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conflation of franks with visigoths?

I made a change (838551115) which was reverted (838551115) and which I have again reverted and this is my attempt to prevent it from being reverted again. apologies if I am not doing the bureaucracy part of this correctly, I typically just make drive-by corrections

the previous version of the line in question was "Against Germanic tradition, each of the four sons of Clovis attempted to secure power in different cities but their inability to prove themselves on the battlefield and intrigue against one another led the Visigoths back to electing their leadership." which seems to confuse two different subjects with each other. the source (bauer 178-179, https://books.google.com/books?id=1u2oP2RihIgC&q=amalaric#v=snippet&q=amalaric&f=false) briefly discusses the frankish succession and resulting civil war among clovis's four sons, then _by way of example_ tells of amalaric, who became king of the _visigoths_, some two decades later, before being killed for incompetence and replaced by an elected warleader. somehow these two different events, tribes, and individuals were merged into the one sentence, which I have removed

Past tense?

So what is the R1b haplogroup? If R1a is Slav, and R1b L's and I's are traditionally called Germanic in ethnography and genetics. Why does this article only discuss the past term? 121.210.33.50 (talk) 04:09, 27 October 2019 (UTC)

I don't believe you can make such conclusions about Y DNA haplogroups. All large groups of human beings have many Y haplogroups. I suppose your suppose is amateur speculations around the internet?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 18:52, 27 October 2019 (UTC)

Article length

This article has become very long. WP:SIZESPLIT states that articles sized at more than 100kB or at more than 100,000 characters in length "almost certainly should be divided". This article is currently at 194,360kB in size and 111,533 characters in length.

As a remedy, i suggest that the culture section be split into a new article. The culture of the pagan and tribal early Germanic peoples is certainly a distinct and notable subject. If this section is split, we will have room for expanding our coverage on additional aspects of early Germanic culture, such as Germanic literature and art, by using various scholarly sources.

If there is support for splitting the culture section into a new article, is suggest that such an article be titled Early Germanic culture, per WP:COMMONNAME. In such a case, we must of course maintain a summary style description of the culture of Germanic peoples here. Krakkos (talk) 10:31, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

References

1. Wobrey, William; Murdoch, Brian; Hardin, James N.; Read, Malcolm Kevin (2004). Early Germanic Literature and Culture. Boydell & Brewer. ISBN 157113199X. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameters: |registration= and |subscription= (help)
2. Green, D. H. (2004). Language and History in the Early Germanic World. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521794234. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameters: |registration= and |subscription= (help)

• • The other obvious approach, which is much more usual on WP, is to split out the history, which must be the bulk of the article. This would also leave room for expansion. I'm not sure removing the culture would entirely solve the lengt5h problem, perhaps someone could give figures for history/culture/the rest? Johnbod (talk) 14:09, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

• This is a good suggestion, John. The history section appears to be even longer than the culture section. If one of them is split out into a separate article, the remaining section will probably be given undue weight in comparison to the one that was split. It might be a good idea to split both the history and culture section out into separate articles, while covering those topics in summary style here. Krakkos (talk) 19:04, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

• Honestly I think a lot of the article should be reduced or removed. Most of it is covered in other articles. This article should focus upon the common threads which united the Germanic peoples, but is not focused. I continue to be concerned that articles and categories about "Germanic" subjects are being inflated with hot air. You would think people interested in these subjects would want good articles.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 15:26, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

• The article is well written and based upon excellent scholarship. However it repeats itself on occasion, and some sections are longer than perhaps they should have been. Pay in mind that even if half of the content of this article is removed, its size would still generally require a split. The best way to get this article down to a proper size seems to be a split of both the history section and the culture section. This will also enable to to shorten the lead, which is too long in my opinion. Krakkos (talk) 11:05, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

• I disagree about the article as a whole. It is poorly written, repetitive, and goes off subject too often into areas best covered by other articles. Also, some parts read like a 19th century praise of Germanic virtue, not scholarship in any sense of the word relevant to Misplaced Pages editing. Concerning the lead, I have already shortened it a bit, and it should indeed be shorter if we can manage doing that without making the article worse. I think however that this should be seen as a task connected to reducing the sections in the body, so that anything which needs to be moved out of the lead can find a new home, and will not simply be lost. One of the challenges is that editors should be using more recent mainstream scholarship instead of for example old encyclopedias.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 14:55, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

The statement that the article as a whole is "poorly written" is patently absurd. There are a few areas where editors with an apparent agenda have resorted to employing much older scholarship (that does not dominate the article however), which reads like eugenicist drivel about Germanic superiority. Krakkos makes the best suggestions here—in my view—regarding the elimination of redundancy and perhaps splitting the article by moving the "Culture" segments into another related article.--Obenritter (talk) 16:10, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

Splitting articles and making new content forks is a cancer in Misplaced Pages in recent years. This article surely has to have any properly sourceable Germanic culture information as a central theme. What else is it about? Problem is that we have bad sections on those subject. Moving them to a lower profile article will just protect poor material. Almost none of the article is based on sources from after WW2, and most of the article is "patently" written in ugly English, which looks like it was ugly before it was cut up and patched together by a committee. Just deal with that reality. I am not the enemy.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 22:49, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

First off--"poorly written" means faulty syntax, poor word logic, unduly cumbersome constructions, and grammatical errors. That's not what plagues this article. Also, the VAST majority of the sources used for this article are post WW2 (by far). While I used to think you were doing the article a service by carefully monitoring the content, you've changed that perception markedly as of late. You seem revel in making sweeping statements founded on poor logic, often for what appears to be attempts to either elicit controversy or cause arguments anymore. This statement "Almost none of the article is based on sources from after WW2," being among the most asinine I've ever seen from you. Are you dealing with an illness or personal trauma? If so, you have my sympathy but you do not have my support or concurrence about the quality of the sourcing (other than the antiquated ones we've already mentioned) in the aggregate across this article. Perhaps the best way to shorten the article is to make the changes suggested by Krakkos. --Obenritter (talk) 02:41, 15 December 2019 (UTC)

