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This is an archive of Talk:Slavic peoples: July 2006 - Oct 2009.

Topics from 2006

What about the Polabians and Pomorians?

The article enumerates all petty nations in Yugoslavia, four of which share the same language and three of which are a result of political bargaining rather than of historical development (nobody mentioned them before 1945), but forgets the Western Slavic Polabians and Pomorians. The latter of the two are almost fully extinct, but the Polabians are still there and speak their language and have their culture, newspapers, legal rights, etc., in Eastern Germany (former DDR). And, again Yugoslavia, aaarghhhh, there are Bunjevci, and Sokci, and Hercegovci, and Jugosloveni, and Gorani, and Muslimani, and Bosanci, and Bosnjaci, an endless number of entities, cantons and republics! A plenty of material for an eternal quarrelling! This is the result when nationality becomes a primary political issue. However, there is not a word about the Kaszubians and Slovinci, who at least should be mentioned as the last surviving groups speaking dialects of the Pomorian language. Somebody hasn't learnt their lessons. 85.11.148.60 21:07, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Eternal quarreling(s)..

Yes, every village its own military, that's how it goes. And god forbid if they don't mention us! But based on this wiki-debate site not only the South Slavs are so passionate at quarrelling, there is hardly any science or at least encyclopedic debate present on this site! Come on guys get a grip, life is not all that serious, and so is not ethnicity! No wonder the "Westerners" don't take us seriously at all and Germans make no distinction between Slavs and Gypsies! ; ) -- —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.229.210.165 (talk) 10:27, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Do I need to remind you the last time germans looked down on Glorics their women ended up sucking Russian and Polish dicks just to feed their starving children? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.157.32.166 (talk) 00:55, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Infobox?

Since when are Slavs some massive ethnic group?

Italic textBold textISLAM AND SLAVDOM There is a lack of emphasis on importance of islam for slavs, big populations of muslims slavs bosniaks , gorani also pomaks etc

When you grow up, you will know... PANONIAN (talk) 22:26, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

Though you may be irritated by this anon's actions, that's not exactly the most constructive edit. There is a point to be made. Slavs are a division of the Indo-European people. They don't share any more unity than the Germanic or Italic peoples do, so an infobox is somewhat of a push, especially when the number is a complete out and out guesstimation. They may be an ethnic branch, but so is every other branch. Besides the infobox was added by another anon who vandalised the page at first. Maybe we need to backtrack a bit. Boscovic 19:59, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

The anon's edits are based on his POV that ethnic groups are strictly separated by the God himself and that there cannot be overlap between two groups or that one group cannot be subgroup of another. I am sorry, but this view is very close to Nazi ideology and it is completelly different from the scientific, ethnological and sociological approach to the problem. First of all, there are many definitions of what is an ethnic group. Here is what our Wikipedia article about Ethnic group claim: "An ethnic group is a human population whose members identify with each other, usually on the basis of a presumed common genealogy or ancestry (Smith 1986). Ethnic groups are also usually united by common cultural, behavioural, linguistic, or religious practices. In this sense, an ethnic group is also a cultural community". I do not see why Slavs cannot be described by this definition. For example, you have Pomaks that are part of Bulgarians, and Bulgarians that are part of the Slavs. All three groups, Pomaks, Bulgarians, and Slavs could be described by this ethnic group definition. Humans have a complex ethno-social identity, and denying that complexity is against the science. One can be Pomak, Bulgarian and Slav in the same time, and all this is part of his ethnic identity. We cannot present that these things are simple because they are not. PANONIAN (talk) 21:46, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Just one argument to support your point of view, I heard recently that one quarter of all 'normal' German family names have linguisticly slavic routes! It's hard to understand that nowadays citizens of the european union still deny the big melting pot we are originating from, just to support old patriot propangda! The overwhelming majority of Europeans speak - like most Iranians and Indians - Indoeuropean languanges, but that doesnt mean we are all basically descendants of an old Indoeuropean people. If we were shouldn't we all look basically alike??? lanx --217.224.13.199 14:50, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

Actually Europeans are the most similar people of all (ie compared to asians and black). This is because 80% of Euro's make up comes from the original (paleolithic, or pre-indo-european) hunter gatherers that inhabited europe before 'migrations'. The rest comes from the IEs plus a few asiatic influences Hxseek 01:22, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

I have putted new map of language distribution,it is more has more precise part "South Slavic" languages, because Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian, Montenegrin (4 languages in 1945 - 1991 period called Serbo-Croat language) are not determined by borders.. We have Serbian in northern and eastern parts of Bosnia, Bosnian in southern parts of Serbia and Kosovo, even Slovak language in small parts of Serbia, Croatian in southern parts of Bosnia etc. --Nedimm 22:49, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

The new map has two defects in my views 1) it's to small, and you hardly distinguish the smaller groups 2) it should make clear the mixed nature of areas like Belarus, Ukraine, Greek Macedonia and Eastern Germany; and that in the last two regions mentioned Slavic languages are spoken only by small minorities.--Aldux 23:36, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Maybe the language map belongs on the Slavic languages page, and we have a map of geographic distribution of "Slavs" in this article. Also, a key distinction about ethnic groups is unity, and the one thing all eastern europeans are unified about is their hatred of one another, so I agree with anon that the infobox should stay out.--tufkaa 14:30, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

I believe and hope that Wikipedia isn't dominated by the Russian secret service and isn't trying to promote that Most of Europe is actually Russian as they apparently speak Slavic. Case in point... Bosniaks are genetically less Asian than Germans/Austrians... Just because Yugo SLAVIA dominated Bosniaks for a short while and forced the Slavic languages on them... doesn't make them Slavic. Also the map doesn't take into account that Kosovo seperated and they don't even speak Slavic language. Also many Bosniaks speak German, Italian and Turkish too, does that make them Turkish, Roman and Austrian and Slav? Surely Language isn't enough for the Russian conquest of Europe.. 77.78.196.142 (talk) 13:36, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Origin of the term Slav - controversial?

Hy, i have put this paragraph on the wiki page:

New hypothesis

Since September 16, 2008 there is a new hypothesis on the origin of the term Slav. The author's argument is that the word "Slav" comes from the word "Splav" (raft) or simply the word "plav" (blue). (The complete hypothesis can be seen at http://www.hlada.com)

but it seems that it keeps getting taken down. Can someone tell me why? Is it because of the link in the end? Writ to me at: info@hlada.com Thx. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Hlada (talk • contribs) 14:35, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

The reason it keeps being taken off is that it doesn't meet Wikipedia's standards for inclusion; in particular it doesn't sit comfortably with Wikipedia's policies on original research, citing oneself and verifiability. The problem is that the only source that you cite appears to be yourself - the name Hlada being your username the source that you cite, and your email provider. To be included in Wiki, it would help if a reference could be provided to a reputable peer-review. -- Timberframe (talk) 15:02, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

splav is from s- + plav (whence also plaviti, naplavina etc.), and English term Slav is just the adaptation of the Slavic original. Earliest Latin attestations write it as Sclavēni, with Latin cluster scl /skl/ substituting Slavic cluster sl that was not allowed in Latin. Latin term can be used as an attestation of Early Proto-Slavic slavēni which regularly gave Late Proto-Slavic (and OCS) slověn-. There is no evidence for any kind of 'p' inside :)

thx for clarifying the terms of posting on wiki ;) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.175.71.18 (talk) 22:10, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Slavic people call themselves Słowianie, Slovani - note that there the first vowel is "o", not an "a" as in Greek and Latin. The name is pronounced Slavjanie only in those languanges where the not-stressed o is pronounced as a, like in Russian. The core is still slovanie.

Look at the origin from the Slavic people point of view. This name has much more in common with slovo - the word than with slava - the glory. The slovanie would mean people of the words, people that can speak, express themselves in contrary to the neighbours (speaking foreign languages) who don't speak any comprehesible language of slavic family hence are mute, not able to speak. Note, that for the Slavic people coming from the east the first people they've met that spoke totally different and uncomprehesible language were Germans. Note also that in all slavic languages, german language (and often Germany itself) is called: niemiecki, nemčina, Немецкий -niemieckyi = mute (Germany - Niemcy, Nemecko = Mute People).

Even today, the german language sounds in the Slav's ears like the murmuring and tongue-chewing rather with the words hardly distinguishable while within the slavic family people can still communicate (more or less efficiently).

The hypothesis that the term Slav origins from the words slava - glory has not such a strong support after closer studies. Merewyn 22:45, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

And I agree with the User who wrote "Slovan" part of this talk page: "other explanations in section 'Origin of the term Slav' seem ridiculous or misguiding... (Why do you think that we would name us Slovans with ethymological roots in Greek or Latin languages, that are completelly (linguistically) foreign?)" Merewyn 23:38, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

However most linguists and historians believe that Slowianie does not mean "people of the word". I was surprised that no serious historian I know about backs this theory, and usually they are calling it "folk ethymology" (Earlier recordings of the name are consequently using "k" between S and L, to sklobenoi, sklovene etc Szopen 10:43, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

The argument that the earlier recordings of the name "Slowianie" are using "k" in the middle (sklobenoi, sklovene) is NOT contradictory with argument of name "Slowianie" originating from "slovo" ("word"). In fact, the ancient authors Greek or Roman could use this middle "k" as a help in pronounciation JUST LIKE English people use "k" in the name of Genghis Khan (IPA: [ʧiŋgɪs χaːŋ], Mongolian: Чингис Хаан) when there was no "k" in original name at all (Khan should be pronounced Han with H closer to the German ch).

So, ancient authors could write sklovene instead of slovene to distinguish between their "normal" L and the palatized L used by Slavs (this type of L can be still heard sometimes in Russian and is vanishing in Western slav languages, in the Polish old movies it can be heard though as the actors were specially taught to pronounce this L in the old manner). (Note for Polish readers: anybody knows what IPA code this "teatralne ł" has?) Merewyn 13:47, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

In this word the soft "l" cannot be pronounced anyway. It you make the l soft, you'll have completely different meaning. According the origins. "slovo" and "slava" are cognates.--Nixer 00:25, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

What different meaning you will get when exchanging L to Ł or reverse?? I get exactly the same word and meaning but in the different Slav languages. Some of us say slovo, some say słowo, the same with slava, sława. And about the Slav sound of Ł (like in Russian Она была - "she was")- it IS different then English W and the best way to approximate it is by KL like the ancients did with the word sklobene. Merewyn 08:52, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Unless you provide other examples of the same usage of 'kl' (preferrably with references), I am inclined to believe that this is your brilliant theory created on the spot right here. Mukadderat 03:52, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Jordanes writes that one of three groups of Slavic peoples were called Sklavene. Medieval historians place lands of Sklavene from Panonia to somewhere to east. Jordanes call Anti and Venedi, as two other Slavic peoples. However Anti (they are often equalised with Aorsi and these with Alans) and Venedi are also names of some tribes of ancient Sarmatians. Interesting is that Sarmatians were actually conquered in I AD by Thracian tribe of Getae, which lived to north from Dalmatians and Thracians in more or less the same lands of Sklavene. Futhermore Sklavene sounds rather similiar to pl. "skladani" - eng. "put together". So what happens if the name "Slovane"/"Slovianie" doesn't actually origins from word "Sklavene"? Can not there be some other reason like "people speaking the same language" and be just simply refering to "slovo"("word")? Are there any arguments against it? Futhermore Germans call Slavs as "Wendes" (from Venedi), so why not assume that Romans did something alike calling Slavs "Sklav" (from Sklavene)? Huh? Pan Piotr Glownia 22:26, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Are you quite sure that "slovo" means "the word"? Doesn't it acctually mean "the letter"?

"Slovo" means letter, yes. --70.119.155.196 15:06, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

"Slovo" actually means the word, whilst "písmeno" (slovak, czech) means the letter.

Just because somebody speaks Turkish and German, that person isn't going to be called Turk/German, so the term Slavic needs to have genetic heritage added. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.78.197.74 (talk) 11:17, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

"Genetic heritage" is an WP:OR concept. No nation anywhere in the world is made up of individuals all sharing the same heritage. Slavic speakers are as genetically different as speakers of Romance, Germanic or Indo-Iranian languages. This article deals with people speaking Slavic languages. JdeJ (talk) 11:20, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

On the contrary Genetic evidence actually is the most reliable Original Research ever invented. Arguing otherwise is insane. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.78.197.74 (talk) 11:32, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

As for the Turk/German theory you've got, you're confusing concepts. Somebody who has learnt to speak German is not by definition a German and someone who has learnt to speak a Slavic language is not by definition a Slav. But the German nation is most definitely German since it has been German speaking for over 1000 years. And the Bosnian nation that you keeps removing is most certainly Slavic as it has been Slavic speaking for over 1000 years. As for your home-made definition that you keep inserting, you better find some sources for claiming that genetics is crucial. JdeJ (talk) 11:34, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

I shall not respond to such personal attacks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.78.197.74 (talk) 11:41, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

To anybody else apart from JdeJ: Speaking Slavic cannot by definition make you a Slav under any circumstances, you may be a German born in Ukraine, and that makes you a German, not a Slav.

So you found a personal attack in there? I've got news for you, disagreeing with somebody does not equal attacking them. Perhaps you'd have the decency to point out the personal attacks as the same time as you give us some sources? JdeJ (talk) 11:46, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

I've marely removed unsourced content, and there is more. Like where it says that Muslims alone are Slavs. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.78.197.74 (talk) 11:49, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Not true. You've removed a perfectly valid map of Slavic peoples and you've removed Slavic nations that every encyclopedia agrees are Slavic. And where on earth does it say that "Muslims alone are Slavs"? Please don't invent claims to argue against. JdeJ (talk) 11:52, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Yes true. As this map is invalid, due to new genetic research: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16266413?dopt=Abstract . And as I said, German born in Ukraine isn't a Slav. Wikipedia should adapt to new discoveries. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.78.197.74 (talk) 11:59, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Lies and warped logic is not in Wikipedia's interest: for example the slogan "Kosovo is Serbia" is a good example of Lies and warped logic as even Serb historians admit that Kosovo was rulled by Serbs for 250 years only via force.

No, the map is not invalid because the article makes it very clear that genetics is not a factor. Once again, there is no people in the world sharing a unique genetic heritage, let alone groups of people. People in Europe have been moving and mixing with each other for thousands of years. And your removal of well-established concept such as Muslims by Nationality is pure vandalism. Please stop confusing your personal opinions with verifiable facts. Lastly, please start signing your contributions using four tildes. JdeJ (talk) 12:04, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

I'd like to know who has established that Islam is now a Nationality instead of Religion? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.78.197.74 (talk) 12:10, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Then read the article Muslims by nationality, it is explained in great detail there. The term was adopted in the official Yugoslavian census more than 40 years ago. Official and verifiable, so please stop deleting it. JdeJ (talk) 12:12, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Notice it says that Yugoslavia changed the name to Bosniaks... we are talking about Present not Past. You seem to be uninformed about the subject. Just because Yugoslavia said something, that should be not only taken as unserious information, it should be taken as lies. Islam is simply not a Nationality. Logic clashes. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.78.197.74 (talk) 12:18, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

The term is still in official use, including the Montenegrin census from 2007.JdeJ (talk) 12:22, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Do you think it wills stick for long? First of all Muslims in Montenegro call them selves Bosniaks. You are deliberately trying to create a confusion with Religion and Nationality while everyone is trying to silence the Slavophile agenda.

It's of no importance what I think. What matters is that it is official and verifiable. And I'm afraid I don't get your comment aboyt "trying to silence the Slavophile agenda."JdeJ (talk) 12:29, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Venedes as Vandals?!?

Frankly I've never read any account which identified Vandals with Venedes; what's more, the fact that Venedes as Slavs is quite undisputed amongst Polish historians. They usually point that ancient writers did not use word "German" as ethnic, but rather as cultural desisgnation (e.g. one of author, can't remember his name - Tacitus - wrote something like he don't know whether call Venedes Germans or Sarmatians, because they move on foot like Germans, but have other cultural traits as Sarmatians...)Szopen 10:43, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Proto-Balto-Slavs and Proto-Germans were closely related groups in the first place. And the Venedes seemed to be assimilated by both. What makes Archaeology, like any other science fun, is there are no simple answers. :-) Nonprof. Frinkus 10:34, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Nazi Germany

"Nazi Germany, whose proponents claimed a racial superiority for the Germanic people, particularly over Semitic and Slavic peoples, plotted an enslavement of the Slavic peoples, and the reduction of their numbers by killing the majority of the population. As a result, a large number of people considered by the Nazis to have Slavic origins were slain during World War II."

Citation?

Give me a break with this crap. While its true there was anti-Slav propaganda in National Socialist Germany, there was no plan for the mass enslavement of the "Slavic peoples", which I suppose to include the Poles and the Croats, among others. The National Socialists organized the Croats to fight the Serbs; they tried, very hard, to create an ethnically Polish occupation government in Poland during the war, though it didn't work and was blocked by several elements (it was in furtherance of this that the Germans brought world attention to the Katyn Forest massacre of Poles by the Soviets). As to "killing the majority of the population", the only "civilians" systematically killed by the German during the war were the "civilian" soviet commissars, most of whom were Jewish, and most of whom committed crimes against humanity.

The statement has been deleted until someone can write something Non-POV.

-- Bill White (neo-Nazi) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.10.35.153 (talk • contribs) 02:38, 27 November 2006 (UTC).

Actually this would deserve article of its own, instead of this over-generalizing paragraph. The plans and their implementation has been changing over time, depending on war situation, and outright killing (usually of the elites) was not the only option - geographical relocation or permanent lower class status or arianization were the other possibilities as was as keeping the existing puppet states. Pavel Vozenilek 23:40, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Once in Poland, Always in Poland?

Who supports this theory that the Slavs have always roamed Galacia, Silesia, etc. since the dinosaurs? No seriously. If this is actually true, then there would be no common bond of any sort amongst "Slavs". I do not claim to be an expert on the subject, but I do know that someone came from the direction of Russia and was headed westward around 500 and then there was another wave around 700. How can Slavs already be somewhere that Slavs haven't migrated to yet? Baffled. --155.247.166.29 05:50, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Nobody claimed that Slavs were always in that region. It is unfortunate that the evidence is rather scanty about the history of todays Slav descendands even when discussing certain issues dating back a few centuries, let alone millennia. The region adjacent to Northern Poland, is said to be the place where Slavic clans were last settled (and had been for quite a while) before settling in todays territories. Hard to believe that Serbs and Croats; and Ukranians and Russians are really diasporans in their own homes but that is what history has led us to believe. It needn't be surprising that early Slavs lived in their postulated homeland for quite some time before that as many ancient civilisations such as the Greeks, Egyptians and Armenians too have continued an existence for thousands of years. Why should Pommeranians be different? Evlekis 11:09, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Contemporary scholarship outside Poland identifies the Pripyat Marshes as the most likely urheimat of the Slavs. Your assertion that the "Russians are really diasporans in their own homes" does not seem factually correct. They are less "disasporans" than, say, Greeks, Germans or Poles. The Kurgan hypothesis indicates Russia as the aboriginal home of all Indo-European peoples. --Ghirla ^-трёп- 11:15, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

I was wrong to assert Russians, I agree. I was just writing in principle. But people did move about in earlier days; whilst I cannot personally confirm that todays Russians - descended from Indo-Europeans most certainly - moved away and returned, it does make sense to speak of a long-settled prolonged proximity stretching from Northern Poland and Germany accross the Baltic zone and into parts of todays RF, all of whom settled possibly many thousands of years. But you must admit one thing, with Russia being the size that it is, and given its former republics which all have a significant population identifying as Russians, there has been some movement over the centuries where-by Russians havn't lived for quite as long as their neighbours. Evlekis 11:57, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

The so-called Slavic Runes

Hi! Somewhere I read about Slavic Runes - or Vlesovitsa - somewhere. Is there anything known about them except that they possibly were (I know they are noted in one or two cases - by a German monk, for example)? I did a Google search - and found nothing more than sites mirroring Wikipedia and an article discussing old Slavic beliefs. The Wikipedia article does not provide so much information on the topic. Is there any new results in research? It is really in my interest. --Cserlajos ^(talk) ^(contribs) 20:59, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

See Book of Veles Mukadderat 03:46, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

I disagree with the last edits, it just reintroduce halftrue, false or fuzzy data. Nasz 21:17, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

Actually there was falsification in XIX century, when some Polish pseudoarcheologists (badacz starozytnosci) presented something he claimed was Slavic runes. When it was proved to be falsification, no serious scientist in Poland would claim that Slavic runes existed. I was told by someone interested in the subject that he found plethora of archeological samples with different signs, which are outhand rejected because they are either considered ownership marks, falsification or something else - anything but runes. Szopen 08:47, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

The Poles

I wander wether the Poles really Slavic? They seemed for me rather of Germanic or Baltic origin.--Ghuter 14:19, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

Certainly Slavic (West Slavs, similarly to Czechs). But you are right that there were important Germanic and Baltic influences and the peoples mixed a lot over centuries. --Lysy^talk 15:40, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

Slavic is a linguistic group. But they are genetically related to Russians and Ukrainians moreso than other Slavs like Czechs or Slovaks according to some non-recombining Y chromosomal evidence. -iopq 05:58, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Czechs are not similiar to Polish. All Southern Slavic people are called Czechs. Polish are Western Slavic people and therefore are called Lechs. It always was so. Please do not invent non-existant things. Thank you. Pan Piotr Glownia 01:01, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Actually Czechs and Poles ARE both classes as western slavs, therefore similar. Southern slavs are NOT called czechs. Pleas do not make up things or let any personal feeling get into the way of facts

Although some sugggests that Czechs are more South Slavic than western Hxseek (talk) 02:59, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

|If you want to talk genetics, Poles are a nice example of the genetic differences between Slavs. A little more than half of the population is of the appearance of Northern Slavs, and are quite similar to Balts, Scandinavians (the whole blond hair/ "Nordic" look). The rest are of a more Mediterranean looking appearance, especially Gorales who have Italic roots, and are more similar to the Central European Czechs.

Slave

Latin sclavus cannot be borrowed from Turkish because it existed long before Turkish invasion.--Planemo 16:29, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

Which Turkish word should be the base for sclavus anyway?

Topics from 2007

Earliest accounts

In this section there's a part that, in my opinion, is not clear:

Allochtonic School wants to believe us those medieval kings and authors didn’t know what they fight or who the subdued people were.

