Talk:Anglo-Saxons/Archive 2

message: i'm under the impression that in the context of "anglo-saxon", "anglo-" means "angle (and something else)". the "something else" in this case being saxons. then the question brought up is: are anglo-saxons a people of mixed angle and saxon descend, the angles and saxons considered as a single people, or both?
in other contexts, "anglo-" means "english (and something else)", but from what i've read from many sources the words angle and english are linguistically related.
:Like the article says, three principal Germanic tribes—primarily the Angles and the Saxons, but also the Jutes—settled/conquered (a matter of perspective) England in the period after the Roman withdrawal.  By the time of Alfred the Great, several centuries later, these tribes had lost their original distinct identities—at least partly through their political unification under Alfred and his predecessors—to consider themselves a single people, the Anglo-Saxons.  From this derives the word England, or Angle-Land.
:Hope that helpes.  Incidentally, you can sign your messages by typing ~~~~.  Binabik80 14:12, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Early Comments

message: The article says that the Celts won. What is the source of this information? The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle says for year 584:-
Here Ceawlin and Cutha fought against the Britons at the place which is named Fethanleag (= "Battle Wood="), and Cutha was killed; and Ceawlin took many towns amd countless war-loot, and in anger he turned back to his own [territory].
Anthony Appleyard 18:25, 26 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Battle of Fethanleag 

message: There are pages for Anglo-Saxon, Angles and Saxons.
There is some confusion, as there is in history. But lets make an effort to differentiate. 
I would like to suggest that Anglo-Saxon is used as the default case, unless there is a good reason to refer solely to Saxons or Angles. 
Perhaps this deserves a discussion. --Dumbo1 00:39, 15 Dec 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: From my understanding of accepted practice, when one writes about Angles, Saxons, or Jutes, one is writing about specific Germanic tribes -- who may, in some cases, not even be located in Britain. The noun Anglo-Saxon refers only to the Germanic tribes that migrated to Britain. The adjective in terms of time refers to the inhabitants of Britain who spoke Old English between c.450 (after their arrival in Britain), & 1066; in terms of ethnicity or culture, it refers to the non-Celtic inhabitants of Britain. (And in US usage, "White Anglo-Saxon Protestant" implies the upper-class culture of the decendants of immigrants from Britain; since my British ancestors were dirt farmers from the Midlands who worked for a living, I prefer to think of myself as "Anglo-American".) -- llywrch 17:39, 15 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Use of Saxon, Angle or Anglo-Saxon 

message: A misunderstanding of what was settled at the Synod of Whitby has crept into the text. --Wetman 09:49, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: [[Synod of Whitby]]

message: I'm under the impression that both sources helped form Anglo-Saxon into Ol;d English: is this current text good? I'm not competent to assess it: "the especially large addition of Old Danish (eastern England), Old Norwegian (from Vikings of the Viken who settled on the West Coast of England)" --Wetman 16:40, 5 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Viking and Danish contributions

message: :"It is a matter of debate as to whether the term Anglo-Saxon can be used as a synonym for English. On one hand there is the argument that says that there were further influxes of people in to England such as the Danes and Normans, as well as the Celts who migrated to England from the other parts of the British Isles, so the term is no longer valid. This is very much the view of the far-left, who particularly like to denigrate everything to do with England at every opportunity. The other side of this argument is to say these people were relatively small in number and, particularly in the case of Danes and the Normans, were of similar ethnic origins as the Anglo-Saxons themselves, and so became immersed into the Anglo-Saxon "tribe"."
I took out the bit in bold since it seemed insulting and didn't logically link to anything else in the paragraph. --Cherry blossom tree 09:38, 5 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  NPOV 

