Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Tonantius Ferreolus (senator)


 * 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 as this seems enough to continue (NAC). SwisterTwister  talk  05:27, 27 March 2016 (UTC)

Tonantius Ferreolus (senator)

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This is an involved problem.

First, there was no person of this name. There was a Tonantius Ferreolus, Praetorian Prefect of the Gauls c. 451, but this article makes it very clear that this is not the Prefect but his son. However, checking the standard references -- Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire, Martin Heinzelmann, "Gallische Prosopographie 260-527", Francia 10 (1982), et alia -- Tonantius Ferreolus the Prefect did not have a son by this name. However, he did have a son Tonantius. Even the sources cited in this article that I have been able to consult do not call this son Tonantius, not Tonantius Ferreolus.

So the solution then should be to simply move the article from the wrong name to the right one? Not exactly.

Reviewing the facts of Tonantius the Younger's life, he lacks any grounds for notability. Unless being the friend of Sidonius Apollinaris, the son of one notable person & the possible father of another (Firminius, bishop of Uze) are grounds for notability. (I know. I looked hard.) He was just Some Rich Dude who lived in the 5th century when the Roman Empire in the West collapsed, about whom we know little more than his name. And maybe of interest to various people looking to trace a connection between the Senatorial families of the Later Roman Empire & the well-born of later centuries -- but in that case, Tonantius should be mentioned in the relevant article, not given his own article. -- llywrch (talk) 23:46, 14 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Keep A 5th century Roman aristocrat whose life attests to the adaptation of Gallo-Romans to their new circumstances, with a sourced article. That is in itself notable. Dimadick (talk) 20:41, 15 March 2016 (UTC)
 * To repeat myself, (1) the name is wrong; (2) his most notable achievement was to receive a pair of letters from Sidonius (one of which compliments him on his villa); & (3) his possible role as a genealogical link. (Which IMHO is suspect, but probably worth a mention in a related article.) There is no surviving material that helps to attest "to the adaptation of Gallo-Romans to their new circumstances" -- far better examples would be his father, Tonantius Ferreolus (prefect) or Sidonius Apollinaris, or any of a dozen individuals we can actually say something about. But if one were to prune the genealogical content currently filling much of this article, & the obvious speculation making up the remainder, practically nothing would be left. If I could salvage this article, I would, but there's nothing here to salvage. -- llywrch (talk) 18:57, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of People-related deletion discussions. Ⓩⓟⓟⓘⓧ (talk) 20:43, 15 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Politicians-related deletion discussions. Ⓩⓟⓟⓘⓧ (talk) 20:43, 15 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of History-related deletion discussions. Necrothesp (talk) 15:48, 16 March 2016 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Kharkiv07  ( T ) 00:36, 21 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Strong Keep If the name is wrong, WP:MOVE the article. Meets the criteria of WP:NPOL namely "Politicians and judges who have held international, national or sub-national (statewide/provincewide) office, and members or former members of a national, state or provincial legislature" AusLondonder (talk) 08:46, 22 March 2016 (UTC)
 * But this personage is not known to have held any political office. The "senator" in the article title refers to his social rank, not to membership in a legislature. -- llywrch (talk) 17:53, 23 March 2016 (UTC)
 * The article suggests he was a member of the Roman Senate. Is this incorrect? The article for this body is in the category Category:Historical legislatures. AusLondonder (talk) 08:12, 25 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Keep As it stands, if the younger Tonantius was appointed Defensor Pedensis by Theodoric in 511, then he meets the WP:NPOL criteria. If he is, then the name should not be changed, as Martindale records the Defensor as "Ferriolus". The article does need a good clean-up; I don't like the biographical articles that are heavily dependent on Christian Settipani's genealogical musings and assumptions, and the blocked user who introduced much of those changes User:G.-M. Cupertino / User:GradyEdwardLoy (and God knows how many other accounts) was too keen to state as fact what are really a bunch of assumptions. Maybe the solution is to go back to a version of the article before much of the extraneous details were added, and judiciously add any additional information from the latest version that are verifiable, or at least clarify statements by declaring that "it has been hypothesised that...". At the same time it would be good to delete unsubstantiated rubbish like "Tonantius Ferreolus' Austrasia bound son Ferreolus would have possessed sufficient standing in the eyes of the Franks to marry a Frankish princess of a minor house". Oatley2112 (talk) 22:56, 24 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Keep -- possibly renamed to (say) Tonantius. If we have unsubstantiated material in it, the nom should purge that.  Peterkingiron (talk) 16:54, 26 March 2016 (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.