Talk:*Kóryos

Dacian draco - wolf motif in standards - analysis by Mircea Eliade
I think this should interest you: Wolves in folklore, religion and mythology2804:14D:5CE7:8E72:418E:773C:3A69:EE6A (talk) 02:01, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Thank you! Alcaios (talk) 09:17, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

"Dog" or "Hound" onomastics in Celtic languages as replacemen for "wolf"-related names, e.g., Cu Chuláinn
Xavier Delamarre argues that, in Celtic compund names, the word "wolf", pertaining to the wildness and lawlessness of the Indo-European warrior, has been replaced by dog/hound names, such as in Cu Chuláinn. Delamarre, Xavier. "Affranchis, chevaux sauvages, libérateurs et mercenaires: le mot gaulois pour «libre»". In: Etudes Celtiques, vol. 41, 2015. pp. 136-137. [DOI: https://doi.org/10.3406/ecelt.2015.2454] ; www.persee.fr/doc/ecelt_0373-1928_2015_num_41_1_2454 179.218.212.120 (talk) 15:55, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Kouretes/Curetes and Korybantes/Curibantes - a possible Indo-European connection?
I'm leaving here some links to the subject of Kouretes/Korybantes, which you couldn't find before you launched the Koryos article: 179.218.212.120 (talk) 01:21, 29 June 2020 (UTC) Rūmniece, Ilze. "ANCIENT "CURETES" AND THE WESTERN BALTIC TRIBE OF "KŪRI" (SOME SUGGESTIVE PARALLELS)." Rivista Di Cultura Classica E Medioevale 55, no. 2 (2013): 587-92. Accessed June 29, 2020. www.jstor.org/stable/23972385.

Belt Buckle of Finglesham Man - possible visual remnant of the animal-like warrior?
An excavation in Finglesham (UK) yielded a piece of archeological evidence with a very interesting imagery: a naked figure (possibly male), wearing only a belt and a horned helmet while holding two spears, one in each hand. The imagery appears close to the Torslunda plates of a similarly dressed figure and a bipedal creature.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:FingleshamMan1965Buckle.png https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Finglesham_Buckle_at_the_Ashmolean_Museum.jpg

179.218.212.120 (talk) 00:00, 30 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Very interesting indeed! I will look into that, thank you Alcaios (talk) 14:31, 24 August 2020 (UTC)

Some more historiography would be nice
From reading the article, I do not have a good sense of how the concept was developed in scholarly circles and what its reception was then and is now. I think that's something in this article that could use some improvement. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.71.97.185 (talk) 16:18, 9 March 2021 (UTC)

Agree. This article says nothing about how this concept was developed. Gold333 (talk) 01:01, 18 September 2021 (UTC)

Did the kóryos actually exist, or is it a hypothesis?
The lead says it is "hypothesized" and "theorized", but the article text makes some very specific assertions (e.g., the beginning of the "Rite of passage" section). What's up? CohenTheBohemian (talk) 14:14, 20 July 2023 (UTC)