OK, I was indeed being a bit sweeping and rushed. (I wrote it late before going to bed.) I could have perhaps chosen better ways of making the point. But the article is surely not good to read, and not well focused? I find it very strange to see editors feeling satisfied about it. Concerning old sources, this is a long article and lots and lots of sources are indeed named, but as one reads through it one feels very much like one is reading information based on an old encyclopedia. I wonder if the sources were added after the words were written in some cases, if you see what I mean. My biggest fear is inflation with duplicated, and I think splitting instead of focusing will make that worse. We will just create more hot air?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 10:38, 15 December 2019 (UTC)

Andrew--you're not wrong that the article could benefit from better organization and perhaps less granularity in some parts. It's not in terrible shape in terms of general content, but it could stand synopsis in some places and certainly the omission of dated info from old encyclopedias and the like. The unfortunate reality when dealing with the ancient Germanic tribes is that most of what has been reported comes from ancient sources like Tacitus, Cassiodorus, Jordanes, Paul the Deacon, Livy, Procopius, and the like. Scholars have since tried to fill in the proverbial gaps to the best of their ability. For my own PhD research on Roman-Germanic contact and the resultant effects on European historical consciousness, I was forced—like historians before me—to rely on these ancient accounts and the best tertiary evidence available, much of which is also medieval. It creates its own conundrums to be sure. The idea of splitting the article so as to reduce its length makes some sense, but that also risks dividing it into compartmentalized chunks where more inane and undisciplined editorial content can be added, which subsequently adds to the policing work in general. If I had more time, I would try to sift through the content and parse out what seems truly relevant against that which may be trivial and/or politicized by persons with politically-incorrect agendas. To be honest, I do not know the best way forward, but the path of least resistance is divide it as Krakkos recommended.--Obenritter (talk) 16:38, 15 December 2019 (UTC)

I think it is always worth being cautious of following a path of least resistance on Misplaced Pages, at least when it comes to splitting decisions. Concerning the content one of the concerns I have is not the ancient citations. I think that the best way to write neutrally requires us to know what the ancient sources were, in order to structure what we write, even though we should base what we write on secondary sources. If we work in that sequence, then we know to be careful about giving undue weight to one popularization.

If we start with secondary sources, then of course for this period nearly all of them contain at least something controversial, and at least some bits which derive from old simplifications. We have to try to have an idea about which is which. It is NOT actually hard to make lots of good looking footnotes, but following the path of least resistance tends to lead mainly to "just so" stories such as the one I recently adjusted about how the Germanic peoples simply replaced Iranian peoples, then Attila simply forced them to move, then Slavic peoples replaced them, and then the Germanic peoples "reclaimed" their lands. It is easy to see how this can be derived from reasonable quality secondary sources, but I hope you can also see why to me it still feels like I am reading something from an old school book.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 12:09, 16 December 2019 (UTC)

@Andrew Lancaster: Thanks for eliciting a chuckle. The reason you feel like you're reading "from an old school book" has primarily to do with the nature of this subject, which as I mentioned, relies on ancient writing. There is only so much one can do in terms of interpreting these ancient sources without editorializing the content into something that results in arbitrary speculation from a modern historian. Going as far back as J.B. Bury, and moving forward to the likes of Walter Pohl, Patrick Geary, Walter Goffart, Peter Heather, Thomas Burns, E.A. Thompson, Edward James, Guy Halsall, and Herwig Wolfram; they have all done what they could with the available information. To be totally honest, it's not clear to me—aside from synopsizing the content a little better or possibly splitting it as Krakkos already mentioned—as to what can be done. His most recent efforts to trim and reorganize left lots of places needing citations and incomplete information, which did not especially thrill me either, but hats off to him for trying to shorten the article and offer concision in other places. --Obenritter (talk) 16:43, 16 December 2019 (UTC)

Well no, the problems I am talking about are not coming from the limited classical sources or the best modern secondary sources. That would be great. I am saying what Misplaced Pages is producing in the name of various sources is often quite different. Gaps in the record are being filled in with the most old fashioned adventure stories and racial concepts which I think are coming from our own authors and much older secondary works. For example, the Eastern Germanic tribes who entered the empire are difficult to distinguish in many areas from Attila's complex of people's which they were part of, although Misplaced Pages is trying to describe the two is clearly distinct; and classical writers did not make the modern distinction between Slavs, Finns and "Germanic" tribes. In fact, they did not really bother about trying to define what Germanic meant and whether any tribe was Germanic. Same goes for Iranian (or "Scythian") etc. It sometimes seems like there is a 19th century style effort being made in Misplaced Pages to hide all that.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 18:41, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

Genetics, continuity of old ethnic groups, etc

@Andrew Lancaster: Just out of curiosity, what is your background? An academic, a hobbyist, someone with a political agenda? A religious official? I am very suspect of your intentions here.

...Says an anonymous voice from the internet. My editing record in a wide range of topics is clear and my concerns are based on reading the actual sources and trying to work according to the consensus rules we have developed as a community on Misplaced Pages. It is clear that this article has struggled with various types of problematic tendencies for a long time, and it has been mentioned many times over the years. The fact that an anonymous person takes the time to attack an editor like this already tells us all something.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:53, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

@Andrew Lancaster: No one attacked you. I'm not really sure what your so-called "concerns" even are. My issue is that you're pushing a baseless, and harmful conspiracy theory that Germans just disappeared one day, and no longer exist, as an ethnic group, which is disproved by a simple genetic test. This baseless conspiracy theory concerns me, because this kind of dehumanizing rhetoric is what leads to genocide, and human rights abuses. Please, I will ask again, what is your background? What are your intentions here?

If you have a real point to make which is relevant to Misplaced Pages and consistent with our policies, then name your sources and explain your editing proposals clearly (or which text you think needs to be kept unchanged). Giving good sources is the method we use on Misplaced Pages, and not trying to talk about who other editors are. (If you have a serious concern about an editor then that can be handled elsewhere; it is not a talk page issue.) For the time being I have no idea what you are talking about. No one has argued that any ethnic group just appeared in one day. Are you arguing for the opposite of that extreme position though, that distinct ethnic groups simply remain distinct?

