Talk:Gleb Svyatoslavich

Latest comment: 3 years ago by Agricolae in topic Population genomics of the Viking world as RS

Population genomics of the Viking world as RS edit

Scientific work "Beyond broad strokes: sociocultural insights from the study of ancient genomes" use this source as information source: ("56. Margaryan, A., Lawson, D., Sikora, M. & Racimo, F. Population genomics of the Viking world. bioRxiv (2019)." (page 25). [1] [2] therefore if this source is used by "Globe Institute, Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences, University of Copenhagen", I see no reason why the same source should not be used on Wikipedia. Or this work "The spatiotemporal spread of human migrations during the European Holocene" from 2020,[3] also uses that work as source, (56. A. Margaryan et al., Population genomics of the Viking world. bioRxiv:10.1101/703405 (17 July 2019).

  • Scientific work "Population genomics of the Viking world" and institutions which participated in that project: University of Copenhagen, Institute of Molecular Biology, National Academy of Sciences University of Bristol UK, Historical archaeology Department of Archaeology and Ancient history Lund University Sweden, Moscow State University, Uppsala University Sweden, Department of Archaeology and Cultural History Norway, Institute of Archaeology Iceland, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, National Institute of Genomic Medicine (INMEGEN) Mexico City Mexico, etc etc...(page 1-3) [4]. I think for now everything is clean as far as this source is concerned. Mikola22 (talk) 13:28, 19 July 2020 (UTC)Reply
Nice finding about the citation of the source by other studies.--Miki Filigranski (talk) 16:29, 19 July 2020 (UTC)Reply
@Miki Filigranski: "Antler combs from the Salme ship burials: find context, origin, dating and manufacture Estonian Journal of Archaeology", scientific work from Estonia, 2020, [5] see DOI under references (doi.org/10.1101/703405). We have and this "Other News Viking relatives? A major new DNA study of Late Saxon period skeletal remains is highlighted in the latest edition of the CBA ‘British Archaeology’ Magazine. The study includes work on some of the burials recovered from the 10th-11th century mass grave recovered from the excavations at St John’s College Kendrew Quad on St Giles in 2008.. etc. Source for this information is this work also under DOI (doi.org/10.1101/703405) [6]. This source use and ISOGG Ireland and he is under "Academic publications relevant to Irish genetic genealogy"[7]. Similar work as the first one but T. Douglas Price is author here and in first he is not listed, "Human remains, context, and place of origin for the Salme, Estonia, boat burials" (2020)[8] [9] also has same work as a source under DOI. Mikola22 (talk) 21:11, 19 July 2020 (UTC)Reply

The Nature item [10] and the PNAS article [11] have authors in common with the bioRxiv preprint. So does the Estonian Journal of Archaeology one. They're not independent. XOR'easter (talk) 01:37, 21 July 2020 (UTC)Reply

But this papers are peer review (at least the first), which means that theirs work in earlier edition in fact gets "certificate of quality." Mikola22 (talk) 07:34, 21 July 2020 (UTC)Reply
No, it doesn't. The earlier paper isn't peer-reviewed until it's peer-reviewed. XOR'easter (talk) 16:15, 21 July 2020 (UTC)Reply
And let's not lose track of the fact that Gleb isn't named in the paper. Yes, a Wikipedia editor can sift through supplements to find a trivial datum that interests them, but that really gives it attention in massive disproportion to the source coverage - we are not supposed to do that, even when the paper has been peer reviewed. Agricolae (talk) 17:48, 21 July 2020 (UTC)Reply
@Mikola22:@Miki Filigranski:@XOR'easter:@Agricolae:The Population genomics of the Viking world paper was published September 16th 2020 on Nature (different from the preprint on bioRχiv), it's not preprint anymore. Gleb Svyatoslavich is mentioned in the Supplementary Information (page 44) of the paper. His sample's designation is VK542. In the Supplementary Tables of the paper, specifically "TableS1_New samples", we can see that his Y-DNA (patrilineal) haplogroup is I2a1a2b1a1a (i believe basal I-Y3120), while his mtDNA (matrilineal) haplogroup H5a2a. In "TableS6_Ancestry estimates" of the same file, we also get his autosomal (atDNA) profile, namely:
2.3% - "British-like"/"North Atlantic"
0.4% - "Danish-like"
0.4% - "Swedish-like"
0.1% - "Norwegian-like"
71.1% - "Polish-like"
24.6% - "Southern European-like"
1% - "Finnish-like"
Can we please find a consensus and add something about this important finding on the article. Demetrios1993 (talk) 02:16, 14 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
What establishes that it is important? Truly important things generally don't get buried in supplemental information. XOR'easter (talk) 03:10, 14 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
@XOR'easter:It's important in the context of the historical individual this article is about. We are not dicussing the level of relevance he had on the paper, but the fact that this information exists, is within it, has been officially published, and it is very relevant to this Wikipedia article. Supplementary information is also part of genetic papers, and is essentially the other side of the iceberg in relation to them by containing all of the details. I still don't understand what's the argument. We have other sources that his sample is being presented, such as YFull's YTree (look at the very first sample - id:VK542). By the way, supplementary information of genetic papers are WP:RS and have also been added in other Wikipedia articles, just look at the article of Mycenaean Greece as an example. Are you trying to tell me that genetic information that directly pertains to Gleb Svyatoslavich is not important and should not be included within this article? Demetrios1993 (talk) 04:48, 14 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
