As this is called "legendary" should it be removed from WikiTree?

Question

This lineage is that of "legendary Kings", including https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/UNKNOWN-89349 Beowulf.

If this lineage is viable, can someone take a look and provide some "estimated dates" and perhaps some better name fields?

Comments

This is essentially a discussion of the disposition of what we might call "pre-1500 legacy profiles" on WikiTree.  There is no dispute that I know of regarding the creation of new profiles of people who exist only in legend:  we don't do it. We all agree on that.

The question as posed relates to the disposition of a profile that was already created before we put pre-1500 restrictions in place.  It is a "legacy" profile in that we would not create it today, but it is here, so what do we do with it?

I would guess that a majority of WikiTree's pre-1500 profiles are such legacy profiles;  if not a majority, certainly a large number.  So if we are going to make policy, we need to make policy for all of the legacy profiles.  Otherwise our standard might be, "legends I like can stay, legends I don't must go."  Or "legends with advocates can stay, legends without advocates must go."  Or "lists of names recorded by Welsh bards can stay because some of the names have panned out, but lists of names in Scandinavian sagas must go because some of them were once worshipped as gods." 

I advocate what I consider a "middle way":  retain legacy legendary material but identify it as legend, and document the legend.  I would like to see a template that creates one of those yellow rectangles that says something like, "This person appears to only exist in legend.  See Research Notes for a discussion of origin and impact of the legend."  I see genealogy as a subdivision of history, and historical legends were once believed to be true and often their existence influenced later history.  

Wikitree avoids actually deleting profiles because WikiTree is a relational database in which every profile is related to other profiles, and deleting profiles compromises the relational system.  

But if as a matter of policy we wanted to adopt a purist approach, the simplest way to achieve instant purity would be for the computer overnight to give all pre-1500 profiles (and all profiles with no date) a privacy level of "unlisted".  Instantly, all the embarrassing legacy profiles would disappear from visibility on WikiTree or anywhere on the internet, except to their own profile managers.  Then pre-1500 certified profile managers who assert that specific profiles meet pre-1500 documentation standards could convert them back to "public".  There would of course be various glitches to work out, but that would instantly take the legacy profiles off the table.

But if we're going to take that approach we should do it quickly, because I suspect there is more than one person like me who, when encountering a "garbage" profile, starts with the question "what is this" and tries to figure out what it is and where it came from, and with that approach we have documented some real people and some others that are legendary, but if we're going to take legendary profiles off the table, a lot of that work is wasted.  And as long as legacy profiles are left on WikiTree, some of us are going to be curious about them and some of us are going to imagine that improving them is a good thing to do.

Answer 1

The more conservative genealogists assert that little or no ancestry can be documented before the time of Charlemagne, born in the year 742.  Much European genealogy must be considered legendary.  In this case, "Scef" is shown as the grandfather of "Beowulf" who is himself a legendary person.  Unlike those of disproven existence, where we have the basis for the belief that no such person ever existed, a legendary person might be based on a real person or might not;  we will probably never know.  We do not delete profiles at WikiTree, so profiles such as these need a treatment that distinguishes them both from deliberate frauds, and also from real people who can be documented.

l would like to see a category of profiles, perhaps with their own template, for "medieval legendary" persons.  To be a true legendary medieval person, the person should (a) be named in some writing that was created before 1500 but (b) not have any actual documentation asserting their existence.  

I think this line of people, because they involve Beowulf, need to be documented in terms of whether the Beowulf legend names them.  They should be categorized as Uncertain Existence until we can get approval for a Legendary template.

Comments

And also not deleted so that nobody comes along and says "what? Beowulf hasn't got a profile? I'd better create one straight away!" ;)

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Another possibility is that we say that Wikitree is a genealogy website where profiles need to be evidence based?

The argumentation above (we have to have profiles for anything people might ever want to make a profile for) could be used to justify almost anything and is obviously not logically valid.

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Sorry, I removed the star because I believe John's answer outlines policy.