I have tried to correct it but I don't really know what it exactly wants to mean. Is it that this school "wants us to believe" that stuff? In that case, it would be an opinion, rather than a fact! I leave it to someone who knows more than me on this subject. Archael Tzaraath 13:35, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

VANDALISM of putting Czechs' ethnicity as ethnic Lechs

Somebody put Southern Slavic people like Czechs together with Lechs. Czechs belong with other Czechs. Not Lechs. Lechs are only Western Slavic people and they never included any of Czech people from south in Bulgaria up to north in Czechs, Slovakia and Southern Lusatia. What I do to notify this clear case of vandalism? Pan Piotr Glownia 01:10, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

-West Slavic peoples are not equal with West Slavic languages because all Slavic peoples used more or less the same Slavic language 1000 years ago and were already partitioned into these western, southern and eastern groups. We Slavic peoples call these ethnic partitions amongst us Slavic peoples for "Lechs" (ethnic Western Slavic peoples), "Czechs" (ethnic Southern Slavic peoples) and "Rusins" (ethnic Eastern Slavic peoples) for a good reason. Common sense tells one that if even Czechs were direct speakers of modern Polish language, then they still would be belonging to the Southern Slavic peoples by their ethnicity. Pan Piotr Glownia 21:58, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Lechs, Czechs and Rusins <- the missing major ethnic information about Slavic peoples

Ethnic West Slavic peoples are not equal with West Slavs as it seems and Ethnic Southern Slavic peoples are not equal with South Slavs. Slavic languages 1000 years ago were still quite similiar to eachother and not like it is today. However even from earlier times Slavic peoples had these ethnic partitions amongst Slavic peoples. "Lechs" stand for Ethnic Western Slavic peoples, "Czechs" stand for Ethnic Southern Slavic peoples and "Rusins" stand for Ethnic Eastern Slavic peoples. This is major partition amongst Slavic peoples and it is not based on language, but on ethnicity. Even if Czechs were direct speakers of modern Polish language, then they still would be belonging to the Ethnic Southern Slavic peoples by their ethnicity. Czechs during entire written history never were ethnic Lechs like Poles. Every historical source is certain on this issue. It is possible that this ethnic partition is even older then any possible differentiation of Proto-Slavic language. I direct you to "Lech, Czech and Rus", which is part of Slavic spoken history as well as historical and traditional ethnic partition on Lechs, Czechs and Rusins used amongst Slavic people by the Slavic peoples. Every dictionary and lecture commenting this ethnic partition will ensure that Czechs were always adressed as "Czechs" and not like Poles "Lechs". Czechs and Poles do belong to different ethnic groups otherwise one had to put Czechs and Poles together with Belarusians and Ukrainians into the same Western Slavic ethnicity, as the Lechs, the Czechs and the Rusins originate from the same ethnic origin, which probably used the same proto-Slavic language. All historical sources begining from XIII century ("Chronicle of Greater Poland" written in year 1295) prove it to be the general ethnic partition used by Slavic peoples in Europe. Pan Piotr Glownia 15:26, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Can you cite at least one modern serious scientific source (not a 13th century legend) that would support what you are writing? — Kpalion^(talk) 16:01, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Piotr, I must say that no one responded to your concerns because no one took you seriously. Like Kpalion said, you'd better support your claims (For the start, Lech, Czech and Rus clearly states that it's a legend) with some contemporary reliable sources. Duja► 16:21, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

In any case, this is at most a local tradition amongs western Slavs, and not a realistic division of ethnicities in any measurable or provable way. Ethnicity is a result of common identity, not genetics or lingustics. Neither Czechs nor Southern Slavs think Czechs are Southern Slavs, therefore they aren't. Zocky | picture popups 16:38, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Hi!

About ethnicity it is stated that

"Members of an ethnic group generally claim a strong cultural continuity over time, although some historians and anthropologists have documented that many of the cultural practices on which various ethnic groups are based are of recent invention (Friedlander 1975, Hobsbawm and Ranger 1983, Sider 1993)."

Therefore I urge you to not be short sighted to the XXth and XXIst centuries. Make notice of:

-Kulturkampf, which for Poles is a rude remark, so please don't do it. I hope you make notes about this.

-Can you imagine Czechs wearing kontusz like Lechs, Cossacks and medieval Hungarians did? It means not only different culture of Polish peoples to Czech peoples, but also different civilization. I hope you make notes about this.

-I am relatively sure I can eventually get you some paper about West-East civilizational and cultural clash raging in modern Poland specially in relations cities vs. country side. So Poland civilizationally is also unlike Czechs. I hope you make notes about this.

-I am Lech and Lechs are Western Slavic ethnicity and I know Czechs always were of Southern Slavic ethnicity. Please take notice I write about ethnicity. Not modern XXI century culture or language. Somebody, who did not eat in McDonald yet? Hallo, anybody home over there!?! ;)

-Czechs are often brown haired and green eyed, when Lechs are often blond/au-burn haired and blue eyed! I hope you make notes about this.

-your papers on language are not in merit equal to my papers on ethnicity, even if mine were written already in XIII century, as they did describe ethnic status quo amongst Slavic peoples lasting for 800 years at least and which still to this very day is part of living culture and tradition at least amongst Lechs. I hope you make notes about this.

As I wrote earlier it is not modern ethnic partition amongst Slavic peoples, but traditional partition of Slavic ethnicities amongst Slavic peoples and yes, I know that Lech, Czech and Rus is also a legend. How do you think Slavic peoples pass traditions from generation to generation in the first place? Koran??? Hallo, anybody home over there!?! ;)

So imho this vital information should be included on Slavic peoples page and it is still missing. :(

regards, Pan Piotr Glownia 21:57, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

This page has been vandalized, please repair

Read the text below, and you will see what I mean. Please note that the offending text didn't seem to show up in the edit screen

Max Vasmer suggests that the word originated as a river name (compare the etymology of the Volcae), comparing it with such cognates as Latin cluo ("to wash"), a root not known to have been continued in Slavic, however, and appearing in meanings of "to clean, to scour" in Baltic, slavs are dumb middle eastern dirty sand niggers.

Whoever wrote that forgets that Slavs were the first people who put a man in space (Yuri Gagarin)... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.120.54.100 (talk) 01:22, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

The Scythians item

Since this article is in a terrible condition, while and despite the fact that it is heavily edited 365 days a year, I am not going to engage in any edits or explaining here why such "theories" have no place in an encyclopaedia like this and why genetic studies are a problem in general. But the only thing any reader can require is at least that the author or whoever write the hypothesis in a way making sense. Thus, I have commented that part out until this has been done. Juro 16:01, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

Your activity is contrary to your declaration: I am not going to engage in any edits . Isnt it beter for common goals of to discus your objection ? Nasz 00:45, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

The above refers to the article as a whole. As you can see, it is impossible to have a normal text in the Slovene section, not to mention the rest of the article. Ad your text:

- I will copy here the text with my notes, I think they are very clear to everybody so the only thing you have to do is to explain and add what is asked:

Similar --- ??what and similar to what?? --- semantic/fonetic analogy Scythian - scytne, szczytne (??so what??) . Scythian distinguish themselves by pointy hat which is known from early Polish sourcese as szczyt/scyt. Similar analogy to words Czech/Czesi is czesni (noble, truthful, humane) also known as cesny or titulary abreviated to cny/a and related to szlachetny/a/i. ^{[citation needed]} ---- where is your souce??? you have been editing here for days, so where is the source for this?????? and how is this related to the word Slovene? -----In any ethnogenesis scenario Slověne and Scythian share the same (few hundreds years apart) territory and R1a1 prove genaological inheritance . -- What has this to do with the word Slovene??

- Point two, the Polish quote refers to the Polish language, not to other Slavic languages, therefore it is invalid in this context (slo-sol). I have nothing against the idea, but THIS SOURCE does not support it.
- The Polish sentence with the words slovo and slava is absolutely pointless and irrelevant
- the Dravidian theory is not a variation of anything you mention above...probably you are somehow confusing the word Slovene, ethnogenesis and some other things at once?
- you are not supposed to add personal opinions to quotes from scientific sources (like the part with "slowy" - who cares that you have a problem with that??), you are not writing a monography, you are supposed to quote authoritative sources, that's all.

Juro 01:16, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

I do not know whether you do not understand the above text or just do not want to understand: The question was not about finding any source you like about ethnogenesis, but to provide (correct) sources for exactly the text you write in the section on the name AND to FINALLY EXPLAIN WHAT THIS MEANS Similar --- ??what and similar to what?? --- semantic/fonetic analogy Scythian - scytne, szczytne (??so what??) . Scythian distinguish themselves by pointy hat which is known from early Polish sourcese as szczyt/scyt. Similar analogy to words Czech/Czesi is czesni (noble, truthful, humane) also known as cesny or titulary abreviated to cny/a and related to szlachetny/a/i. ^{[citation needed]} ---- where is your souce??? you have been editing here for days, so where is the source for this?????? and how is this related to the word Slovene? -----In any ethnogenesis scenario Slověne and Scythian share the same (few hundreds years apart) territory and R1a1 prove genaological inheritance . -- What has this to do with the word Slovene??Juro 02:56, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

And this sentence: +The not visible to some toponyms include : 49000 km² Slovakia. In Poland counting only 'inhabitated toponyms': "Slow* contains 25, 126 has "Slo*" is a claer evidence of vandalism on the part of user: Nasz. I would appreciate if an admin could intervene here. Juro 03:09, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

(i deleted the redundant repetiton. ) You reverted it, ok:

Im trying to add references ... Could you be so nice and wait.

J:what and similar to what??
N:the below to the above. Do you
J: so what??
N: what "so wahat"?
J:you have been editing here for days, so where is the source for this??????
N: you deleted it.
J -- What has this to do with the word Slovene??
N: read, perhaps Semino, the ling:gen corelation.

If you have still questions, please fromat it as a list, it will be more convinient to answer or if you not object i will reformat your question or number it. Is it ok with you?

03:48, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

ps:

J:...like the part with "slowy" - who cares ...
N: in which Slavonic languge you finding "slowy" ? In Russian... i will have to improve my Russian! If you dont care for truth, what you are doing here ?

You are obviously neither able to explain, not to undestand what you write, you are adding original "research" (although reaserch is a misnommer), nor are you able to understand the text you are quoting, you are lying about the texts you are quoting or deleting, you are trolling, you are not discussing etc. You are definitely not qualified for any edits whatsover in this article. So just stop and write about things you have an idea of. Juro 10:38, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

This is the 5th time I am asking you to provide the source for this: Similar semantic/fonetic analogy Scythian - scytne, szczytne. Scythian distinguish themselves by pointy hat which is known from early Polish sourcese as szczyt/scyt. Similar analogy to words Czech/Czesi is czesni (noble, truthful, humane) also known as cesny or titulary abreviated to cny/a and related to szlachetny/a/i. and to explain in normal language, what this has to do with the word Slovene. Are you able to understand what you are requested to do, or not? Juro 10:40, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

And I am adding another point to the above list: WHO EXCEPT YOU claims that the word Slovakia is the origin of the word Slavs? Provide sources. Juro 10:42, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

This is radiculos. 1)What do you claim as not true ?

I am claiming nothing. Just answer the items of the above list, plus the last addition.

2)To what word do you like me to give you a references?

Nasz 10:57, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Do I have to quote the above text for the 7th time? OK: provide the source for this: Similar semantic/fonetic analogy Scythian - scytne, szczytne. Scythian distinguish themselves by pointy hat which is known from early Polish sourcese as szczyt/scyt. Similar analogy to words Czech/Czesi is czesni (noble, truthful, humane) also known as cesny or titulary abreviated to cny/a and related to szlachetny/a/i. and to explain in normal language, what this has to do with the word Slovene. Juro 11:03, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

1 Similar semantic/phonetic analogy Scythian - scytne, szczytne.

the Polish proverb "Słowiany sławio a Scyci scyco" (En:~Slovene glory but Scythian glorie)

2 Scythian distinguish themselves by pointy hat. Name for pointy hat is known from early Polish sources as szczyt/scyt.

This is obvious. There is also a trdition to put on popielec a pointed hat when kids go house to house puring ashes. As writen "Ludzie prosci wierza ze popiol z trupich kosci". En> "The comon people elive that ashes are from ancestors ashes)"

3Similar analogy to words Czech/Czesi is czesni (noble, truthful, humane) also known as cesny or titular abbreviated to cny/a and related to szlachetny/a/i.

Czech Czeszka Czesi pl:cześć ru:(czest czesnost) pl:(czesnik czesny czesna czesni ... I think you find the words in any dictionary. I have impresion that you know the words as Czechoslovakian, did you(?). Do you need references?

4and to explain in normal language, what this has to do with the word Slovene

Ok we can write the above and wrote that this has nothing to do with the subject. It will be ok with you? As you wrote with two hypotheses when you say it "is wrong" and you put other which say the same at once :)). But jumped to relation to Dravidian language. Do you think, thas František Palacký ida was, that the 'most homolitic' branch of IE people has to find the words for themselves from peripheral language, is it your point in this debate? Why you deleted placed for Palacký{fact}?

Nasz 21:54, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

I see the problem now, your English is terrible (this is not meant as an insult), therefore you do not understand. There is no such thing as "evident" in etymology and there is no such thing as original research in this wikipedia (WP:NOR) or in any secodary literature (like encyclopaedias) in the world. You need a SOURCE for every word, for every conclusion you draw so that we can write: according to X (and not according to Nasz!) Slovene comes from XYZ. Secondly, believe me, the part you have written is LINGUISTICALLY incomprehensible, it is not clear what exactly you are trying to say - it is not clear, what is similar to what and what that is supposed to imply with respect to the word Slovene. Thirdly, what you have written concerning the name Slovakia with respect to Slovene is an absolutely inacceptable nonsense and your personal lie. Thirdly, the part on the Dravidian theory AS A WHOLE is word by word taken from the study, Palacky refers to religion - you have 2 links in the text or are you going to claim that you do not see them either? ...And as for your last comment: If you read carefully the theory says that the word is Dravidian, not Slavic, which is of course a "bypass" of the problem, that slava as a Slavic word is wrong. But that does not matter, I am not a proponent of anything, I have just quoted one theory (maybe it is totally wrong, but this is not the place to discuss this, this is the place for quotes). Juro 22:21, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

please comment

Some editors have objection to truth in those sentences:

The suspitius disaperence of 'manuscript sources' edited by Theodor Mommsen, De origine actibusque Getarum in the highht of German imperializm. Almost forgoten book of another Jordan who wrote 100 years earlier De Originibus Slavicis. < ref>title: De Originibus Slavicis, author Johann Christoph Jordan /ref> There is also unnknow reason what for Mommsen edited Goth History since the works was suposedly edited, printed and published by Konrad Peutinger 300 years before. <!- see the entries in Konrad Peutinger and disscusion i [Getica]-- >

The most cited Codex Argenteus 'goth language' 4th c codex is recognized by computer alegoritm < ref> Stephen Huffman, 2000 [1]</ref>as first Czech next to Polish language. By the way the book was stolen from Czech capitol and now is notouriusly qoted as example of 'Germanic' text.

Regnum 'Sclavorum Gothorum sive Polonorum' title of Polish kingdom. < ref The Problem of the Origin of the Slavs T. Sulimirski The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, Vol. 75, No. 1/2 (1945), pp. 51-58 doi:10.2307/2844280 /ref>

1 still?
2 Why ?

Nasz 07:59, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

I will only comment on the second of these points, the Codex Argenteus, or rather the use of the algorithm to support the assertion. Use of the algorithm, a computer program, qualifies as original research, which is not allowed on Wikipedia. The algorithm is not a scholarly study, its content has not been peer reviewed or fact checked, and it can therefore not be used as a reliable source for the assertion. A ecis^Brievenbus 22:53, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

Not true: The alegoritm was published in Science magazine (is it credible source?). Is hosted and set up by well know university, by person with schoplary credential. It do what it is designed to do, wery wel. The reference are easy to verify.

Today scholars wrote soft. The soft perform exactly how is devised by scholar. The amount of "research" involwed in it is "copy paste". It is less originality in it than when you writing any text on wikipedia unles you copy it form the soure. Are the above sentences true? Point to me if/when is not true.

Nasz 00:04, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Has Science magazine written about the algorithm in general, or about this particular result of the algorithm? The software may be written as it should be, by very knowledgable people. But it's still software, the comparisons are still the findings of a computer program. Computer programs are not independent, peer-reviewed, fact-checked scientific studies, regardless of who wrote the computer program. A ecis^Brievenbus 17:31, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Juri did you aded this ?

1) According to the standard reference ([2]), the word Slověne "cannot be derived from the word slovo ...., because -ěninъ, -aninъ occur only with placenames ...., but a placename *Slovy ....is not documented".

2) This would refer to the ancient Slavic warriors. A proponent of this theory was e.g. Roman Jacobson (reconstructed IE root *kleu-').This theory is wrong, because the word slava occurs only later [3],

If yes , is it your conclusion about incorectnes of the etymologies ?

J: Just read the source. Juro 12:08, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

N: My question was posted after readin the two links. There is no occurence of string "ěninъ" in bouth links/documnts/w.pages. By the way i think 'ěninъ' contains mixed leters of 2 alphabets. Chek it yourself. or quote 'for my ignorance' a text here.

*slověne не может быть (несмотря на аналогию алб. shkipetár "албанцы" : shkipónj "понимаю") образовано от сло́во, так как -ěninъ, -aninъ встречаются только в производных от названий мест (см. Мi. ЕW 308; Миккола, РФВ 48, 271), однако местн. н. *Slovy (Первольф, AfslPh 8, 24 и сл.) не засвидетельствовано. What other lies can you present? Incredible. You should have been banned the moment you appeared here. Juro 20:18, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for quote, (aparently the search not work properly) I will tranlate 'word by word' this and you chek if the ranslation is corrct. OK?

slověne can not be (not looking on analogy Albanian 'shkipetár' "Albancy" : shkipónj "ponimaiu" = "i understand") 'pictured' from " сло́во" slovo word, 'yes as' -ěninъ, -aninъ {what it is in russian albanian other ?} -ěninъ (~-enin' or ~epip' -aninъ anin) are found only in words-related to toponyms ((см. Мi. ЕW 308; Миккола, РФВ 48, 271), howewer toponyms for example/begining with *Slovy' (Первольф, AfslPh 8, 24 и сл.) no fonded are.

in cleaned it will mean.

slověne can not be pictured from slověne word slovo as -enin -anin only are found only in words-related to toponyms, howewer toponyms for example/begining with *Slovy are no fonded.

1 Why they looking for Slovy* ?. Is the obscure Slowy* hand pick up as agument ? How Slowy* has to be related to Slověne?
there is a lot topnim from Slov* including your country Slovakia, in other Slavonic langoages v is wrinet as w eg in Polish. There is a map of Poland (i can show) showing numerous toponyms (the number was given) begining with *Slow and much 10 timae more as Slo*

i think the dictionary entry may be related to Slov-anin Slov-enin. But the dictionary entry explecitly saing that the -enin -anin are fond in toponyms. Anyway this is only one sorce. And do not make you in position to say that other sources are "is wrong". Acording to NOPV conflikting sources shaould be listed with a bit of explanation. Vasmer's Etymological Dictionary is not a panaceum, and you are not also shure that is fre from eg typo errors.

Nasz 22:56, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

I am not the proponent of anything, unlike you. Secondly, just read what the current version says,It contains the answers to all your questions, and it has even a translation if you would bother to read it instead of deleting things you do not understand (do you realize that you have deleted the source twice pretending it does not contain what I say, and now you admit that you do not understand Russian? - in other words your edits were lies). Thirdly, if you had at least a basic idea about the topic at hand, you would understand that this etymological dictionary by Vasmer and Trubachev is the most authoritative source on Slavic languages (except for a newer one which is not online, but equally by Trubachev), therefore actually it would be enough to translate it and the result would be the only correct and reliable part of this whole terrible Slavic peoples article. Any serious study on the word Slovene starts with a reference to exactly this dictionary (you can take the first external link as an example) and do not dare to doubt any such work if the only language you seem to understand is Polish...Nevertheless the text of this article mentions other marginal and probably wrong theories and I do not delete them...And once more: To be clear, you personal opinion is irrelevant and after what you have written NOT DESIRED for lack of basic competence in this field. Juro 23:10, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

I think personal opinion is important to understanding. Without having personal opinion thinking is impossible and is not possible to discus without thinking. (I rather hope that you have a personal opinion). I asking you a question how do you understand what do you quote and what? From your site it is not very pleasant. Anyway look on my questions and if you have any idea what to answer share it, please. Nasz 17:26, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

Any personal unpublished opinion is irrelevant and prohibited for the wikipedia. This might not apply to other spheres, of course. Secondly, the questions are ridiculous, the only thing you have to do is to read carefully, the answers are there. But the point is, I see no reason for any personal discussions with you, given that it has nothing to do with the text of the article - and it does not, because your pure personal opinions cannot not be included in any article (and should not have been included in other articles - I do not know what you have already written, and have no time to check it).Juro 00:30, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

I dont understand what prohibits you to share opinion on talk page, to beter understand the article subject, but ok, lets consider chaper closed. Nasz 23:42, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Maybe I can help. The relevant guideline is Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines. It says: "Article talk pages should not be used by editors as platforms for their personal views." The goal of a talk page is to discuss ways to improve the article, not to discuss the subject of the article. A ecis^Brievenbus 00:23, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

so mayby you will know: 1 what alphabet are those words writen in так как -ěninъ, -aninъ . (i made it bold in above quote) the first 2 words "tak kak" are cyrlic the two other looks like mix of latin(with Czech marks) and ending with cyrlic mark "ъ". For me this "nin" are just plain latin chadacters N I N (in lover cases). 2 What errors i made in my 'word by word' translation of this qoute(as above and criticized by/at 'les above'). What is the cryptic logic in this qoute, whuch you can get, but my IQ :( not grasping it. Eg. Why the word "*Slovy" is used? Is it a not atested but econstructed word ? The hipothethical protowords are mark by * as '*abc' . If this is a not atested but hipothethical protoword who did create = reconstruct this *word. If this '*Slovy' is in fact hypothetical protoword how can be used as argument against atested words ? ... Just look:

The copy paste quote from today art in wikipedia:, the word Slověne cannot be derived from the word slovo ...., because -ěninъ, -aninъ occur only with placenames ...., but a placename *Slovy ....is not documented"

09:29, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

Restore deleted.

Please answer my question. Which scholars or politicians use these medieval authors as evidence for the autochthonic theory? Aecis (copy by N: from main article)

There was article, recently deleted, from wikipedia on this subject(as i remeber quite referenced). Prhaps you may restore it.

If you will do it ask also for restore article titl ed Saganet. Saganet is perhaps the largest colection of so caled Nordic manuscriptos. Contains abot 200k pages of handwriting.