I agree that this information is important and it should be part of the article. Mikola22 (talk) 05:26, 14 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
And I agree with XOR'easter that this is just trivia, no more worth mentioning that his blood type or which of his testicles was larger. The fact that information exists does not make it noteworthy. In an example I have brought up elsewhere, I could tell you, with a reliable source, exactly what king Henry II of England ate on one specific day when nothing of consequence happened - it is information that exists and which has been published, but which has no business being in a biography of Henry, even if someone with interest in medieval culinary arts may be fascinated by it. To answer Demetrios1993's question, I do indeed think that genetic information directly pertinent to Gleb is not important and should not be included within this article. If historians pick this up and start featuring it in their historical accounts of Gleb, that would be the time for Wikipedia to do the same, but we should not be digging data out of obscure supplementary material and deciding for ourselves that it is noteworthy and important. To do so would be massively out of proportion to the amount of coverage this genetic result has received in the scholarly literature about Gleb - which is precisely none whatsoever (unsurprising given that the primary result was just published). Agricolae (talk) 06:03, 14 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
@Agricolae:Comparing what King Henry II of England might have ate on one specific day, with genetic information that is directly relevant, not just to Gleb Svyatoslavich, but his recent ancestors and descendants, is a poor argument. I am not trying to be rude, but this information is as relevant as saying that his father was Sviatoslav II of Kiev for example. Genetic data is meant to provide more insight into the background of the subject, and even reveal information that the historical record remains ignorant of. Whereas history is unable to shed light on the background of Gleb's mother Killikiya for example, genetics are here to do it instead. Furthermore, historians don't have to pick it up for it to be relevant to the article, geneticists did instead and that is meritful by its own. Also, it doesn't really matter that this information was published in the Supplementary Information (SI) of the study. It is common practice for very important information to be included in the SI instead, which again, is also part of the study. There is nothing obscure about it. For example, look at the article of the Sintashta culture which includes genetic information such as Y-DNA and mtDNA haplogroups that are not part of the proper paper but of SI. If you really think that genetic information is not crucial, even though many Wikipedia articles are beginning to contain a relevant section as bibliography is being enriched by genetic data, then let's try to find some common ground and come to a consensus, which is why this discussion was initiated after all, per WP:CON. I am willing to leave out the autosomal (atDNA) data mentioned above, but a sentence about his Y-DNA and mtDNA should at the very least be included. But, to be honest i really feel like atDNA should be included as well, within the same sentence. Demetrios1993 (talk) 06:56, 14 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
(I have this watchlisted so please don't ping me). It isn't directly relevant, or even indirectly relevant to his immediate ancestors or descendants. Ethnogenetics don't affect one's societal status, behavior, abilities, or anything else that bears on a biography. Even if, as these data suggest, his pedigree isn't what we think it is, it doesn't change a thing. In the medieval patrilineal social structure, the identity of the father (and to a lesser extent, with rare exceptions, the mother) and their marital status determined one's own status in society, and genetics have nothing to do with it - it is the legal father that determines this, not the genetic father (a boy born to the queen will still have the societal status of a king's son, even if they have the paternal genetics of a stable hand). Any no, important material does not get put in the Supplemental Information - by definition, that is material not important enough to go in the main paper. Further, it is an important distinction that no historian has reported this: we do not base our biographical coverage on what interests people people studying viking genetics. Knowing his mtDNA haplogroup or Y haplogroup is no more informative than knowing whether he was a dog or a cap person, or what astrological sign he was born under - it had no effect on anything in his life. Common ground is great, if there is any to be had, but we seem to hold completely incompatible views on the relevance of this material. Perhaps you can illuminate why you think this is important - what you would wish to say about it that would add to the knowledge of Gleb, because I am just not seeing how it would not be some combination of uncontextualized data dug out of an obscure table (WP:PROPORTION violation) and our own conclusions about relevance (WP:SYNTH/NOR violation), neither of which really works for me. Agricolae (talk) 08:38, 14 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
