Title: Fatal Error when Previewing Child Theme
Last modified: August 19, 2016

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# Fatal Error when Previewing Child Theme

 *  [livelovepasta](https://wordpress.org/support/users/livelovepasta/)
 * (@livelovepasta)
 * [15 years, 1 month ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/fatal-error-when-previewing-child-theme/)
 * I am trying to create a twenty-ten child theme before I do this update because
   I never made a child theme after last update and have made many simple edits 
   since then directly on the twenty-ten theme and I don’t have a list of what I
   changed.
 * I went into file manager and created the folder for the child in the right spot
   and what I did was just copied the exact style.css file from the twenty-ten folder
   and added it to the child folder. Then I edited the header of the style.css in
   the header to say:
 *     ```
       /*
       Theme Name:     Twenty Ten Child
       Description:    Child theme for the Twenty Ten theme
       Template:       twentyten
       Version:        0.1.0
       */
   
       /* =Reset default browser CSS. Based on work by Eric Meyer: http://meyerweb.com/eric/tools/css/reset/index.html
       ```
   
 * I also did exact copies of the functions.php and the header.php becasue I think
   I may have made changes to those as well and put them into the child folder.
 * When I went into the dashboard and tried to preview my child template it gave
   me this error: “Fatal error: Cannot redeclare twentyten_page_menu_args() (previously
   declared in /home8/livelow7/public_html/wp-content/themes/twentyten-child/functions.
   php:221) in /home8/livelow7/public_html/wp-content/themes/twentyten/functions.
   php on line 224”
 * What did I do wrong and how can I fix it, thank you.

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)

 *  [Rev. Voodoo](https://wordpress.org/support/users/rvoodoo/)
 * (@rvoodoo)
 * [15 years, 1 month ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/fatal-error-when-previewing-child-theme/#post-2019416)
 * you can’t have an exact copy of functions.php….. that is what I tried to explain
   earlier…. I must not have done a good job
 * You modify things using your child theme’s functions.php, using filters, actions,
   etc. But twentyten’s functions.php will always load
 * Delete the functions.php from your child theme, and you should be all set!
 *  [Rev. Voodoo](https://wordpress.org/support/users/rvoodoo/)
 * (@rvoodoo)
 * [15 years, 1 month ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/fatal-error-when-previewing-child-theme/#post-2019417)
 * [http://voodoopress.com/2011/02/modifying-headers-from-a-twentyten-child-theme/](http://voodoopress.com/2011/02/modifying-headers-from-a-twentyten-child-theme/)
 * Here’s a post with an example of overriding some twentyten functionality
 *  [Curtiss Grymala](https://wordpress.org/support/users/cgrymala/)
 * (@cgrymala)
 * [15 years, 1 month ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/fatal-error-when-previewing-child-theme/#post-2019418)
 * First of all, if that really is the content of your style.css file, you open 
   a comment that you never closed.
 * `/* =Reset default browser CSS. Based on work by Eric Meyer: http://meyerweb.
   com/eric/tools/css/reset/index.html`
 * should be:
 * `/* =Reset default browser CSS. Based on work by Eric Meyer: http://meyerweb.
   com/eric/tools/css/reset/index.html */`
 * Secondly, from the error message, it looks like you copied the functions.php 
   file from twentyten and pasted it into twentyten-child. You shouldn’t do that.
   You should create a new, blank functions.php file in twentyten-child, and start
   from scratch there. Then, just create the new functions you need for your child
   theme; as all of the original twentyten functions will be automatically inherited.
 * EDIT – Looks live voodoo beat me to it. 🙂
 *  Thread Starter [livelovepasta](https://wordpress.org/support/users/livelovepasta/)
 * (@livelovepasta)
 * [15 years, 1 month ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/fatal-error-when-previewing-child-theme/#post-2019426)
 * Ok sorry and thanks for the replies. I just removed the functions.php from the
   child theme folder and then the preview looked great. I actually don’t think 
   I even changed anything from the functions.php to begin with.

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)

The topic ‘Fatal Error when Previewing Child Theme’ is closed to new replies.

## Tags

 * [upgrade](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/upgrade/)

 * In: [Fixing WordPress](https://wordpress.org/support/forum/how-to-and-troubleshooting/)
 * 4 replies
 * 3 participants
 * Last reply from: [livelovepasta](https://wordpress.org/support/users/livelovepasta/)
 * Last activity: [15 years, 1 month ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/fatal-error-when-previewing-child-theme/#post-2019426)
 * Status: not resolved

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