message: Anon user added this new text:
:However, contrary to the information presented above, the majority of genetic studies indicate that the Anglo-Saxon mass migration did in fact occur. As stated in one study, “It suggests that between 50% and 100% of the indigenous population of what was to become England was wiped out, with Offa's Dyke acting as a "genetic barrier" protecting those on the Welsh side.”  It has been found that the genes that comprise the English people are almost identical to that of the genes of the Germanic peoples of continental Europe, “The English and Frisians studied had almost identical genetic make-up but the English and Welsh were very different.”  In fact not only are the English descendents of these invaders, the Anglo-Saxons and Vikings, but the Scottish and Cornish gene pools also show a high percentage of Germanic genes, "The Cornish are in effect Anglo-Saxons who for a time used a language that was hanging around. The genes of Scottish males also betrayed considerable inter-mixing with outsiders."  It seems that only the Welsh escaped the onslaught from the Anglo-Saxon invaders, thus creating a genetic barrier in the British Isles. Through these genetic studies it has been shown that the Welsh are closely related to the Irish (not including Ulster), Highland Scots and the Basques. Some of these studies can be viewed in the links below.
This needs to be integrated into the article without lines like this: "However, contrary to the information presented above, the majority of studies..". The whole issue is very controversial with multiple POVs and should be presented as such. Stbalbach 22:24, 4 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Re-added with some minor rewording to put in context with rest of the article, thank you for the contribution. Stbalbach 03:25, 5 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I think that the cited media articles (Western Mail and BBC) may not constitute reliable sources, see Science and medicine, Cite peer-reviewed scientific journals and check community consensus and Beware false authority headings in this page, and see my posts about genetics below. Alun 18:25, 29 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  New text by anon user 

message: Hello,
Sorry for causing a fuss, I did not mean too. This was my first major edit of an article and I have never really noticed the discussion boards before. I will fix up what I wrote and put it here next time. I am not a very good writer when I try to be terse, so it will definitely be of better quality in the future. I felt that the section I wanted to add to was rather one sided in that it only presented the results of only one particular genetic study. In college I took a great interest in military history and the history of the Germanic tribes, so I have read through a considerable amount of historical and genetic data that refute the one study mentioned in the current article. I was just trying to make things a bit more balanced. Again sorry for any trouble, it was not intentionally. Thanks.
:No it was fine its a good edit and is needed. Sorry if I over-reacted at first, normally you dont need to discuss first, it just seems this is a very controversial/debated subject so anyway they are usually the hardest ones to write about on Wikipedia.Stbalbach 15:24, 5 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I think that the cited media articles (Western Mail and BBC) may not constitute reliable sources, see the Science and medicine, Cite peer-reviewed scientific journals and check community consensus and Beware false authority headings in this page, and see my posts about genetics below. Alun 18:28, 29 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  New Text 

message: I'm confused by this passage:
:Before literacy, the Runic alphabet, called the futhorc (also known as futhark), was used for inscriptions.
This seems to assert that the use of the runic alphabet was preliterate. But the word "literacy" is usually taken to mean "ability to read and write" -- in any writing-system, not just the Roman! So what can it mean to claim that Anglo-Saxons read and wrote in runic before they were literate? --FOo 20:44, 6 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Writing before literacy? 

message: The term "Anglo-Saxon" is from Latin writings going back to the time of King Alfred the Great, who seems to have frequently used the title rex Anglorum Saxonum or rex Angul-Saxonum. The origin of this title is not quite clear. It is generally believed to have arisen from the final union of the various kingdoms under Alfred in 886.
What is the source of this information? I think this information is incorrect. Alfred the Great did not unite the English. Alfred united various kingdoms, and his Kingdom of the Anglo-Saxons included all of the land south of the Thames (basically Wessex and Kent) and much of the rump of Mercia that was not in the Danelaw. It is possible to think of Alfred's Kingdom of the Anglo-Saxons  as comprising the land south and west of a line running from London to Chester. Alfred's son Edward the Elder conquered East Anglia and his daughter Æthelflæd Lady of the Mercians much of the five boroughs of the Danelaw. It was for Edwards son Athelstan to unify the whole of England in 937 after the Battle of Brunanburh. This information is from The Age of Athelstan by Paul Hill (). Alun 02:26, 23 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of Alfred