(Please do ping me because even though i have watchlisted this, i never monitor my watchlist) The aforementioned genetic information of Gleb is directly relevant to his ancestors and descendants. We are not talking about social status, behavior, abilities, or anything random here. We are talking about Gleb's genetics that pertain to his paternal (Y-DNA) and maternal (mtDNA) lineages (through haplogroups), which is like saying his genetic surnames. By having knowledge of someone's haplogroup you can then create lineages that bypass recorded historical barriers. For example, by looking at his Y-DNA (patrilineal) haplogroup which is I2a1a2b1a1a (I-Y3120), and actually through YFull (that i shared above) it has a more detailed position on the YTree under I-Y3120 > Y4460 > Y3106, we see that his paternal origin is actually Slavic and not Scandinavian as usually thought. That is also visible in his autosomal DNA by the way which is predominantly Polish-like and Southern European-like, with the first being representative of Slavic ancestry and the latter likely pertaining to his mother Killikiya (maybe had a Crimean Greek or Italian ancestor?). Isn't the data that reveals such points important and relevant? And that is just a small example. The ironic thing is that a similar sentence is already mentioned in I-L621, where it describes Gleb as having predominantly Slavic ancestry, belonging to I-Y3120 and being the oldest sample that has been found under I-Y3120 (one of the two most predominant haplogroups among Slavs). This last point is likewise very crucial for our article. It seems the editors of that article don't really distinguish relevant information based on material that is included in the proper paper and material that is included in the SI of the same study. Most genetic papers don't have this information on their proper papers to begin with, and this isn't something strange. Usually details such as this are meant to be supplementary, not because they aren't crucial but because the subject that it deals with might not require it to be within the proper paper. Hence the importance of information isn't really ranked by being included in a proper paper or in its SI, but by its own merit independently. Furthermore, why does a historian have to report this in order to have significance? Forget the fact that this information was officially published two months ago, therefore it's quite fresh. Also, why do you describe the Supplementary Information as obscure when it is just another part of the same study and the very paper constantly makes references to it for more details? To be honest it's less obscure than the proper paper that sits behind a paywall while the Supplementary Information is free to be viewed regardless of membership or not. Is the aforementioned information of the Sintashta culture and I-L621 articles WP:PROPORTION violation, because my suggestion is very similar to what is already published there. Last, nothing of what i suggested above is either WP:SYNTH or WP:NOR. If you think so please elaborate why. Is there any guideline in Wikipedia that prohibits us from sharing genetic information pertaining to the subject of an article, let alone one that doesn't relate to WP:BLP, because if there is such a guideline i am willing to leave the information out? Demetrios1993 (talk) 12:08, 14 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
@Demetrios1993: Simply declaring it relevant because you personally like it doesn't cut it. The example you give is exactly why it is problematic to use it - if accurate the result shows that Gleb had a southern European ancestor in some position in his pedigree - so what? That this ancestry came through Killikiya is your interpretation and as Wikipedia editors we aren't allowed to draw our own conclusions - the source does not mention Killikiya nor address on which site side the southern parentage resides, and further, how would this ancestry change how we view Gleb - again without introducing our own interpretations, it wouldn't because the authors of the paper do not address this. Also, Gleb's haplotype could be perfectly noteworthy or not (a separate issue for a separate Talk page) to an article on the haplogroup (the same applies to the use of genetic information for a historical population), while being insufficiently noteworthy for an article on Gleb. The focus matches the subject; noteworthiness is context-specific, not universal, and in each of these cases, whether such material is noteworthy on Gleb's page, whether it is noteworthy on a haplogroup page, and whether it is noteworthy on a population page, are distinct questions (in the case of populations, we do have an argument against its use: "However, primary sources describing genetic or genomic research into human ancestry, ancient populations, ethnicity, race, and the like, should not be used to generate content about those subjects, which are controversial." from WP:SCIRS). Any data you have to dig out of a data table in an appendix (basically what Supplementary Information section is) is inherently obscure, and paywalls have nothing to do with it. The relevant guidelines are WP:PROPORTION, WP:PRIMARY, and WP:SYNTH, all of which apply until in secondary sources published biographers (not individual Wikipedia editors with their individual, unique perspectives) decide this is noteworthy information. Agricolae (talk) 16:19, 14 November 2020 (UTC)Reply

@Demetrios1993: Having now read to the bottom of the wall of text, I agree with Agricolae. XOR'easter (talk) 17:42, 14 November 2020 (UTC)Reply