In classical times, the Germanic peoples included relatively sedentary Celtic speakers in the west (probably the original Germanic people) and Finnish speakers in the north. It was not a linguistic term, and it certainly wasn't connected to DNA. What this article needs to do better is to explain how the classical sources broke up the Germanic peoples into (inconsistent) categories, and what scholarly hypotheses have been published about the reality of those, including their languages and descendants. It is within those categories, such as the Suevian, Norse, and Gothic groups, that we get groups where we can say something meaningful about language. Concerning the whole group of Germanic peoples, we can only generalize in a much more approximate way.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 13:19, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

@Andrew Lancaster: I am going to ask you again, what is your background? What are your intentions here? Are you in genetics, linguistics, history, archaeology? I'd appreciate an answer.

A *few* quotes from you

"Where is any good strong source which clearly says that they do still exist" "

"I still have not seen any reliable source mentioning a real modern version of the Germanic peoples"

"Our sources about the ancient Germanic peoples make it clear that they do not still exist. There is no source saying that a new ethnic group came into being, and there is no modern Germanic culture or ethnos or nation or folk"

"I and others have explained why these sources do not justify the proposal that any classical Germanic people lived on and continues to exist today. The lists of modern peoples who supposedly belong to a Germanic people are clearly just lists of groups who speak a Germanic language."

You are *explicitly* stating that Germans do not exist as an active, existent genetic ethnic group, that descend from those referenced in ancient sources.

However, this is patently false, and is backed up by the most elementary of research, using a simple Google search.

DNA was extracted from burials in Spain, identified as those of the Visigoths.

This DNA has been processed, and, for quite some time now, has been available for public use, for comparing to living, contemporary humans, from a service such as MyTrueAncestry.

In comparing DNA samples, extracted from yourself, or another living human/hominid you can compare to the, arbitrarily, previously referenced Visigoth samples, and determine the relative genetic relationship, and the closeness of the two specimens.

In doing so, you will see that there are plenty of Visigoths living, breathing, and walking around today. Including me!

Thus, your conspiracy-theory style, and dehumanizing assertions of there being no modern Germanic ethnos, or "folk" or Germans just disappearing one day, are baseless.

Which brings me back to my original question. What is your background? If you are, as I hope, a layperson, I think you should leave this subject to more educated individuals, as it seems that you aren't adequately informed.

I sincerely hope that you are here, in good faith, and are not here to dehumanize, and push dangerous rhetoric, that can, and does lead to human rights abuses, and genocide, among other things.

-Floyd

The sources you name, and the personal focus of this post are not compatible with Misplaced Pages policy, and clearly not going to help this article. I think you need to familiarize yourself with the how and why of Misplaced Pages content and talk page policy, and you need to avoid talking past people, and instead use these talk pages for focused discussions about real editing ideas.

For what it is worth I think your approach to human historical population genetics involves some misunderstandings. Probably this is making it hard for your to follow the discussion. Genocide is rare, of course. Ethnic groups rarely just disappear but they can and do fade away, merge, absorb others, divide, and change character. But DNA and genocide are of limited relevance. Proving that someone is descended from the Eburones or the Teutones would not make them an Eburone or a Teuton.

For example, all of the several connected peoples called Franks in 1100 were certainly successors of the peoples called Franks in 400, in many ways, but not especially much in terms of DNA or language. For this reason, as summarizers, we treat various types of "Franks" as separable subjects, with their own articles and sections. There are obvious practical reasons for this, but of course we also need explain the certain and hypothetical links between the different types of Franks. That is the difficult bit. We should be discussing how to get those details correct and well-balanced. Just equating all Franks, or equating all Germans, would be as a impractical as denying any links between them. I hope this helps explain the discussions you have been looking at.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 15:54, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

@Andrew Lancaster: Please cite the Misplaced Pages policy where academic, scientific papers, from established universities, are not compatible.

"Proving that someone is descended from the Eburones or the Teutones would not make them an Eburone or a Teuton"

This is, again, contradicted by my previously provided citations, containing scientific papers.

Again, "This DNA has been processed, and, for quite some time now, has been available for public use, for comparing to living, contemporary humans, from a service such as MyTrueAncestry."

You do not seem to understand that a people, such as the Visigoths, are identifiable, on a genetic level, in uniformity, and can be positively identified as being closely related, genetically, to other Germanic peoples, in opposition, to an arbitrary ethnic group, such as the Sami.

You also do not seem to understand that this is science, this is falsifiable, observable, material, science.

This is not conjecture. This is not "gossip," this is not semantics, which is what you seem to be concerning yourself with, relative to this article's contents, here.

I will ask again, what is your background, and what are your intentions here? Are you here in good faith?

If you are a layperson, why are you seemingly trying to play the role of a trained scientist, when it's evident, you have no understanding of the subject?

For the sake of human rights I will also provide a quote from my last post.

"I sincerely hope that you are here, in good faith, and are not here to dehumanize, and push dangerous rhetoric, that can, and does lead to human rights abuses, and genocide, among other things."

Best

-Floyd

I don't at first sight see anything I am saying disagreeing with those papers. I think you simply don't want to understand my point. Genetics can identify the interbreeding populations which are ancestral to a person. This is not the same as ethnicity, although it can be an indicator. It is in fact self-evident that people do not always belong to the same ethnic groups as their genetic ancestors. Ethnicity is not the topic of genetics. I have not seen any geneticist claim that because a modern population seems to be partly biologically descended from a specific ancient one, they have to be in the same continuous ethnic group? If you can quote a geneticist saying this in a peer-reviewed publication we can look into to it though.

