published material :) — Kusma ( t· c) 12:56, 16 September 2016 (UTC) reply

This section is at least three times as long as it should be and simultaneously contains completely unimportant info while not mentioning some of the most important things, e.g. that Mackenzie stuck to his wrong diagnosis even after it was obvious that it was wrong and that Gerhardt came to the conclusion that Mackenzie took a biopsy of the wrong vocal chord, the one on the right (Gerlach/Keil (1988), p. 278 f. -- Joachim Gerlach und Gundolf Keil: Der Kehlkopfkrebs Kaiser Friedrichs III. In: Würzburger medizinhistorische Mitteilungen 6, 1988).

Even Morell Mackenzie is more honest:

In November, however, the German doctors were again called into consultation, and it was ultimately admitted that the disease really was cancer; but Mackenzie, with very questionable judgment, more than hinted that it had become malignant since his first examination, in consequence of the irritating effect of the treatment by the German doctors. The crown prince became emperor on 9 March 1888 and died on 15 June. During all this period, a violent quarrel raged between Mackenzie and the German medical world. The German doctors published an account of the illness, to which Mackenzie replied by a work entitled The Fatal Illness of Frederick the Noble (1888), the publication of which caused him to be censured by the Royal College of Surgeons.

-- Espoo ( talk) 20:35, 12 February 2019 (UTC) reply

Include some discussion of the theory that Bismarck influenced the treatment in order to push Fredrick off. 77.69.34.205 ( talk) 17:01, 1 August 2020 (UTC) reply