It is actually relevant information because it directly pertains to him and his actual background. You asked me to tell you why i think it is important and i gave you a quick personal evalutation of the data. Nobody said that my interpretation ought to be added. As an individual i am allowed to draw my own conclusions based on the data. Again, nobody said for these to be added. They were just meant to show you what is possible by considering the relevant genetic data. The source doesn't mention Killikiya directly, it does so indirectly though by presenting us with Gleb's mtDNA (matrilineal) haplogroup. Forget the southern autosomal ancestry, it was just a hypothetical interpretation of where it might have come. mtDNA isn't hypothetical though. That haplogroup was inherited directly from his mother. For the sake of information, have a look at this image to understand the differences between the three forms of ancestral DNA that exist. I disagree. I believe Gleb's genetic data is noteworthy for his article, and specifically his Y-DNA even indirectly noteworthy for his male ancestors' and descendants' articles. I am surprised that you write, "noteworthiness is context-specific", when you have been constantly belittling the relevance of such information just because it was published on the SI of the very same study as the proper paper, by essentially parallelizing the broad general context of the study with this Gleb article. Again, your argument about this information being "inherently obscure" is totally baseless. You aren't digging any data out of SI, the very proper paper directly references and forwards you to its information throughout it. When someone sits down to read a genetic study, he ought to go through the SI, otherwise he doesn't really comprehend the study, hence the constant references that point you to the SI. And besides this, your argument again contradicts the context-specificness that you yourself cited above. Please ignore the "paywall" quote i made and don't take it so serious, since it wasn't meant to be literal. Of course a proper paper behind behind a paywall doesn't make it obscure, nor does its SI being freely available is obscure. The quote from WP:SCIRST doesn't apply here. This genetic data isn't controversial, hence why it's also being used in the aforementioned I-L621 section of Haplogroup I-M438. Besides that which stands by its own, some secondary sources already exist despite the data being fresh, such as the following article by one of the most popular genetic websites out there, namely that of Indo-European.eu. To be honest your arguments don't cut it in my perspective, and that's perfectly ok. That is always a possibility in a discussion. Hence why i am choosing to ask the opinion of an admin. I have never discussed with this individual, therefore this isn't some WP:CANVASS violation. I just recently saw his neutral and rational stance on a disputed edit, and regardless of if i am wrong or right on this, i would appreciate his view. Throughout this thread we have three editors (Mikola22, Miki Filigranski, Demetrios1993) that are for the inclusion of Gleb's genetic data in the article, and two (Agricolae, XOR'easter) that are against it. What do you think of the above, EdJohnston? Demetrios1993 (talk) 22:16, 14 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
Don't conflate the two different reasons for not including the information. One is that mtDNA (or Y, or autosomal) doesn't tell you anything applicable to the life of Gleb. He did not behave any differently because his mt haplogroup was one vs another. He owed his position to the fact that his legal father was Sviatoslav and his mother was Killikiya. Knowing what region her mother's mother's . . . arose from a thousand years or more before in no way changes our understanding of his actions. If Igor was ethnically Slavic, how does that change our understanding of Gleb's life, a half-dozen generations later? It doesn't. It is genetic trivia. The other, entirely independent reason is that it has only appeared buried in an obscure appendix to a primary source about an entirely different subject. Either of these, individually, would be reason not to put it in the article. Agricolae (talk) 22:50, 14 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
Nor is it applicable to the life of historical figures when a "Popular culture" section is included in their articles, as it happens in the one of Mara Branković for example, yet you think that genetic data directly pertaining to Gleb is irrelevant. It is as relevant as Gleb's surname (and even more). Furthermore his mtDNA subclade H5a2a, has a TMRCA (time to most recent common ancestor) of 1600 ybp, namely 400 AD or 600 years prior of when Killikiya was approximately born. On the second reason. Again, there is nothing obscure about Supplementary Information nor is Gleb unrelated to the subject being presented by the study. If he was part of an entirely different subject the study wouldn't dedicate almost a page just about the archaeological finding and background of him, nor actually study his sample and present the results among hundreds of others. In fact 442 Viking-era genomes (including 297 males) from across the Viking world were studied, and one of those was Gleb's (Something that is also mentioned in the following secondary source with reference 47, Subdividing Y-chromosome haplogroup R1a1 reveals Norse Viking dispersal lineages in Britain published November 2nd 2020). Last, there is truly no practical way to have included information about all of these samples in the proper paper. That's what SI is for, on which the proper paper constantly makes references to. For the record, this is just from the SI PDF:
1.2.2.5. Ukraine
(Prepared by Inna Potekhina, Institute of Archaeology, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine)
Samples from three sites in the Ukraine were selected for analysis: Chernihiv, Lutsk, and Shestovitsa.
