Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Circassians in Romania


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was DELETE. postdlf (talk) 00:15, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

Circassians in Romania

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This article is quite frankly a perfect sample of what does not constitute an encyclopedic subject. The entire topic is irrelevant, as the article candidly notes: "In the 2002 Census, two persons declared to be Circassians". (Mind you, even this is entirely original research, since the records of the census, cited as the reference, do not actually and understandably go into as much detail. One presumes that the author of the article, a self-styled Circassian, got this info from personal interviews!) The rest of the article is entirely speculative and highly promotional: "Some traditions are similar between the two peoples. For example, both Circassians and Romanians are known to be very hospitable with their guests". The rest, about place names or surnames, is simply WP:COAT, whose sources are either unretrievable, unreliable or non-existent (see for instance the article's main reference). The few relevant tidbits, such as the 1870s exodus of virtually all Circassians from Dobruja (which btw only became Romanian territory in 1878), or their current presence in Turkey, are aptly covered in other articles: Deportation of Circassians, Circassians in Turkey, Circassians in Israel. Dahn (talk) 12:59, 2 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Delete - a classic bit of original research. About half the sources are self-published/blogs, one is the white pages (!), and the rest, while more or less reliable, are either irrelevant or twisted to prove a point. The little content that is relevant, as Dahn points out, has plenty of other target articles where it could be covered. - Biruitorul Talk 14:24, 2 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Romania-related deletion discussions.  -- • Gene93k (talk) 23:23, 2 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Ethnic groups-related deletion discussions.  -- • Gene93k (talk) 23:23, 2 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Merge in to article called Circassian diaspora. There is no mention of a Circassian diaspora in Romania within the diaspora article and any useful information within the Circassians in Romania could be usefully merged there.  Nipson anomhmata   (Talk) 12:05, 3 April 2011 (UTC)
 * That would be a solution, but let's note that the article now claims there are no more than two Circassians in present-day Romania, and even this WP:FRINGE claim is not actually sourced - the census results simply show one person in one locality who declared him/herself something that was recorded as Altă etnie ("Other ethnicity"). Dahn (talk) 08:41, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
 * It is safe to assume that if 10,000 Circassians were displaced to Romania in the 1800s that there will be more than two of their descendents there today (whatever the census says).  Nipson anomhmata   (Talk) 20:00, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
 * In theory, perhaps. But somehow that line of thought seems to go against, for instance, the core tenet of WP:V: "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth: whether readers can check that material in Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source, not whether editors think it is true." Dahn (talk) 20:16, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
 * It has already been verified that 10,000 Circassions were displaced to Romania. Anything else, including the census results, is speculation.  Nipson anomhmata   (Talk) 01:25, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Actually, let me restate this: 10,000 Circassians were not displaced to Romania, but to a region which became Romania some years after those Circassians were displaced further, to Turkey; in all, those Circassians had only been living in that region for some decades. Provided it were known that Aztecs are from a place in the United States (i.e. that Aztlán was on the Mississippi or something), this article would be the practical equivalent of an Aztecs in the United States article. Beyond that, the article speculates about the (earlier) existence of Circassians in any other regions of Romania, and their present-day number now is two (allegedly). So what "Circassians in Romania" are we talking about? Dahn (talk) 06:51, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Interesting. So what you are saying is that there was more than one displacement and that this location was temporary.  Nipson anomhmata   (Talk) 11:01, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes. Unfortunately for the Circassians and their Dobrujan neighbors, it was temporary: in 1877, during the Russo-Turkish War, the Russian advance into Dobruja was the effective ethnic cleansing of that region. Most Musilm populations there either fled or were expelled en masse, including other refugee groups from Russia - the Crimean Tatars, the Nogais, various Turkic subgroups. This all happened before Romania was assigned the region by Russia, in forceful exchange for most of the Budjak, which was still Romanian-owned in 1877. Now, I'm not saying that Romania has a clean record in this matter (Dobrujan Muslim populations continued to be pressured by Romanian colonization, and 20th century totalitarianism in Romania effectively encouraged some more to leave for Turkey), but the Circassian thing, for what it's worth, did not occur on Romanian territory. For an overview, see Islam in Romania (I'm being immodest, as I wrote most of it back in the day). Dahn (talk) 11:26, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
 * To sum up, the "Circassians in Romania" are in reality the Circassians in Turkey, the Circassians in Israel, the Circassians of Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Kosovo etc. That is to say, the Circassians of those Ottoman provinces that were not ran over by the Russians. Dahn (talk) 14:44, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
 * While the conclusion is OK, I have to note that the first paragraph is riddled with factual errors.Anonimu (talk) 15:28, 5 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Delete Too little info in reliable sources for a separate article.Anonimu (talk) 15:28, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.