Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Osyth Essex


 * 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. Factors which I have registered in this discussion are that nobody wants the article kept as is, and the one who wanted this merged conceded that the dates are probably unverifiable. Given that the dates make up about half the information of these articles, means that there is very little left to merge. Sjakkalle (Check!)  09:30, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

Osyth Essex

 * ( [ delete] ) – (View AfD) (View log)

From the backlog I came across this article, which would appear to be an A7. Decided that given its history, a speedy is not appropriate. A search for context is not particularly helpful due to the umpteen places called Essex. There are some in this chain that have context, an explanation of notability (i.e. Eoffa de Wessex) and are therefore not up for deletion. However there are some in this chain with no assertion of notability and it's only through following a chain that you find they're remotely connected with someone. Also bundled here, created by the same person in one day: I'm guessing these came about from an effort to make articles for those listed on the House of Wessex family tree but there's no evidence these people were Kings of Wessex as opposed to Egbert of Wessex who was a king and has the information to create an article. TravellingCari 13:45, 21 August 2008 (UTC) There may be something wrong with the nomination as there is a redlink in the deletion notice. Peterkingiron (talk) 22:36, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Eoppa de Wessex
 * Ingild Wessex
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of England-related deletion discussions.   --  TravellingCari  13:47, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of History-related deletion discussions.   --  TravellingCari  13:47, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Merge all the content on the ancestry of Egbert of Wessex into one article. The only sources on this are probably genealogies in Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.  I suspect the dates are unveriable.  If kept Eoppa de Wessex should be Eoppa of Wessex; Osyth Essex should be Osyth of Essex; etc.  Which was the senior and junior lines (and so whether a junior line usurped the throne) is probably also unverifiable.  The dates do not match for Osyth Essex being identical with Osyth.  Peterkingiron (talk) 22:36, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * What's the benefit of merging unsourced and possibly unverifiable information. If notability is not inherited and there's no evidence these people held a title, what's worth merging? Not necessarily disagreeing, but curious. TravellingCari  01:34, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Delete Eoppa and Eafa are known only as names in a lineal ancestry of Alfred the Great presented in the ASC. They held no known title, nor are they notable for any other reason - they are just names between other names in a long list of names. There is not even uniformity of opinion that they existed, rather than simply being invented to link Alfred's grandfather Egbert to the older kings. Ingild is mentioned in the same pedigree, and also explicitly as brother of king Ine, but again, no title, no other notoriety (and contrary to what the Eafa article says, they were not the senior line, displaced by a junior line - the inheritance of the kinship did not follow primogeniture, but rather passed from one strongman to another among a large family group). As to Osyth, she does not even appear in the ASC. She seems to have been invented in the 19th or 20th century as a way to link pedigrees together. None of these meet the notoriety standard. Agricolae (talk) 23:30, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment I have edited the Eafa page to better reflect the consensus of historians. Note that this removes the majority of the context, and all that remains relating to speculation about his son's ancestry and not directly to Eafa, and would be better merged into the latter's page. Agricolae (talk) 05:27, 24 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Thank you for explaining this in both of your comments. You're clearly more familiar with the topic. TravellingCari  18:58, 24 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment -- In the light of Agricolae's comments, this article fails WP:V. AS to the wider debate, ASC is a reputable historical source, and about all we have on this period.  The fact that it may be based on oral tradition in Egbert's family does not render it necessarily unreliable: we are dealing with a largely illiterate society; indeed, claims that it is unreliable are verging on WP:OR.  It is possible that some of the other people also appear in charters, but it may difficult to determine if the person named (probably a witness) was in fact Egbert's ancestor, or another of the same name.  They may have been earldormen, ruling a shire under the king, but we cannot know.  There is a strong case for merging them all into Egbert of Wessex into an ancestry (if not already there).  During the course of this discussion, I have removed WP:OR statements about usurpation by more junior relatives, as I doubt we even know who was the elder.  Peterkingiron (talk) 21:08, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment Just addressing some of this last, for the period in question, there is no other source but the ASC entries from Alfred the Great's time, or later. It is not a question of WP:OR - it is a legitimate minority opinion, with peer reviewed published scholarship that question this descent. I have seen it, and I have seen other scholars rejecting that interpretation - I just don't have anything handy to cite. I think there is enough to justify Ealhmund, whose page I have just savaged, but not for the earlier generations. I would suggest the generations back to Ingild brother of Ine of Wessex on Egbert's page, with a mention of descent from Cerdic, but not the names before that, then use Ine's page for the rest of the descent. Agricolae (talk) 02:09, 27 August 2008 (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.