Nasz 00:59, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

I have just read Saganet. While Saganet may contain the documents of these medieval authors, I couldn't find a single reference to scholars or politicians using those documents as evidence/arguments for the autochthonic theory. The question was not what the argument is, because that is obvious. My question is who uses the argument. A ecis^Brievenbus 17:36, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

The Saganet is the article with sources(is creadted by me article deleted whithot a note to me, i didnt say it is source for autochtonic debate, just another deleted art, important in history, containig 200.000pages of sources), the article deleted was hosted for yeras it was linked to the page of Vandals and deleted in this year, the title was the ralations about Vandals and Poles. (Did you try to quick delete my art about a person who you pointed by [ [...] ]< to interviki?) Nasz 21:57, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Rest assured, I did not speedy delete any article you have created. You can check the log of all the articles I have deleted. I did add a {{notability}} tag to one article, but that is not a nomination for speedy deletion. About Saganet: I misunderstood you, I'm sorry. If you can give me the exact name of the article about the relations between Vandals and Poles, I will have a look at it to see if some references can be added to this article. Okay? A ecis^Brievenbus 22:22, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

OKay sory, my mistake. You did not mark it. it was [4] sombody else. I regard and like you contributions. I will look for the vandals who dleted Vandals & PL ...;). Nasz 23:35, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Ancient Macedonians at 6th century AD ?

Almost all of the South Slavs can be traced to ethnic Slavs who mixed with the local population of the Balkans (Illyrians, Thracians, Ancient Macedonians, Dacians and Getae) and with later invaders from the East (Bulgars, Avars, and Alans), then fell under the hegemony of the Ottoman Empire.

I wonder how this reference to Ancient Macedonians exists. According to the article the Slavic tributes arrived in the balkan peninsula at 6th century AD. At that time, inside the Byzantine Emperor, the Byzantine Macedonians do not consist a seperate group, but they were self-identified and counted as Greeks. They were also recognised as Greeks from the rest of Greek populations from the 4th century BC (1000 years earler). So, either it should be Byzantine Greeks, either nothing. (It's like saying that they mixed with the Athenians for e.g.) Besides, at 6th century AD it's Medieval time and not Ancient. Temporarily I delete the Ancient Macedonians and I'm waiting for further corrections. The same is applied for the Thracians.

That sounds ridiculous indeed. The Slav tribes never came into contact with the Macedonians in the balkans. Since they self identified as (Byzantine) Greeks for at least a millenium. Having said that, the Slavs can not have absorbed Macedonians and Greeks into their gene pool. It's either Greeks or nothing at all.(Sal)

I think this is more a matter of the destiny the ancient Macedonians would meet themselves. It is safe to say that by the time the Slavic tribes settled in their present-day location - Macedonian was not being used as a demonym, but the region itself bore the name: compare this to modern day Greek and Bulgarian regions of Thrace (Bulgarian: Trakiya) named after a now fully dissimilated population. It is always interesting when a nation identifies by one demonym which is to itself an exonym (originating from an external language), it clearly indicates that there has definitely been a fusion between no fewer than two groups of people foreign to each other. In the first place, two nations meet; in the second, all speak one language and have one identity, but not that of the linguistic race, but the opposite group. One such reason for this is that whilst you have two separate nations, the one which will later dominate may have accepted that their shared land is a toponym dedicated to the other: either because the other nation settled first (such as the ancient Macedonians arriving on the Balkan before the Slavs), or because the late-comers fought their way in - imposed their name - but became absorbed by the non-native locals (ie. France, from Franks - originally Germanic but fell to language and culture of Roman peoples). Looking at the timeline, Slavs only arrived from the 6th century and Macedonian people adopting Greek identity model from period before Christ, it is unlikely that Macedonians and Slavs will have met. What will have happened is that local Greeks, having kept the name Macedonia from the ancient people's land, will have clashed with Slavs. These Slavs will later adopt the name Macedonia for their own reasons, and primarily use it to differentiate from other modern Slavic nations (ie. Serbs & Bulgarians) before using its ideologies to stand against Albanian and Greek nationalists from the other direction. The difference here is that the Slavs' use of "Macedonia" is secondhand; first it passed to one group of people who used it as a regional affinity, before another group of people on that land (Slavs) took it. I agree that it should not be stated that Slavs mixed with Macedonians in the same way that Slavs did mix with Bulgars - to create "Bulgarians". Evlekis (talk) 14:51, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

common identity ?? very untrue

Sentence about common identity sounds very strange, so I removed it. There is little sense of common identity-what do Poles feel common with Macedonians or Russians ? I know attempts were made in 19. century to create a common identity but they failed. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Przes (talk • contribs) 11:21, 14 May 2007 (UTC).

Please read ~~up the page~~ the archives. Most Poles thinks that Poles are Slavs. Most Russians think that Russians are Slavs. That's common identity. Zocky | picture popups 03:29, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

The idea seems disputed. Some claim there is common identity, some oppose the idea. http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~sarmatia/998/kurczaba.html "In The Next American Nation, Michael Lind says:11 'Suppose that the federal government created a category of citizens of eastern European descent called Slavics, and made them eligible for affirmative action benefits. Soon...many Americans of partial Polish, Russian, Czech, or Romanian descent would discover their common Slavic identity, and apply for favorable treatment in college admissions, minority set-asides, and so on.... Before long....there would be "Slavic Studies Departments" at major colleges and universities, where intellectuals would debate the exact elements of the "Slavic" culture common to Catholic Poles, Orthodox Russians, and Protestant Hungarians.' As it happens, the federal government has not created a new category called 'Slavics.' And if it had, I doubt whether Romanian Americans and Hungarian Americans, their ancestors having resisted Slavicization for centuries, would embrace the status of born-again 'Slavics,' government blessings notwithstanding. Nevertheless, Lind's comments put to focus a crucial dependence between official government and academic policies on the one hand, and enrollments on the other. In a bid perhaps to discourage the study of anything but Russian, the government poured much money into the study of Russian, while the American academy has made 'Slavic languages' into an almost racial category and, presto, we have Slavic departments. Lind's comment captures well the arbitrary nature of the Slavic construct in the American academy. If ever Catholic Poles, Orthodox Russians, and Protestant Hungarians sat together, the Poles and Hungarians would undoubtedly have much to discuss; but their discussions would not include the question of how to become more perfect Slavs." http://www.unc.edu/depts/slavdept/lajanda/slav075barber.ppt "many people classified as Slavs identify more strongly with nationalist identity than with a common Slavic identity."

www.mah.se/upload/IMER/Program/IPES/Summary%2520of%2520The%2520Meaning%2520of%2520Europe.doc "The location of Czech between East and West sometimes was interpreted as a position between Germans and Russians, which in consequence led to different opinions about Europe. Slavic identity was especially strong during the German occupation. However with the defeat of Germany and emerged domination of the Soviet Union, the Western elements became dominant and the Slavic one was forgotten."

http://www.search.com/reference/Slavic_Europe "when Polish people were asked in a poll to mark traits they associate with Russians, only 0,4 % marked "Slavs" as an answer" Utlip

I don't care what some random poll in Poland said. Nobody is claiming that all or any people in all or any Slav country think that it's a very important thing, but most of them agree that they're Slavic and that they have common origins. The rest is just nationalist blahblah. Zocky | picture popups 21:46, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

You disregard several sources in favour of your own opinion ? I don't think saying "nationalist blahblah" is a serious responce. Utlip

Some of your sources are really bad, like the poll. Other sources simply don't say what you claim they are saying. Nobody here is saying that Slavic people feel identify primarily as Slavs, but they do identify as Slavs, as any encyclopedia or scientific article on the subject will tell you. As I said, this has been discussed ad nausea. Until things in real world change, this discussion is futile. Zocky | picture popups 23:27, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

If the sources are bad or good may be judged in different way by different people. There are here though. Your opinion needs a serious source to confirm such claim. If it is so as you say, a full written citation wouldn't be a problem that would confirm the sentence.--Utilp 20:56, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

"Origins and Slavic homeland debate" section problems

I merely came across this article - I have no special store of scholarship in the area, and most definitely no desire to get bogged in what looks like an ethnic partisan swamp. However, the entire "homeland theories" section needs some major work, and is frankly an embarrassment in the revision I saw (here).

On a brief inspection, it would appear that what may have once been a coherent section has been eroded by insertions from what I assume is one or more "anti-Allochthonic" editors with a very poor command of English. I have no idea if this theory is indeed now discredited, but even if so the existing unsourced, opinion-strewn text would certainly not be the way to communicate this. And while phrases such as "the book is still defended by Germans like holy bone" provide amusement, even in proper English the underlying sentiments would be inappropriate for an encyclopedia article. I realize that some contributors may not have English as a first language, but there is still a responsibility that contributions meet some minimum standard, or to enlist another editor's help in writing. "He was activ politian verbant suporter of falen pangermanizm" approaches gibberish.

There are any number of other problems with the section. I'll mark it with cleanup and neutrality tags, and hope someone suitable can be found to undertake the work. Is it possible that there is an earlier version of this section in the revision history which could be restored? - David Oberst 04:02, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

If you want to contribute good strting point is to incorporate the cohesive PCT theorems. Nasz 05:18, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Becose you cited the pangerman created swamp it may be helpful if you try to incorporate these words: Slavic ethnogenesis by Mario Alinei, 3.6 History of ideas Nasz 05:26, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

PCT is uttermost fringe and not even on topic here. It will not get air time on this article, beyond perhaps a single short phrase, per WP:FRINGE. dab (𒁳) 06:48, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

The problem here is that what the article calls the discredited "allochthonic theory" is a matter of consensus among historians outside of Poland. All the authors listed for the "autochthonic theory" are indeed Polish, and one of them is from 12th century. The whole naming is slightly silly: whether Slavs were in Poland in 2000BCE or not, they were not autochthonic - they came from somewhere, ultimately from Eastern Africa. Zocky | picture popups 11:20, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

OKAY... You'll excuse me, but how can you explain the fact that most of the peoples (if not all) who speak Slavic languages will understand somewhat of each other, if they're not all Slavs: Serbs-Croats-Slovenians-Macedonians-Russians-Poles-Slovakians-Czechs-Sorbs-Bulgarians-Biyelorussians-Ukrainians,etc.??? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.203.194.97 (talk) 23:20, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

I am sorry to say this , but this article is pretty wrong. The first written occurences of words relating to the current "slavonic" are after the (i think roman) introduction of the word slave in europe. Just like the word "serbian" derives from spanish . However there is a light in that these people recognised this fact and got themselves a culture organised to withstand it, not uniquely they took the enemy's derogative for a compliment and after the dark european middle-ages , flourished as a language. The heartland theory is perhaps inaccurate in so far that eg. the "Serbians" at that time already were aware of their dedication in Hispanica.(trust tacitus).77.251.188.67 (talk) 03:50, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

A romanticized painting of Slavs during the Middle Ages.

I just came to this page and browsed through the pictures until I stumbled upon this one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Slavs.jpg When exactly was this painting made? Because Middle Ages is a very broad period of time... For me this painting looks like made during the Romanticism when pan-slavic and nationalistic ideas originated. (Kazkaskazkasako 09:46, 6 June 2007 (UTC))

PRESCENCE OF ISLAM IN SLAVIC PEOPLES

Lack of emphasis of importance of islam in slav world, particularly in south slav society. Many large slavic muslim groups i.e Bosniaks, Pomaki, Gorani. Should be given more mention, as they represent the third biggest religion amongst slavic and other nationalities in slav countries (i.e Tartars, certain caucassians in russia).

Your first point is partially correct. It is worth mentioing that some slavs in the south did convert to islam from christianity during the Turkish conquest. However on the whole they are a small minority. An exception is the Bosniaks who represent a large portion of the people who live in Bosnia. Yet they are still a minority in the context of Slavdom as a whole.

But it does not need to be emphasised. Generally Slavs are identified as a christian, european peoples. Christianity is not only their religion, but it influences their entire culture, festivals, slavic saints and way of life in general. Islam has no part in the life of the the overwhelming majority of slavs. Anyway, the whole religion section is brief, and it does not discuss orthodoxy or catholicism much more. So what do you want ? For the sake of keeping the article succint, if one wants to learn about Islam then they may perhaps refer to an article about Turkish peoples or Arabians

Your second point is absurd. Why would an article about slavs talk about Tartars, Turks, Albanians ? THis article is about slavic people, not a country. Eg if this as about Russia, they yes it would certainly need to mention that many different ethnicities and religions exist.

Islams importance in Slav Word is no more then its importance in the Celtic or Germanic world, the slavs are overwhelmingly christian, there are more atheists among them then muslims.--84.94.29.123 06:54, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Well, that's not a good comparison. There's no people speaking a Celtic language or a Germanic language that is Muslim, not even 5%. There are a few peoples speaking Slavic languages that are almost fully Muslim, and some further peoples who are partly Muslims. JdeJ 08:53, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

What do you mean fully muslim or partly muslim ? Its either you're muslim or not, those muslims slav converted 500 years ago either by force or to avoid taxing by the Ottoman Empire, the entire slavic culture is based on christianity and Islam is a foreign religion for them. And bosniaks barely make up 1 percent of the slavic population, islam in this article is just as worth mentioning as it would have been in the article about germanics or dacians or greeks.--84.94.194.195 06:59, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Partly Muslims, in the sense that there are significant populations of Muslim Bulgarians and Muslim Serbs although the majority of Bulgarians and Serbs are Orthodox. I think most Muslim Slavs would disagree with your claim that Islam is a foreign religion, and your claim that Islam isn't worth mentioning here is just uninformed. In an article about the Slavic peoples, it does make sense mentioning every religion that is the main religion for at least one Slavic people. That includes Orthodox Christians, Catholic Christians and Muslims. JdeJ 08:05, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Here we go again, trying to link religions which people actually didn't care about in reality and have instead hurded goats and sheep in the past. While those pople were associated with those religions via propaganda machines who were paid by particular side to suit them at the given period, usually in order to try to exterminate them and so on. Case in point, YugoSlavia labeled Bosniaks as simply Muslims while half of them believed in Islam, Bosniaks were an ancient people who were mentioned even during Roman times as famous military nation who offered mercinary divisions to the highest bidder whos shields and swords have been found in as far as Egypt and United Kingdom 77.78.199.224 (talk) 10:44, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

No they weren;t Hxseek (talk) 10:55, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

WARNING: Duplicated section !

WARNING: there are two sections titled "Origins and Slavic homeland debate" which are an obvious fork, dangerously diverging. Please merge ASAP. `'Míkka 18:38, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

The duplicate was added only recently by user:Xcor by its single edit. I delete it here, for reference: I am not an expert and cannot judge what happened (maybe a failed attempt to revert to older version) Mukadderat 03:51, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Origins and Slavic homeland debate

The location of the speakers of pre-Proto-Slavic and Proto-Slavic is subject to considerable debate. Serious candidates are cultures on the territories of modern Poland, Belarus, European Russia and Ukraine. The proposed frameworks are:

Lusatian culture hypothesis: The pre-Proto-Slavs were present in north-eastern Central Europe since at least the late 2nd millennium BC, and were the bearers of the Lusatian culture and later the Przeworsk culture (part of the Chernyakhov culture).
Milograd culture hypothesis: The pre-Proto-Slavs (or Balto-Slavs) were the bearers of the Milograd culture
Chernoles culture hypothesis: The pre-Proto-Slavs were the bearers of the Chernoles culture of northern Ukraine

From the 19th century onwards, the debate became politically charged, particularly in connection with the history of the Partitions of Poland, and German imperialism known as Drang nach Osten. Generally, both German and Slavic want to be 'autochthonic' on land at river Vistula.

Autochthonic theory (the Proto-Slavs are native to the area of modern Poland), before 5th century.

Allochthonic theory (the Slavs immigrated to the area of modern Poland) after 5th century.

The debate has been used as a tool of political propaganda and is often emotionally charged and interspersed with pseudoarchaeology and national mysticism.

Contemporary scholarship in general has moved away from the idea of monolithic nations and the Urheimat debates of the 19th and early 20th centuries, and its focus of interest is that of a process of ethnogenesis, regarding competing Urheimat scenarios as false dichotomies.

End of forked section

Mukadderat 03:51, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Real problem: lack of references

Please forgive me for the criticism in the area I am far form being an expert, but each time I revisit this article (usually after longer times), I see its content seriously chenged without any footnotes added to justify the change. Isn't it agains the basic wikipedia policies? I understand that initially when wikipedia was less strict in its rules, many articles were written with few references. But you have to agree that it is reasonable to expect that new contributions must follow the current, reasonably well established rules. What is your opinion? Mukadderat 03:56, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

References have been added Neverlose1 11:23, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Please DO NOT ADD a section with the same title and repeated text. Please put you additions into the existing section. Please do not revert other people's edits without checking what you are reverting: you deleted other editor's unrelated edits. By the way you did not add any references. Mukadderat 14:51, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Hi! I was just wiki-hopping from german to english sites and wondering: how much quarrels would I find on this discussion-site of "Slavic peoples". My impressions are: - both sites are lacking references - both sites are seeming to refer a research-level of a 100 years ago - both sites are obvious predestinated for unlimited struggles about that (impossible) "historical truth"

So, what I was trying to stutter is: It´s suprising, how seemingly people try to defend their private-enlightments without any self-criticism. I´am very reliefed about that, because my studies in early-slavic-ethnogenesis are more than unacceptable in modern-german-historicism and I am not alone with these thoughts...--139.30.24.119 (talk) 17:37, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Religion

The Czech Republic, along with Estonia, has one of the most non-religious populations in the European Union. According to the 2001 census, 59% of the country is agnostic, atheist, non-believer, 26.8% Roman Catholic and 2.5% Protestant. - Gaston28 - August 5 2007.

Yes. i think the article refers to traditional religions of slavs, ie catholic or orthodox. Granted now most people in the western world are agnostic or atheist Hxseek 08:32, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

"Ethnic" group

Talking about Slavic peoples as a separate ethnic group from their neighbours is just nonsense. There's no such thing as Slavic peoples, Germanic peoples or anything of the kind. Europe was populated by a great number of different peoples before the arrival of Indo-European languages, most of these peoples are still unknown although some, such as Etruscans and Basques are known. These people weren't replaced by "Indo-European", they just adopted the languages. The peoples speaking Slavic languages in Southern Europe are much more closely related to their non-Slavic neighbours (Greeks, Albanians, Romanians). A gigantic invasion of Slavs replacing the earlier peoples in the Balkans never took place, the vast majority switched language. This article itself makes that very explicit. Poles and Czechs have been intermingling with Germans for over 1000 years, Russians with different peoples speaking Finnic languages and Turkish languages. While the articles for various inhabitans of modern countries (Russians, Poles, Serbs etc.) and Slavic languages are all very relevant, this article could as well be nominated for deletion. It's trying to prove something that doesn't exist. JdeJ 17:54, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

What are you talking about? Slavic peoples and Germanic peoples exist. There exist notable differences between the two visually. Studies have been done to prove the existence for these unique ethnic groups, and I don't see why you would talk against proven science.

Sure, you're right. Seeing the difference between a Norwegian and a Bulgarian is usually quite easy. I'm in no way saying that there are no genetic differences between Europeans, far from it. It's obvious to all of us that we can usually tell the different between an Englishman, a Swede and a Greek to take three examples. There's a lot of science done on this, as you say, and it should in no way be denied. The "problem" here is that the genetic groups have very little connection with the language groups. During the last 3000 years, many peoples (or part of peoples) have changed language. Most of the French people (except the South of France) were Celts before they were romanised. The Spaniards were Iberians. The Italians were partly Etruscans, partly Romans. The Romanians were Dacians. It's not like all these people were killed and replaced by Romans, they just adopted the Roman language and culture. That's why we can talk about Roman languages, but it's nonsense to talk about Roman peoples. Same thing goes for any language group. I said it's rather easy to pick a Norwegian from a Greek, but I'd like to see people try that on group with 20 people, 10 Austrians and 10 Slovenes. Would people be able to tell the "Germanic" Austrians from the "Slavic" Slovenes. I doubt it, as these neighbours have more in common than the Austrians do with the Icelanders or the Slovenes with the Bulgarians. Similar examples can be found all over Europes. Both language groups and population groups exist and I'm not denying any of that. It's just that they aren't the same. JdeJ 20:46, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

When you said "Slavic" Slovenes, you hit the nail on the head. Slovenes and Slovaks nationally, Slavonians of Croatian regionally, Slovincians of Poland lingusitically as well as other communal names are all derived from the Slavic endonym. It is true that people have mixed, but people have mixed everywhere, or have dissimilated adjacent populations who were related in the first place to make them one and the same. But this is not what composes an ethnic group, it is how people declare themselves. Now much of Western Europe which is Romance speaking is so as a result of its Latin speaking past; Germanic invasions did indeed bring an end to a unique identity, but it did not break the Romanic people into pieces, it just stretched them: linguistically, and culturally, there is a continuum however you look at it. This marvelous continuum across the North Germanic; West Germanic (minus England); West Romanic; East Romanic (Romania and Moldova); north, and south Slavic worlds means that you cannot possibly draw a line down any geographical territory and say, "these people are one ethnic group genetically", and "those are another". And you certainly cannot drive around Krakow, Brno, Lviv, Ljubljana, Sarajevo or Varna and say "that Croatian is not ethnically the same as the other Croatian because Ivan's eyes are green and Zvonimir's are brown". On principle, you have your key ethnic group, say Ukrainian for instance; those down the road may say that they are Slovaks indeed, but you cannot tell me that Ukrainian identity is genetically based upon the mixtures and interferences which affected Ukrainians only, no Belarussians, no Russians, no Poles, and with regards to the Ukrainian population, it stops once people become Slovak. Perhaps that is not what you were saying. However, ethnic groups do look to an ancestral past which encompasses the wider community. Now when members of that community speak a totally different language, such as in the FYROM with Albanian; it is difficult for us to embrace each other as a single race, though we all admit to having shared experiences (Ottoman subjugation, Communism, poverty, corruption etc), and we all acknowledge that we may be distantly related. But when those neighbours speak a language which is contiguous, it becomes more natural to see each other as one and the same (of course, one needs to forget about national pride before adopting a more moderate patriotism here), and it does happen. Now with Slavs, unlike Germanics and Romance speakers, the term "Slav" in some form has been with us for as long as we can remember. There have been times down the centuries when people from present-day Poland, Russia, former Yugoslavia etc. may have used half a dozen names to denote who they are nationally, and "Slav" has always been among them, and it is what we have always known to be the linking factor from us in Macedonia and Bulgaria, to those in the far north of the Russian Federation. What's more, many people are Slavists; there was a popular movement thoughout the 18th and 19th centuries to unite all Slavic people. In this time, there was a revival of Slavic folklore and pre-christian beliefs which surfaced. Today, there is no plan to nationally unite the Slavic peoples, but then looking at it another way: is there a need? When Pan-Slavism came into effect, I believe that most Slavic people were subjugated (living under non-Slavic empires or republics), today, the vast majority of Slavic people live in Slavic countries of some kind: there are the occasional communities trapped outside, such as the Lusatian Sorbs of Germany; some left their previous settlements to live elsewhere before that territory became independently Slavic (eg. Burgenland Croats and Slovenes; Banat Bulgarians living in Hungary or Romania), others are in the diaspora but atleast they still have their family in Slavic countries. And most national flags maintain the Slavic tricolor, so there is an afinity even if not national. But looking outside the Slavic world, you have the enormous Arab world: there are about 15 Arab countries. They too have been subjected to historical mixing; Morocco with Iberians (Spanish and Portuguese) both ways leaves Syrians and Lebanese having a more European look than North Africans. Algeria is Algeria and Bahrain is Bahrain, each complete with their own ideas about nationalism and statehood, so what is Arab about them beyond language? But the people themselves embrace as Arabs even if they don't care to share the same capital city, currency and president/ruler. Think of Slavic as being "an ethnicity to the nationality", then it will be easier. Evlekis 11:41, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

