Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Mythical Chronology of Greece

This page is an archive of the discussion about the proposed deletion of the article below. This page is no longer live. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page rather than here so that this page is preserved as an historic record.
The result of the debate was keep. Mindspillage (spill yours?) 05:19, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Mythical Chronology of Greece

Original research and general kookiness DreamGuy 06:14, May 23, 2005 (UTC)

• Weak keep : I'm not sure about this one. It looks like it has potential with a lot of editing. --Barfooz (talk) 07:13, 23 May 2005 (UTC)
• Move to Timeline of Greek mythology, but remove the speculative dates. Martg76 08:06, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

The dates are not speculative and are accepted by most modern scholars. They are taken directly from extant chronologies and king lists such as The Parian Marble, Castor, Diodorus Siculus, Apollodorus, Tatian, Eusebius and Jerome.--Argyrosargyrou 17:52, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

• Delete: In the Greek mythology#cosmology, the rough events could be listed. Without specific references for each date, it's speculative to surmise that it was at year X BC or Y BC for an event. Geogre 15:42, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Well in that case you might as well throw out all the Egyptian chronologies and king lists which at best are only accurate to +/-5 years and at worst could be centuries out. In fact in the case of Egypt there are 3 different chronologies that have been reconstructed because nobody can agree on how long each pharaoh reigned and when a battle took place. Since margins of errors have been given on all the dates, the Greek chronology is no different to the ones used for Egypt. In fact the traditional Greek chronology is considerably more accurate than the Egyptian because every ancient historian agreed that 1183 BC was the date the Trojan War ended and 1103 BC was the date of the Dorian decent into the Peloponnese. --Argyrosargyrou 18:11, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

You do understand, don't you, that the problem here is not with a scholarly dating of Greek legendary events, but that these are legendary dates deduced solely from literary evidence? The dating for Egyptians comes from modern archeology. Modern archeology also indicates that the Trojan War, whatever it was, was probably 800-900 BC. The dates you have here, though, include the gods, etc., and come entirely from legendary speculation. Jerome is a great authority on a lot of things, and he's a saint and one of the brightest men in history, but he wasn't an archeologist. That's why this material shouldn't be presented as fact and should be put in the cosmology section of the Greek myth article. Modern scholars don't even agree on how and what the Greek gods were in origin, whether they were cthonian gods, hero cults, or nature gods, much less how and when each migrated into the Greek isles. Geogre 03:09, 24 May 2005 (UTC)

• This nomination is the result of the personal academic and religious bigotry of DreamGuy who wants to censor this article because it does not fit in with his prejudices and misconceptions of Greek history and mythology. The chronology for this article was primarily based on Jerome's Chroncon which was the standard historical text http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/jerome_chronicle_02_part1.htm
• Jerome's Chroncon is now available for the first time in English so you can check it out for yourselves. http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/jerome_chronicle_01_prefaces.htm
• I vote that the article stays unaltered using the chronology given which is the most accurate available. Before considering any decision to remove this article I demand that it be peer reviewed by PhD's and experts in the field not by people that have no idea what they are talking about and who have not read even one of the sources I quoted as has been revealed by the discussion. The removal of this article would amount to censorship.