Chernihiv city, Chernihiv oblast (region), Ukraine
Relevance for the Vikings: Rurik dynasty.
Gleb Svyatoslavich, ‘Gleb, son of Sviatoslav’ (in Ukrainian and Russian languages the endings ‘- ovych’ and ‘-evych’ in a name mean ‘son of’), was the 11th century CE prince of Tmutarakan/Novgorod, aged 25-35 according to anthropologist analysis.
Sources of information: Skull was found in 1967 in a stone sarcophagus near the Saviour’s Chernihiv cathedral. It was an accidental discovery during construction works on the territory of the state historical and cultural reserve ‘Chernihiv Starodavniy’ (Ancient Chernihiv). Prior to the date of discovery there was no institution in Chernihiv (USSR) that could professionally gather archaeological data. Therefore, there are no archaeological reports of these findings in the archives. The skull was sent to Moscow and returned back in a wooden box. For many years, it lay in this box in the archives and was rediscovered for science only in 2016.
Coordinates: WGS84: 51° 29′ 20.45″ N, 31° 18′ 28″ E; 51.489014°, 31.307778°
Dating (archaeological only): The sarcophagus was found in the backyard of the cathedral. The depth of the upper plate of the sarcophagus was 1.9-2.0 m from the modern surface. The stratigraphy was slightly damaged by the later breach of the soil: water supply pipes are laid 0.2 m above the headboard of sarcophagus. Archaeologists date it to the 11th century CE.
Anthropological data: aged 25-35 years, traces of sword wounds are preserved on the skull. All anthropological measurements and indexes are in the article95.
Sample used for DNA analysis: VK542 Ukraine_Chernigov
Aside of the genetic data that is published in the Supplementary Information's tables, much of this is equally relevant as well. Not trying to be rude, but i don't see any valid argument in all of this discussion. Let's wait and see what the admin has to say. Personally i have no problem being corrected if am wrong, but truly i think that i am not. Demetrios1993 (talk) 01:06, 15 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
You won't see me defending the inclusion of 'In Popular Culture' sections in articles - they are a holdover from the early days of Wikipedia. In some cases a portrayal in popular culture has become so iconic that it affects how the subject is viewed, but that is obviously not the case with material dug out of a data table in a massive appendix to a paper about something else that nobody 'in popular culture' is ever going to read.
As to the rest, it is just you again saying that it is important because you say it is, but given the chance to explain why, you presented your personal observations about what it tells us about Killikiya and Southern European DNA (conclusions that can't actually be reached from the data), only to double back and say we wouldn't actually include those observations, so again, we are back to you wanting to include it just because you really want to, not because it accomplishes anything for the narrative. Unless/until some scholar uses that information in their account of Gleb, it is just raw data, uncontextualized, and as such is not the material for Wikipedia biographies. Agricolae (talk) 10:16, 15 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
I concur with Agricolae's replies and would add that administrators' opinions are just like any other editors' and are not given more weight when evaluating whether a consensus has formed. XOR'easter (talk) 17:54, 15 November 2020 (UTC)Reply


I don't know Wikipedia rules in this case (whether genetic information is for the article) but I think it is valuable information. Some articles have DNA information's, example Richard III of England [12]. Also exist and article List of haplogroups of historic people, so this information could find a place and here. Mikola22 (talk) 21:15, 15 November 2020 (UTC)Reply

Three points in response: 1) 'Other articles have it' is not a strong argument - there are many, many poor-quality Wikipedia articles that are loaded with cruft, too many to ever clean up, so there is always going to be a page somewhere on Wikipedia with similar information, but this doesn't mean there should be. 2) The Richard III case was not something that had to be dug out of a data table of a massive appendix to a primary research paper about viking genetics that almost nobody is ever going to read - stories on it appeared in all of the major newspaper and broadcast news venues throughout the English diaspora. There is simply no comparison between that level of secondary coverage and this instance, where there is, as of yet, absolutely none. 3) Noteworthiness is page specific. It is perfectly possible that this information could be noteworthy on List of haplogroups of historic people, while not being noteworthy on Gleb's page itself - the two pages serve different purposes, and list pages have different criteria for inclusion than text articles. Agricolae (talk) 21:41, 15 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