 * this entire submission lacks any legitimate academic writing and has no basis in material facts. Why is this page approved? 2603:7000:801:1143:F842:3EB8:92BA:975C (talk) 13:27, 15 August 2023 (UTC)
 * More thoughts on issues with the page (as of 17 August ):
 * 1. WP:NPOV: The lead states that kóryos is hypothetical, but not all the article reflects this, especially Rite of passage and Wolf-like behavior. Nor is there any discussion or criticism of the idea. This is a bit surprising given its obvious weaknesses.
 * 2. WP:WEIGHT: The Historiography section is too brief for something that is ultimately a historiographical artefact. Moreover, its history of Nazi and alt-right associations and rehabilitation by contemporary science seems pretty important.
 * 3. WP:UNDUE/WP:SYNTH/WP:OR: The supporting evidence – all the Attestations section and large parts of others – is much longer than the sections on the kóryos itself. Also, the implications are that this evidence explains why archaeologists support the idea, and that these groups are descended from a common PIE ancestor, but this goes unsaid. The importance of the linguistic evidence is also unstated.
 * 4. WP:INTEGRITY: The citations often link several sources together, which weakens text-source integrity and makes them difficult to check. For instance, the first line of Rite of passage reads
 * "The kóryos were composed of adolescent males (presumably from 12–13 up to 18–19 years of age), usually coming from prominent families and initiated together into manhood as an age-class cohort."
 * There are three or four claims here supported by four sources, but which supports which? The specific ages are probably from Kristiansen et al, but that's OR (see point 5). Note that weasel word "presumably", too; there are a few of these.
 * 5. I haven't been able to check most of the citations, but at least some are unreliable. For example, the Historiography section has three paragraphs with five citations.
 * The first paragraph is fine.
 * The second cites Nordvig to support the claim that there is "new evidence supporting the existence of such brotherhoods of warriors in early Germanic and other Indo-European cultures"; the chapter says that "The last three decades of archaeological research has yielded strong evidence for the aristocratic warband theory from the Vendel Era" (550-800AD, not PIE period), but describes thought on Männerbunde as split into two camps, and older warrior fraternities as "highly theoretical".
 * The third also uses Nordvig to support Kershaw's book as being "influential", but the article does not judge the book at all. There's another cite for a source I couldn't check.
 * So, of four cites I can judge, two are fine, but so far as I can tell, one is partly right at best and one is completely wrong.
 * Another example: the Rite of passage sentence in point 4 cites Kristiansen et al., which includes this:
 * "They describe, as a typical feature of these societies, the formation of warrior youth bands consisting of boys from 12–13 up to 18–19 years of age, when they were ready to enter the ranks of fully grown warriors. Such youthful war-bands were led by a senior male, and they were often named 'Black Youth' or given names of dogs and wolves as part of their initiation rituals."
 * But the previous sentence reads: "It [Indo-European expansion] gains further support from later historical sources from India to the Baltic and Ireland." The "12–13 up to 18–19" is not describing PIE koryos at all, but common themes in later Indo-European societies. Confusing PIE and later societies is also linked to the OR issues in point 3.
 * To be fair, I haven’t been able to check most of the sources, and plenty of those I could find were fine.
 * 6. WP:BESTSOURCES: It's odd that the "standard" book (McCone) is cited three times in the article, and the other book mentioned as notable (Kershaw) 11 times, but the papers by Anthony & Brown and Sergent are cited 15 times each.
 * 7. There's nothing in the main article about physical evidence for this, which seems like a big issue and is apparently what the Anthony & Brown paper is about. There's a lot of emphasis on conclusions but less on evidence.
 * 8. The first line of Wolf-like behavior describes the kóryos members as "shape-shifting", which is at least careless writing.
 * I am not sure how to proceed, but hopefully someone who has access to more sources than me will be able to deal with these issues. CohenTheBohemian (talk) 13:59, 18 August 2023 (UTC)
 * Agree with all the above. Somebody went… wild, with this article.  Volunteer Marek   03:12, 1 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Really, both the hypothesis and this article look like a molehill made into a mountain. CohenTheBohemian (talk) 16:44, 7 July 2024 (UTC)
 * I have to admit I did contribute to the article... but only on the etymology part, since there are philologists and experts in the many Indo-European languages who do find the "*koryo-" word in the languages they respectively study, e.g., "Corio-" in the Celtic branch.
 * If I may have a say, perhaps the etymology part, with the attestation in the ethnonyms, can be moved to the article about Indo-European vocabulary as just that, without going to the minutiae of what they represent. KHR FolkMyth (talk) 22:43, 8 July 2024 (UTC)
 * That seems like a good idea to me, as it's not directly relevant to the article. Worse, I think that sort of material (not just etymological) is conflating armed forces with this specific hypothesis and creating OR (possibly careless scholarship in the sources, too). CohenTheBohemian (talk) 14:34, 10 July 2024 (UTC)