message: I have just read, Y Chromosome Evidence for Anglo-Saxon Mass Migration, A Y Chromosome Census of the British Isles (both of which are from the same group in UCL), Y-chromosome variation and Irish origins and both citations given in the article in support of genocide, English and Welsh are races apart (3) and Genetics make Welsh distinct (4), it seems that both of the citations are articles written by journalists, and not published scientific research.
Indeed the BBC article (English and Welsh are races apart) seems to be entirely based on the Y Chromosome Evidence for Anglo-Saxon Mass Migration article, but it misquotes and misunderstands it, and the journalist that wrote it seems not to have read the actual original paper at all. This is evident in the quote:
 suggests that between 50% and 100% of the indigenous population of what was to
 become England was wiped out
which seems to be a misunderstanding/sensationalisation of this from the abstract of the original article:
 these striking patterns are best explained by a substantial migration of
 Anglo-Saxon Y chromosomes into Central England (contributing 50%-100% to the gene 
 pool at that time) but not into North Wales
not only is the abstract misquoted and it's meaning completely changed, but an actual reading of the paper itself will reveal this statement:
 We note, however, that our data do not allow us to distinguish an event that
 simply added to the indiginous Central English male gene pool from one where
 indigenous males were displaced elsewhere or one where indigenous males were
 reduced in number
The main conclusion of the paper makes no mention of massacres or genocides:
 This study shows that the Welsh border was more of a genetic barrier to 
 Anglo-Saxon Y chromosome gene flow than the North Sea.....
 These results indicate that a political boundary can be more important than a
 geophysical one in population genetic structuring....
The second cited source Genetics make Welsh distinct is more extreme in it's language, and also seems not to be related to any actual published genetic studies. These quotes by Steve Jones in the article:
 This shows that in the Dark Ages, when the Anglo-Saxons turned up, there was the
 most horrible massacre on the English side. They killed everybody and replaced
 them
and
 The Cornish are in effect Anglo-Saxons who for a time used a language that was
 hanging around.
do not seem to come from either of the UCL papers,even though he is a professor at UCL. In fact the data in the more recent of the two papers A Y Chromosome Census of the British Isles seems directly to contradict these two statements. There is a clearly defined increase in Germanic influence (the paper refers to this as North Germany/Denmark and cannot distinguish between (Viking) Danish and Anglo-Saxon Y-chromosomes) the farther east and north of England the samples are taken from. York and Norfolk have the strongest bias in favour of Germanic Y-chromosomes, most of the English samples are skewed somewhat towards the Germanic, with Scottish samples tending to be less Germanic than the English ones, the Cornish samples come closer to the Basque/Welsh/Irish samples than any other English (and most Scots) samples. The Basque, Welsh (with the exception of Llanidloes) and central Irish samples all cluster together. On the whole English and mainland Scots samples tend to have a greater or lesser bias towards the Germanic samples based on location, though none cluster close to them. Samples from Orkney and Shetland show no Germanic bias, but do show a strong bias towards the Norwegian samples, similarly samples from Dublin show a slight bias towards the Norwegian:
 The sites with the highest degree of German/Danish input are York and Norfolk,
 followed by Southwell and Llanidloes. All of these except Llanidloes are
 historically in regions where the Danes are known to have had a significant
 presence. The remaining samples are closer to the indigenous group; for these
 populations, this finding suggests a lower demographic impact by North European
 populations. This can be seen by the frequency of AMH+1, which is always above
 33% in British populations but remains below 26% in the continental source
 populations; these data are consistent with the presence of some indigenous
 component in all British regions
This analysis then went on to compare the Frisian samples used in the Y Chromosome Evidence for Anglo-Saxon Mass Migration study and concluded:
 We therefore compared Frisians to our North German/Danish sample and found
 that the two sets are not significantly different (p=0.3, data not shown). When
 included in the PC analysis, the Frisians were more "continental" than any of the
 British samples, although they were somewhat closer to the British ones than the
 North German/Denmark sample. For example, the part of mainland Britain that has
 the most continental input is Central England, but even here the AMH+1 frequency,
 not below 44% (Southwell), is higher than the 35% observed in the Frisians. These
 results demonstrate that even with the choice of Frisians as a source for the
 Anglo-Saxons, there is a clear indication of a continuing indigenous component
 in the English paternal genetic makeup.
I think that these papers have been misunderstood and/or deliberately distorted by journalists in order to produce a good story. As for Steve Jones's comments, well they don't seem to reflect the actual science produced at UCL. I can only assume that Professor Jones's comments themselves have been misunderstood, misquoted or taken out of context.
Given all this I think the whole section on Genetic Y-chromosome analysis needs to be re-written with proper science used to support any claims made, rather than journalistic interpretation. Alun 13:01, 26 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Thinking about verifiability, I think that the cited media articles (Western Mail and BBC) may not constitute reliable sources, see Science and medicine, Cite peer-reviewed scientific journals and check community consensus and Beware false authority. Alun 15:15, 27 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Genetic analysis and good sources