The name on the profile is  Beowa ( Beowulf). We are already conflating the myth of Beowa  with the hero of the poem Beowulf. These are  entities with two different sets of parents. Were they supposed to be the same individual? Was Beowa a 'god of barley or corn' Scholars debate such issues https://www.google.com/amp/s/larhusfyrnsida.com/2016/01/10/finding-beowa/amp/ We don't claim to have such expertise. We would probably end up linking to Wikipedia.  

I believe that our role as a genealogy site is to attempt to describe familial  relationships between people known to have lived.  How do you assign a birthdate to a mythical person?  (the date on the profile 550 correlates with a date recently suggested for the poem Beowulf (https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.medieval.eu/beowulf-dated-to-ad-550/amp/ )

 If we include a profile for Beowa, why not Chicomecoatl (Aztec goddess of corn).  If Beowulf,  the hero of the poem, why not Bilbo or Thorin?

 If it were to be deleted,  restrictions on pre 1500 profiles mean that there should be little risk of a new one being created.

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@Helen, the link you posted is to a blog, and it is not really debating anything which would affect genealogy?

I think the excuse which gets used on Wikitree, of us needing to have profiles for mythical people because otherwise someone will make profiles for mythical people, really only makes sense to me in borderline cases where a person and their family connections to real people are at least arguably possible to reconstruct?

Whatever it is which drives people to make profiles which are not real genealogy, I think the best way to reduce the number is simply to have a clear policy of not allowing them.

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The Wikipedia article Anglo-Saxon Royal Genealogies, which appears to be scholarly has the genealogy being discussed. - in section 9, Ancestors of Woden.  The first written records appear to be Anglo-Saxon, it only appears later in Scandinavian sources, though presumably it could have started as oral history anywhere.

One of the sources used in the Wikipedia article is Teutonic mythology by Jacob Grimm, in an Appendix on Anglo-Saxon Genealogies

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I linked to a blog purely to demonstrate the problems. I should have stuck to wikipedia.https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beowa.  

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@Andrew - we do have a policy for not allowing creation of profiles for fictional people:

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Help:Person_Profile#Profiles_of_real_people_born_AD.2FCE_only

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That is good to know Ros. To be clear, I voted for John Atkinson's answer...

...So my reason for making extra comment is that despite such policies, there is still this common argument that if we don't make these profiles someone else will.

I can't see how this argument can keep appearing given the policy, the general aim of the wiki, and also given that pre-1500 is restricted editing anyway.

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In fact, sometimes profiles are deleted. It's rare, but at least once profiles representing characters in a video game (or something like that) ended up deleted. I just wonder where the line will be drawn. These profiles look like they're out of The Ring of the Ribelung or Lord of the Rings.

And as I see it, our work in the Disproven Project is to identify false genealogies / profiles of invented people and separate them. Once they're properly quarantined, I'm not interested in researching them further. I'm OK with some of our contributors being interested in legends, but IMO it's not what WikiTree is about.

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I see a clear distinction between Legendary profiles and those subject to Disproven Existence.  Disproven Existence is likely to result from a fraud or a mistake, and will often be recent, i.e. within the last 500 years.  I think Legendary material should be material derived from or attributed to some writing which itself dates to the period before 1500, was believed to be true at the time, and probably can never be proved or disproved by modern standards.

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I'm not sure I agree. A lot of fake pedigrees go back much earlier than 1500 without being traditional legends. Consider the fake Wheeler genealogy with its medieval Rebecca Lynns and Patty Sues, or Charles Augustus Fernald's fabrications.

About two thirds of the profiles in the Disproven Existence watchlist are pre-1500.

I suppose we'll have to agree to disagree, because I'm not much interested in making a distinction. I just want incorrect pedigrees disconnected and profiles for people who didn't exist clearly labelled as such. Say I'm a practical person and not interested in theory. I want the results.

