Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Hiallt


 * 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 keep. The deletion argument was based on the lack of personal notable achievement. However, there is a strong consensus that his historical legacy coupled with such sources as exist make him a valid encyclopaedic subject. Bridgeplayer (talk) 00:29, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

Hiallt

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Does not pass WP:BIO; only claim to notability is being begotten by some notable people and begetting a notable clan. No information on the person himself is available, and notability is not inherited. Crisco 1492 (talk) 04:42, 14 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of People-related deletion discussions.  —Tom Morris (talk) 05:01, 14 September 2011 (UTC)


 * Keep. Our biographical standards are created primarily to exclude trivial people in the present time; the amount of sourcing available for people born nearly eleven centuries ago is so different from the amount of sourcing available for people alive today that anyone from that time for whom we have this much information should be covered.  Do you really believe that we can know this much about him without the existence of substantial coverage?  Nyttend (talk) 03:46, 15 September 2011 (UTC)
 * "Know this much about him" (emphasis mine). We know about his family, not him. If he is truly notable for begetting people, how many sons and daughters did he have? Any estimates? Siblings? Battles or important raids? If we are going to write about every single progenitor out there, we'd have untold billions of possibilities. Crisco 1492 (talk) 14:55, 15 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Hiallt is not notable for begetting lots of offspring and the article does not claim such. Surely successful begetting in Wiki terms is a qualitative not a quantative process, he only needed to beget one notable offspring (Thoralf - it's in the sources but not mentioned in the article because it's not yet important) in order to achieve the position that we are discussing here. (Note - Klara Hitler begat 6 offspring, but we don't really care about the others.) Billions of progenitors? May I suggest a different biology textbook for this debate to stay sensible. Chienlit (talk) 17:52, 15 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Hmm? If his claim to notability is not being the ancestor of a notable person, then what is it? Regarding the "billions", our article on Human population notes that there were 2 billion alive in 1927, of which at least a billion must have died by now, and most would have had at least one child. Go back another 2000 years and there will be even more. Should a (theoretical) common ancestor of Hulk Hogan, Kim Jong Il, and Desmond Tutu have an article for having a notable descendent? Crisco 1492 (talk) 14:55, 16 September 2011 (UTC)


 * Strong Keep. Hiallt founded / originated at least one, possibly three, communities in France. I think that is redolent of a 'significant' achievement, but it doesn't take many words to say this, (we only have the anachronistic French idiom as proof), and so it is covered in a few words the article. But his real significance is that his DNA was spread throughout Western Europe and the Middle East in positions of great power, and his family's expansionist culture has resonated throughout geopolitics for 1,000 years. I wrote the article because I was researching backwards from 9/11 for the root of the conflict, a path which leads inexorably over 1,000 years to the first crusade and bloodshed in the Holy land and a climate of mistrust and misunderstanding. It then leads further back to 'some of' the instigators of the crusades, Vikings, who had already traded, plundered, pillaged, conquered, tricked and settled throughout both Russia and Western Europe so that they were known as Normans, English, Italian etc. Hiallt was probably born too late to be a plunderer of Normandy, the Treaty of Saint-Clair-sur-Epte may have ensured that he instead became a settler, but when a Viking decided to settle on your fields I doubt whether it was a pleasant experience. A settler is probably not much more than a plunderer who stays, integrates with local women, giving the choice of fight to the death, enslavement, or running away.  It is possible that no information about Hiallt passes Wiki's tests, but that doesn't mean that we should delete such people, maybe we need to refine the tests. This article gives us the merest glimmer of the slightest insight into the incredibly successful expansionist culture of these people. The direct quote from Goffredo Malaterra  ...took the Cross with the intention of plundering and conquering Greek lands.. may well be a reasonable insight into the hereditary culture of the family, rather than merely a  description of Tancred, but it is up to the reader to piece together their own picture. (For me the quote would seem to be a good basis for 1,000 years of bloodshed and mistrust.) I look forward to 2121 with intense anticipation and absolute certainty that Wikipedians will have unearthed more verifiable details about the man and his family. Chienlit (talk) 13:08, 15 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep. There may not be much known about this person, but his name appears in multiple records and traditions as the scion of an influential family and the founder of a community and a dynastic family. Particularly considering that it is now some 1100 years after his death and his name is still remembered in this fashion, that's more than enough notability to be the basis for an article. --Orlady (talk) 16:16, 16 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep I totally agree with Nyttend's argument. Not to mention the multiple records about him and him founding at least one town. Bgwhite (talk) 20:33, 16 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep because this is an encyclopedia. The various notability guidelines are designed to help us deal with marginal cases, not topics that are obviously encyclopedic. Phil Bridger (talk) 21:51, 16 September 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.