Please also note that it is bad etiquette on a talk page to copy the large chunks of text several times over without ever coming to a point relevant to any specific editing proposal. It is also keep pushing things towards personal demands or inquisitions about personal information. It should not be relevant, and it is an important policy on Misplaced Pages that we work based on citing sources, not ad hominem debate. If you have an editing proposal to make based on sources, then please get to the point. Note that I have also placed this discussion into a new topic because it is clearly a distraction from the discussion you entered. --Andrew Lancaster (talk) 18:42, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

Does modern "Germanic" heathenism need to be mentioned in the lead

We have this:

Historical Germanic paganism, the indigenous religion of the Germanic peoples, ended with Christianization in the 11th century.<sfn|Germanic religion and mythology, Encyclopædia Britannica Online> Elements of Germanic paganism survived into post-Christianization folklore, and today new religious movements exist which see themselves as modern revivals of Germanic Heathenry.

I propose it is not suitable for the lead of this article? It is not about classical Germanic peoples.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:35, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

I oppose removal, since it starts with the historical Germanic paganism up to the whole or partial usage/claim today. Simply we should not regard every aspect of the article based on the debate above, there are undeniable (claims) of connection.(KIENGIR (talk) 09:02, 26 December 2019 (UTC))

It is not about denying all possible connections, but a question of whether it should be in the lead. We can not put everything which is connected indirectly to the subject in the lead? This article has too much repetition. The same things are sometimes being explained in the lead, and then in more than one section. Detailed discussions should be in the main body sections, or other articles. Surely we need to be allowed to clean that up?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 09:33, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

Well since there is spicy debate related, we are likely to wait also for other inputs...(KIENGIR (talk) 11:01, 27 December 2019 (UTC))

SUPPORT the deletion of modern heathanism--far too ancillary for the lead.--Obenritter (talk) 17:57, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

Support deletion: The introduction is a summary of the content of the following main sections. None of these sections covers the constructed faith "Heathenry", and definitely should not. As a fringe phenomenon of little notability, it would not deserve mention here even if (if – I do not endorse it) this article were to be extended to include the purported "modern Germanic peoples" (I only mention this since KIENGIR alludes to the dispute of Sept 2019). –Austronesier (talk) 13:01, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

A first batch of new proposals for consideration

I will sign each proposal so that discussion can be started on any of them.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 11:21, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

• Ethonym section. I believe this should be shortened into a more typical "Nomenclature" section, explaining the term Germani and related terms such as Teutons, and everything else to be moved or removed. Discussion about the first Roman authors should go with other such discussion. I am not sure we need a special discussion in this article about the term *Walhaz. Remember this article is not the main article for Germanic as a language group.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 11:21, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

I agree that this section is overly long and duplicated in later sections. It should be shortened. Perhaps parts of it could be transferred to Germania. Krakkos (talk) 15:59, 28 December 2019 (UTC)

There are many ways to do it, but important is to look at the whole flow of the article first.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 19:05, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

• Classification section. In reality this important section spells out the fragmentary classical record of categorizations. It is perhaps better moved downwards. --Andrew Lancaster (talk) 11:21, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

I agree that this section should be transferred downwards. This is the case in similar articles such as Slavs and Balts. As with the ethnonym section, parts of the material here is repeated in the history section. This issue should be fixed. Krakkos (talk) 15:59, 28 December 2019 (UTC)

• I think it is better to work chronologically after the nomenclature section, and move next to the History section. I think much of the information we have under Ethonym and Classification is reduplicated in sections here, and should be integrated instead that everything is only mentioned once.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 11:21, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

I agree that part information from the ethnonym and classification sections could be integrated into the history section. Krakkos (talk) 15:59, 28 December 2019 (UTC)

• The first sub-section of the history section is actually about Denmark, southern Scandinavia, Indo Europeans and so on. Also, when it says the Germanic peoples, it is clearly talking about the Germanic speaking peoples, and ignoring other Germanic peoples. I think we can not expect readers to follow why we suddenly change subject like this.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 11:21, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

One of the principle subjects around which Germanic peoples has revolved been "language"; a point which you've argued on numerous occasions. So are you now saying the traditional Russian people who have some ties to the Viking Rus and the subsequent Slavic people derived therefrom should also be included? You claim to want to reduce this article's size, I would argue that such an approach would do the opposite.--Obenritter (talk) 17:57, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

I can't see how you could draw that conclusion from what I am saying. The Rus are much later. In the classical period this eastern area's ethnography is poorly defined and there is not much we can report from the classical sources and archaeology. Certainly in earlier sections of the article the main point to make, which all our sources make, is that the boundary between Germani and Scythians, and whether there are other types of people between them who are neither, is a bit unclear. Some of the classical sources do however mention tribes who might be Finns, Estonians, and Balto-Slavic. In Poland some of the Germanic material culture groups may have been multilingual. Consider the Buri, Lugii and Vandals.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 19:14, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

That the Germanic peoples originated from an Indo-European population of Denmark and southern Scandinavia is firmly established in the sources provided by Obenritter. This content should remain. Krakkos (talk) 15:59, 28 December 2019 (UTC)

No, what our sources say is that Germanic languages came from there, and of course some large chunk of population. But of course we do not want to avoid discussion of the connections between these two distinct subjects. Nevertheless we have to make the differences clear too. The origins of the Germanic languages are a prehistory "background" topic for this article, so they should not appear right at the beginning in a way which simply equates this to the article topic.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 19:14, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

• Early Iron Age. A lot of this information simply reduplicates what we have below in the chronological sections. I suppose theoretically it is supposed to give a archaealogical and linguistic view as opposed to the classical view but in reality both perspectives need each other and so it is full of duplicated discussion of the classical sources. It would be easier to mention modern discussions in each chronological section, together with the classical sources?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 11:21, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

This section deals with some of the Germanic peoples from an archaeological perspective, as historians are not the only ones with a vested interest.--Obenritter (talk) 17:57, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

Information on the archaeological history of Germanic peoples is relevant to this article. Such content should not be removed. Krakkos (talk) 15:59, 28 December 2019 (UTC)

Of course any such material should not be removed, but we are duplicating material by having this separate discussion. I suggest combining discussion of all sorts of evidence together, with the article divided up more chronologically. In any case the article needs a simpler structure in order to help both readers and future editors.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 19:22, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