--Argyrosargyrou 17:42, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

• This needs a deal of thought. This is a mythical chronology (since others could be constructed from the legends), but 'according to whom?' A case can perhas be made that this is a fair record of Jerome's suggestions, if so, fair enough, but rename it 'Jerome's mythical chronology', and remove anything that goes beyond Jerome (as original research). The comparison with Egyptology is patently false: the Egyptian dates are a reporting of current scholarly ideas about real history. This article cites no secondary literature - so unless it is simply a record of Jerome's work then it ought to be deleted as original research. In short a) Rename and clean-up – as Jerome’s work b) or delete as original research c) or cite mainstream scholars who also adopt this chronology (but I doubt that’s possible).--Doc (t) 19:14, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Since Jerome used multiple sources including Eusebius, Castor, Diodorus and Apollodorus it is not actualy his chorology. Technically the chronology in question is referred to as the "Traditional Chronology" and was not exclusive to Jerome. I have already cited mainstream scholars who use this chronology within the margin of error including Michael Wood, Alden A. Mosshammer, and J. C. Stobart. Jerome's main source was Eusebius who he translated into Latin and there are more dates and reigns in Eusebius Preparation of the Gospel where he also cites Tatian. Eusebius main source was Diodorus Siculus who wrote a complete history from the time of the Gods up until about 50 BC. Diodorus considered the Gods to have been real people who were once kings of Greece. Almost every modern scholar agrees with the 1183 BC date for the end of the Trojan War and an 1450 BC date for Minos I of Crete.--Argyrosargyrou 19:46, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Quote from Michael Wood's "In Search of Myths and Heroes"; "The archaeologists' discoveries of Bronze Age (2300-700 BC) artefacts made it clear that the Greek myths and epic poems preserve the traditions of a Bronze Age society, and may refer to actual events of that time"--Argyrosargyrou 20:04, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

• Weak keep. I pretty much agree with Doc above, but I think this page has tremendous potential, of comparable significance to the Ussher-Lightfoot Calendar, or at least Dates in Star Wars. We shouldn't have original research in Wikipeida, but many of our most interesting pages involve original integration. However, I am very concerned about the following sentence near the end: "The author reserves the right to update the chronology at any time as information becomes available." --Arcadian 20:42, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

• Weak keep. Useless as it stands, but there could be the seed of a good article in it. Frjwoolley 20:46, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