"Think of Slavic as being "an ethnicity to the nationality"". Unfortunately this cannot make sense, because the UN definition of ethnicity takes into account of religion. This was part of the problem with the former Yugoslavia. Although the various group there (former Yugoslavia) are genetically and linguistically homogenous in general, they were not so from a religion POV, thus they are classified as different ethnic groups. The terms Slavic, Germanic etc are used as a linguistic classification, and by extension as a genetic classification, although one has of course to take into account human history and sociology. Black Americans are English linguistically, having lost all contact with the languages of their African ancestors, but genetically they are still very much African. Russians may be 'Slavs' by appearance and by language, but a recent survey showed that half the male population of Moscow have the Mongolian alcohol oxidase gene, which showed the success of the Mongol invaders at impregnating local women. Because of this genetic fact, do we now classify Russians as Mongolians? 86.157.233.233 21:07, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

Sorry I havn't been here since August. No we do not take Russians to be Mongolians. Mongolians may have been successful in satisfying the Slavic girls, but it is the child that counts: will he be one race or the other. The dominance of language is more important than most people think: I can't explain these reasons but hundreds of books have been published about this subject. I accept that genetically, Slavic-language speakers from north to south and west to east probably have very little in common. But then you don't have to go outside your "ethnicity patch" to find this variation. Just compare Croatia's short fat dumpy Zagreb race with their very own Southern Dalmatians: tall, broad and handsome. Now compare these Croatian Dalmatians to Serbs from adjacent Herzegovina, or Montenegrins (not strictly a separate nation here I accept), see if you can tell who is who. All right, I don't know about ethnogenesis but I am sure that if two nations sharing a certain territory appear similar whilst their own brethren living farther away are different, there must be some mixing (hence genetical links) between them. We've said it millions of times, ones ethnic group is ones choice. On that note, I accept that there is nothing official about being Slavic anywhere in the world. But never mind the UN, I wasn't claiming that Slavic is a modern ethnic term when I stated that it is the "ethnicity of the ethnicity", I meant that it forms the basis for people's identity. As a natural speaker of a Slavic language, I can be sure that although I may not be "pure", certain ancestors of mine sacrificed whatever it was that they were to adopt the identity of a group of people who were Slavic. It is accepted that Slavs were a people, and that the similarities between Slovene and Polish are not the result of two originally distinct peoples meeting and adopting each other's words, but rather an ancient group of people who split, mixed, spread and came out on top despite adopting new non-Slavic race names. That is also another longwinded subject which requires scientific explanation. Back to the Germanic peoples, it is very upsetting that there is no "collective" term in any language to describe an old race who again - spoke a single language which ramified and shot off in different directions. Germanic itself is widely acceptable, but no writer or historian has ever been able to speak of the proto-Germanic people in the same way that tales can be told about proto-Slavs. This is probably because during the Romantic nationalism awakening period, Slavic-language people from all corners put their heads together and concentrated on recreating a single identity whilst you didn't have the same thing with people from present-day Sweden, Holland and the UK. This is my guess. Of course, the other issue here is about modern nationalism across Slavic countries. If you study the plans laid out in the 18th/19th centuries by the architects of todays existing nations, you will find a shocking amount of irredentism everywhere: most Slavic states take some issue with a neighbouring territory, not only which land should be theirs, but which people are rightfully their own. Albanians and Serbs can argue all night to whom should Kosovo belong, but there is no argument over who is ethnically what: even where it is known that certain names from one group is derived from an earlier tribe of the other. But for Polish/Slovaks/Western Ukrainians and those from that area is another story: sure these ethnicities are present in Lviv, but find one ultra-nationalist of any of these living in the city who accepts that the others are "one of the other" race. There are many of these examples: in Pirin Macedonia (Bulgaria), you had a tradition of one telling the other "you are from my race, Macedonian", and the other saying the complete opposite, "no, you are mine, Bulgarian" etc. These trends are also known across North Africa and south-western Asia: over a dozen countries, complete with their own "ideologies and reasons for being", but by conrtrast, most do declare to be Arab. The linguistic variation from Mauritania to Kuwait is as diverse as Macedonian to Russian; and you can spot the difference in appearance between Moroccans and Syrians a mile away. But they call themselves Arab and nobody challenges it. They are not all Sunni Muslim, as many Iraqi's are Shia; and pockets of Arabs everywhere are Christian, and Jewish for that mater, even athiest. So, if modern Slavic ethnicities are as unsure over "who is mine and who is yours" as Moroccans and Algerians who are accepted as Arab, there is no harm in calling linguisticly Slavic people, "Slavic" in some ethnic sense. Evlekis 15:30, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

To 86.157.233.233 @half the male population of Moscow have the Mongolian alcohol oxidase gene, which showed the success of the Mongol invaders at impregnating local women@ - BTW I wonder where did you get this study? IMHO it's a nonsense. Alexandre Koriakine (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 23:38, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

While there's some questionable comments above there most certainly is no such thing as a "Slavic ethnicity". If you're referring to "Slavs" as a group of people who speak related languages you'll notice they fail to satisfy the definition of ethnicity by not having a common culture, religion, and origin. Ethnic groups tend to share those in addition to language. Moreover I don't know where these generalizations about groups are coming from. Some must be ignorant of the last 100 years worth of literature and research disproving many physical traits as belonging to ethnic groups (certainly in Europe). quite contrary to propaganda traits like light eyes and hair tend to be concentrated in non-Germanic countries in Europe (Frost & others). This is quite easily seen in the fact that you'll often see Hungarian actors or actresses playing the "most German looking" character in movies while many Britons play "the most Italian looking" character. Yes you can sometimes tell where someone might be from but there's no scientific basis for that and you'll just as likely to be wrong or right. Getting back to the core of the issue here: if you consider Slavs an ethnicity how would you propose to explain vast genetic similarities between Scandinavians and Poles? Or for that matter the differences between Lithuanians and Bosnians? Bottom line is that languages dissipate over different areas than do genetics or culture. Slavs are a linguistic family and most certainly not an ethnic group. JRWalko (talk) 04:21, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

Many errors in your statement. First a simple one: Lithuanians and Bosnians don't have to be similar, because Lithuanians are a Baltic, not a Slavic race. Bosnians on the other hand are very similar in appearance and culture etc. Bosnia also however contains three main nations: Serbs, Croats and Muslims. There are differences between northern/eastern Bosnians with southerners (ie. Herzegovina) and western (notably Dinaric Alps) residents, mainly the great height of the Herzegovinians. Another minor group of people identify as Yugoslavs composing a fourth Slavic nation. All Bosnian towns have a presence of each of its nations; and where it is not too obvious regarding dress code (ie. where Muslim girls wear short skirts in summer), I challenge anybody to go into one such town and point out exactly who is from which nation! "Slavs are not an ethnic group" as you say, but Slovenes are and their name is a derivative of the same term. Likewise the southerners of the Balkans (ie. modern-day Bulgarians, Pomaks, Macedonians, Gorani, Serbs in the south/Torlaks) originally bore the name Slavs upon arrival, only later adopting new demonyms. The Slavic identity remained, as indeed did the term Slav itself which has always stood among Slavic peoples as an alternative demonym. Croatian historians for example, recall times when the people may have called themselves Croats ,Slavs or Illyrians among other names; they still nationally identified as Croat. I don't know what the true definition of "ethnic group" is or how to satisfy it, but you cannot separate language from origin. You can say that people do not have a common culture or religion, but not origin. To explain simply: once an individual assimilates his new nation, he adopts the history of the nation too. This way you cannot have one section of Czech society claiming to be of some non-Slavic origin whilst stating that the rest of the nation is Slavic. Such a phenomenon is only possible if the nation had a secondary identity marker, such as a unique religion; but even then, they would have kept their name as one separate from the rest of the community whose language they adopted. This is how Jews maintained their identity across millennia. But even they know that they mixed with non-Jews; had some of their originals dissimilated; and took in converts. Today you have black and white Jews, and all are united not only as a religious group but as a nation. In Kosovo you have the Ashkali who speak Albanian but claim an ethnic affiliation to the Roma groups. Their small and familiar numbers help to identify them as well as their sense of tradition, but even they could not all have come to speak Albanian without any Albanian ancestry; and they must surely know that they can never thrive, or expect to survive future generations. Loss of language and no secondary marker will result in future absence. Either way, Slavs do have some aspects of common culture such as folklore and other minor tradition. There are also a number of organisations and bodies which exist to unite Slavic peoples socially just as there are for Arabs (across many countries) and Latin Americans. But the biggest error on the above statement is the following remark: "they fail to satisfy the definition of ethnicity by not having a common culture, religion, and origin", which is 100% incorrect. No nation, no matter how small, will have a people and legacy comprising "a common culture, religion, and origin." An ethnic group exists because its members declare themselves by that demonym. There is no policy that states that they must have the same religion, and as for culture: as I said with Bosnia, you don't have to be a member of a different ethnic group to have another culture. Big enough differences exist within the Ukraine between its west and east; in Poland across all areas; in Serbia with three distinct areas which are north, central and far south; in Croatia with Dalmatia/the hinterlands and the central European plains with Istria too; even Montenegro with half a million people has cultural/religious/historical variation across its few thousand square kilometres. It doesn't mean that Montenegrins are not an ethnic group. Nobody adopts a new identity whilst continuing to claim the origin of the previous which he rejected. And faith is down to the individual's choice. Nobody in Tehran can deny that one is Iranian simply because he is not a Shia Muslim. The article is about Slavic nations, not a claim of ethnicity. It is not a suggestion that all are genetically similar, because genetics vary among their primary nations, needless to say among all who call themselves Dutch, German, French, Spanish or Italian. Evlekis (talk) 02:10, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Indeed. This articles obviously confuses language groups and ethnicity and needs serious revisions. People speaking the same category of language may or may not be part of the same "ethnic group." Languages and ethnicity are not the same. Of course they can overlap, but that does not make them the same thing. Would you equate the Romanians and the Portuguese whilst separating Slovenes and Austrians? That's just silly. Codik 12:02, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

All the arguements are ultimately futile, because there is no accepted definition of what ethnicity actualy entails Hxseek (talk) 11:04, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Commonality

I took liberty to replace an intro phrase about commonality by an equivocal sentence "both similar and dissimilar", which is while may look meaningless and non-informative, it is more correct. For example, Bulgarians are much closer culturally to Turks than to Belarusians, if forget common Orthodox Church (which is common only partially, by the way). Mukadderat 21:53, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

That is a very controversial statement. The same can be said for any nation on the Balkan peninsula who have been under Turkish occupation for 500 years, and the Bulgarians only had the misfortune to be the closest to Turkey. Capricornis 02:06, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

I must add that most Bulgarians would probably be offended by this comparison. Although there is no ethnic tension between Bulgarians and Turks, they view each other as very different. 24.4.151.152 03:07, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes that is a well put description. But note that the similarity between Bulgarians and Turks refers to a genetic ancestral one, I'm not sure how culturally similar they are. After all religion has been the defining feature of many a civilisation until today Hxseek 11:30, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

In addition, that is the unique thing about southern Slavs in particular. They share similarities to other Slavs- a sense of similarity and relatedness (manifest in particular in western countries, eg Australia and A,erica, whereby Czeques, Russian, Poles, Serbs all seem to befriend each other), yet the that similarity can certainly extent to a regional level, whereby there seems to be an affinity with their neighbours (eg Macedonians, Greeks, Bulgarian, Romanians; and Poles, Lithuanians, etc). Just a thought Hxseek 03:48, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Chernyakhov culture

The multi-ethnic Gothic state may have already had, at its fringes, elements of proto-slavic culture. This may have been a responce to the need for the proto-slavs to create a social and political unity in the face of disintegration of the Gothic empire and the arrival of the Huns.

Prior to this the slavs were obscure, not mentioned in history. They may have been what are referred to as the peoples of the 'forest-steppes' that were under the dominion of the scythian -sarmatian kingdom, however were not scythisized. From Cambridge Medieval History, volume I, the Slavs. Hxseek 12:02, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

SLOVENE and NEMZY.

Hello all,

I hope you will correct the article.

First of all there is no need to look for roots of word SLOVENE in Latin or Greec languages.

In fact the explanation is simple, obvious, and hard to argue: SLOVo means word/language(eng.). SLOVene are people who can speak and understand one common language.

Furtermore, word NEMEZ(sngl.)/NEMZY(pl.) means dumb (engl.) and it was used previously for all kind of foreingers who couldn't speak SLOVO (the language) of SLOVenic people.

However, starting from 18 century, in Russia people started to associate mainly Germans with this word (before expressions like English NEMZY or Dutch NEMZY were quite common). In modern Russian language (and I beleive in some other slovonic languages - i.e. Polish and Ukrainian) NEMEZ/NEMZY is still a synonim of Germans.

Summary: SLOVENE are people who can speak and uderstand one common language (SLOVO). NEMZY (dumbs) are people who cannot say or understand SLOVenic language (SLOVO).

Thank you, Anatoly Shamkin ashamkin@gmail.com —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.225.206.160 (talk) 06:46, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Does their name also come from SLOVO? How about their name?

Otherwise, I was wondering, does Jordanes really say that Venethi, Sclaveni, and Antes are collectively called Spores? I know of two chapters of Getica where he speaks of Venethi, Sclaveni, and Antes and nowhere in them does he say that they are called Spores. 201.12.178.33 12:51, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

You can not claim one explanation to be the correct one, though your explanation is quite interesting and possibly the most accurate. There are several viable explanations, like in the venetic theory the word originating in Venci and getting the prefix "selo", meaning "small village" or "sel", derived from "seliti" in the meaning to "move", or perhaps "slo" in the meaning "went". The meaning "slo ven" or "went out"(of the original homeland) has also been proposed, there are also some more humorous ones like the prefix "slo" originating from "sol" which means salt. But since we can never know for sure how it originated, we have to either state all the theories or none. Regards. 86.61.30.53 (talk) 15:22, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

Folk

Folk etymologies and scholars such as Roman Jacobson traditionally link the name either with the word sláva "glory", "fame" or slovo "word, talk" (both akin to OSl slusati "to hear" from the IE root *kleu-). Thus slověne would mean "people who speak (the same language)", i.e. people who understand each other, as opposed to the Slavic word for foreign nations, nemtsi, meaning "speechless people" (from Slavic němi - mute, silent, dumb), as for example in Polish: Niemcy is Germany.

Please source this. Quite a statement. Mallerd 16:38, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Slav: 1387, Sclave, from M.L. Sclavus (c.800), from Byzantine Gk. Sklabos (c.580), from O.Slav. Sloveninu "a Slav," probably related to slovo "word, speech," which suggests the name originally meant member of a speech community (cf. O.C.S. Nemici "Germans," related to nemu "dumb;" and cf. O.E. þeode, which meant both "race" and "language"). Identical with the -slav in personal names (e.g. Rus. Miroslav, lit. "peaceful fame;" Mstislav, lit. "vengeful fame;" Jaroslav, lit. "famed for fury;" Czech Bohuslav, lit. "God's glory;" and cf. Wenceslas). Spelled Slave c.1788-1866, infl. by Fr. and Ger. Slave. Adj. Slavic is attested from 1813; earlier Slavonic (c.1645), from Slavonia, a region of Croatia.

+

slave:c.1290, "person who is the property of another," from O.Fr. esclave, from M.L. Sclavus "slave" (cf. It. schiavo, Fr. esclave, Sp. esclavo), originally "Slav" (see Slav), so called because of the many Slavs sold into slavery by conquering peoples.

"This sense development arose in the consequence of the wars waged by Otto the Great and his successors against the Slavs, a great number of whom they took captive and sold into slavery." [Klein] O.E. Wealh "Briton" also began to be used in the sense of "serf, slave" c.850; and Skt. dasa-, which can mean "slave," is apparently connected to dasyu- "pre-Aryan inhabitant of India." More common O.E. words for slave were þeow (related to þeowian "to serve") and þræl (see thrall). The Slavic words for "slave" (Rus. rab, Serbo-Croatian rob, O.C.S. rabu) are from O.Slav. *orbu, from the PIE base *orbh- (also source of orphan) the ground sense of which seems to be "thing that changes allegiance" (in the case of the slave, from himself to his master). The Slavic word is also the source of robot. Applied to devices from 1904, especially those which are controlled by others (cf. slave jib in sailing, similarly of locomotives, flash bulbs, amplifiers). Slavery is from 1551; slavish is attested from 1565; in the sense of "servilely imitative" it is from 1753. slave-driver is attested from 1807. In U.S. history, slavocracy "the political dominance of slave-owners" is attested from 1840.

I'm deleting the word folk etymology. Mallerd (talk) 19:42, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Byzantine influence upon Slavic peoples

After the fall of the Byzantine Empire, the bloodline of the Emperor continued in the Muscovite royal family. The Emperor's daughter married with the Muscovite King I believe. The Byzantines had greatly influenced many Slavs, such as Serbians, Bulgarians, and Russians. They also named them as their successors after the fall. Should there be a mention of this in the article? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.156.44.218 (talk) 19:16, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Topics from 2008

Linguistic groups, not cultural

User Molobo insists of inserting a claim that East, West and South Slavs aren't just a linguistics grouping but also a religious and cultural grouping. I'm reverting this, as it is obviously false and consist of original research. Molobo has provided a source, but the source doesn't support his claim. To take Slovenes, Czechs and Slovaks as examples: Czechs and Slovenes are both Catholic (religious), belonged for a long time to the Austrian Empire and was influenced by it (Culture and History). Bulgarians, in contrast, are Orthodox and were influenced by the Byzantine and Ottoman Empires. When Uuser Molobo is trying to invent a common religious and cultural ground for the three linguistic groups of Slavs, he is making things up. Which religion is common for the South Slavs (they are Catholics, Orthodox and Muslims)? The whole insertion is original research from the beginning to the end, as anyone with a knowledge of European history will known. Most importanly, the source provided by Molobo most definitely doesn't define South Slavs along religious or cultural lines. JdeJ (talk) 16:39, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Please present sources contradicting Encyclopedia Brittanica. Furthermore they are clear religious divisions between West and East Slavs in terms of religion for example, the quote speaks about this clearly and mentions it as one of divisions. "The whole insertion is original research " Encyclopedia Brittanica can't be classified as original research, sorry. Your personal opinion on EB is not enough for it to be removed. --Molobo (talk) 16:44, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

The problem isn't with the source, the problem is that you've made your own interpretation of it. The source you provided states that "Religion (mainly Eastern Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism) divides Slavs, as does the use of the Cyrillic and Latin alphabets". That is true, not all Slavs share the same religion nor the same alphabet. But

the source, EB, does not say that this is the basis for dividing West Slavs, East Slavs and South Slavs. That's your own interpretation and it's not correct. Both Slovenes and Croats are Catholics and use the Latin alphabet. JdeJ (talk) 16:50, 4 January 2008 (UTC) Historic and cultural divisions from the quote:

Historically,

Religious divisions:

Religion (mainly Eastern Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism) divides Slavs, as does the use of the Cyrillic and Latin alphabets

The only problem is that the quote doesn't mention that this religious clear divide between East and West Slavs. Of course there are no muslim West Slav groups, I am not sure about Eastern ones. But it is clear that religious divisions are clearly present and define each group--Molobo (talk) 16:57, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

With all due respect, may I ask how old you are? I thought that these were the things thought in school all across Europe. Since you claim that religion defines each Slavic group (West, South and East), would you please tell us which religion you think defines the South Slavs? JdeJ (talk) 17:12, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Please stop personal attacks.I already explained to you that scholars note East-West division in Slavic groups. It is mote uneven in South Slavs, but even there there is division between Catholic Croats and Orthodox Serbs. It is also clear that two largest groups-West and East Slavs are clearly divided by cultural and religious line and this fact needs to be noted.--Molobo (talk) 17:28, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm not attacking you as a person, I'm attacking your reasonin as it is wrong. You say yourself that there is a division between Catholic Croats and Orthodox Serbs. Well, so what's the problem? Then the group South Slavs is clearly not defined as a group by any common religion and it would be wrong to claim it. JdeJ (talk) 17:32, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

So you admit that East and West Slavic groups the two biggest are clearly divided on religious grounds ? --Molobo (talk) 17:35, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Admit? That's what I've said all the time. But you seem to forget that this article is about all Slavic peoples. If we were only talking about East Slavs and West Slavs, yes, religion would be a differentiating factor. Between West Slavs, East Slavs and South Slavs, it's not. JdeJ (talk) 17:41, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Further sources on division based on culture and religion:

The end result of this conflict was a dvision of the Slavic world into two cultural zones. There was a western zone of Roman Catholic religion , where the official language was Latin and the vernuclars developed only very slowly as written languages, these included all of West Slavic, Slovenian, and Croation half of SerboCroatioan. The Eastern Cultural zone had Orthodox religion, with Old Church Slavic, serving as as the liturgical language and having a profound effect on secular language too. In this zone were most of the East Slavs, from their Christianization officialy in 988, plus the remainder of the South Slavs. This cultural division still survives in the alphabets used by different Slavic languages(...)The cultural difference survives even where religious adherence per se has disappeared. Languages and Their Status Author: Timothy Shopen, Center for Applied Linguistics page 130 University of Pennsylvania Press --Molobo (talk) 17:38, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Exactly. The source you provided supports the notion of cultural and religious divisions but makes it clear that these do not equal the division into West Slavs, East Slavs and South Slavs. It clearly groups "all of West Slavic, Slovenian, and Croation half of SerboCroatioan (sic!)". JdeJ (talk) 17:41, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Finally we are going somewhere-

We need to treat and describe the clear division between West and East Slavs in terms of religion, culture and history that divides and makes them what they are.
South Slavic internal divisions need to be treated in seperate way as the East-West division goes amid their own inner groups.--Molobo (talk) 17:43, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Hm, yes. We're going to same point I've repeated ten times already in what has been the most patience trying excercise I've experienced on Wikipedia. Anyway, both of the points you make are satisfies in the article already. Check out Slavic_peoples#Ethno-cultural_subdivisions for the cultural definitions and [[5]] for the religuous differences. Furthermore, the historical differences are elaborated upon in the history section. So please stop mixing this with the linguistic grouping. JdeJ (talk) 19:52, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

As you yourself say they are many divisions and current formulation only speaks about linguistic one, avoiding religious and cultural divisions shown by scholary sources presented above.This is obviously not neutral as the lead may suggest that only linguistic division exist between West, East and South Slavs and not thousand years of different development and culture.--Molobo (talk) 21:24, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

No, the article mentions all the divisions you've talked above and I've outlined them above. For God's sake, why is it necessary to write everything ten times before you understand it. Read the article and you'll see that both the cultural and religious differences are already in there. What is more, they are in there with their proper definitions and not the bogus ones you think exist. JdeJ (talk) 08:53, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, but currently the main text in the lead only speaks about linguistic division. Further much more important cultural and religious divisions that for example divide East and West Slavs are almost completely glossed over.