I still find the sudden changeover to discussion of Scandinavian archaeology and Germanic language origins to not fit in the article properly. It leaves out discussion of most of Germania and many Germani, and it does not fit in the flow of this article. I think most of it could better be in articles about Proto Germanic origins and archaeology.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:18, 16 January 2020 (UTC)

• Earliest contacts section. I see no evidence that Pytheas mentioned Germani or Germania?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 11:21, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

Cunliffe, Burns, and other mention Pytheas in this regard. What evidence are you looking for specifically? Some of the careless editing by Krakkos managed to eliminate the citations associated with the original content. Also, what are you trying to accomplish here? Such reckless and ill-informed commentary from you is why I am not gong to help refashion a page that was otherwise in reasonable shape until this recent crapola. Your original policing efforts to keep the modern construal of "Germanic" off the page was commendable. This current effort is simply destructive as your last comment illustrates since you fail to understand context evidently. Using such logic, we would ignore the writings of Cassiodorus and Jordanes, who likewise mentioned the Germanic Goths without referencing the Germani or Germania. --Obenritter (talk) 17:57, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

The Goths are however discussed by other classical sources. It is true that I am saying we should separate Germanic languages and classical Germanic ethnicity in our minds, and in our writing. I think we all know that our specialist sources have concerns about Cassiodorus and Jordanes, but that does not mean that they all totally reject the equation of the later Goths with the older Gotones. Furthermore, in this case the Germanic language of the later Goths is sometimes cited as one of the reasons for not totally rejecting this. --Andrew Lancaster (talk) 19:22, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

The works of Pytheas are lost. His works are however cited by other classical scholars, such as Pliny the Elder, who in his Natural History includes the descriptions by Pytheas of certain peoples of Germania (Gutones and Teutones). The northern travels of Pytheas are generally mentioned in scholarly works about Germanic peoples, such as those by Malcolm Todd and Francis Owen. If Pytheas is mentioned in the best sources on Germanic peoples, he should also be mentioned in Misplaced Pages's article on Germanic peoples. Krakkos (talk) 15:59, 28 December 2019 (UTC)

Yes, but I think it is difficult to get this out of our current article? It could even be read as saying that Pytheas is known to have mentioned the "Germani" by that name? We should be careful to avoid implying too much.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 19:22, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

Coming back to the Pytheas remarks. Currently we say "he was also possibly the first to distinguish the Germanoi people of northern and central Europe as distinct from the Keltoi people further west". Why would this possibility be important to mention? The sources we use are not really all that strong? To me the whole section seems not to fit. It basically repeats something several times, which could fit in one sentence: he is the earliest known European author on the topic and he influenced later writers. Why don't we shorten to something like that?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:18, 16 January 2020 (UTC)

Genetic definition?

"The Germanic peoples (Latin: Germani), were a collection of ethnic groups of continental Northern European origin, identified by Roman-era authors as distinct from neighbouring Celtic peoples. "

This doesn't sound right. It should say either "The ancient Germanic peoples" or " The Germanic peoples, are". The wording makes it sound like the germanic peoples no longer exists.

--176.11.24.191 (talk) 21:31, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

This has been discussed many times, but to go over it again: The Germanic peoples mentioned in classical times indeed no longer exist. People confuse the idea of "Speakers of Germanic languages" which is a completely modern concept defined in a completely new way, and covered in other articles, with those classical peoples. We have found non-specialist sources which make this confusion (or charitably we might call it a shorthand), but specialist sources, and their definitions make the distinction quite clear. The two topics are certainly connected but also certainly not the same.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 19:04, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

@Andrew Lancaster This article does a really poor job creating a distinction between the ancient Germanic peoples and modern Germanic peoples. Germanic people are to this day referred to say a group with a shared and common ancestry, beyond functioning as a term for a linguistic group. Norwegians are for example referred to as a north-Germanic ethnic group. --84.213.153.62 (talk) 19:57, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

Yes, that is my concern. I would say the article is inconsistent about whether there is a distinction. But the case of North Germanic certainly does not help us. North Germanic is a term which only comes from modern linguistics. If anyone speaks of a North Germanic group of peoples they are clearly extending modern linguistic terminology, but this is less confusing than the case of "Germanic" without the "North", where we have to be more careful. There was no classical "Northern Germani".--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 14:29, 4 January 2020 (UTC)

@Andrew Lancaster: "This has been discussed many times, but to go over it again: The Germanic peoples mentioned in classical times indeed no longer exist."

I have explained this to you, SEVERAL TIMES, now, that this is FACTUALLY FALSE. You are wrong. Provably wrong.

I will again present you with the information disproving your baseless assertions, which are are unable to be substantiated, and are quantifiable, as they do not represent the evidence, proof, and or facts, sourced through genetic testing.

This is, again, contradicted by my previously provided citations, containing scientific papers.

Again, "This DNA has been processed, and, for quite some time now, has been available for public use, for comparing to living, contemporary humans, from a service such as MyTrueAncestry."

I ask that you please stop pushing this dehumanizing, baseless conspiracy theory of Germans just disappearing one day.

You are wrong, and it is unacceptable, immoral, and unethical to be spreading this false information that is harmful, and can have material consequences. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:6c40:5e00:7e3a:e5bb:6f86:917a:96a4 (talk) 01:59, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

@2600:6c40:5e00:7e3a:e5bb:6f86:917a:96a4: You should first make up your mind whether you want to discuss Germanic peoples or Germans. These two are quite different things.

In any case, since this is the talk page of Germanic peoples, I will answer about the topic Germanic peoples (although IMO, Andrew Lancaster already has sufficiently explained the case). The Germanic peoples of classical times do no longer exist indeed. Many of these ancient ethnic groups contributed to the ethnogenesis of the modern Germanic-speaking peoples to various degrees, and this is certainly still visible in the genetic ancestry of many individuals belonging to the latter (again: to various degrees!). However, the ethnogenesis of the modern Germanic-speaking peoples is more complex than that, and should not be reduced to one selected genetic signature, or to linguistic affiliation alone.

