Is detaching mythological people from one another the way forward?

Question

Just found this. If this is the way we're going it'll make tidying up so much easier. Just Sweden or..............?  Seems like a good idea to me though it took me a minute or two to work out which Dag this was.

Comments

You can read this discussion:
https://www.wikitree.com/g2g/524162/pre-1500-help

And check out Anna Arimathea:
https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Arimathea-11

Answer 1

Looks like my co-Leader for the Sweden project has put quite a lot of work into explaining and categorizing Dag. She is the pre-1500 qualified one, but very busy with her job in the summer season.

My choice is to stay away from pre-1500. I've got quite enough disentangling messes post-1500 - mainly from old imports. The patronymics being so similar all over the country has stimulated a lot of "genealogy by indexed birth records", patching together families with total disregard for the geography. Some of them can be salvaged. If they're post-1600 they can often get some primary sources (at least for their existence).

But, I take it you think the legends and fictions cause less problems if treated like Dag - then all is well and good.

Answer 2

Made this an answer as I'd like more input. Currently we have 4 Friggs (one descended from Cadwaladur), 3 Yrsas and several Dag of Westmares (one with Saxon parents). I'm quite happy to spend a couple of weeks on this working through the Ynglinga Saga which I have to hand. Even considered borrowing the Prose Edda later on. Even if this is the way ahead they'll need merging. At the moment it is a MESS.

Comments

I guess the Welsh one was a different non-person originally.  But she's confused and conflated all over the net - what's 500 years.  I can't see where she came from, and she was junk anyway.

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Junk or not they're here and need dealing with.

Answer 3

I would add my strong "yes" to your question.  Legendary material is part of genealogy because it appears in so many old genealogies;  making it disappear and not addressing it simply leaves it out there to cause trouble.  So it's best to keep the profiles and document what the legend is and how it developed.  Sometimes the legend started with a kernel of truth about a real person, and legendary material got added.  That is especially important to document.

A person who never existed cannot have a parent, a spouse, or a child, so they should not be connected to other profiles.  That will frustrate those who want all WikiTree profiles to be connected somehow, but if we allow connections that we are sure are not real, then I might as well claim living royalty as my parents!   When parents, spouses or children are attributed to them, they should be referenced in the ==Research Notes== and linked to other profiles there.  One advantage of this is that contradictory legends cease to be a problem.  "The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles says she was married to [[Jones-4568|John Jones]] but Nennius says she was married to [[Legend-24|Beowulf]].  You don't have to choose which is true, because the truth you are reporting on is not the truth about the legendary person, but the truth about what each legendary source said.  You're simply reporting on how the legend developed.

Where there are multiple profiles about the same legendary person, of course they need to be merged.  One of the challenges in merging is always to make sure you have the right LNAB, but finding the right LNAB for someone who never existed can pose extra challenges!