"not the bogus ones you think exist" You think EB and University of Pennsylvania books are "bogus" ? Sorry but can you finally give some scholary sources that would support your private views ? --Molobo (talk) 10:12, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, EB is just one of the sources supporting my view. You claim that the division of Slavs into West Slavs, East Slavs and South Slavs isn't purely linguistic but also religious. You haven't presented a single source supporting this yet. What is worse, you're not even capable of understanding the sources you've presented yourself. Both EB and the other source you presented contradict such a division. As I've explained on this page ten times already. If you're not capable of understanding it, well, that's not my problem. Slavs are grouped along national lines, linguistic lines, religious lines and cultural lines. The division of three groups (East, South and West) is purely linguistic. I'm not going to waste any more time on explaining this. Everybody with the tiniest grasp of either Europe or the English language will have understood it already and I'm seriously starting to suspect that you're just trolling. I'm not going to contribute to filling up this talk page with this nonsense discussion, everything of value has already been explained to you ten times. Sorry for sounding harsh if you really are here for honest reasons, but I doubt that very much. JdeJ (talk) 15:43, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

EB clearly states that divisions exist on cultural, religious level also, so it can't support your view. So far you are presenting only your own view, no sources have been presented.--Molobo (talk) 16:46, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

1. Yes, EB states that divisions exist on cultural and religious levels. No, it does not link these to the division of Slavs into three groups, that's your misinterpretation.

2. I've explained this 11 times know in great detail. I know that you will probably never understand it, but everybody else certainly has already. If you're an honest contributor, read this discussion before posting your same nonsense again.

3. I will report you for trolling. There is no doubt in my mind that you're doing this only to disrupt Wikipedia. Nobody could be so stupid as to not understand the sources he posts himself nor understand something that has been explained to him in great detail over and over again. I'm sure you're having great fun trolling here, but I hope to see you banned. JdeJ (talk) 17:02, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

"No, it does not link these to the division of Slavs into three groups, that's your misinterpretation." It does so: "western Slavs were integrated into western Europe; their societies developed along the lines of other western European nations.

Eastern and southern Slavs suffered Mongol and Turkish invasions and evolved more autocratic, state-centred forms of government.

It is a clear division into three groups, as to the rest, sorry, but I don't think a content dispute can be seen as trolling, especially as I provided several sources backing the thesis that Slavs are divided due religion, culture, history. So far you didn't brought any contradictory sources. --Molobo (talk) 17:21, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't think it is too far fetched to say that there is somewhat of a religious and cultural unity between Slavs. Certainly they all have unique features, but there is some intangible aspect that draws them together- more than just language. One can easily recognise a fellow slav, just the look of the person. Christianity unifies and defines the Slavs. They would all be Orthodox had the western Slavs been dominated by Germans (and Bosnian muslims are just a historic aberation) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Hxseek (talk • contribs) 09:49, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

There is no cultural or religious unity amongst "Slavs" (and they are gone anyway since thousand years, replaced by seperate nations). As 'one can reckognise' that is a strange claim. How ? By calling Bosnians aberration you comitted a serious offensive violation of civility. Also you should learn history more. For example Poles have been great friends to Ottoman Empire and in fact some converted to Islam such as Josef Bem, when escaping tyranny of Russian Empire. All in all your claims have no base in facts.--Molobo (talk) 05:57, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

Clearly the best way to solve this inevitable confusion is to simply stop dreaming that Language simply makes a person a Slav. The most rock solid way to know if a nation is Slavic, is to simply see if majority of the people in that nation have the typical Slavic genetic signature. For example Bosnians, Bosniaks to be more precise have less Slavic or Asian genetic signature than Germans or Austrians... yet they are listed as Slavs only because their oppressors happen to be Slavic and forced the Slavic language on them... 77.78.196.52 (talk) 23:49, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Same with Croats and Serbs.But you still speak a Slavic language,if you don't want to belong in that group anymore,i suggest you to invent a new language.Maybe Esperanto could do in period of transition. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.3.240.245 (talk) 09:27, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

About the map

The image shows a map that appears to show what areas have Slavic peoples. I noticed that it extends into the Lapland, where the indigenous Sami people live. Would they be considered Slavic? And also, it seems to extend into Siberia. Except for the descendants of people exiled there by Stalin, isn't Siberia home to native Siberians? Just wondering if there can be some clarification. ForestAngel (talk) 13:46, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

The map is correct in this respect. The Sami people are not Slavic, that's true. Most of Lapland lies outside Russia and is not marked on the map. The part of Lapland that is within Russia is correctly marked, as native speakers of Russian by far outnumber the Sami in the region. The same is true for Siberia, not originally inhabited by Russians but now with a solid Russian majority. JdeJ (talk) 17:21, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

I think JdeJ is out to create a Slavic empire all by herself. However as soon as Wikipedia realises that the Russian Secret service is trying to dominate Wikipedia, by Admining their own users gradually, and making bloated maps where this fake entity called Slavs who importantly are supposed to have a centralised base in Russia... Soon enough East Germany will be Slavic (Russian) since some of them still speak Slavic languages. 77.78.197.6 (talk) 20:30, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Ouch, my secret plan is out. Yes, my secret dream is to create a great Slavic Empire comprising most of Europe. And I'm convinced the best way to achieve this ultimate goal is to edit out vandalism to a Wikipedia article on Slavic peoples. That's the only reason I'm trying to prevent vandalism. Well, sorry for feeding trolls but rather tired of this notorious vandal [6]. JdeJ (talk) 21:04, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

I believe 77.78.197.6 has a point, it certainly is in Russian global interest to gather allies via the Slavic route. 91.191.29.67 (talk) 14:13, 7 March 2008 (UTC) This statement is absurd, the second biggest national group from Slavic languages group are the Poles, and it is certain that due to geopolitical and historic reasons they would never become allies of Russia. The third largest group are the Ukrainians and their relationship with Russia is also tarnished by history. I suggest removing those strange comments. Wikipedia is not a discussion forum.--Molobo (talk) 03:05, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

ethnogenesis

I think it would better the article if the ethnogenesis section was a bit more streamiline.I just think it is a bit disjointed currently, perhaps a little confusing even —Preceding unsigned comment added by Hxseek (talk • contribs) 04:58, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

What WAS ANNO DOMINI Thinking? Just LOOK at this Calendar? No zero.. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.141.228.241 (talk) 04:52, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Is it ok to delete nonsense from this page?

In most cases I object strongly to removing comments from talk pages but I'll make an exception and suggest that the long and tiresome tirades by the IP-jumper operating from 77.78.xxx be removed. The user in question has a long of history of vandalising this article and of threatening Wikipedia with bringing in hackers to destroy this site when he was blocked. His repeated vandalism is the only reason this article was semi-protected and then he turned to the talk page. I don't see how his ramblings about Yugoslavia having forced Bosnians to speak Slavic contributes anything to this site, as I'm sure any contributor will know that Bosnians had been speaking a Slavic language for about 1000 years before the creation of Yugoslavia. Nor do I consider his home-spun theories of Wikipedia being an undercover for the Russian secret service, about how all Slavs are Russians, and about how Germans and Austrians are more Asian than Bosnians have any relevance whatsoever. Trolling of that kind doesn't add anything of any value and distracts from real discussions about content. JdeJ (talk) 23:00, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

I agree. We need to stick to the point. Balkan Fever 23:10, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Great, I'll wait for a day or so first to see if there are users who disagree before taking any action. JdeJ (talk) 23:27, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

You might as well remove any other (fairly) off-topic comments while you're at it. Balkan Fever 23:51, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Ha ha. He's obviously a nut Hxseek (talk) 11:28, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

Genetics I disagree with the genetics section, specifically regarding the two southern slav groupings. Where is the reference to the research that this refers to? To say that the Croats and Serbs are more similar to the Slovenes and Macedonians respectively then to them selves is actually laughable. Any European group will associate themselves more with their western rather than eastern neighbors, but the Croats take this to the extreme as can be seen in their ridiculous Aryan German fantasies. If anything, Croats would be more similar in appearance in general to Macedonians rather than Slovenians. Furthermore, the Serbs are much more similar in appearance to the Croatians than the Macedonians or Bulgarians, so in a number of ways this grouping is very misleading. On another side note, the use of halpogroup percentages is highly misleading. Especially when it refers only to one halpogroup. For instance, Sorbs are described as having the highest percentage of halpogroup R1a. Does this mean that they are genetically 61%, slavs, or does it mean that they are the most slavic (100%)? Certainly the interpretation of Herzegovian’s as having 12% of the gene could be (has been) misused as describing them as being 12% slavs which is a complete under representation.

 —OziSerb3 (talk • contribs) 15:22, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

But we can only rely on Genetics for non-POW content. We have nothing else, as we know everybody likes to interpret history to favour their side. Genetics have indeed proven that Kosovars are not Serbs and therefore Kosovo is not Serbia, as the western media keeps mentioning. 77.78.197.84 (talk) 13:42, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

New genetic reference

Can somebody please figure out how to add this to reference list: http://mbe.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/22/10/1964#TBL1 It is new GENETIC analysis which happens to prove that only Bosniaks are indigenous Europeans in X-Yugoslavia region and are absolutely unrelated to Slavic heritage Genetically. 77.78.199.117 (talk) 12:38, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

Cultural and Ethnic markers, such as quisine to decipher what culture/ethnic group Bosniaks belong to

1) Cuisine - Cuisine_of_Bosnia_and_Herzegovina.

It seems basically Turkish, end of that subject. 77.78.197.84 (talk) 14:54, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

2) Architecture. Architecture_of_Bosnia_and_Herzegovina

It is also illuminated here what kind of architecture Bosnia has. http://fp.arizona.edu/mesassoc/Bulletin/bosnia.htm

3) Language. Bosnian_language

I say Bosnian language is only around half Slavic, I'll go look for evidence if anybody disagrees. But remember language cannot be the only factor in cultural or ethnic conclusion due to other cases in the world such as Native Americans who speak English and the list goes on endlessly. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.78.197.84 (talk) 13:08, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

4) Religous behaviour (for example Serb Orthodox may behave differently in their religous expression to some other Orthodox groups)
5) Genetics. (The thing that is the least capable of lies and POW)
6) Bosniak gene pool: http://www.relativegenetics.com/genomics/images/haploMaps/originals/I1a_large_RG.jpg http://www.relativegenetics.com/genomics/images/haploMaps/originals/I1b_large_RG.jpg http://www.relativegenetics.com/genomics/images/haploMaps/originals/I1c_large_RG.jpg

Serb gene pool: http://www.relativegenetics.com/genomics/images/haploMaps/originals/E3a_large_RG.jpg http://www.relativegenetics.com/genomics/images/haploMaps/originals/E3b_large_RG.jpg

So Bosniaks belong to a whole entirely different tribe, or gene pool, and frequent Scandinavian I haplogroup almost exclusively in Balcans and as much as Swedes. Where as Serbs as you can see frequent intensely the E haplogroup who's ONLY and closest ancestors are Central Africans while other mixes are less than a few percent each. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.78.198.26 (talk) 09:07, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

Lets make a big list here...(remember no side in reality has anything to lose by ACTUALLY getting to the truth here)
Remember to leave emotions out of this, as this is here to help us solve the conundrum, and stop the eternal arguing, if you change your mind about something, it is not a bad thing, but it more a brave thing. Also nobody will read your entire story if it's oversized, please make it simple, short and easy to read, the longer it is the more it looks false, as reality is usually very short and simple.

77.78.197.84 (talk) 13:02, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

"5) Genetics. (The thing that is the least capable of lies and POW)" Disturbing claim. Genetics speak nothing of culture. One can be brother of another person and be Jewish Pole while the Brother is a Turkish Muslim. It has nothing to do with genetics--Molobo (talk) 03:22, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Yeah but both of them won't be Slavs by all accounts. 77.78.197.84 (talk) 12:33, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

So if I accept Jewish religion and continue to speak Polish, I will be no longer slavic ? Excuse me but I don't get your ideas.--Molobo (talk) 13:56, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Who said a change of religion has anything to do with Identity? I do however think, your Russian/Slavic propaganda is being crushed by modern technology which can prove the true course of history and add to loss of credibility of the "Slavic favouring version of events" which will be void of all credibility for all time to come. Indeed, one of the most popular type of educational program in "Civilised world"'s media are programs that try to find people's real heritage via genetic technology, that's one of the reasons why your dismissal of such stuff runs into the ground. 77.78.197.84 (talk) 15:39, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Removed sentence

Yet they are connected by speaking often closely related Slavic languages, and also by a sense of common identity and history, which is present to different extents among different individuals and different Slavic peoples. I removed this sentence. It is not neutral, seems to advocate an ideological view and is wrong in several cases to an extent that would require serious explanations that would distort the lead. --Molobo (talk) 03:16, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Good example how the article should be treated

The Germanic peoples are a historical group of Indo-European-speaking peoples, originating in Northern Europe and identified by their use of the Germanic languages which diversified out of Common Germanic in the course of the Pre-Roman Iron Age. The ancestors of these peoples became the eponymous ethnic groups of North Western Europe, such as the Danes, Swedes, Norwegians, Germans, Dutch, and English.

The Slavic peoples are a historical group of Indo-European-speaking peoples, identified by their use of the Slavic languages . The ancestors of these peoples became the eponymous ethnic groups of Europe, such as the Russians, Poles, Sorbs, Czechs, Ukrainians, Slovaks, Croats and others.

--Molobo (talk) 15:48, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

As to anon's comments (now deleted?), bilingualism is another thing, there are many Turks living in Germany and noone states that they are Germanic, even though many of them speak German. Same with Slavic-speaking Albanians in, say, Kosovo. //Halibu tt 11:19, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately, this is the tactic driven by this one user who has many nicknames on Wikipedia.. If he/she lost an argument, and cannot see a way out, he/she simply deletes stuff he/she doesn't want to answer. 77.78.197.84 (talk) 17:00, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Lol. I'm not the one who has changed user account around ten times to avoid blocks, like the anon POV-pusher has done. All of them beginning with 77.78. I've got exactly one account on Wikipedia, this one. The decision to have the comments of this one user deleted was taken long ago, all users involved agreed. The reason is not to censor anyone, but that he's using talkpages in complete disregard of WP:TALK, to go into long and highly irrelevant discussions, together with wild attacks on other users. He has a long history of edit warring on many pages related to Bosnians, of repeated vandalism, of pushing his own very original research despite a general consensus to the opposite, making highly racist edits and of changing to a new IP as soon as he is blocked under an old one. He is the reason most pages related to Slavic peoples and languages now are semi-protected, to counter his vandalism. In short, he is one of the most disruptive editors on Wikipedia. JdeJ (talk) 17:50, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Yeah sure, and Serbia's mythical history says they originated from Kosovo, who cares? 77.78.197.84 (talk) 18:04, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I fail to see how Serbian mythology justifies your disruptive behaviour on Wikipedia, I don't even see connection between what you're writing and the topic at hand. Then again, that's true of most of your "contributions" to this article. JdeJ (talk) 18:11, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I didn't however fail to notice that you take drastic actions whenever I remind people of what is for/against "Russian interests". So nonsense meets nonsense, Russia isn't brother nation with half of Europe, the "Slavic" concept is a myth forced down peoples throat when Russia was a Super power. But people are now scared of Russia and want Russia to vanish because Russia exterminated more than 20 million people in gulags inside of a few years. Adding to that, Siberia it's people and its oil is much better off in USA hands. 77.78.197.84 (talk) 18:28, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Funny. Since I'm not Russian, haven't ever been in Russia, have no connectio to Russia and, as far as I remember, have made 3000 edits to Wikipedia without more than perhaps ten concerning Russia, I don't really know why I should care about "Russian interests". I do, however, care about verifiable facts in articles and about keeping original research out. I also care about keeping to the subject, so I really don't follow you into your strange excursions into "Serbian mythology" or "Russian interestets". This is the page to discuss how to improve the article Slavic peoples and discussions completely unrelated to this will be removed as per WP:TALK. JdeJ (talk) 19:37, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

User 77.78.197.84 is a disruptive troll, that clearly has no knowledge of history or ethnogenesis. He is the same guy who has been writing in Bosniak article trying to push absurd theories that Bosniaks are the result of fusion of Illyrians with Turks and Germans, having no Slavic contribution at all. He should be blocked. I think he is probably an old user called 'Anceint land of Bosna or something like that. Hxseek (talk) 23:22, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

It's abundantly clear who the troll is, since 'name calling' falls under the term: troll. It's also obvious that Hxseek, Osli* and a large number of nicknames who dominate Wikipedia balcan sections seem to have surprisingly identical grammar+behavioural+interests patterns. Basically trying to push a absurd notion that Bosniaks are actually Serbs who have converted to Islam, where as Genetic studies prove that Bosniaks have 64% DNA markers common to Illyrians and the rest a mixture of Goth and Celt, where as Serbs in Serbia have majority DNA markers common in Bulgarians, Romanians and Russians. Osli and his nicknames constantly dismiss any references that say this even if they are famous Anthropologists. 77.78.198.147 (talk) 22:39, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

No. You are a troll. You are misinterpreting data and coming up with your own pseudo-scientific theories. You might as well give up because no body takes you seriously. Hxseek (talk) 05:14, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

JdeJ and Hxseek are correct; IP guy is a troll. Somebody should get rid of him. Quickly. JdeJ, if you have enough time to find each block log of each IP he has used, maybe he'll be indef blocked (finally). Balkan Fever 10:05, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

He has been using at least the following eight IPs. 77.78.198.147, 77.78.197.84, 77.78.196.142, 77.78.199.224, 77.78.196.52, 77.78.197.6, 77.78.197.74, 77.78.196.131.

As Hxseek points out, he is misrepresenting the source, his edits do not have any support in the source he claims, as has been explained to him at length already. JdeJ (talk) 11:07, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

You're just a serb nationalist, who has no more access in Kosovo haha, I think Kosovo has already received the same weaponary as Israel LOL, maybe you serb fascists will be running away from apaches soon enough instead of digging mass graves all over Europe. 77.78.197.181 (talk) 09:51, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Genetics

I propose that the genetics section be touched up. At present it presents a group of South Slavs a being distinct from the rest because of the contribution of the native Balkan populace to their genetic roots. However, this is not unique to the South Slavs. All slavs encountered and mixed with other peoples as they spread out. Whatsmore, it assumes that R1a is the marker of "slavicness"- which is not exactly true. Hxseek (talk) 08:47, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Look Bosniaks gene pool, they only share ancestry with Scandinavians: http://www.relativegenetics.com/genomics/images/haploMaps/originals/I1a_large_RG.jpg http://www.relativegenetics.com/genomics/images/haploMaps/originals/I1b_large_RG.jpg http://www.relativegenetics.com/genomics/images/haploMaps/originals/I1c_large_RG.jpg

Look Serb gene pool, they only share ancestry with central Africans: http://www.relativegenetics.com/genomics/images/haploMaps/originals/E3a_large_RG.jpg http://www.relativegenetics.com/genomics/images/haploMaps/originals/E3b_large_RG.jpg c is almost extinct, and other E haplogroup branches are similar but the CLOSEST and MOST RECENT ancestors to Serbs are Central Africans.