There is not a single one of these ethnic groups that has an unbroken one-to-one continuity from ancient times until now. The Goths, Vandals, Cherusci, Hermunduri etc. have disappeared. No modern sane individual self-identifies as a Goth, Cheruscan etc. (except maybe in historizing role-play and by denying their actual ethnicity). This is hardly a "conspiracy theory".

In modern ethnography, "Germanic peoples" is not a meaningful entity except for being a shorthand for "Germanic-speaking peoples", even though amateur geneticists who propagate their simplistic misinterpretations of valid research results in blogs and forums, and their readers believe otherwise. –Austronesier (talk) 10:02, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

A couple of attempts to distill a short answer to the anonymous writer's comment:

• No one has argued that the classical Germanic peoples just disappeared. The term/category faded out of use. (It is not even really clear how important the category was ever critical to members of these groups, or the neighbouring peoples. We have a small number of confusing references by Roman authors, and a tradition of how to read them.)
• To the extent that "Germanic peoples" can be sloppy shorthand for "Germanic language speaking peoples", then of course ethnic groups exist which strongly associate with such languages, and no one has argued otherwise. It is not the subject of this article though. We have many overlapping articles covering this.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 15:14, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

@Andrew Lancaster:

@Austronesier:

The importance, or lackthereof, is irrelevant. As this relates to genetics.

It is not even really clear how important the category was ever critical to members of these groups

By "Germans" I think you mean the Deutsche people, which is a nationality, nationality is not genetic. Anyone can be Deutsche, anyone can be Cuban, anyone can be Japanese.

The Germanic people(s) are a distinct, identifiable genetic group, with a shared matrix. The Sami are a distinct identifiable genetic group.

The Germanic people(s) of "classical times" DO, indeed, exist, today.

Yet again, I must provide the evidence, disproving your (baseless) presuppositions.

This is, again, contradicted by my previously provided citations, containing scientific papers.

Again, "This DNA has been processed, and, for quite some time now, has been available for public use, for comparing to living, contemporary humans, from a service such as MyTrueAncestry."

They did not disappear, they did not stop existing. Their genes did not dematerialize out of existence.

The Germanic people(s) of today are the product of these ancient people(s), through genes, that have been passed down, from parent to child, over many generations.

Your comments regarding language are irrelevant, as this is is a genetic matter, not a linguistic one.

You have conflated established tribes, with genetics, consistently in your posting.

The Ancient German tribes, indeed, no longer exist, as established tribes.

The genes, of these ancient Germanic tribes, do, however.

At no point did the ancient Germanic people(s) break off, sever, or separate, from the Germanic people(s) of today.

Allow me to continue.

The opening of the Germanic Peoples article:

The Germanic peoples (Latin: Germani), were a collection of ethnic groups

note: ethnic "groups" doesn't apply, here, to the ancient Germans, it is an ethnic GROUP, not groupS.)

Okay, now let's check the ethnic group page:

An ethnic group or ethnicity is a category of people who identify with each other, usually on the basis of a presumed common genealogy

The first thing, in this article, as an identifier, is GENEALOGY.

From Merriam-Webster

Definition of genealogy

an account of the descent of a person, family, or group from an ancestor or from older forms

Again, this article designates "Germanic Peoples" as an ethnic group(s).

If the living Germanic peoples are an ethnic group, and the ancient Germanic peoples are their grandparents, the Germanic peoples, relative to those that which this article concerns itself with, STILL exist.

Again:

At no point did the ancient German peoples break off, sever, or separate, from the Germanic peoples, of today.

The problem here, is that this article is about ETHNICITY, not tribes, or linguistics.

If you'd like it to be about ancient Germanic tribes, or linguistic groups, consider altering the article, to reflect this.

Or making another one, all together.

I have since demonstrated, with the use of scientific papers, that the ancient Germanic People(s) do, as an ETHNIC group, indeed, still exist, and never STOPPED existing.

I say this again out of critical importance:

The continued use of "were" in this article is dehumanizing, unacceptable, inappropriate, irresponsible, immoral, and unethical, and I believe it ought to be changed, on the basis of the provided evidence.

Forgive my awkward formatting, and whatnot, I am, relatively speaking, new to using Misplaced Pages, and am still learning my way around, I have since made an account.

-Benjamin N. Feldenstein

I have split this out as a new section, as it clearly had nothing to do with the section it was inserted into. I can't get anything worth replying to out of the above post, and don't see much point replying to it at any length. There are no citations, and there appears to be no good understanding of what this article and related ones are even saying, or what the published sources say. This article uses published sources concerning the classical Germanic peoples. There is no scientific genetic definition of any "people", ethnic group, or tribe, and in any case no evidence that these neighbours of the Gauls and Romans were seen as linguistically or genetically united. In the few sources we have they are clearly defined as a mixed group of diverse named peoples, united by geography and perceived lack of mediterranean civilization. Essentially they were the neighbours of the Gauls, and contrasted with the Gauls. To the extent that they formed a military threat this was under the leadership of various Suebian related peoples, who were clearly named as a large group of peoples who were newer to the area. On Misplaced Pages, we have to take our bearings from what the best published sources say about these things. Note:

• We can not use Misplaced Pages as a source on Misplaced Pages. That would be WP:Circular.
• I have adjusted the opening sentence of ethnic group because it was poorly written and clearly not matching the sources it cites.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 10:30, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

@Andrew Lancaster:

You didn't provide a single citation for anything you just said, or anything else you've conjectured.

Where are YOUR citations?

There are, however, citations, for MY assertions, of which are provided below.

I, yet again, will post them.

This is, again, contradicted by my previously provided citations, containing scientific papers.

Again, "This DNA has been processed, and, for quite some time now, has been available for public use, for comparing to living, contemporary humans, from a service such as MyTrueAncestry."

These citations disprove your baseless claims that the so-called "Classical Germans" are separate, and are unrelated to the Germanic peoples of today.

The Germanic peoples ARE, not WERE.

They did not disappear, or stop existing.

Your assertions above are not substantiated by any citations, and or evidence.