Those great examples brought up by Mikola22 aren't from poor-quality articles. It just goes on to show that in this current-era Wikipedia, genetic information is relevant and should be included in the respective articles. Wikipedia articles about historical figures aren't limited to biographies of their actual lives, but additional relevant information in relation to them, such as memorials, genetic data, archaeological data, popular culture, etc.. As with the example of Richard III of England which has a "Discovery of remains" section, we could likewise treat the information provided by Population genomics of the Viking world more broadly by including Gleb's archaeological data, as well as its genetic. As for the 2nd point, again i find it baseless. That's like saying that information provided in the footnotes of books shouldn't be treated as WP:RS and that somehow they lack merit, yet i have seen such references multiple times. Or that in order to be justified it should gain the same level of popular traction and thus secondary coverage as Richard III of England's finding. Gleb's finding already has at least one secondary source, namely the one i already shared above by Indo-European.eu. Maybe more exist that i am unfamiliar with, and in the future surely more will exist. That source still meets the criteria per WP:SECONDARY. On the 3rd point, exactly, noteworthiness is page-specific, and that is mainly what we are arguing about, namely three editors in this thread find it page-specific while two don't. At least you agree that this information is appropriate for the List of haplogroups of historic people (Gleb's haplogroup will be added), because till now you gave me an impression that you had a vendetta against genetics. Demetrios1993 (talk) 22:50, 15 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
Please, enough with the intentional distortion of what I said. I never said the Richard III article was poor. I said you can find anything somewhere on Wikipedia, so citing other pages is a flawed approach. I also said that there is no similarity whatsoever between the Richard III and Gleb cases because there is a mountain of WP:RS secondary sources reporting one result, and absolutely none reporting the other. (The List article, on the other hand, is indeed a poor article, in conceptions and execution, but many lists suffer from the same deficits.) You are also being incredibly dishonest to claim that I agreed the information is appropriate for the List page. I said it may be because the criteria are different for different types of pages - that is not an approval, simply an indication that it is and entirely distinct discussion (one that belongs on the Talk page over there). As to your 'secondary source', a blog post on someone's personal web site is not WP:RS, plus I can't help but notice it refers to "A sample from Chernihiv (VK542) >potentially< belonging to Gleb Svyatoslavich". That "potentially" is all the more reason not to drink the Kool-Aid. Agricolae (talk) 23:27, 15 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
There is no intentional distortion of anything. You gave me the impression that you considered articles with genetic data as poor-quality that aren't compatible with Wikipedia's guidelines and are yet to be cleaned up. Then on the second point you agreed that the inclusion of genetic data in Richard III of England is justifiable, therefore it seems like you agree that it's perfectly fine for genetic data to be included in a relevant article, as long as there are primary and secondary sources to back it up. And the thing is that both primary and secondary sources exist for Gleb's case, and they are both reliable. How is the Indo-European.eu article written by scholar Carlos Quiles not WP:RS. That is baseless. Per the definition of WP:SECONDARY, "A secondary source provides an author's own thinking based on primary sources, generally at least one step removed from an event. It contains an author's analysis, evaluation, interpretation, or synthesis of the facts, evidence, concepts, and ideas taken from primary sources.". As for the potentially in his quote, it isn't something exclusive to Gleb. He treats all other samples in his article likewise, such as "Izyaslav Ingvarevych, the 13th century prince of Dorogobuzh, Principality of Volhynia/Galicia, is probably behind a sample from Lutsk (VK541), and belongs to hg. R1a-L1029 (a subclade of R1a-M458), showing ca. 95% of “Modern Polish” ancestry." and "Yaroslav Osmomysl, the 12th century Prince of Halych (now in Western Ukraine), was probably of hg. E1b-V13, yet another clearly early Slavic haplogroup.". Everyone can obviously see that this is just a scholarly way of presenting things. Regardless, i personally have no problem with a version that would include the "potentially" in it. The fact is that we have both primary and secondary sources in regards to that genetic data. Sources such as YFull's YTree (look at the very first sample - id:VK542) can also be considered WP:TERTIARY additional sources that cite this information. Demetrios1993 (talk) 01:10, 16 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
And this post-doctoral fellow at a Spanish Medical School is an expert in the field of medieval Kievan history? He can give a noteworthy opinion on what the DNA result means for understanding Gleb and his place in society? Let's see, what does Dr. Queiles have to say about this question? - nothing, except that that it wasn't even for sure Gleb's DNA. Well, glad we got that cleared up. How much better his biography will be when we can tell the reader that whoever the owner of that DNA was and some people in Poland shared a common male-line ancestor a thousand or more years before - not! Unless we have a secondary source that takes these data and puts them into a useful biographical context, it is of no use. We cannot draw our own conclusions about what it means, and without conclusions, it is just uncontextualized genetic trivia, like whether he would think coriander tastes soapy, or whether his earwax is dry or wet - a curiosity to those interested in such things, but not the fodder for a well-written biography. Agricolae (talk) 02:11, 16 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