message: I have cut the following misleading map from the article:
While I have no doubt that if readers possessed a microscope, they would be able to discern that Cornwall, Wales nor Strathclyde-Cumbria are actually presented by the map's author as being "Anglo-Saxon", without the possession of a microscope you are left with that distinct impression (the only clue is that all three are green). Can anyone please draw up a much clearer map that can actually be read?--Mais oui! 11:29, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: This one  is used in the article Heptarchy. If it's good enough, and it looks ok to me, why not reuse it ? Angus McLellan 12:12, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I have restored the map and altered the caption 9without making it unwieldy) unitl a better one turns up. If the reader follows the link first to the image page then to the high-res version they can check the detail there. GraemeLeggett 12:24, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with Mais oui!, I've often though that it's not a very good map. What's wrong with the map used in the Heptarchy article? Alun 17:44, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I have replaced the old map with the Heptarchy map. What is the consensus on this? Alun 18:14, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Removal of misleading map 

message: I felt that the article here on Anglo-Saxon migration was too long, focussed too much on controversial research, and would be likely to confuse the general reader. I've shortened it down to take in the main historical, archaeological, linguistic, place-name and genetic arguments, essentially having one paragraph on 'violent invasion' and another on 'more peaceful settlement'. This is a more general page on 'Anglo-Saxons', and so if anyone wants to go into massive detail on any of these accounts I think a new page should be made dedicated to the matter. Harthacanute 14:09, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You make a good point, there is enough material in the Y-chromosome papers for a full, shortish article. I wonder if there is any call for one? The reason I wrote the Y chromosome section so thoroughly (I hope!) was because there was so much incorrect information based on false premises and a general lack of understanding of the results of the research. Much of the misinformation was from the use of journalistic sources from newspapers and magazines, where the journalists themselves had either not understood the work, or had deliberately misrepresented it for sensationalism. I have no problems with the current wording, though I hope the incorrect assertions that were there previously don't start to creep back in again. Maybe this would be reason enough to create a genetic analysis article. Maybe the way to go would be to create a general article on the use of genetics to try to illuminate ancient migrations, there's plenty of stuff out there, even for the neolithic for example. What do you think? By the way you don't seem to have referenced your edit of the genetic analysis. Alun 14:09, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Rewrite of Anglo-Saxon Migration

message: Right, I've fleshed out the section on migration a bit and made it a main heading, which I think it appropiate as it's quite important in thinking about who the Anglo-Saxons were. I've tried to make the rest of the page less POV, toning down the language in some places. I'm not sure about some of the arguments and they can be clarified by those who know better. Also, the sub-sections under Anglo-Saxon Culture could do with being expanded/reorganised/deleted as necessary. I've moved Anglo-Saxon Language to its own section as I think it deserves greater focus; literature remains under culture. I've also added some nice pictures, drawing heavily on the Norse version of the page. Should liven it up a little! Comments? Harthacanute 23:43, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Nice balanced rewrite of the migration section. Good work. Alun
Sections are organized logically by topic, not according to what individual Wikipedia editors personally think readers should focus on. Your suggesting anything in the Culture section is second-rate, and even ready for outright deletion! --Stbalbach 07:11, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