Further evidence disproving your claims that the Germanic peoples of today do not descend from the so-called "classical Germanic peoples"

Regarding the genetic composition of England

Using novel population genetic models (using samples from living individuals) that incorporate both mass migration and continuous gene flow, we conclude that 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) When we compared our data with an additional 177 samples collected in Friesland and Norway, we found that the Central English and Frisian samples were statistically indistinguishable.

This paper includes DNA processed, and analyzed from SEVERAL ancient Germanic peoples, showing the contemporary English, do, indeed, descend from them.

This study, alone, disproves your baseless, and unsubstantiated assertions that the so-called "classical Germanic peoples" share no connections to the contemporary Germans, of today.

but I will go on.

Langobard genetics

A principal components analysis of the Szólád and Collegno samples, in conjunction with modern references, showed that the ancient samples harbored genetic ancestry that overlaps with that of modern Europeans.

For the sake of the length of this "talk" page, I will withhold anymore papers on genetics, as the provided papers sufficiently, and comprehensively, debunk your baseless, unsubstantiated assertions, and conspiracy theory style conjecture.

Here is an entire write up with citations detailing the matrix of the contemporary living Germanic peoples, sourced from historical documentation, genetics, and linguistics.

Let us detail yet even more evidence, with respect to the matrix of the contemporary, living Germanic peoples.

You now have historical documentation, linguistic, and genetic evidence, all which display a direct continuity of the so-called "classical Germanic peoples" that resulted in the contemporary Germanic populations, as well as uniformity, between them.

I will ask, yet again.

Where are YOUR citations? Where is YOUR evidence?

Your dangerous, dehumanizing, borderline racist, and baseless rhetoric must stop. It is becoming increasingly clear that you've an agenda here, that you're trying to spread, thankfully, it is not supported by evidence.

No one is denying links between ancient and modern peoples, so please stop pretending that, but obviously being descended from a Visigoth does not make you a Visigoth, and none of the papers you cite say anything like what you want them to say. On the other hand, you are not even making any clear editing proposals. Please either make a clear proposal or stop bombarding this talk page, which is intended for discussion about editing strategies for the article.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:03, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

References

1. https://academic.oup.com/mbe/article/19/7/1008/1068561
2. https://www.genomeweb.com/sequencing/genetic-analysis-elucidates-ancient-longobard-social-organization-movements
3. https://haplogroupi2b1ismine.wordpress.com/the-germani-germanic-peoples-origins-and-history/#genetic
4. https://scholarship.tricolib.brynmawr.edu/bitstream/handle/10066/18702/2016DinhC.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y
5. https://www.dbnl.org/tekst/_low001199601_01/_low001199601_01_0023.php
6. http://linguistics.byu.edu/classes/Ling450ch/reports/german.html
7. http://linguistics.byu.edu/classes/Ling450ch/reports/frisian
8. https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780199772810/obo-9780199772810-0211.xml
9. http://linguistics.byu.edu/classes/Ling450ch/reports/Danish1.html
10. https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3637&context=etd
11. http://www.ling.helsinki.fi/~fkarlsso/Hist_Ling_Nord.pdf

The Early Germans by Malcolm Todd

Which version of Malcolm Todds book The Early Germans was used when writing this article? In the notelist, a 1999 version is used, while the version listed in the bibliography is from 2004. I have the 2004 version of this book, and the 1999 citations in this article are not verified in the 2004 version. Krakkos (talk) 10:16, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

@Krakkos: Evidently the 1999 book was originally used. Fortunately, I have both versions, so a simple index search and a few minutes of effort enabled me to find the cited information within the 2004 version, which I corrected within the article...so you can verify it accordingly now.--Obenritter (talk) 00:45, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

Expansion and restructuring

Hi! I came across the article today and read a few paragrahs. With regard to the "expansion tag" i think terms like Roman-era, believed to have and Roman period (all in the lede) should be replaced. The sentence: These "Visigoths" were given a large part of what is now southwestern France. is redundant (IMO) without mentioning the Visigoth Kingdom in Iberia. Is it OK to add references in German? All the best Wikirictor 18:33, 15 January 2020 (UTC)

German-language sources are acceptable as long as they are reliable. The current lead gives undue weight to fringe views and makes a number of unsubstantiated fantastic claims that are contradicted by reliable sources. It's definition of the topic in question reads like the intro to an ancient Roman encyclopedia rather than a modern English-language Misplaced Pages. The fact that the lead links to Germanic languages in scare quotes says it all. I wish you good luck in implementing your proposed changes. Krakkos (talk) 20:31, 15 January 2020 (UTC)

@Wikirictor:

• I agree that German language sources can be used.
• What would "Roman period" be replaced with? The article is currently about the Roman era Germanic peoples, and not Germanic language speakers, who are sometimes called "Germanic peoples" as a kind of shorthand in non-specialist tertiary works, but not reliable sources (even if Krakkos does not like this). This has been debated many, many times on this talk page and other in other parts of Misplaced Pages. (Some of the Germanic language speakers are one PART of what is covered, so it is of course an over-lapping topic.)
• Concerning the Visigoths I think the point you raise is a classic question of where to draw the line when writing a lead. Of course all these things should be discussed in the main article, but we should not try to include everything in the lead. It has probably gotten a bit to long.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 07:52, 16 January 2020 (UTC)
• Also, thanks for adding the citation to Liebeschuetz. I think it is the type of source which needs to be used more on this article and it contains a lot of material which can be useful to editors of this article, including references to older authors.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 09:07, 16 January 2020 (UTC)

the double footnote system is not well done

We currently have both footnotes with comments (efn template) and citation notes (sfn template). However, many of the efn footnotes are extremely trivial or off-topic, and many are effectively just citations which should surely be in the other type of note. I can't help thinking that some of us have gone overboard in the use of templates more generally because for example I see cases where a clear citation is given, but it has apparently become so unclear in the editing window, that someone has come along and added a "citation needed" template.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 09:03, 16 January 2020 (UTC)