We know that there arent many ancient documents about this region, but this will help clarify who belonged to what type of tribe in the past. Note that this is only recent ancestry of course, E haplogroup may have evolved from middle east before 20,000 years ago, but this is not important as those are massive figures and that kind of stuff is not worth going in to, as to what kind of monkeys humans were 100,000 years ago :). 77.78.198.26 (talk) 08:48, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

Sorry but "Bosniak" as an ethnic-genetic (and, in the last 20 years, linguistic) term didn't exist 500 years ago, let alone in the timeframe these figures apply. Discussing Slavicized natives (which contributed just as much to other ethnicities in present-day Bosnia) is only of sporadic interest to this article; the primary emphasis should be on every available evidence to the gradual spread from Ukraine (Slavic & IE Urheimat) and it's contribution to individual Slavic ethnogeneses. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 02:24, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Yes they did, although surpressed by attempts of Slavic violent dominance as expected. However Bosnia and Bosnians or Bosniaks have existed as a concept right after the fall of Roman Empire as people who live around the river Bosona(Roman/Illyrian). However, due to very mountainous terrain in Bosnia, Slavs avoided Bosnia as anthropologically expected, which explains why these people learned to speak Slavic language, it was in order to trade with the Slavic people who surround them, and yet quite exclusively share no genetic similarities with Serbs and Croats. By the way Bosniaks share no genetic heritage with Ukrainians or Slavs for that matter whatsoever. Bosniaks frequent the I haplogroup roots most intensely as Oxford Uni confirms. 77.78.197.181 (talk) 23:23, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

If so, they'd be the first ethnicity in the world that managed to forgot everything about their language/culture, adopt the language of foreigners they "traded with" and exert no superstratum linguistic influence on neighbouring "foreign" tribes. And all this in less then a century. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 03:47, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

I don't need to 'If so' anything with you, scientific findings are backing me up, it's your word against Oxford University, and not your word against my word. Just look at where you can find Haplogroup I, and where haplogroup E, end of story. if you're unsure whether haplogroups are considered credible then look at this http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6293333.stm and if you are going to tell me that BBC is racist, then I give up, you're simply retarded :x 77.78.197.181 (talk) 00:15, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

No, you don't need to "if so's" with me or anyone else of the dozen other people that have pointed to non sequiturs in your "arguments". But until you do so, you remain just another obnoxious troll whose edits will be undone instantaneously. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 19:26, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

And you remain an ignorant liar, if scientific research hit you in the ass, you'd ignore it to your grave, you're a typical slavophile who wants to trick half of Europe to be allies with russia under the false pretense of slavism. The only people who are Slavs are Belorusians and a bunch of other 'crap nations' and russia will brake apart like a deck of cards sooner than you think 77.78.196.34 (talk) 23:34, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Here are a couple of latest songs in Bosnian language, see if you can spot ANY Slavic words in it? In reality I've realised that Bosnian language doesn't isn't even dominated by Slavic language.. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lr7vFb-5d7g http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkcBuUlgOTI 77.78.208.156 (talk) 13:29, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Can't hear the audio where I am now, but I think I know where you're getting at. FYI, out of 1000 the most frequent lexemes in so-called "Bosniak/Bosnian language" as invented in the 1990s and codified by Halilović et al., and sampled by University of Oslo's corpus, less then 3% are Turkisms by my count. Bosniak language is not likely ever to get rid of it's Slavic super-structure, no matter how many Muslim-friendly loanwords from Persian, Turkish, Arabic etc. are artificially put in it, because ordinary folks will never use them. It's very sad that you're ashamed that much of your ethnic and linguistic past. The truth can only set you free of that paranoid Slavophobia you carry in your heart. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 06:49, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Her, here. This guy (user 77.78...) is burying his head in the sand. His claims are outright comedy. We are giving him too much credit by even acknowledging his idiocyHxseek (talk) 14:04, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

You're not up to date with reality obviously, due to the war Bosniaks have massively rejected as many as possible Slavic words and terms and have almost completely gone back to Turkish/German/Italian, and now a Slav cannot ever hope to understand average Bosnian speaking. And by the way there is no such thing as an ethnic Slav as you can see at the start of the article, and what's more Bosniaks in fact share past(heritage) with Scandinavians ONLY as per genetic Haplogroup revelations by Oxford and Stanstead universities which point out that Bosniaks have the I haplogroup roots and Serbs have E roots. And by the way, just listen to those songs, EVERYBODY speaks like that amongst Bosniaks, out of spite and resent due to the war. It's over, Slavic is like less than 10% now. I challenge you to undestand anything from those LATEST songs by Bosniaks, and with that you can prove that I'm wrong right? 77.78.200.160 (talk) 13:43, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Dear 77.78.200.160 your knowledge and understanding of prehistory human genetics is almost none, it equals zero. Your history knowledge is even worse than that. Genetically Bosniaks are nothing special, neither distinctive from others in the region. You are discussing about I haplogroup as some Bosniak characteristic which is ridiciolous. In general Croats have more of it than Bosniaks. All South Slavs have it in rather high percentages. Investigations were made a few years ago when Serbia and Montenegro were the same state: Yugoslavia. So under the name of Serbs there would be Montenigrins too. So Serbian 25% (or something similar) of I haplo could be very high statistically in Montenegro, perhaps higher than among Bosniaks, probably similar to Dalmatia where it's over 50% (in some islands more than 75%). On the other hand, Bosniaks have quite nice percantage of E haplogroup, which is almost virtually absent in Croatia, while more found in Serbia and Macedonia. If you think that I haplotype (I2a precisely) is strictly Illyrian, you are wrong. Illyrians, how we call them, never existed as some homogenous people. The western Balkan was settled by some 70 different tribes 3.000 years ago. Only one little tribe in modern Albania were Illyroi (Illyrii). Greek and Roman writters gave that name to all inhabitants of the WB. There was no some unique Illyrian language. There were probably many different languages and dialects distinguished in 2 main groups: Centum and Satem (Indo-European languages). Genetically there were admixtures of haplotypes same as it's today. It was not so long time ago. Probably ~75% of all modern South Slavs are descendents of the indegenious Balkan people if observing the period of last 3.000 years. People who were coming in 4th-7th century from the north made the rest and only some of them were really Slavic speakers. Small groups with a lot of influence on the natives. Slavization was process - assimilation. It happened everywhere in the WB, not only in Bosnia. Also similar procceses happened everywhere in Europe, not only in WB (with other European languages of course). Bosniaks as ethnical concept is something very very young, only 18 years old. All modern South Slavs are different admixtures of the historical "Illyrians", Venets, Greeks, Thracians, Dacians, Huns, Goths, Avars, Sarmatians, Alans, Balto-Slavs, Italic people, Turks etc... And Slavs in this story were actually Sclavens - the members of multiple ethnic groups with the same "lingua franca" - Old-Slavonic language which probably originated from some proto-Slavic language in Pannonia, not in Russia. If you want to participate here, first learn something. Zenanarh (talk) 22:06, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Insightful as always Z. Hxseek (talk) 14:08, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Maps

I am not happy with the new "airbrush" style maps. They look carelessly made, and references like "Mostly based on work by Velentin Sedov: Slavs in Middle Ages" isn't very confidence-inspiring. Hxseek, I think you should experiment with the GIMP some more, in particular the layer functions, before attempting maps like that. The colour scheme may be a matter of taste, but it doesn't look very professional to me. I do suggest re-insertion of the map directly derived from EIEC, Image:Slavic distribution origin.png. dab (𒁳) 12:21, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

well you're right; it may be a matter of taste. But i think my map is hands down better than the one you refer to, it is more detailed for starters . Hxseek (talk) 09:51, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Deleted phrase about religion

I deleted the following quite erroneous phrase (and unreferenced, too) from the top of the section "Religion and alphabet".

The Slavic people believed in their own religion and mythology (see Slavic mythology), which descended from the Proto-Indo-European religion.

It is highly dubious that Slavic peoples had some common religion, given that different Slavic peoples originated in radically different ways
Proto-Indo-European religion is a reconstruction and it is a grave logical fault to say that "Slavic religions" descended from something which is hypothesised on their basis.
Their mythology is not exactly common either. It is true that mythologies are shared, but it was also quite well shared with other surrounding peoples. While Slavs do share some myths, just the same they have quite different myths. Since there was no written corpus, there is no reason to believe that various protoslavic tribes had some monolythic common.

In any case, whatever can be said here it must be phrased as a matter of opinion of an expert rather than an indisputable fact, and this opinion must be reliably referenced. Mukadderat (talk) 21:57, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

As far as I know, most of the Slavic pantheon is reconstructed, or specific to a region. It doesn't help that the articles are almost completely unsourced and/or stubs either. Not to mention the hoaxes that surround it. Balkan Fever 06:17, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Article is an unreadable mess

The article on slavik peoples is a mishmash of unreadable jargon. It needs to be better organized and more clear. There are too many editors that are not impartial or objective. They need to be excluded. Some of what they write is absurd to even the most novice historians. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Filipcyk (talk • contribs) 03:49, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree with that. It's basically POW 95%+. The entire article is full of Serb/Russian POW where no important differentiation between Slavic speaking people is made, you'd think they're all the same without any non-slavic roots. In reality people learned Slavic in for trading purposes, not because they came from Russia. You'd think that half of Europe is Slavic and brothers with the strongest Slavic nation Russia which is bullshit. Wikipedia is transforming into a Slavophile propaganda machine to reverse the outcome of the already finalised Cold war. 77.78.200.160 (talk) 18:00, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

I presume you're Polish, and understand that Russia exploited the Slavic commonality theory during Eastern Bloc times. However, the article is NOT some POV ( I assume that's what you meant, ather than Prisoner of War) article. It mentions at least a couple of times that Slavs are today religiously and culturally heterogenous and that from the outset they mixed with other peoples. THe spread of Slavic as a means for a language of trade, whilt interesting, is a theory not put forward by the concesus of historians. There was an undeniable spreading of Slavs through out people. Just like the Goths spread, just like the Huns spread. They were all multi-ethnic groups, but the focus of the article should naturally focus on the origin of the core body of Slavs. And the article actually states a Ukrainian or Polish origin, not Russian. Hxseek (talk) 09:23, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Est. 320,000,000 Slavs ?

What is the source of that claim. Anyway this is a very diverse group-the box is for single nationality or ethnic group. I think it should be removed-no source, can indicate that there is a single unified group(which isn't true and misses the colossal diversification of former Slavic tribes now turned into nations). Also for example Germanic peoples article has no such box to my knowledge.--Molobo (talk) 21:03, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Turkic peoples has the box, but with sources. Ostap 02:40, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Since no sources were provided and no argument was given for presenting ancestors of Slavic tribes as unified ethnic group I will remove the table.--Molobo (talk) 21:30, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Since no reference was brought up I removed the table. It gave no source for the numbers placed 10mln Belarus above 38mln Poland, and claimed Orthodox faith is in majority and Catholics are a minority-which obviously is a manipulation knowing that in countries like Croatia or Poland this is dominant religion and they are almost no ethnic Poles or Croats of Orthodox faith. Such generalisation is only possible if we treat Slavs as unified ethnic and religious grouo-which they aren't. Also the table was for single ethnic group.--Molobo (talk) 13:14, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

Anatolian hypothesis

re: (fringe theories are inappropriate here Undid revision 234106758 by 76.16.176.177 . —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.16.176.177 (talk) 05:54, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

No they are not appropriate. According to all mainstream scholarship, 5000 BCE there were no "Balts" or "Slavs", it was still Proto-Indo-European language/culture. Balto-Slavic divergence is usually-dated to ~1500BC-500 BCE --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 08:51, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

strange section

I have no idea what the purpose of the 'Slavic peoples under foreign rule' section is supposed to be. All ethnicities in Europe have had to suffer foreign rule at some point in their history, Slavic peoples are not special in this regard. This strange section just seems to more POV pushing from Nazi-influenced groups so I've deleted it. Ronwa (talk) 11:36, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

1869 South Slavs

South Slavs distribution map in 1869: [7] - Added by User:Olahus. Am I the only one that thinks that it's a bit anachronistic and impartial? Bosniaks and Vlachs certainly did not declare themselves as Serbs back then. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 09:33, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

If Olahus would have made up a map today claiming a certain distribution of South Slavs in 1869, I would definitely agree with you. But this is a contemporary map from 1869, this is how the producers of the map defined the groups and their distribution at that time. Granted that the editor of the map in 1869 may have commited errors, I still don't find it very anachronistic. JdeJ (talk) 10:13, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

The "producers" then obviously had faulty sources. This way it looks like a rough outline of Greater Serbia (whose propaganda was very actual at the time this map was drawn). So unless one wants to claim that 150 years ago Dalmatian and Bosnian Croats and Bosnian Muslims (Bosniaks) declaread themselves as "Serbs", there is no reason to insinuate it either to a casual reader by placing it on the article. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 12:24, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Ivan, I don't understand your point. The map claims to depict areas inhabited by Slavic (ethnic) population, not Serbian (national) populations. The question should therefore be: were the areas highlighted on the map actually poulated by Slavs? The question does not need to exclude the co-existance of non-Slavic populations, nor does it imply anything about nationality or (later) national boundaries. Why does the map raise for you questions about identifying Bosniaks and Vlachs as Serbs? -- Timberframe (talk) 12:35, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Do you se that SERBEN and KROATEN titles? This map implies that in the 1869 Croats were confined to a small area of present-day northern Croatia, and all the else were SERBEN. The question of whether these were inhabited by the Slavs back then is non-issue - the whole area has been Slavicized more then a millenia ago (with some pockets of Romance speakers surviving up to 19th century). The ethnic constitution of the central area was reshuffled several times by the time this map was made (1941-45, 1991-96), but there is no doubt that the area was still Slavic. Modern concept of nation was still being forged back then, and most people would declare themselves with some regional appellative (Dalamatians, Herzegovinians, Bosnians..), but for us today, it would be misleading and anachronistic to literally interpret that. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 12:56, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Seen at its full size the map appears to have been amended since it was originally produced. It claims (top centre) to be "Nach den neuesten Untersuchungen von A. Petermmann" - according to the new research by A. Petermann, which would place it in the 3rd quarter of the 19th Century (Petermann died in 1878). But the key in the bottom left corner clearly shows signs of later ammendment - the symbols for the borders of Asiatic Turkey, the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Greece appear to have been added by typewriter. Similarly all the coloured boundaries appear to have been drawn by hand and many of them don't follow any visible demarcations on the map. The ethnic labels (Kroaten, Serben, etc) appear in two different fonts: a bold sans-serif and a lighter serif, the former being out of keeping with any other font I can see on the map. Furthermore, the bold sans-serif labels occur outside the green area (used presumeably to denote Slavic populations on the original map) - see for example multiple instances of "SERBEN" in the white UNGARN (Hungary) region. The use of an uncharacteristic font and inconsistency between the labelling of Slavic populations and the shading suggests that the labelling may be a later addition. There is too much about this map that suggests that it has been tampered with to allow me to feel comfortable about presenting it as a depiction of Slavic population distribution in 1869. Does the article really need an ethnographic map from this era? -- Timberframe (talk) 14:31, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

What a funny site that promacedonia. Essentially all of the maps of the period were made by some politically-motivated "estimations". People still don't get a simple thing: ethnicity and nationality are, when it comes to Slavic peoples (whose expansion in the 5th and the 6th century was linguistic and cultural one, not "ethnical"), artifical and arbitrary construct. There is no other way to classify people as "Serbs", "Croats", "Macedonians" etc. except by using official censi data based on their self-declaration. I'm removing this absurd map cause it's not only unreliable, but highly misleading. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 10:06, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Dear Ivan Štambuk, why do you feel so extremely embarassed about a mid-19th-century map? This map was created by August Heinrich Petermann, a well-known and one of the most appreciated German cartographer and geographer of the 19th century. It's improbably that Petermann has drawn this map with some tendentious intentions. Concerning the Bosniaks: in 1869 there was no talk about a Bosnian ethnicity (they wre simply called "Muslims") and I rather believe that the author intended to include in his map the Serbs from Lika-Krbava and northern Bosnia (see also this CIA map from 1991). Concerning the Vlachs, I don't know what you mean, as I know the Serbians from Bosnia are called "vlasi" by the Croatians and Muslims. However, the size of the text "SERBEN" and "KROATEN" is truly unimportant, because the ethnic borders between the Serbs and Croatians aren't marked anyway because they were considered to be a single ethnic group (from linguistic reasons) with at least 2 identities. --Olahus (talk) 20:27, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Dear Olahus, I hope Ivan will excuse me jumping in before him, but I wonder if you actually saw the map before it was deleted (or checked the diffs). It shows Serbia and Croatia as two distinct regions, separated by a well-defined border, and labelled to show Serbians living in Serbia (as well as elsewhere in Hungary for example) and Croats in Croatia. Thus the map makes, or implies, a clear correspondence between regions and ethnicity in the case of these two groups. Doesn't this weaken your claim that ethnic borders aren't marked and fly in the face of your claim that they were considered to be a single ethnic group? The map conveys the impression that they were two distinct groups occupying different regions. This seems like more than a simplification, and more like a deliberate manipulation of people's perception. As I mentioned above, the deception - if there is one - is not necessarily attributable to Petermann since the map that was presented has signs of later amendment, including quite possibly the contentious ethnic labels -- Timberframe (talk) 20:46, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm not "embarassed" by it, where do you get this impression? :) Map is wrong and misleading, titles are wrong, I don't care who wrote it or for what intentions. Your insinuations of Bosniaks not being an ethnicity back than, or Croats and Serbs being the same ethnicity on the "linguistic criteria" are bizarre and hardly worth time of commenting. "Vlachs" were later incorporated into Serbian ethnicity by religious criteria (Orthodoxy), but they had separate identity thru centuries that lasted well into the 19th century (when religious division became national, and the names Croat and Serb spread. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 11:13, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

There is no border drawn between Serbia and Croatia. The red line is not an ethnic division line, but the border between Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire (in 1869 Bosnia wasn't occupied by the Austrian troops). As I already said: there is no reason to believe that the authors were interested to favour the Serbians. The map shows the point of view of the year 1869. Look e.g. the division line between the Serbians and the Bulgarians: the Torlak area was regarded to be Bulgarian on that time. So, what now? Concerning the Vlachs, a source would be good.--Olahus (talk) 13:57, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

The map is, quite simply, inaccurate, and paints a misleading picture of the ethnic distribution of various Slavic peoples. "There is no reason to believe that the authors were interested to favour the Serbs", I agree, but that fact does not make the map accurate. The KROATEN and SERBEN labels are completely misplaced and lead to wrong conclusions about the ethnic composition of the area. What's more, the placement of the labels unfortunately corresponds with the approximate borders of a "Greater Serbia", which is why this map will be unacceptable to anyone more acquainted with the actual (historic) situation in the Balkans. The Serbian and Croatian national identities are extremely similar, but they still differ. A map is either correct or incorrect. We cannot simply say "close enough" and leave it at that. --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 14:18, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Concerning the suspicion that the map would correspond with the approximate borders of a "Greater Serbia", please read what I wrote above about the Serbian-Bulgarian dividing line. I really doubt that this map could represent the ideal of a Greater Serbia.--Olahus (talk) 16:36, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Would it be the part you said "So, what now?" ? If so, the answer would be: nothing, we leave 19th century nonsense behind, as the most of the Slavic peoples covered by the label "Serben" where never exclusively Serbs, and they certainly did not declare themselves as such in 1869. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 16:01, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

I would agree that the map may incite some of our less informed readers to jump to conclusions. Of interest however, this is not the only map to depict the area settled by Serbs to be larger than that of Croats . Hxseek (talk) 07:00, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

Pardon my observation, but it seems to be Ivan rather than Olahus who is intent on rewriting history by trying to make ideas in the 19th centurt fit today's reality. I haven't yet seen any argument here, apart from Croatian nationalism, to support deleting the map. JdeJ (talk) 10:23, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

A map is weird, at least. It definitely doesn't reflect real distribution of the ethnic groups. BTW we don't need Sherlock Holmes to confirm this: Ethnonyms "Slovenen", "Kroaten", "Serben" and "Bulgaren" were added later to the map. These graphies are bold, written in different font and what is the funniest of all, written above or next to the original ones. If you take a better look there's small "Kroaten" in the western Bosnia where "E" of newer Serben is. Exactly where it should be placed if the map was made in the 19th century - Croatia or Croats should be written in the central area between Slavonia and Dalmatia (Lika, Gacka, Gorski Kotar and western Bosnia) and not near Zagreb - which more corresponds to the idea of the Greater Serbia missionaries that Croatia was only around Zagreb (!?!). There's also smaller original Serben (or Serbia?) where Serbia should be, but not in Bosnia part of the map. There's also smaller original Bulgaren, a little bit northern of the new bold "Bulgaren" in the map. This is fake map, obviously proccessed by some "Greater Serbia" supporter. Nothing new, we're almost used to it. Olahus you are uploader of this image. Can you provide partial scans of the map? Where this map is archieved? From where it's taken? Obviously this is not original, it's completely unacceptable and should be removed. Zenanarh (talk) 12:05, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't know what more "arguments" do you need beside facts. Area covered by "Serben" label was, according to any other historical source other than 19th century Greater Serbian propaganda, not composed of "ethnical Serbs". Olahus' claim that "there was no Bosniak ethnicity" looks like an outburst of a first-class Serbian nationalist myth, according to which Bosniaks (Bosnian Muslims, term being used retroactively) are some "threcarous Serbs who converted to Islam and betrayed the faith of their forefathers" that and fueled the 1990s wars propaganda. By the end of the 19th century terms Croat and Serb became basically synonymous with Catholic and Orthodox, but this was not so in the past. Unfortunately Bosniaks came to be acknowledged very late by the Communists, due to some narod : narodnost and the "right to self-declaration" issues, but that doesn't mean that they "didn't exist". There is no other way but to project modern concepts of nationality and ethnicity to the past period, as everything else (notably maps from that period NOT being based on censi data but drawn by German "ethnoarchaeologists") would be POV and politically incorrect. Therefore, modern map depicting the ethnical distribution from that period from a verifiable source would be much more appropriate, if it's necessary at all for this article. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 15:55, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

[8] - what is this Olahus, you're putting back the controversial map while the discussion is still ongoing? You don't own this article. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 12:48, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Irrespective of its accuracy , or lack thereof, we need to ask what the inclusion of such a map adds to the article. Will including it improve the contents of the page, or address something which has been left out ? Hxseek (talk) 02:44, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Shouldn't it be 'people' not 'peoples'??

