Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Maltese nobility (2nd nomination)


 * 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. Geschichte (talk) 06:40, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

Maltese nobility
AfDs for this article:


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Seeking a delete (or, preferably, a redirect to History of Malta) for an NN article and topic that's been plagued with problems from its inception, principally a lack of reliable sourcing and rampant sockpuppetry. The redirect's been reverted twice by an anon IP, but none of the information here has been sourced (save to a dead link), the notability of any of these "titles" has been unproven through the course of several dozen AfDs and prods, and at some point, enough is just enough.   Ravenswing     23:04, 25 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Politicians-related deletion discussions.   Ravenswing      23:04, 25 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Malta-related deletion discussions.   Ravenswing      23:04, 25 May 2021 (UTC)


 * Strong Keep - Lists and linked articles need/s attention, not deletion. Has been neglected for so many years, but I have attempted to begin working on this article (I feel obligated as a history fanatic), but will likely need a far better database. However, as eloquently mentioned in the previous deletion attempt:
 * "Looking at the[se] articles makes it clear that many of these families once played a significant economic and political role in the history of the island. That this may no longer be the case is no reason to delete them from historical memory. Uppland (talk) 17:07, 10 September 2005 (UTC)"

Am of the opinion that this topic is an asset to WP, especially *because* it is so unknown. I hope the original main contributor to the article sees this and can help in adding additional references to mine. Knightoften (talk) 03:45, 26 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Comment: That might be difficult, because the original editor was community banned and his websites spam-blacklisted for (among other things) badly misrepresenting his own credentials, which were the underpinning for many now-deleted articles on various alleged Maltese titles. Recapitulating the history of all of that would be far more effort than it's worth -- several dozen deletion discussions, attempts to overturn some of them, an RfC, a couple swings at ANI.  But that being said, the reason those articles were deleted was that no reliable, independent sourcing could be found.  We don't keep unsourced articles on Wikipedia becausewe believe they might be important.  We keep articles where reliable sources provide "substantial coverage" to the subjects, as the GNG requires.  I'm happy for this to redirect to History of Malta, as it had been before an anon IP started spamming, but this article already went a couple years without adequate sourcing, was hotly debated for several months beyond that, and finally redirected when it was proven that the articles the likes of Uppland praised were just this side of hoaxes.  There is now no scope for anything but that proper sourcing to be a prerequisite for an independent article.   Ravenswing      04:01, 26 May 2021 (UTC$$

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
 * Keep. The version of the article that was deleted years ago was written by a biased editor and based on self-published sources. I considered that the topic itself was still notable, so recreated the article based on the relevant section of Burke’s Peerage. The edition I used has since been removed from archive.org, but there is no requirement for sources to be available online. That a subject attracts vandals is a case for blocking those vandals, not for deleting the article. Opera hat (talk) 18:59, 26 May 2021 (UTC)

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  Sandstein   12:00, 2 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Keep It takes no time to establish the topic's notability – see Malta's aristocracy, for example. Our policies WP:ATD; WP:NOTPAPER and WP:PRESERVE therefore apply. See also WP:NOTCLEANUP. Andrew🐉(talk) 13:35, 2 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Keep as above—on top of Andrew's source it's not hard to find scholarly sources discussing the topic on Google Books either, including an entry on "Maltese nobility" in the Historical Dictionary of Malta. Might well be plagued with problems, the list might need to be junked if it's unsourceable, but this seems like a "so fix it" thing and a content dispute rather than a matter for AfD. —Nizolan (talk · c.) 14:30, 2 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Keep There's a load of stuff out there, going literally back to the Crusades. This is a thing, it's got a ton of sources, if the article falls short, then it's more - as noted above - a case of fixing it!!! Best Alexandermcnabb (talk) 15:33, 2 June 2021 (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.