text: I would of course not deem to push my views, such as they exist, on how Wikipedia pages should be laid out :-) But as I've started... I'd personally be in favour of removing the Anglo-Saxon culture section (because culture is too much of a catch-all term) and making each sub-section a section in its own right. I entirely agree that the page should be organised logically by topic, but it doesn't seem too logical at the moment. Not sure if that's very clear, but I've just woken up. And am now late. Harthacanute 09:30, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Next Steps...

message: I've no problem with getting rid of so many "Germanic/Germanic/Germanic tribes" which were scattered through the article, but seriously we do need these two particular references. Its the first mention in the article, and so it needs to be stated exactly where Old Saxony is. How many people know it's even in Germany, let alone whereabouts? 5% of the English-speaking population? Ditto Jutland - recognition will be a bit higher because of the battle maybe, but not with any geographical certainty. Jameswilson 23:44, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I may be channelling Ted Nelson, but when I see a link and I don't understand what it means, I click the link. I'm fairly sure that's the whole point of hypertext. Old Saxony may not tell readers much, but clicking the link will make everything clear. Less is more. Angus McLellan  (Talk) 00:17, 3 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I cant agree. User-friendliness is all. Hyperlinks are there for if you want more detailed info, not just a simple fact such as a location or a date. I cant see any reason for editing those out. Its good information and basic to understanding the paragraph.
And anyway, as things stand, why is it OK to specify the location of where the Angles came from (not deleted), and then object to the same thing for the Saxons and Jutes (both deleted)? Jameswilson 00:43, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

text: The article's quite long as it is, I see no reason for unnecessarily lengthening it, as Angusmclellan says, if you need to know more, click the link.  It's what I usually do. If you are going to include every fact (and some argue that the Anglo-Saxons were in fact mainly descended from the indigenous people of Great Britain, so there's no real academic consensus regarding their origins) in this article, then we should delete the seperate Angle, Saxon and Jute articles, or else what are they for? Alun 06:41, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

text: I don't get it, how can it be edited by people without a computer? Alun 14:52, 3 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: We are writing this for other people to use, it's not an end unto its self. -- Stbalbach 02:08, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

text: Well in a print encyclopedia the article would have to be much smaller than it is now. Print encycopedias are much more limited by their size than a web based one, how large do you think a printed version of just the english wikipedia would be at present? How many people could fit the thing into their houses? Anyway it's somewhat irrelevant as link independent doesn't really mean anything. When I say above that you can click on the link to find out what it means, it's just another way of saying I looked it up in another part of the encyclopedia, so it is link independent, links are just convenient. Alun 05:21, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Articles are supposed to be independent units, that stand on their own. How the end user uses it is hard to conjecture - it could be print, CD or DVD ROM, or some future media. We are building content, not a web site. The other article may or may not be available to look at, as you say, a "complete" printed copy is impossible (the current CD version of Wikipedia is only a few thousand articles). Granted, this is all theoretical and in practice %99 will read this through some online media so it's probably irrelevant, pragmatically speaking.  -- Stbalbach 13:42, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: What WP:TPA says is "nearly self-contained" and "comprehensible by itself". The introduction says that the Angles, Jutes and Saxons were Germanic, and it isn't expecting much of the reader to make the connection between Germanic and Germany. This is not, after all, the Simple English version. What more is needed ? Angus McLellan  (Talk) 14:50, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree, we don't need to go into massive detail, it's what the other articles are for. Alun 14:44, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

text: Why do you care? TharkunColl 22:58, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think that it's important to speak well, even on forums such as this. Enzedbrit 01:34, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  How many Germanies