Looking over the history of the article there is an incredible over-loading of the bibliography, with almost constant additions of new references about Roumania, English poetry, Geography of Europe, etc etc. Anyone who wants to check it themselves will be able to confirm that these additions are being made as part of the project by user:Krakkos to find some kind of source to justify his obsessive efforts to say that there is still a "modern Germanic people" and that linguistic groups are identical to ethnic groups, which reliable sources, even the ones that have some sympathy such as Liebeshuetz, recognize to be controversial. We eventually need to remove these sources, and replace them with more appropriate ones to the subject. Also, these constant attempts to reinsert these claims, duplicating them into every section, and also in other articles, strange new categories etc, is also a bigger problem that is clearly designed to be difficult to track and repair. It may eventually require more systematic action and community discussion.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 07:37, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

restructuring: further ideas

Currently the structure is:

1 Ethnonym

1.1 Germani

1.2 Teutons

2 Subdivisions

3 History

3.1 Origins

3.2 Early Iron Age

3.3 Earliest contacts

3.3.1 Pytheas

3.3.2 Migrations of the Bastarnae and Scirii

3.4 Cimbrian War

3.5 Encounter with Julius Caesar

3.6 Early Roman Empire period

3.7 Conflict and co-existence with the Roman Empire

3.8 Migration Period

3.9 Fall of the Western Roman Empire

3.10 Early Middle Ages

3.11 Post-migration ethnogeneses

Starting with the first sections, and keeping in mind to create a sctructure which does not encourage the duplication we keep seeing, here is an idea:

3.3 Earliest contacts

3.3.1 Pytheas

3.3.2 Migrations of the Bastarnae and Scirii

3.4 Cimbrian War

1 Ethnonym

1.1 Germani

1.2 Teutons

3 History

2 Subdivisions in classical sources

3.5 Encounter with Julius Caesar

3.6 Early Roman Empire period

3.7 Conflict and co-existence with the Roman Empire

3.8 Migration Period

3.9 Fall of the Western Roman Empire

3.10 Early Middle Ages

3.11 Post-migration ethnogeneses

To delete, and potentially replace with a new discussion on prehistory and/or a new discussion upon pre-imperial movements of people (but I don't see any good sourced material yet to write anything worth including).

3.1 Origins

3.2 Early Iron Age

Comments welcome.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:11, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

RfC: Is information and sources on peoples speaking Germanic languages and following other aspects of Germanic culture, within the scope of this article?

Please consider joining the feedback request service. An editor has requested comments from other editors for this discussion. This page has been added to the following lists: History and geography Language and linguistics When discussion has ended, remove this tag and it will be removed from the lists. If this page is on additional lists, they will be noted below.

Close to a year ago, the topic of this article was subtly transformed from being about peoples "identified by their use of the Germanic languages" to being about peoples "identified by Roman-era authors as distinct from neighbouring Celtic peoples". This major change of scope was only partially discussed in beforehand at the talk page, in a RfC initiated by a trolling IP sock of Freeboy200. As a response to the change of scope, an article titled Germanic peoples (modern) was created. In a subsequent discussion at Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Germanic peoples (modern) (2nd nomination), the majority of participating editors were in favor of merging that article into this, and the result was a redirect. More recently, i have attempted to merge content, such as citations from Francis Owen and Edward Arthur Thompson and plenty of other scholars, into this article. Owen and Thompson were both university professors who wrote books on the subject of Germanic peoples. With the current scope used as justification, these sources have been removed as "inappropriate sources" that are "about another topic (speakers of Germanic languages)". This leads to the question of this RfC: Is information and sources on peoples speaking Germanic languages and following other aspects of Germanic culture, within the scope of this article? Krakkos (talk) 10:51, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

• Yes - Per WP:PRIMARYTOPIC and WP:BROADCONCEPT.

In reliable sources, Germanic peoples are generally treated as peoples characterized primarily as speakers of Germanic languages (and followers of Germanic paganism, Germanic law, Germanic warfare etc). Explicit definitions can be found from Edward Arthur Thompson, Malcolm Pasley, Encyclopædia Britannica, and the Webster's New World College Dictionary. The body of this article, and the sources most frequently used, are clearly using this definition. They include plenty of information about peoples such as Norsemen. Norsemen were not "identified by Roman-era authors as distinct from neighbouring Celtic peoples". Norsemen lived outside of Germania after the Fall of the Western Roman Empire and had no Celtic neighbors. They are considered Germanic because they spoke Germanic languages. This is the primary concept for the term Germanic peoples.

If information about the primary concept is considered beyond the scope of this article, a separate article could be created. Articles for speakers of every other major Indo-European language family currently exist, so it would be strange not to have one on Germanic peoples. Creating multiple articles like this is however discouraged per WP:BROADCONCEPT. The best solution is therefore to include information and sources about peoples speaking Germanic languages and following other aspects of early Germanic culture, into this article. Krakkos (talk) 10:51, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

• Pinging Andrew Lancaster, Johnbod, Yngvadottir, Bloodofox, Ermenrich, Alarichall, Obenritter, Katolophyromai, Florian Blaschke, Hrodvarsson, Austronesier, Joshua Jonathan, Benjamin N. Feldenstein, Dimadick, and KIENGIR, who have been involved in related discussions, per WP:APPNOTE. Krakkos (talk) 10:51, 17 January 2020 (UTC)
• Yes I don't see major distinctions between ancient and medieval Germanic people. Romans are not the only people who left written sources on the subject. Dimadick (talk) 11:10, 17 January 2020 (UTC)
• Yes is is within the scope of the article, and no one has ever said otherwise, but it is not the topic of the article. This Rfc is just the latest attempt to confuse everyone. It is irrelevant to any editing discussion, but the explanation of Krakkos shows that the question posted is not the question he wants to ask (which is a question he has already asked many times). I propose this Rfc should be closed, at least as currently worded. Referring to the IMPLIED question, (1) Norse peoples were "Germanic language speaking peoples" and (2) "Germanic peoples" is a term sometimes used as a shorthand for Germanic language speaking peoples. It is a topic handled in other articles and also relevant to this article. (3) But being exact with our terminology, like we have to be, there are TWO concepts with an overlap, not one. --Andrew Lancaster (talk) 11:15, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

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