Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Noble Order of Saint George of Rougemont

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. This is a tough one. Some arguments brought forward are without merit: the quality of the nom is not important. Once nominated, we should address the question of notability, whatever the quality of the nom. Also, whether or not an article exists on another wiki is irrelevant either, unless that other article points to some sources that may help us here. That the organization has nothing done of note in the last 200 years is also irrelevant, as notability is not temporary. There are valid arguments for keeping and for deleting the current article. However, it appears that up to and including the period around the French Revolution, sufficient sources can be found (one of them a whole book, although I do not have the expertise to decide whether this is a reliable source). Whether or not the current incarnation of the order merits any mention in the article can be discussed on the talk page. Randykitty (talk) 16:51, 25 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Noble Order of Saint George of Rougemont (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)

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Procedural nomination for an IP editor. The rationale is

The article seems to discuss various similarly named organisations which may or may not have existed and which may or may not have any connection to each other. Reyk _YO! 21:36, 29 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete - The article's creator, seems to be a single purpose account. The user only ever edited that article, and chivalric orders, which they only edited to insert information on the article they created. This makes me think that the article was created by somebody connected to a modern self-styled order who was trying to give their group a veneer of legitimacy by connecting it to (fictional or historic) groups that were also named after St George. 79.97.226.247 (talk) 18:56, 30 December 2014 (UTC) Edited 79.97.226.247 (talk) 19:01, 31 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep – This order has a corresponding article in the French WP: fr:Ordre de Saint-Georges de Bourgogne. Unfortunately they can't be linked right now because they belong to different items at Wikidata. The items need to be merged and I don't know how to do that. There is also a discrepancy in the founding dates. The French WP says 1435, not 1390. Also everything from "From the French Revolution..." in the English article is missing in the French version (per nom, possibly because a present-day member wants to take it further). Anyway I think it was real and a valid topic for an article. The present-day connections can be checked separately without deleting the article. – Margin1522 (talk) 18:41, 31 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

There's so little useful information on the page, and so little indication (unconvincing assertions aside) what, if anything, connects any of these groups other than being named after St George, that even if it were to be kept it looks like a case of WP:BLOWITUP. 79.97.226.247 (talk) 11:49, 4 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of France-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 21:54, 1 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of History-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 21:54, 1 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Military-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 21:54, 1 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Organizations-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 21:54, 1 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete - Going by the article, this organization (if it actually exists as a contiguous entity, which is doubtful) has done nothing in 200 years, and is less notable than the Loyal Order of Water Buffaloes Lodge No. 26. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Раціональне анархіст (talk • contribs) 05:49, 5 January 2015
• Comment – From the French WP article and the sources in the article, I think we can probably say that the description is valid through the French Revolution. Of course, to be sure we'd have to read the books. The situation is murkier after that. Here is a page from www.heraldica.org on "Revived and Recently Created Orders of Chivalry", according to which this order died out in France around 1830, and was revived in the 1920s by a dubious individual in Italy, died out again, was condemned as a "false order" by the Holy See in 1953, and has been revived again more recently. So the first part of this article appears to be OK. We can decide later what to with the second part -- delete it, ask for more references, or handle it as a "bogus order", according to how other such cases have been handled. – Margin1522 (talk) 15:56, 5 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep -- The French WP article has existed since 2006. They obviously think it worth having. If the article has some unreliable content, that should have words of scepticism added, or be deleted from the article, or be tagged, as the circumstances may require. Hoiwever there is a core of material on the late medieval/early modern period, whcih shoudl clearly survive AFD. No doubt the conclusions of Margin1522 can be edited into the article (if they are not already there. Peterkingiron (talk) 14:18, 6 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I really don't think the corresponding French article is a reason to keep. The creator of that article's first edit was to an article [someone who was supposedly a member of the "order" as well.] Given that the page on the English wikipedia was also created in 2006, I don't think it's beyond the realm of possibility that both were created as part of a coordinated effort by the group at self-promotion. Particularly since website is available in two languages: French and English. 79.97.226.247 (talk) 00:10, 10 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete. As a matter of policy, the existance of an article on the same subject on the French WP isn't evidence of notability. Which thus leaves us with an article created by a single-purpose account, citing obscure untranslated foreign-language texts, with no inline referencing indicating what comes from where - or indeed whether particular material is actually supported by any of the sources cited at all. My (very limited) French, combined with Google translate [1], suggests that the French WP version is in a similar state - only citing less sources. It does at least begin with an equivocal "Selon certains historiens..." ("According to certain historians..."), which may imply more than it states outright. It is of course entirely possible that this Noble Order is of the historical significance claimed, and that the historical continuity implied is real - but I think we have to conclude that there isn't enough evidence presented for this to be verified without a level of research that is beyond what might be reasonably expected. If anyone wishes to do such research, and to write a new properly-cited version, that will of course be open to them. But for now, I can't see the justification for the present article as an encyclopaedic entry. There are just too many unanswered questions. AndyTheGrump (talk) 05:33, 13 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Comment – OK, the fact that a French article exists is not proof of notability. That's a valid policy argument against one reason for keeping it. But the reasons for the rest of the no !votes seem pretty flimsy. For example • WP:UNFAMILIAR. But we have many articles on orders of St. George (see Order of St. George (disambiguation)). That you an editor is unfamiliar with them is not an argument. • That it was created by an SPA. But policy says that's irrelevant (WP:INVOLVE). • That it lacks inline references. But general references are also allowed (WP:GENREF). • That the sources are offline. But according to WP:PAPERONLY that doesn't matter either. "If an editor seeking deletion believes the creator placed fictitious references in the article to make a hoax seem legitimate, the burden of proof is on the one seeking deletion. This will only occur with definitive proof or knowledge that these sources are really fictitious, and not based simply on a hunch." That's because of our basic policy of WP:AGF.