AD —Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.123.210.103 (talk) 13:57, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

No, a fundamental point of the article is to explain the origins of the many different Slavic groups (peoples). An article entitled "Slavic people" would only be able to comment on the generalised origins and common features of the Slavic race as a whole, and not on the subsequent divergences and differentiating characteristics of groups from the common stock. -- Timberframe (talk) 14:49, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Map on Ethno-cultural subdivisions

The map

is completely inaccurate and it only presents a serious threat that somebody could see it and put it in some sort of scientific work which would then present nothing more serious than Shrek. There isn't Serbo-Croatian language or Serbo-Croatian languages. Following that logic we could then make Italian-Portuguese languages, Russian-Macedonian languages, Dutch-German languages and a million more crap like this. What really exists is Croatian, Serbian, Bosniak and Montenegrin language. That is clearly written in constitutions of these republics and only in Wikipedia 18 years after dissolution of Yugoslavia it and its preposterous ideas are alive and well. Every native speaker of these languages knows when somebody speaks another language of your virtual Serbo-Croatian group. The difference is not so obvious to you foreigners but I as a native speaker of Croatian language can tell. If I wanted to translate one page of Croatian text to Serbian i would have to change the whole text, its syntax, words, grammar and god knows what else. I could do it because I was alive when Croats yet had the opportunity to read more Serbian texts but I am not sure that an eighteen year Croat could. In fact, he certainly could not and the same goes for Serbs. Serbo-Croatian tried to unify that differences in one artificial language due to purely political reasons but that failed because nobody in Croatia wanted to talk Serbian and vice versa. The politicians were living in their fantasies and ordinary folk continued to talk like they always talked - in Serbia Serbian, in Croatia Croatian, in Montenegro Montenegrin and to be honest in Bosnia Serbs, Bosniaks and Croats were so mixed that there really existed something like Serbo-Croatian. Today that is changed. With the dissolution of Yugoslavia there was no more political pressure to live in fairy tales and its peoples could finally make their languages official. That is the situation today, only in Bosnia that difference goes by ethnic lines. Because I am a Croat I really don't care what will you do with Serbian, Bosniak and Montenegrin but Croats speak Croatian and this map

is at least more accurate than the one on top of the text. So I will change it back and if somebody still lives in myths I suggest reading these articles - Croatian language, Differences between standard Croatian, Serbian and Bosnian and especially FOLIA CROATICA-CANADIANA: A study on various aspects of Croatian language history. A 243 pages long document in PDF format. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sulejman (talk • contribs) 21:32, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Hi Suleman, thanks for explaining. I completely understand, and accept, your concern to differentiate between Serbian and Croatian, the distinction seems just as valid as that between Czech and Slovak (which were also formerly combined into an artificial construct for geo-political rather than linguistic purposes). My concern with your version of the map is that it makes a number of other changes which need to be validated, such as the purging of slavic language pockets from Hungary and Romania, the purging on non-Bulgarian languages from Bulgaria, the purging of Ukrainian from bordering regions of Russia, the expansion of Slovenian deep into Austria and the expansion of Rusian and Ukrainian into Moldova. Before we accept these changes into the article we should be able to demonstrate that they are verifiable. As a compromise and a step in the right direction, why not modify the original map to dinguish the Serbian and Croation languages while we debate the other changes? -- Timberframe (talk) 08:55, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

It is not my map and I think it is not made to be so precise, I see it more like just a rough sketch so that one can see what is the situation. If somebody wants to be detailed I suggest making a completely new map. There aren't Serbian and Croatian languages, there is just one Croatian and one Serbian language. That border goes by ethnic lines because every nation has cleaned its language from foreign influences and is now making language according to own cultural heritage. So, Croats recroatized they language by returning older forbidden Croatian words and by making new ones for the new stuff like laptop, hardware, mobile phone and others. Serbs lean on their language heritage from Republika Srpska, Vojvodina, Beograd and Central Serbia and that is foreign to Croatia like Poland. So:

Serbian language infuences - Montenegro, Bosniaks, and Serbs in Bosnia

Croatian language infuences - Croatia, Croats in Bosnia, Burgenland Croats and Molise Croats

Boniaks don't know what they want, their language is serbianized Serbo-Croatian with many turkish loanwords and Montenegrin, when standardized, will be as far from Serbian almost like Slovenian language. Sulejman (talk) 11:03, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

The distinction between Croatian and Serbian is much smaller than that between Slovak and Czech. The languages are well-nigh identical and completely mutually-intelligible. As I've often found myself pointing out, the differences between various dialects within Croatian, for example, are far more significant than those between standard Serbian and standard Croatian (Kajkavian and Chakavian are not mutually-intelligible), while these are "independent languages". The primary reason for a modern-day separation of these languages is plainly political (not linguistic) and brought upon by the recent Yugoslav wars. While on the scale of the Balkans the differences between Croatian (1), Serbian (2), Bosnian (3), and Montenegrin (4!) languages may appear significant (all of which are practically identical), I see no reason to make the distinction on large scale considerations. --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 09:16, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

DIREKTOR, this map is not about the distinctions in standard languages, which represent idealized codified norm which is propagated by the media and in which people are schooled; it's a map of spoken language, and large percentage of Croats doesn't actually speak Ijekavian Neoštokavian as their mother tongue [even though they often think they do]. Moreover, it's ridiculous to include Čakavian, Kajkavian and Torlakian as belonging to some alleged "Serbo-Croatian" group, making a clear-cut line between e.g. Slovenian and Croatian border, where there is a dialect continuum between Kajkavian and Slovenian speeches. This "SC" is not a genetic grouping of dialects: all West South Slavic dialects are.

The fact that Serbs and Croats chose the same dialect (moreover the same subdialect of the Štokavian narječje) as a basis for their standard (literary) language is an outcome of conjunctions of different and various historical circumstances, and is completely orthogonal to this issue. Same is valid for this newly-invented "languages" ("Bosnian" by Dayton accord and "Montenegrin" which is yet to be properly codified..): "Bosnian" is not the "language of B&H", but a codified standard of Bosnian Muslims, Bosniaks [why it's called "Bosnian" and not "Bosniak", is a long story]. Bosnian Croats speak Croatian, Bosnian Serbs speak Serbian, and both of them would prevalently claim affiliation with Croatian/Serbian cultural and language milieu. The fact that Serbs, Croats and Bosniaks share one specific subdialect of Štokavian [which happens to be base the respective standard languages] is hardly enough to legitimize the political construct called "Serbo-Croatian", which even in Yugoslavia was not so uniform being codified in two "variants" (which were to be called "Serbo-Croatian" and "Croato-Serbian" under the penalty of imprisonment and censorship). Not to mention that the very usage of term "SC" gives lots of people creeps and is potentially insulting. I fully support Sulejman's edit, but per Timberframe's guideline of not committing the other changes to the map. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 09:42, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

the differences between various dialects within Croatian, for example, are far more significant than those between standard Serbian and standard Croatian (Kajkavian and Chakavian are not mutually-intelligible). DIR it's not really true. The main difference between various dialects within Croatian are non-Slavic words collected by different dialect speakers. So Chakavian dialect collected a large amount of Dalmatian Language words (jarbol, gusterna, girica (gira), gripa / Gripe - a quarter of Split, kapula, macaklin, garma,...) and in later periods some words of Venetian language, while Kajkavian dialect speakers collected a large amount of Germanic or Hungarian language root words. But in the same time the main part of the Slavic root words in these 2 dialects came from the same proto-Slavic idiom/dialect. Observe some examples between Chakavian Croatian and Kajkavian Slovenian in comparison to standardized Stokavian Croatian: west - Cha: zahod, Kaj: zahod, Sto: zapad ("I'm going to the west" in local Chakavian spoken on an island 4 nautical miles southern of your home city Split, one "seen from the ponistra" it is "Gren va zahod sunca"! In Slo Kaj: "Grem v zahod" or "Grem proti zahodu", in Stokavian: "Idem na zapad"); bed - Cha: posteja, Kaj: postelja, Sto: krevet; flour - Cha: muka, Kaj: moka, Sto: brašno; fire - Cha: oganj, Kaj: oganj, Sto: vatra;... There are differencies between Slovenian and Croatian Kajkavian, in Croatian Kajkavian there is certain influence of Scakavian Ikavian (dialect of Croatian spoken previously mainly in B&H and some central parts of Croatia) and Stokavian. In the beginning Kajkavians settled not only the western Alps, but also all Slavonia. They were pushed to the west by the Ikavians and Stokavians. BTW Scakavian Ikavians originated to the west of "Jekavian border" as a mixture of the earlier Slavic settlers Chakavians and later Stokavians.

Standardized Croatian in the most cases comprises Slavic words from all Croatian dialects, while Serbian has only Stokavian, all other are "loans from the western (non-Serb) dialects"

It's all much more complex than what you often find yourself to point out and if you would extract and compare only original Slavic root words from Chakavian and Kajkavian you would have completely the same West South Slavic idiom, different from the one which was a basis for Serbian language - East South Slavic. These two proto-South Slavic idioms neither technically neither ethnogenetically are mutually familiar. Zenanarh (talk) 12:08, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

Haven't we already decided that 'South Slavic' languages are a dialectic continuum, beter classified into Ikavian, Chakavian , Stokavian , etc rather than 'Bosnian', 'Serbian', 'mid-north coast Herzegovinian', etc, etc ? Hxseek (talk) 22:01, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

How exactly is this relevant? Croatian and Serbian are different in all three discussable levels: 1) standardological (obviously) 2) dialectal (Čakavian and Kajkavian are not Serbian) 3) historic-cultural (completely separate literature traditions throughout history). BTW, the so-called "dialect continuum" has been "broken" since migrations in the 16th century onwards caused by Ottoman invasions, and also in the 1990s due to the war. Take a look at any map of dialects that encompasses Croatia and B&H, and see what a mess it is. 600 Years ago, it was quite different though. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 23:06, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Genetic - again

IP 83.77.135.167 deleted a section on genetics including references, commenting in the edit summary "tons of bs. that "New Study" is really amazing, oh my god". Sorry, 83.77.135.167, but that's just your opinion so on its own it's WP:OR and WP:POV and not a good enough reason to delete referenced (and therefore verifiable) material from the article. If you want to dispute the accuracy of the referenced material then a better way to do so is to find other reliable sources which challenge it and include a reference to those as well. In this way the reader has access to both sides of the argument instead of being denied knowledge of either side because you consider it "bs."

Regarding your previous deletion, with the comment "absolutely irrelevant and possibly wrong information. also, the abstract doesn't mention who are the 2 south slavic nations that are similar to the western and eastern slavs", much the same thing applies. The info is certainly relevant because it concerns the subject of the article. Whether it's right or wrong is not for you to say, provided it accurately reflects the content of the referenced material. If it doesn't then you can justify editing or challenging specific points, in this case by deleting the mention of Croats and Slovenes or adding a {{fact}} tag after it, but deleting the whole passage is a step too far without showing that the ref itself is considered unreliable by authoritative sources. -- Timberframe (talk) 18:16, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

The conclusion of the study actually dealing with the problem of Slavic Urheimat might as well be incorporated in the section on Slavic homeland problem: Results of the interpopulation Y-STR haplotype analysis exclude a significant contribution of ancient tribes inhabiting present-day Poland to the gene pool of Eastern and Southern Slavs, and suggest that the Slavic expansion started from present-day Ukraine, thus supporting the hypothesis that places the earliest known homeland of Slavs in the basin of the middle Dnieper. So Middle Ukraine = Slavic Urheimat = PIE Urhemait. This is the only theory supported by both genetic and linguistic evidence. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 19:09, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

I question whether we should use this study as the only reference for genetics. The intro states that, genetically speaking, slavs are seperated into 2 groups - the 2 South Slavic groups, vs 'the rest' . This is the only study which suggests such as categorization. Secondly, we only have an abstract of the study.

Other studies have found that eastern Europeans (including non-Slavic Romanians and hungarians) cluster together, due to the pattern of settlement and migration in pre-history, nothing to do with "Slavicness". Eg Seminos' famous paper in 2000. Pericic pointed out that rather than the two south slavic populations, northern Russians are 'unique' in the fact that they are the only Slavs who carry Haplogroup N3.

I think we need to update the genetics section with a more widely referenced approach

In fact, the entire article need an update. The whole "mass migrations" theory has been questioned.

Hxseek (talk) 01:29, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

You can access the article only from an academic institution IP range. Enable e-mail on your Preferences and I'll send it to you ^_^ --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 14:58, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Another thing, quoting "To our knowledge, this is the first report on the use of genetic markers in solving the question of the localisation of the Slavic homeland." - if this is true, this paper is very important indeed. Perhaps a separate article, [[Proto-Slavic Urheimat hypotheses]], similar to [[Proto-Indo-European Urheimat hypotheses]], dealing synthetically with archaeological, genetic and linguistic perspectives on various theories of the Slavic Urheimat should be more appropriate? So far the lots of content has been dispersed throughout several articles, with not enough "big picture" perspective. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 15:06, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

OK. Please send it over. I have been doing some research about origin theories, I think the section definitely needs elaboration. However, the issue is complex, because the question of the proto-Slavic linguistic urmeheit may be a rather different one to the genesis of the historical entities known as Sclavenes and Antes. Hxseek (talk) 02:39, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Those are the names applied in the late historical period after Slavs make their first appearance in written history. Before that, there was at least a millenia and a half long period during which Slavic-speaking community was confined to a certain geographical area, and the Slavic speech evolved. That area is the real Urheimat (both linguistic, geographical and genetic). What happened at the Danube limes and after the expansion is entirely different story.. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 12:41, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, that's the traditional theory. Others exist which we chould introduce to the article. I;m working on a draft now. Hxseek (talk) 01:54, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Ivan, send it to me too. I'm very interested. Hxseek and me had a very long discussion about it. Zenanarh (talk) 18:40, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

This is nice paper [9]. It contains a lot of data and some about Slavic people. Zenanarh (talk) 22:54, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

You mean the part on Asian nomadic mtDNA influence on Slavs ? Hxseek (talk) 08:13, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Rurikids and general update to Rus in Migrations section

|I feel that adding "Finnic peoples" as influencing the Rus state is correct according to research which states Rurik being of Finno-Ugric origin. I will direct you here for my citation: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rurik

EDIT: the above comment was mine.| CormanoSanchez (talk)

|I am not completely convinced either way by the above Rurikid study and I am aware it is still contentious, but I assume at this point my edit stands? Would anyone be willing to clarify or dispute it?| CormanoSanchez (talk)

Ethnogenesis and formation of tribal identities

|When in history could it be most accurately described as the period when "proto-slavs" began forming different tribal identities? Did the Goths encounter only "proto-slavs", people calling themselves slovjane or some other variant, or where there already divisions in this similar to the dividing of the Germanic peoples (hence the Goths)?

I know that there were West Slavic tribes in the period where Goths moved through the Baltic regions, but what about earlier?

More simply put, by the time the proto-slavs started expanding and meeting other peoples, did they have different tribal names or where they still all grouped under the general identity of Slav?

I feel that this topic in particular should be clarified in the article, if possible.| CormanoSanchez (talk) 01:56, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

It's hard to tell. Depends on which source you read. For example, Forin Curta beleives that the emergence of 'Slavic tribes' - in terms of societies which embody a collective interest and a sense of identity only emerged in the Danube basin, upon their contacts with the Roman world. The Sclavenes were one ethnie beyond the Danube, amongst others. They preferentially spoke what we now call Slavic, thus this name Slav/ Sclavus was therefore also used to refer to all other tribes which came to speak slavic. However, the language was named after that Sclavene tribe, and the origin of the language is different and pre-dates the political appearance of the Sclavenes. The two are not inherentally linked, but is an historical coincidence- it just so happened that Slavic became the lingua franca of the new cultural/ political conditions in eastern Europe at the time.

Older views, for example Soviet-era Slavists, beleived that all Slavs emerged from one tribe and spread out in a mass migration. Their theory states that from the common Slavic Prague culture emerged the Antes in 300 Ad, then the Scalvenes in 400 AD, roughly. From these supra-tribal entities, offshoots formed all the individual tribes after 500 and 600 AD. There are few Slavic tribes which have the same name in East, South and/or West Slavic areas - eg Croats, Serbs, Severians, Moravians. Some beleive this indicates a common indentity which was already established in the 'homeland. Others do not agree and beleive it's is just how the Byzantines named them.

Hxseek (talk) 01:12, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

Topics from 2009

Update

This article needs an update reagrding the "origins" and "migrations" sections Hxseek (talk) 00:09, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

PCT

moved from above section #"Origins and Slavic homeland debate" section problems Balkan Fever 03:28, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

what this is this section about

the questionable by some sentence is here:

4 Tributary of Danube postulated by Oleg Trubachyov supported by Mario Alinei in his PCT, who extend Trubachyov time-frame < ref >author: Alinei, Mario, title: Interdisciplinary and linguistic evidence for Palaeolithic continuity of Indo-European, Uralic and Altaic populations in Eurasia, with an excursus on Slavic ethnogenesis; pdf< /ref >. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.15.124.2 (talk) 09:45, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

I see that the right of the PCT theory to be mentioned is once more in dispute. I have re-instated it because it seems entirely approrpriate to mention it in the existing context which mentions a number of theories under the heading of "Homeland debate" and introductory words "The location of the speakers of pre-Proto-Slavic and Proto-Slavic is subject to considerable debate... The proposed frameworks are:...". That debate exists is in itself a noteable and documented fact that can and should be highlighted in an encyclopedic survey of the subject. We're not going to have a balanced article if some editors deny readers the opportunity to know about some of the theories simply because, in their opinion, they are fringe or "brain-damaged" (I'm quoting from Ivan Štambuk's edit summary.) As for it's mention being WP:undue - it's the only mention in the article; is the PCT theory so absurd that any mention of its existence gives it undue weight? I contend that censoring mebtion of it is ppoint-of-view pushing and gives undue weight to competing theories. If editors want to explore the relative merits of the various theories this should be done, possibly in a separate article, on the basis of citing reviews which meet Wikipedia's criteria. -- Timberframe (talk) 10:06, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Are you insane? No one advocates or supports PCT today beside this closely-grouped coterie of (pseudo-)scholars. In fact, most of the common handbooks completely ignore it as it is fringy OR piece of rubbish. is the PCT theory so absurd that any mention of its existence gives it undue weight - yes it is, as it radically conflicts wall the other theories (in time-frames of about 2-5 millenia). Moreover, Trubačev's account on Slavic homeland problem has abs. nothing to do with PCT, and he is mentioned there just as "hook" to insert this PCT gibberish. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 15:16, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Am I insane? No. Nor am I an expert (or anything approaching) on the subject; think of me as a neutral reader looking for compliance with Wikipedia's policies. I'll look into the relevance of the Trubačev ref to the PCT. Meanwhile, can you provide refs to show that PCT is rejected by neutral respected authorities on the subject, and that your statements above are more than your personal WP:POV? I'm afraid that this subject is badly tainted by what you aptly describe a pseudo-scholarship from many sides, and while I assume good faith your language suggests more than a little bad faith which makes it hard for me to regard you as entirely neutral. -- Timberframe (talk) 18:51, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Meanwhile, can you provide refs to show that PCT is rejected by neutral respected authorities on the subject - No I can't, because PCT is so absurd and fringy that no respected authority gives enough damn about it to publish papers refuting it (at least I haven't found any non-PCT-endorsing linguist that takes it into account, and of PCT coterie only 1 is linguist AFAIK). PCT is formed in a way that it pleases various hardline and supremacist nationalist and supra-nationalist sentiments, telling e.g. that Germanic-, Romance- and Slavic-speakers and cultures are thousands of years older than what is usually taught at schools, and that they're "native" to the regions where they're spoken nowadays, so one can speak of Germanic, Slavic or Romance dialects/languages in the 4th or 3rd millennium BCE, which is absurd. Give some thought to the PCT, try realizing where it fits in the general scheme of things, and I can assure you that you'll develop pretty much the same amount of disgust and contempt towards IP-address insertions of PCT into various articles linking to one particular website.

As for Trubačev - he has no involvement with PCT at all AFAIK, his own theories and conclusions on Proto-Slavs and their relationship with "Illyrians" in prehistoric period and also fringy inconclusive BS.. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 00:37, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

[10] At least one member of United States National Academy of Sciences support this theory but Ivan Štambuk accusing them as anybody who can think of brain damage.

So what? The 99.999% of the rest of scholars completely ignores it. We cannot just present it as some kind of "alternative view" to theories that have been advanced for centuries by hundreds of scholars. I've read papers by people with Ph.D. in physics on topics such as aliens, hydrino, creationism... The prominence of the theory does not stem from the credentials of the individual authors advocating them, but from the acceptance of the theory itself by the scientific community as a whole. Stop vandalising the article. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 06:15, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

1. You should ignore to if you have nothing scholarly to say. Perhaps you wrote about it, its quite interesting for humanity subject, did you ? If so show please show links to your publication. But reading your post here it so likely the otherwise valid question appear to be rhetorical.

2. If nobody opposing a scholarly XYZ theory there nobody have a disagrement with XYZ theory. Certainly those who have sound objections and do not wrote about it can hardly belongs to scholarly community. Or perhaps the objections will be easily refuted so nobody want to object to it to be just refuted. There is also 'theoreticaly' possible hypothetical situation when scholarly freedom is somehow squeezed and some subjects are labeled as to risky to ruin carers. But such hypothetical terror it today very unlikely. Most probably PCT thesis are sound, there is a group of scholar working in PCT framework and other silent (perhaps) do not have for now nothing in the subject to say. Can you grab that simple conjecture?

3. For your stupi-stipulated over the counter examples show me members of United States National Academy of Sciences who seriously work on that! 24.15.124.2 (talk) 08:01, 21 February 2009 (UTC) ps: chcking one of the links you brought into your words we ma see quite remarkable difference explanation of CQM and hydrinos has met with criticism in the literature[4] and is not generally accepted... but you hoping to put on that PCT is criticized because nobody criticize it - if so - that's just plain antisemantism.

1) My opinions are irrelevant, it's what renowned and established scholars think about PCT. In this case - nothing (as they don't care). I'm merely acting as a policy-enforcing channel (see WP:FRINGE, WP:UNDUE, WP:OR) of general scholarly opinion. I could mediate to you my personal cogitations on the subject, but I see no point in doing so. Standard handbooks on Slavic ethno- and linguogenesis completely ignore PCT, and so should Wikipedia.

2) If nobody opposing a scholarly XYZ theory there nobody have a disagrement with XYZ theory. - that is a fallacious conclusion. In this case, nobody opposes (generally) because nobody's heard of PCT, or thought of it as having scientific prominence that would justify thorough criticism in scholarly publications. I mean, people don't write papers on "Earth is not flat" type of theories. Once again, it's irrelevant whether their is group of pseudo-scholars working on the "PCT framework" - if their work is not established and accepted in the scientific community as a whole, it cannot be mentioned per WP:UNDUE, regardless of how "truthful" their theories are. There are hundreds of PCT-style theories nobody's heard of, why should PCT be different?

3) the example of hydrinos, aliens etc. was merely to illustrate the point that credentials of the person propounding a particular theory are not enough of the argument to support the theory itself. It's non quis, sed quid. And hydrino is actually waaay above PCT (they're received criticism!) by that measure. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 09:55, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Don't say nobody, you just talking about yourself. Who you are ?

Ivan Š.: The 99.999% of the restof the rest of scholars completely ignores it.

24.: the numerical value is certainly incorrect. NAS has only about 2000 members. So one if only one 2000 you can just range in 1/2 of 99.9. Given that te group of 2000 conduct research in all divergent fields of research only few (IŠ is due to check it and correct his false statement, if he want to continue pretend to be honest here) do research in prehistory. So the value may be even 0 50 70 but never even close to 99% you cant show us 200 prehistorians in NAS. This is called overestimation if insane or lie if intended. So what you will prefer to put as motive for your such 1000 times incorrect value? Or perhaps just talking about all scholars? If so - show us the (complement of 0.999 99 =1 000 000) enumerating million Such huge group of scholarly prehistorian who in 21 century published (in just one monograph) 2000 pages on European prehistory and who supposedly like to ignore considerations of colleges, working in framework of continuity ? 24.15.124.2 (talk)

<cynicism>Yeah, sorry, it should've been "99.99%" percent, not "99.999%"..</cynicism> --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 12:11, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

It may be worth to look for 'Ivan independent' calculation google scholar deliver quite different numbers. Who want to compare the result should know that this is not a molecular biology where citations are numbered in hundreds or hundreds of thousands, because scholars involved in paleolinguistics subject was just few dozens in the world, (living less) and they work on all branches of human languages.

Clicking on the first two links [11] [12] shows indeed that these "massive" citations (of the 2 most important CPT works) are almost all self-referential..LOL What exactly are you trying to "prove", except that no one cares about PCT ? --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 12:08, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

I want to prove that you can recognize high hundred thousands high school teacher from unique scholars. You claim taht comon handbooks do not reprint yet 2000 pages book di dellea continuita

but i see in few minutes : C DIALETTALI ,B di FRANCESCO, Carlo Severi, Franco Cavazza GABRIELE COSTA, X Ballester, Matteo Meschiari, V Della Valle, BRUNO LUISELLI, P Trifone, Jean Chiorboli, L Serianni ,L RENZI,G Sanaa, IX Adiego, C Tugnoli, Ottavio Lurati, X Ballester, Salvatore Claudio Sgroi, Rita Caprini, Giovanni Di Pasquale, JESÚS SANCHIS CALABUIG, Alfio Lanaia,

EOI de Alzira.