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Well, I think we have large areas of agreement!  The fake Wheeler genealogy and Fernald's fabrications clearly belong in Disproven Existence.  And if Disproven Existence they get a nice banner and image warning people that we consider their existence disproven.

I suppose where we disagree is that I would not submit Beowulf for Disproven Existence labelling.

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Jack I think many examples have shown that this logic does not work. There is no clear difference between old and new mistakes.

In your explanation above you seem to positing the existence of a different type of "proof" that existed before 1500. Just isn't real. Those legends were just like the legends people make up on Ancestry.com. They are just due to a lack of critical thinking, and not a different kind of critical thinking. What might be different is whether those people cared whether it was true or not. They were not making a wiki. They were making stories.

There is either real evidence or no real evidence. There is no alternative logic to the one we have.

I also object to the term "conservative". Genealogy is evidence-based or else it is story telling. Story telling is great but that is not what this wiki is for.

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This is a really interesting discussion. I’m sat with legs on each side of the fence (ouch! Lol)

I’ve seen the work Jack does, particularly in Wales where untangling and differentiating the mythical from the true in very early time periods is (to me) virtually impossible, and I applaud him. It’s not easy work by by any stretch of the imagination. But myths often originate in some kind of substance of fact.

I’m not familiar with Beowulf, or how much fact and fiction intertwine in this myth, but what I would say is we can’t have a policy where we delete ‘mythological’ profiles that already exist. If modern genealogies perpetuate these myths we need to have them marked as Fictional, disproven, to show newer genealogists. It’s an education for them whether they do or don’t have pre-1500 permission. And promotes our accuracy to say.....

This is not ok, it is disproven, please don’t believe what you may see on other sites!

And we definitely shouldn’t see more created, like michael said, we have better pre-1500 regs now :-)

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If we can have a profile for Arthur, King of the Britons, why not Beowulf?

I was taught, many millennia ago, that a legend differs from a myth in that a myth never was, but a legend most likely evolved from a truth, or multitudes of truths that have been merged into a single whole.

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I think if we want to show editors how to work we should do that on help articles etc?

I think the family tree we are making should not contain wrong material, because it aims to be accurate. Making it deliberately inaccurate surely can't teach anyone anything?

The tree can and should mention things which are not perfectly certain, but not fictional characters or figures from old stories whose existence is no longer certain, and/or whose genealogical relationships to the main family tree are not considered to be known.

The fact that myths might have a basis in real events does not really seem to justify treating them as real events?

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Myths never had a basis in fact.  Legends may have.

If it is such a sticking point, let Beowulf join the ranks of Robin Hood et al on a space page of his own.

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We are talking mainly about profiles that were uploaded 10 years ago. I don’t think we have an issue with anyone currently doing this otherwise it would be via an MIR not G2G.

Deleting falsehoods is probably not the way to go. It like sticking your fingers in your ears and pretending people aren’t doing this on other sites. At least if they come here they can see it’s not real and why!

Oh and Melanie 100% also characters from The Mabinogion.

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My response was to your King Arthur comment, re Robin Hood, there are about 25 possible men over possible times periods as the story (poem, tale) evolved. He is fictional but no doubt concocted from stories spanning several hundred years involving ‘charitable works’ as we would say today. Lol. It’s a heartwarming tale lol.

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@ Lizzie - have you seen Sir Tony Robinson's searching for the real Robin Hood?  It includes some very plausible explanations for the growth of the story.

Still -- Robin Hood HAS a page, not a profile.  I see no reason why the Beowulf profile should not be converted to a similar page.  It's also probably where "Arthur Pendragon" belongs, but the decision there was, obviously, to mark his existence as "Uncertain Existence".

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@Lizzie "Deleting falsehoods is probably not the way to go. It like sticking your fingers in your ears and pretending people aren’t doing this on other sites. At least if they come here they can see it’s not real and why!"

I honestly can't see how placing falsehoods into our family tree just like a real person makes it clear that they are falsehoods. It would be simpler to link to Wikipedia, make pages which are not profile pages, or include discussions about the stories on the profiles of real people who are supposed to be related to them. That would be enough.