Carlos Quiles doesn't have to be an expert on Kievan medieval history in order for him to be considered a reliable secondary source. He makes an analysis of the Population genomics of the Viking world study, a genetic study, and yes he does give a noteworthy opinion on what the DNA result of Gleb means, and that is the following, "For N1a-Y4339 – N1a-L550 subclade of Swedish origin – as main haplogroup of modern descendants of Rurikid princes, see Volkov & Seslavin (2019) – full text in comments below. Data from ancient samples show varied paternal lineages even among early rulers traditionally linked to Rurik’s line, which explains some of the discrepancies found among modern descendants". He then follows with the aforementioned quotes about Gleb Svyatoslavich, Izyaslav Ingvarevych, and Yaroslav Osmomysl, hence the potentially and probablies in relation to them. In a few words, the genetic data of Gleb and others mentioned by Quiles in his article, show that the Rurikids didn't all share the same origin which also explains the discrepancies among the modern descendants, and that the ones belonging to haplogroups/subclades other than N1a-Y4339 (subclade of N1a-L550 which is the predominant among Rurikid descendants), are likely not real descendants of Rurik (since they represent a minority among them). This is not uncontextualized genetic trivia and it is very relevant to understanding the Rurikids, of which Gleb was a member of. As a sidenote, if you want to see the patrilineal variety among modern descendants of Rurik have a look at the RurikidDynasty FTDNA project. Demetrios1993 (talk) 06:03, 16 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
Yes, to be a reliable source, one actually does have to have relevant expertise. This so-called expert's last published scientific paper I could find was entitled "Stereophotogrammetric surface anatomy of the anterior cruciate ligament's tibial footprint: Precise osseous structure and distances to arthroscopically-relevant landmarks" - yeah, that qualifies him to talk about Gleb Svyatoslavich of Novgorod. This is someone whose expertise is in human osteo-anatomy, but who dabbles (and self-publishes) in historical ethnography as a hobby. Even so, his simple statement 'the paper says the skeleton that may or may not be Gleb's has this particular genetic marker', is of no value to a biographical narrative. This shouldn't be about Wikilawyering to justify shoehorning this genetic trivia into the article just because it exists and we like it. We need someone who has actual relevant expertise on Gleb to directly comment on what it means for Gleb, or else we are left pretending we are the experts. Agricolae (talk) 13:32, 16 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
Quiles' work throughout the years speaks volumes. Indo-European.eu is not some obscure website, but probably one of the four most popular in terms of ancient, medieval, and modern genetic ancestry (among other relative things) coverage. And he gives noteworthy evaluation about them; doesn't simply report on them. And no, again, he doesn't have to be an expert on Kievan medieval history, even though i am sure he knows more than the average Ukrainian person. If that was the case, we wouldn't consider secondary coverage sources such as newspaper articles of which the authors in most cases, without the slightest of expertise, simply make small summaries about the primary sources. I have seen a ton of those being used throughout Wikipedia. Carlos Quiles is not comparable to that level of authorship, and you can see it throughout his regular publications on his website. Furthermore, his statements about Gleb and the Rurikids are verifiable. I don't have any agenda nor am i trying to shoehorn genetic relevant (not trivial) data into the article just because it exists and i like it. I landed on this article quite by chance, by reading the aforementioned section of I-L621 in Haplogroup I-M438, where it already cites what we argue about. So, out of interest i entered Gleb Svyatoslavich's article with the expectation that i would be able to read more about this relevant finding of his, and to my surprise there was not a single word about it, let alone a section. So i got suspicious and prior of even editing the information myself, i went to Gleb Svyatoslavich:Revision history and i saw what was going on. I quite honestly saw the rational behind the study being an unofficial preprint back then, and the exclusion of such information could be justified, but since today it has been officially published i saw no constructive reason as to why it should be excluded, let alone when it's already being cited in other pages of Wikipedia, and that's why i chose to comment here. And despite what you say, primary, secondary, and tertiary sources do exist, about a straightforward piece of information such as his Y-DNA haplogroup. The study in question has also been peer-reviewed by Dr. James Barrett, Dr. Wolfgang Haak and Dr. Pontus Skoglund (additional info), which makes the source all the more reliable. Let's also not forget the fact that the study in question has some 90 authors in total, all of whom are experts in their fields. And again, articles about historical figures aren't just limited to their biographies, but evidently as aforementioned also include information about memorials, genetic data, archaeological data, popular culture, etc.. Anyway, since no consensus has been reached i am not going to continue arguing about this. Demetrios1993 (talk) 02:58, 17 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