There is one online reference in the article, the Google Books paragraph in the German book, which in general confirms the story through 1715. There is also this book (see also Chapter 8 "Resurrecting a Dead Dodo") and the heraldica.org page that I cited. And our article on Self-styled orders. It seems to be that we plenty of tools for dealing with implicit claims of continuity. Unproven suspicions and lack of interest in medieval history are not valid reasons for deletion. – Margin1522 (talk) 18:24, 13 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Where did anyone mention a "lack of interest in medieval history?"79.97.226.247 (talk) 22:10, 13 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, I don't want to put words in anybody's mouth. But we are discussing deletion of an article on a medieval order. Instead of looks fishy and may or may not have existed, I think we should try to find out whether it did or not. For example, the author of the main book has an article on the French Wikipedia – fr:Éric Thiou. From the bibliography, he looks like a legitimate historian, so that is probably genuine. – Margin1522 (talk) 23:05, 13 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete: Lack of substantial coverage in multiple reliable independent secondary sources. Self-promotional OR based on dubious sources. Can't even tell if this group existed or exists in the real world at all, so probably safe in assuming that it doesn't. As the same goes for the article on French WP, it means nothing and adds nothing in terms of notability. It's pure drivel, and can be deleted in it's entirety. Nothing worth saving or merging. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 17:07, 14 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]
• Weak delete- the only question is whether this bogus order has value to the encyclopedia as an example of a prominent self-styled order. I would suggest we've already got enough articles on more prominent organizations of this type. Reyk _YO! 07:17, 15 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment – It's going on two weeks now and probably getting close to closing. I'd just like to remark once more that the !votes questioning the order's existence seem rather dubious, given that the article cites an entire book on its history. Look at it this way. If we did have an article on a medieval order, would we delete it in order to prevent a latter-day revival from inserting material about itself? No. But that is essentially what is being proposed here. – Margin1522 (talk) 04:24, 20 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep. As with many other "procedural" deletion nominations, the quality of the nomination is poor. There's no real justification for deletion provided in the nomination, there's no accountability offered by editor Reyk. These types of nominations shouldn't be allowed, IMHO. Keep per Peterkingiron and other discussion. --doncram 18:45, 21 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete - I can find next to no coverage of this topic in English language books, and as there seems no way of verifying the foreign language sources claimed in the article, this leads to believe it doesn't meet the WP:GNG requirements for "significant coverage" in independent reliable sources. Anotherclown (talk) 07:22, 25 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.