When we make an actual profile for someone then 99% of our readers and users understand this to mean that we are saying this person and their connections have been confirmed by research.

Answer 2

As this line represents a Scandinavian legend, it may be a candidate for attention by the Early Scandinavia project.

Comments

The Beowulf poem English, West Saxon to be precise.  The fact that the hero is Swedish, and most of the action takes place in Denmark, allows a very interesting glimpse of the network that was 10th C. Western Europe. As Jack suggests, the Early Scandinavia project is the place to deal with this.

For those who saw the recent film 'The Dig' There is a beautiful description of helmets like that excavated at Suttonhoo - from Heaney's translation of Beowulf in verse 300 ''Boar-shapes flashed above their cheek-guards, the brightly forged work of goldsmiths watching over those stern-faced men."

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Is this a legend wiki? Yes or no.

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Legend - in the same category as the Scandinavian Sagas.

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Isn't Wikitree a genealogy wiki? :)

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As you say; it's not genealogy. Though it is interesting to find a way to deal with existing profiles.

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I guess that if we are doing genealogy, then genealogy is the aim which has to guide those decisions? I think Wikipedia is a better place to handle the many topics connected to understanding the Beowulf story. I think if we try to be like a B grade Wikipedia we will achieve less in genealogy?

Answer 3

I dont know anything about how big this universe of legends is. that being said, in the Geni profile that is linked to your target link they make a clear distinction that the tree is fictional and isnt linked to other trees. and they allow community to make additions comments.
This by itself isnt a qualifying credential for anything pree 1500. It is just a series of legendary entries. They may have historic interest for the community, but make clear, just who or where thie story was lifted from. In some cases it has no "author" just copiers.

Answer 4

Thanks Robin for asking this question.

Although we have a policy on WikiTree that we don't delete profiles, we also have a policy that we create "profiles of real people born AD/CE only" and that "profiles cannot be created for", amongst others, "fictional or mythical people"  Free space profiles can be created for these purposes. See this Help page

Even if we retain these profiles and mark them as uncertain or disputed existence, as in the footnote in the above help page, the fact that these profiles exist on WikiTree at all, brings it into disrepute with some medieval scholars.

As any estimated date is going to mean these profiles would be pre-1500 means that there should be no chance that they would be recreated, given the current restrictions on adding and editing people born before 1500.

Comments

I fully agree, John.

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I also hope these profiles will be deleted.

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Delete! Delete! Delete!

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Current WikiTree policy on deleting (or "removing") profiles may be found here: Deletion FAQ.  The short version, as John says, is "we don't delete profiles."  

I think everyone can agree that these pre-1500 "legacy profiles" are a problem.  It would seem to me there are only two broad solutions to the problem:  (1) Persuade WikiTree leadership to permit a massive deletion of some thousands of pre-1500 legacy profiles, uploaded by Gedcom before we put restrictions in place, of people who can never be satisfactorily documented as real people, or (2) Do what we can to identify, isolate, and make the best we can of these profiles in the absence of authorization to delete.

There is no point in spending any further time on approach #2 if approach #1 is a possibility, so I would recommend that advocates of deletion seek a ruling on the matter from WikiTree leadership.

Answer 5

We do indeed have a policy on not creating fictional-people profiles:

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Help:Person_Profile#Profiles_of_real_people_born_AD.2FCE_only

Answer 6

I vote for an advertised policy of no legends and delete them.   There is more than enough to keep the few of us with pre-1500 certification busy for years to come correcting the old imports and creating new profiles without wasting any time on them.

Answer 7

I think the profile UNKNOWN-89349 does not represent Beowulf but instead Beowa, who is son of Scyld, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beowa

I really think they each should have their own profiles. Therefore, I have moved the info gathered on Beowulf to the profile for UNKNOWN-103257 and also rejected the merge between these two profiles.