Look at paleolinguistics and point out how many listed there scholars schould cite greatest work on paleolinguistics. Tray to abstract for moment and check what languages they works and check also if are able to wrote after 2003. Do not list the h+m.

You wrote that 'common handbooks ignore PCT' -it seem that you mistaken high school teachers with paleolinguistic scholars. Do not forget that in continuitas work group web there is much more references . 24.15.124.2 (talk) 13:39, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

you should also find them.

Linguist Mario Alinei - University of Utrecht.
Linguist Xaverio Ballester - Universidad de Valencia.
Philologist Francesco Benozzo - Universit di Bologna.
Linguist Franco Cavazza - Università di Bologna.
Linguist Michel Contini - Università Stendhal de Grenoble.
Linguist Gabriele Costa - Università del Molise.
Linguist Philippe Dalbera - Università de Nice.
Historian Paolo Galloni - Edizioni Viella, Roma.
Anthropologist Henry Harpending - University of Utah - Salt Lake C.
Prehistorian Alexander Hausler - Universitat Halle/Saale.
Linguist Alfio Lanaia - Università di Catania.
Linguist Jean Le Dû - Università de Brest.
Anthropologist Matteo Meschiari - Università di Palermo.
Prehistorian Marcel Otte - Università de Liàge.

Blanked by some vishu-kisu or camouflaged as some far-or-closeer-ester admin who can't like you find name in paper to the extent that he want to link Uralic Continuity Theory to author developing Paleolithic Continuity Theory

that you mistaken high school teachers with paleolinguistic scholars - no you genious, I meant the standard university-level Slavic philology introductory texts, for English-speaking area that being Schenker's The Dawn of Slavic which discusses various stupid theories on Slavic homeland problem (a problem that is solved a long time ago, the results being confirmed by the latest genetic studies; the real problem remaining being various Slovene/Polish linguo-supremacists). Equivalent type-of handbooks in Russian and German also don't make any mention of PCT. Clear exemplar of fringy rubbish, and no matter how many names you copy/paste here, it won't change the fact that you simply cannot write NPOV article on PCT as the whole theory lacks critical reception from the scientific community. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 14:08, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Naked stupidity may be interesting but ... bay, bay. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.15.124.2 (talk) 15:16, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

I LOVE RAFI posted on the page

Under the Scenarios of Ethnogenesis section, there is a "I LOVE RAFI" posted. is this supposed to be here? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.149.150.106 (talk) 03:19, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Nope, it was part of a spate of vandalism. I've reverted the article to its state prior to the vandalism. Thanks for highlighting it; please feel free to fix any vandalism you come across if you're confident about doing so. -- Timberframe (talk) 09:45, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Slavs and Sclav

There is systematical misuse of false similarity between Slavic word "slav" and Latin word "sclav", what means slave. The English word "slave" itself is deceptive. It is obviously originated from Latin "sclav". Slavic word "slav" is relative to Slavic words "slovo" = word, "slava" = glory, and "sloboda" = freedom. Romans never studies Slavic languages, neither they ever conquered Slavic tribes. So the relation between "slav" and "sclav" is excluded. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.102.213.190 (talk) 20:16, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

WHAT ARE YOU AFRAID OF? Slav vs slave

People keep removing any mention of the theory that "Slav" derives from "slave". I know this theory is bonkers, but it is out there and we must not pretend otherwise! Free Dictionary states: <As far as the Slavs' own self-designation goes, its meaning is, understandably, better than "slave"> - so it implies that THE MEANING of Slav is "slave". Check up also this: http://boards.history.com/topic/History-Now/Slav-As-In/520037598 - it seems History Channel also believes that "Slav" COMES from "slave". That's why I believe that the way I put it in the article, i.e. that the name is supposed to derive from the alleged enslavement of the Slavic peoples, reflects the beliefs of some people - whether we like it or not. We can debate whether it can be rephrased in a better fashion, but we cannot ignore the fact that some people believe that. What are you afraid of? This is "alternative theory" section anyway! Dawidbernard (talk) 06:53, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

We are not afraid of anything. In Russian language major words like "Glory"(Slava)and "Word" (Slovo) comes from Slav. Actual word slave in russian is "Rab" which somewhat similar to word worker in Russian and doesn't sound like slave at all. What you are proposing is as stupid as saying that Jewish Rabbi comes from Russian Rab and so Jews were slave to Russian. Slav is not originated from Slave. Period. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.36.161.154 (talk) 13:11, 29 June 2009 (UTC)
Support per what Dawidbernard has said, provided that sources meet the requirements of WP:V and WP:RS; this should also satisfy WP:FRINGE. Proportionate weight should be given per WP:UNDUE, which a brief mention in a section dedicated to alternative theories would satisfy. -- Timberframe (talk) 08:27, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

PS I disagree with the title which takes a provocative and challenging tone while the CAPS imply shouting. It seems to demand that one chooses between Slav or Slave, with no middle or neutral ground. I understand that you may be frustrated, but concensual resolution rarely come about by shouting at people and demanding that they take polarised positions. That just creates an emotional context which clouds neutral thinking. Can you change it? -- Timberframe (talk) 08:34, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

This is not some "alternative theory", it's a misunderstanding by Dawidbernard. English word slave comes via Old French from Medieval Latin word Sclavus meaning "slave" (at the time of borrowing/descending), originally however meaning "Slav". Latin word Sclavus, as well as the Middle Greek Σκλάβος, are borrowed from Slavic self-ethnicon, which at the time of borrowing sounded as slaven- (in Early Proto-Slavic period), later changing to sloven- (/a/ turning /o/, following a general shift of quantitative oppositions to qualitative ones, and that is the form preserved in most Slavic languages today). The consonant cluster sl- is not allowed by Latin and Ancient Greek phonotaxis, so the prothetic /k/ was inserted turning the sl- into skl-. The evolution of meaning "Slav" to "slave" is secondary in Latin (from it spreading elsewhere). The original meaning of Slavic autonym itself, the ultimate source of both English words Slav and slave (obviously coming via different routes), is not 100% sure, but most probably is related to Common Slavic *slava and *slovo (6th-century Early Proto-Slavic *slāwā and *slawa) originally probably denoting "people who speak our tongue", and that is what the article currently states. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 21:54, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

The "slave" theory is commonly encountered and so I support its being mentioned, but Ivan's counter-argument, with suitable refs to support it, would make a good counter-balance alongside it. -- Timberframe (talk) 22:46, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

There is no "slave theory" when discussing the original meaning of the word for "Slav" in Slavic itself (i.e. the meaning of Slavic autonym slov-en-inъ) - the "slave" meaning evolved much later in Middle Latin/Romance, and that's what all the sources that Dawidbernard misunderstood actually say. English words Slav and slave are two different words with two different etymologies, the latter with well-motivated semantic shift originating in Latin (with Slavic-speakers becoming reservoir of slaves for soon-to-be-crushed-to-pieces Roman empire). --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 23:42, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

I concur. Its based on incorrect etymology and therefore need no inclusion. You would have to substantiate what "commonly encountered' means. Sounds like WP:Weasal Hxseek (talk) 10:59, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

In addition, whilst Slavs were sold as slaves, eg by nomads or Verangians, there is no reason to assume that they were more numerous than other groups in such circumstances. In fact, the opposite might be true, in that, Slavs were known for taking large nubers of prisoners, esp in their raids into the Balkans. Hxseek (talk) 01:20, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Evidence for Slav (Wend) settlement in East Anglia?

While there is historic evidence for alliances between the early Danish kingdom and Obotrite(Wend) tribes settled along the Baltic coast of NW Germany, I am sceptical about the statement that numbers of Slavs, as a constituent part of Sweyn's and Canute's army, were settled in East Anglia. For the Danish leaders it may not have been unusual to employ mercenary troops, and so I would not consider this theory totally implausible, On the other hand, I know of no primary source evidence to confirm this. The reference in the article to the transfer of Slavs to England as a constituent part of the Danish army and their later settlement in East Anglia therefore needs to be substantiated. At present the statement makes only a generalised assertion and reference to a secondary source. Geoff Powers (talk) 08:52, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Neutrality tag

Let's set the ball rolling. To judge by the edit summary for the diff at which the tag was added, the issue appears to be the map and its caption: "Countries with majority Slavic ethnicities and at least one Slavic national language". The edit summary makes the point that "Main map features Kosovo, which is predominantly Albanian not Slavic". In fact the map doesn't show Kosovo as a separate country, and that appears to be the root of the problem. If the map is amended to show Kosovo as a separate country then, by the criterion of the map and the assertion that the Kosovan population is predominantly not Slaavic, Kosovo should not be coloured. Alternatively, if the country borders are kept as the map shows, with Kosovo included within Serbia, then the Kosova population doesn't change the predominance of Slavic populations in Serbia-with-Kosovo. Anyone want to take up the arguments? -- Timberframe (talk) 19:40, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

My two cents: I would agree with the first logical conclusion suggested above; "If the map is amended to show Kosovo as a separate country then by the criterion of the map and the assertion that the Kosovan population is predominantly not Slavonic, Kosovo should not be colored". Indeed, old maps of Yugoslavia show Kosovo as distinctly marked out, along with Vojvodina, a province that does have a Slavic majority. Therefore, and even if we take the idea that Kosovo is still a province of Serbia, the "entity" would still not merit a place in an article, (or map for that matter) about Slavic peoples because it does not have a majority Slavic population. This explanation would also seem to also apply to the alternative approach "the Kosova population doesn't change the predominance of Slavic populations in Serbia-with-Kosovo." Interestedinfairness (talk) 21:58, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree. The issue, if I've understood the original concern correctly, comes down to whether Kosovo should be depicted as a country, since the map's caption states that it shows "countries". Since the world at large hasn't formed a consensus on that, I doubt we're going to do any better here. It may be that the only consensus we can come to is that the neutrality tag is a red herring because it relates to the statehood of Kosovo, a subject on which the article is silent and therefore doesn't have a point of view. -- Timberframe (talk) 23:25, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

This is a bit of a difficult one. The map shown is probably created by one of the users. It is a rough guide outlining the territories where the Slavic nations of today live. If one were to make a more detailed exploration, he'd add colour to surrounding areas where a Slavic population has been traditionally settled. This will encompass the entire areas adjacent to Slavic countries. In Europe, you have the Wends/Lusatians of Germany close to the borders with Poland and the Czech Republic. In Italy you have Slovenes, especially in and around Trieste. You also have isolated Molise Slavs, or Molise Croats, farther south. In Austria, again, you have Croats and Slovenes in Burgenland; traditional Slovenes in Carinthia locked out of Yugoslavia when their affiliates (now absent) voted to remain part of Austria after WWI; and there are some indigenous Slovaks there given Vienna's proximity to Bratislava. The name of Graz is Slavic in origin. Hungary has ethnic Slovenes, Croats, Serbs, Slovaks and Ukrainians. Romania has Croats, Serbs and Bulgarians; including the Krashovan community. Albania has pockets of Montenegrins, Serbs and Macedonians. Greece has Macedonians (or Slavs), Bulgarians and Pomaks. Turkey has both Pomaks and Bulgarians. The Baltic countries all have Ukrainian, Byelarussian and Polish minorities: Russians are infact very significant in urban towns in Estonia. The middle-eastern lands which broke from the Soviet Union in the early 1990s all have Russians, as do the Caucasian countries. But looking at it another way: within the Slavic lands, you have a vacuum across many areas and Kosovo is just a tiny example. Albanians form the same kind of majority in western Macedonia as they do in Kosovo. They also do this in two of the three municipalities for which they fought between 1999 and 2001: Preševo and Bujanovac. Hungarians are an absolute majority in many contiguous municipalities in Vojvodina, with Romanians in others. There are distinct Italian areas in Istria affecting Slovenia and Croatia, and other largely Albanian pockets within Montenegro. Hungarians also form a majority across wide parts of Slovakia whilst Germans still form majorities in small parts of Poland and the Czech Republic which can certainly be highlighted. But perhaps the best example of a country to have most of its territory if not its population with non-Slavic majorities is the Russian Federation. This is naturally because despite its vast size, the areas on the Asian side are extremely sparse. Even so, the federation has (I think) 83 federal units and the names of so many of them reflect the key nation to inhabit it. Take known lands such as Chechnya, Ingushetia, Dagestan and North Ossetia; every one non-Slavic. Farther on you have Astrakhan, and then Kalmykia; the latter is renouned for being the only European entity with a Buddist majority (the Kalmyks are related to the Mongols who settled there in the 17th century). One unit is the Jewish republic; Karelia bordering Finland is itself an enourmous land in which its population is linguistically and ethnically closer to the Finns than the Slavic peoples. But the thing to consider mainly with Kosovo is its constitution. I am now purely referring to the entity which declared its independence and is recognised across most of the west: it describes itself as a country with six equal constituent nations. For all their small numbers, they include: Serbs; Bosniaks; Gorani. The stars on the flag are purported to represent six nations. Serbian is (by definition of the ruling body) an equal language with Albanian, and it appears on the passport cover. In other words, the Kosovan government recognises the rights and equality of those six nations as Bosnia and Herzegovina does with Serbs, Croats and Bosniaks. All right, the Serbs haven't accepted this and there is no rotational government as such in Kosovo; and unlikey too given the small numbers. But Kosovan authorities are doing all they can to convince the outside world that the new country is not an Albanian dominated nation. Evlekis (talk) 00:44, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Or perhaps the problem is simply that the map is now out of date and could do with modifying, changing. It is misleading to insert a Neutrality tag on the opening space for the sake of Kosovo. It will make people think that the first paragraph is dubious which it is not; it also contains sources. Evlekis (talk) 01:22, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

If the second option is taken (ie that Kosovo is part of Serbia) then Slavic is a predominant language there given that Slavic is the predominant language of all of Serbia. 121.209.233.94 (talk) 15:16, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

You say "If one were to make a more detailed exploration..." and indeed there is such a map (Slavic languages.png) further down the article (albeit language-based, but it illustrates the point about enclaves). However the map in dispute clearly defines its resoltion to be at country level, so it can't be expected to depict enclaves. The majority of the population of Serbia - with or without Kosovo - is Slavic, so Serbia gets coloured. For me that's clear cut and there's nothing wrong with the map by its own definition, nor does the map's definition push a point of view regarding the constituent populations of Kosovo. The only possible POV regarding Kosovo that I can see is with regard to Kosovo's statehood and, as that question has not yet been resolved internationally, any depiction of that region could be disputed by someone. To err on the side of the status quo pending resolution follows well-established precedents, so I believe the map is as neutral on the point as it can be.

I propose we give the editor who inserted the tag a couple of days to respond to this discussion, after which we can remove the tag unless arguments in its favour are forthcoming and not resolved. -- Timberframe (talk) 06:57, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

For the time being, I am happy to keep the neutrality tag on top of the article as a token of the good faith you recommended in your summary. My own edits since I have been making contributions to this site may well have given some observers the impression that I am partial to certain sides in various conflicts. Whatever my own conscience may be, I try not to exert these things if I can help it; and Kosovo is a fine example of one land where-by I have no firm opinion myself about its status. To give a philosophical example: there is no neutrality in conflict. If I'd been pro-Kosovan independence such as Interestedinfairness, I would be outraged by the inclsuion of a map which ignores Kosovo's position. If I took the view supporting Serbian integrity then I'd be pleased to see the map honouring Serbia's angle. So neutrality is out of the question. Things are not helped by the fact that the map is out of date and it precedes Kosovo's unilateral declaration, in addition to the map being sketched by an editor and not downloaded from a site. I personally suggest a new map which would ouline Kosovo and perhaps fill it with a different shade and provide a footnote explaining its current situation. Evlekis (talk) 11:38, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

I've noticed that maps such as those exist all over the site, take this uploaded file concentrating on Vojvodina within Serbia: [13]. It may be sensible to use the Macedonia solution for these disputes. Macedonia, the country, is referred to by its full constitutional name Republic of on general articles, plainly as Macedonia on local articles/subjects close to home, and by its UN name of Former Yugoslav Republic of in anything concerning Greece/Greeks or for any official context where the country is represented as FYROM. This has worked years so far without any problems. Evlekis (talk) 04:50, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Actually, all that Macedonia stuff did have some problems, so the new, binding solution (as determined by the community, overseen by ARBCOM) can be found at WP:NCMAC. Perhaps it would be best not to follow the (old) Macedonia example... Balkan Fever 06:08, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

I think that while you both make good points in relation to articles dealing with areas such as Kosovo or Macedonia where international consensus is lacking regarding the status and naming of terretories, the conversation isn't really relevant to this article. The concern raised by Interestedinfairness in the edit summary accompanying the neutrality tag relates to the map's claim to depict "countries" while it does not depict the border of Kosovo (and therefore it depicts its population as Slavic along with the majority of Serbia). In other words, Interestedinfairness is concerned that this article does not recognise Kosovo as a country. I contend that it is of little significance to this article, in which the map serves only to give the reader a general geographic orientation, not a detailed geopolitical one.

As has been mentioned, any affirmation or denial of Kosovo's existence as an independent country would be non-neutral; this article remains neutral on the subject by not raising it at all. It seems to me to be an inappropriate use of this article and our time to try to force this article to take a decision on the statehood of Kosovo, a subject already being discussed at more approrpriate talk pages. In short, in the context of Interestedinfairness's other involvements, I regard the neutrality tag as disruptive forum shopping. My only reason for asking you to accept the tag for a few days is to allow IIF to defend it; removing the tag without having first had both sides of the discussion would only leave the door open for repeat tagging. -- Timberframe (talk) 11:20, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

To be honest, I didn't even see the caption under the image. My concern lies with the fact that "Kosovo" the entity/country/region/territory --- whatever you wish to call it --- is clearly a distinct area of land. This distinct area of land does not have a Slavic majority. Even if Kosovo did not declare its independence, it would still not merit a feature on the map. That's my contention, not whether Wikipedia "accepts" Kosovo's independence or not. Thanks, I await your comments.

Interestedinfairness (talk) 11:40, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Ok, but since you now recognise that the map depicts "countries" and not "distinct areas of land", you will understand that Kosovo does not feature on the map at all. Can we now remove the tag?

Otherwise, the solution you seek appears to be to remove the shading from that portion of Serbia (as depicted) which equates to Kosovo, but since the map resolves only to the level of countries, this is impractical and unnecessary unless Kosovo is first defined as a country. So unless you want to pursue the "Kosovo is a country" argument here, I don't see what you want to be done or why you think the map affects the article's neutrality. -- Timberframe (talk) 12:02, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

I feel the map should for now be removed. It does need to give the borders for Kosova and it definitely should NOT be marked any colour but pure white like the rest of them. A Slavic state it is not. We all know how it was first part of Yugoslavia then spent a few years under Serb hostile occupation and that that occupation ended and now the state is free. OK some serbs have remained from those who moved in after Milosevic annexed it but the character of the place is 100% Albanian, not like Russia. A Balanced View (talk) 12:16, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

It is a shame you are banned. One day, if you return with a new identity (as no doubt you will), perhaps you can blow your cover and write to me explaining exactly what you mean by "not like Russia." What does Russia have to do with anything? Evlekis (talk) 12:08, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Solution: the map (as is the case in the Serbia and Kosovo articles), should show Kosovo as distinct from Serbia. But if that does happen, will it still be right to show Kosovo "the region" as having a Slavic majority? Methinks not; I mean, off course Serbia is a country, but so is Kosovo (according to 62 nations), thus a compromise must be reached. (Interestedinfairness (talk) 12:19, 13 July 2009 (UTC)).

It's clear to me from your answers that however you word it, you placed the tag because you are not happy about a map which does not differentiate between Kosovo and Serbia-without-Kosovo. That's a subject that is way outside the scope of this article. I would suggest you take the argument elsewhere, but you're already doing that. Meanwhile, for the reasons I've already given above, I for one regard the tag as disruptive and unconstructive, and since only you and your puppet have objected I'm removing it, leaving you free to concentrate on fighting on more relevant pages. -- Timberframe (talk) 19:39, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

No consensus has been reached. Your opinion is no more valid than mine. I'll assume good faith this time but please do not throw around accusations against me in the future; sock puppet users have been identified here. I will reinstate the tag until other users comment and a consensus has been reached -- Interestedinfairness (talk) 22:17, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Get off the Reichstag please. No-one gives two hoots, the boundaries are not easily visible at the zoom level in the article, and it really would not matter that much even if they were. ninety:one 22:51, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

A multiple-blocked confirmed sock puppeteer is assuming good faith (while using a puppet to suggest they are not a lone voice). Hilarious. Go fight your case on the Kosovo page, it has nothing to do with this article. If and when consensus there is to redraw maps, then you are welcome to come back and make the same request. Meanwhile, the tag is inappropriate because the article is maintaining its neutrality by not commenting on the statehood of Kosovo. -- Timberframe (talk) 08:51, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Please stick to this article. The sock puppet case is finished as you well know, and now I'm assuming bad faith on your part. On Wikipedia, we have a duty to be accurate. The current map features Kosovo as a "part of Serbia". As we know however, Kosovo is considered "disputed". Thus, in the interest of accuracy and neutrality, Kosovo must be highlighted on the map; as is the case with the Kosovo and Serbia articles. Kosovo must be shown separate to continue this consistency, thus resulting in its non-relevance to this article. As was suggested above kosovo's statue " [is a] subject that is way outside the scope of this article." We are trying to reach a consensus, Wikipedia is not a democracy, and it certainly is not a dictatorship. So try and balance your argument and lets see what we can agree on. ---(Interestedinfairness (talk) 20:44, 14 July 2009 (UTC)).

Go away, re-draw the map, then come back. Until then, I can only assume that your Spiderman suit is staying on. ninety:one 20:49, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Archiving

Page is now c. 250K, would someone mind setting up an archive bot? ninety:one 22:54, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Retrofit talk-page year headers

04-Oct-09: I have added subheaders above as "Topics from 2006" (etc.) to emphasize the dates of topics in the talk-page. Older topics might still apply, but using the year headers helps to focus on more current issues as well. The topic-year boundaries were located by searching from bottom for the prior year#. Afterward, I dated/named unsigned comments and moved 1 entry (name "New genetic reference") into date order for 2008. At this time, the talk-page is ready for another archive-split. -Wikid77 (talk) 19:00, 4 October 2009 (UTC)