A self-published blogger is not the kind of expert the SECONDARY policy is talking about, no matter how long they have been doing it, and whatever he has been doing over the past years, he has not been talking about GLeb all that time. But this is all a red herring, since he never says anything worth putting in the article. The identities of the reviewers are also irrelevant - reviewers give a thorough review of the body, but only superficial review of 'supplementary information' material, where Gleb's haplogroups appear. Anyhow, the reliability is not at issue - it is noteworthiness, which would be established by secondary sources about Gleb giving space to the material in question. That has not happened. (It hardly could have given how new the publication is.) Until then, it is just a datapoint for which we lack the contextualization to put in the article - we would have to either just throw in an uncontextualized piece of random data, which is anathema to a well-written narrative article, or we would have to use our own musings to contextualize it, which is forbidden. A bad outcome either way. We need to wait and see what the field (the historical field, not the genetic genealogy/ethnicity field) has to say about it. Agricolae (talk) 03:25, 17 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
If you had ever read a genetic (or other similar) study, again, you would know how untrue that argument is. The proper paper constantly makes references to the supplementary, and without it you cannot comprehend the entirety of the study. And SI is of course considered a reliable source. Supplementary Information of genetic studies have been used many times in Wikipedia articles by their own, without even a secondary or tertiary source. It's not something new, let alone unreliable. But i have already explained that. Also, Quiles has a great expertise on covering such genetic information, and that's what he presented along with a context. But, you find the source unreliable unfortunately, and that's ok, even though i am sure you find his relative context rational, namely that of not all Rurikids sharing the same paternal line (evident through a number of medieval samples); something that is also verifiable by looking at their modern descendants and the variety they have. Anyway, i have no problem waiting for more sources, and surely they will be more as this study is quite fresh. Demetrios1993 (talk) 04:37, 17 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
Your erroneous insinuations about my past reading practices aside, I don't necessarily find the source unreliable (the identification of the skeleton, and hence the whole relevance of the results, is a different matter, but let's just put a pin in that and move on because it is really immaterial at this point). I do find the reported result of no use to a coherent biography of Gleb. Both can be true, that not all Rurikids had the same paternal DNA, and that this in no way changes how Gleb, who held his position, not due to his DNA but because of his legal paternity, is viewed in a historical context. We can't know the latter until a reliable secondary source tells us how this changes the way scholars think about Gleb, and that the difference is significant enough to merit inclusion. Without that or injecting our personal opinions into it, all we could possibly do is say 'here is a random factoid about Gleb that I as an editor think is interesting, make of it what you will'. A good biographical article should be a narrative, not just an arbitrary selection of significant and trivial facts about the person selected by editorial whim. Agricolae (talk) 13:12, 17 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
And that's where i disagree. I believe genetic data of medieval and ancient populations or figures should be included in their respective articles, if it exists. And i say if, because we have such data for a very small minority. Gleb being the oldest sample found who belongs in that major haplogroup is also extremely relevant. That's the reason i was surprised when i first entered this article and there was no such information to be found, even though present in other articles. And again, Wikipedia articles of such historical figures aren't limited to biographies, as has been aforementioned. Anyways, there is no point in arguing more since we obviously disagree on this. Demetrios1993 (talk) 01:15, 18 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
We base our coverage on the coverage of similarly-focused reliable secondary sources, not editorial whim. Agricolae (talk) 02:06, 18 November 2020 (UTC)Reply