• Keep but sources should be added for each of the dates. Capitalistroadster 23:46, 23 May 2005 (UTC)
• Keep but rename someting better. Subject matter is completely analogous to the Ussher-Lightfoot Calendar. Doc's comments and the original authors have convinced me to vote delete for now. Subject matter is interesting indeed, but it is too much original research as it stands, since the author used multiple sources without citing each entry. Articles on the separate formulated chronologies by Ancient and Medieval authors would be perfectly appropriate by the themselves, but not a chrnology that mixes or combines them as this one does. I would be inclined to vote keep if the author would agree to label each separate date according to its source(s), such the article is not presented as a unified historical work, but an assembling of Ancient sources. -- Decumanus 23:54, 2005 May 23 (UTC)
• Keep but expand (with more sources, commentary, etc.) and possibly rename if appropriate. — P Ingerson (talk) 23:57, 23 May 2005 (UTC)
• Comment the comparison to the Usher speculation is not appropriate - precisely because that is clearly designated as Usher's theory/research. This, however, is drawn from a number of ancient sources (although principally Eusebius/Jerome). Unless it is a generally accepted scholarly timeframe (and verifiably such), then it is by definition original research compiled from ancient sources. Further, were Greek myths narrated by the ancients with a consistent and discernable timeline in mind? - Or is that not a highly a dubious theory in itself? I say again, as interesting as this is, this needs labelled as someone's reconstruction (if you can reconstruct history from myths) or deleted. (And if we are combing archaeology with interpretations of the authorial intention of mythic literature then we are doing original research.) --Doc (t) 00:37, 24 May 2005 (UTC)
  • Can we get an historiographer in here? --Doc (t) 01:02, 24 May 2005 (UTC)
• I cleaned up the page somewhat, and added in a few footnotes. If the original authors of the article are reading this -- if you could get in some more footnotes, it would help the article survive VfD. The books seem legitimate, but if you could help tie the books to specific assertions, not just include them at a list at the end, it would really help. (By the way, I'm not that experienced with footnotes, so someone else may want to take a look and see if I formatted them right.) --Arcadian 03:03, 24 May 2005 (UTC)
• Keep and cleanup. This chronology needs more sources to back up some of its claims. Megan1967 05:21, 24 May 2005 (UTC)
• Comment: The creator of this page claims the nomination is due to "personal academic and religious bigotry". This is absolute nonsense. The problem with this is it's all unsourced dates for which the creator assembled willy nilly without references. In fact the article makes no sense at all, as these are straight mythical events with no historical veracity. Assigning dates to them completely unsourced as if they have real meaning is nonsense. I also highly suspect that the creator of the page is a well-known netkook who thinks these events actually happened in history. The "religious bigotry" line apparently refers to his religious beliefs, as otherwise the comment makes no sense. And I wish people wouldn't vote on this unless they take a step back and look at the overall picture of what the article is doing: Giving ridiculously useless dates to events that never happened. What kind of encyclopedia lets people wander onto this information as if it was really real? DreamGuy 07:27, May 24, 2005 (UTC)
  • Last comment: dates for mythology or even fictional events are not the problem per se (see Starwars etc.). The problem is whose dates are these? Starwars dates exist (consistently?) in the mind & work of Lucas. These dates relate to myths retold and recreated in disparate cultural situations over centuries. Do these narrators share an imagined timeline? Unless they are in the mind of one named author (Homer, Eusebius etc) and titled as such, or are reporting an accepted framework of modern scholarship – then they are original research. Citing different sources for different ‘events’ will not do – as their selection and amalgamation would still be idiosyncratic and original research. --Doc (t) 09:16, 24 May 2005 (UTC)
• Rename or Rewrite. I share Doc's mixed feelings. I do not think the article should be deleted, but only because of what I see as its potential. Obviously no one is claiming that these are accurate dates of real historical events. The article is related to mythology, not history. As a chronology of mythological events, I think it can be of great use to any scholar researching Greek mythology. This is because myths are not (just) meaningful in and of themselves, but because they are part of a larger body of literature (i.e. mythology), which has an underlying logic. The temporal relationship between mythic events is one clue to that underlying logic (the chronology in which the myths actually came to exist, to be told, to be written down, i.e. the chronology of literary events, is another matter — these are historical events and provide a whole other angle to analyzing mythology, equally valid, but different from the chronology of mythical events). However, in my own experience people within a culture may have widely varying views of the temporal frame of their myths — they may differ as to the order of events; they may differ as to whether the events occured in sequence or are all different ways of talking about the same moment in their "history;" or they may relegate myths to some ahistorical/nontemporal time. I do not know enough about Greek mythology and the literary and historical study of Greek mythology to know which, if any, of these possibilities applies to Greek mythology. I do know, though, that an article such as this must (1) be as clear as possible about who/what the source is for this chronology; when that source was composed/when its author lived; and an account of the historical context in which the author of this source lived, which gives clues as to how this chronology may have been used. Moreover, if there are differing chronologies, or among Greek writers wholely different views about the temporality of the myths, these views must also be represented. And of course, all properly sourced. Such an article will be worth far more than the "dates in Star Wars" article (which really just give us some insight into George Lucas's creative process); it will be a useful link to the article on Greek mythology, giving, or sparking, some insight into ancient Hellenic culture. Slrubenstein | Talk 14:53, 24 May 2005 (UTC)
• Keep, source and expand per Slrubenstein Kappa 19:42, 28 May 2005 (UTC)
• Weak Keep. It's utter tosh, but it's interesting. Perhaps there should be a Genealogy of Greek Mythical Figures article too. Phlogistomania 14:37, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)
• Delete Genealogy of Greek Mythology would be useful, but this is not it. Consensus om the dates is almost certainly impossible, and IIRC the date of the Trojan war, here, is fifteen years away from the (plurality?) conventional wisdom. Septentrionalis 21:19, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)

This page is now preserved as an archive of the debate and, like some other VfD subpages, is no longer 'live'. Subsequent comments on the issue, the deletion, or the decision-making process should be placed on the relevant 'live' pages. Please do not edit this page.