Talk:Origin hypotheses of the Serbs

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Origin hypotheses of the Serbs article.
This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic.
New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help.

Article policies

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Archives: 1

Serbia Mid‑importance

	Serbia portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Serbia, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Serbia on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.SerbiaWikipedia:WikiProject SerbiaTemplate:WikiProject SerbiaSerbia articles
Mid	This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.

History Mid‑importance

	History portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject History, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of the subject of History on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.HistoryWikipedia:WikiProject HistoryTemplate:WikiProject Historyhistory articles
Mid	This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.

Ethnic groups Mid‑importance

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Ethnic groups, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of articles relating to ethnic groups, nationalities, and other cultural identities on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Ethnic groupsWikipedia:WikiProject Ethnic groupsTemplate:WikiProject Ethnic groupsEthnic groups articles

Mid

This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.

WikiProject Ethnic groups open tasks:

Here are some open WikiProject Ethnic groups tasks:

Meta-tasks:
- Place the {{Ethnic groups}} template on the talk page of articles within the scope of this project.
- Resolve the disparity in importance rankings among different ethnic groups
Articles about ethnic groups that currently have issues needing resolution:
Start an article:
- Wikipedia:WikiProject Ethnic groups/Article requests

Feel free to edit this list or discuss these tasks.

Classical Greece and Rome Low‑importance

	This article is within the scope of WikiProject Classical Greece and Rome, a group of contributors interested in Wikipedia's articles on classics. If you would like to join the WikiProject or learn how to contribute, please see our project page. If you need assistance from a classicist, please see our talk page.Classical Greece and RomeWikipedia:WikiProject Classical Greece and RomeTemplate:WikiProject Classical Greece and RomeClassical Greece and Rome articles
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Middle Ages Low‑importance

	Middle Ages portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Middle Ages, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of the Middle Ages on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Middle AgesWikipedia:WikiProject Middle AgesTemplate:WikiProject Middle AgesMiddle Ages articles
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Greece: Byzantine Low‑importance

	Greece portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Greece, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Greece on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.GreeceWikipedia:WikiProject GreeceTemplate:WikiProject GreeceGreek articles
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.
	This article is supported by the Byzantine world task force.

2011 re-creation

User:PANONIAN: Per above and WP:BRD, it's your turn to discuss. --Joy [shallot] (talk) 10:50, 8 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I do not think that I wrote that whole article. I started it with description "Transfered here from History of Serbia" and, as far as I remember, I wrote only some parts of it. Now, I understand that we have a problem because citations were not properly added into text, but only into this list: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_the_Serbs#References However, what ever issues user:Ivan Štambuk might had with this article, the way in which he simply annihilated whole article is very wrong course of action: [1]. I just restored that article to its last version, but I do not have enough time now to work more on its content. Perhaps user:Ivan Štambuk (or any other user) can post "citation needed" tags to parts of this article that he considers POV, unsourced (or what ever) and then somebody (me or anybody else) could later add proper quotations. Note that I edited this article some 4 years ago and that I still did not examined all changes of other users in these 4 years. I am sure that article now also might have some parts that would be seen as POV or unsourced by myself. When I find time, I will see to improve this article a bit. PANONIAN 11:09, 8 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I don't quite see it that way, because a quick skim of the article history shows people had various issues with the stuff you left back in 2006:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Origin_of_the_Serbs&diff=62975951&oldid=62427201 {{fact}} tagging
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Origin_of_the_Serbs&diff=64651156&oldid=63592385 However taking the large distances into the account it is highly unlikely that today's Serbs have anything to do with that particular toponym.

In any case - the standalone article existed from 2005 to 2008, but it didn't exist other than as a redirect between 2008 and 2011, and only you noticed. Maybe there is no consensus that it is better to have a flawed article as opposed to no standalone article. We should probably call an {{rfc}}. --Joy [shallot] (talk) 11:39, 8 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I have no time to examine who exactly added which info article. Anyway, I am not in my home now (and all my books related to this subject are there). So, in next few days, I will examine my sources and I will see to quote what I can in this article. I think that I maybe also used data from some (now expired) web site and I am not sure is this data correct or not. Anyway, when I finish with my work in this article, you are free to delete all its parts that could not be quoted with reliable sources. However, there are several scientifically based theories about origin of the Serbs and I think that there should be an article that describes them. In fact, we can completely rewrote this article: it can contain first part where all early historical mentions of Serb name could be listed and second part where various theories and interpretations related to that could be provided. However, work on this article is not a small job and I would need some time to finish it. PANONIAN 16:05, 8 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

In the meantime, you significantly improved it - thanks. The article Name of the Serbs could also use this kind of help, there's much of the same synthesis over there, too. --Joy [shallot] (talk) 16:25, 11 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

You are right. I will see to improve that article too when I find time. PANONIAN 18:27, 13 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Massive PoV WP:FRINGE garbage

This article does not balance enough mainstream thought about the origin of the Serbs and, as Ivan pointed out, there's just plain crazy-talk in it.

Serbs from Mesopotamia? Serbs from Pakistan? Please.

Let's agree to remove the more outrageous theories (cited or not!) and try to give this article a more respectable face. HammerFilmFan (talk) 13:06, 26 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I have removed the section with the ridiculous Mesopotamian stuff. Can't believe it was on the page for so long-- embarrassing. --Calthinus (talk) 21:13, 21 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Studies on Serbs origin

Please help finding reliable, modern and mainstream studies on Serbs origin. The article has everything, from WP:OR to sourced claims, notable to fringe theories. I don't believe that Serbian Academy and many reliable historians (like Tibor Živković) did not research or mention Serbs origin.--Crovata (talk) 23:53, 25 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Will do, when time is available. You could help by tagging disputable entries.--Zoupan 01:38, 26 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Just to mention, I am not interested in editing the article, but as someone who speak Serbo-Croatian language, and managed to get Origin hypotheses of the Croats at a certain level, I just hope amateur readers won't fall anymore from the very start into endless research, often getting wrong information, which results with even worse conclusions. It is a very important article, but it will need, as you said - time. I will not tag or edit the article, just write a review of the article. Also would note, "reliable historians" - both Serbian and international.

1) "In the 19th century, various scholars provided several theories about the origin of the Serb ethnonym. Some researchers claimed that the ethnonym, and thereby ethnic origin, dated to ancient history." - Outdated and fringe theories, even if given media space (Jovan I. Deretić), should not be given weight and validity in the article according to WP:NPOV, and be emphasized in the article's intro. This kind of theories are the one, due to lack of information on primary sources like Wikipedia, amateur readers often stumble upon and because of lack of knowledge and critical understanding, receive wrong information and impression.

2) Mention of assumed Serbian name in toponyms throughout history (like in Pliny the Younger or Ptolemy) need quotes from original sources (like Perseus Project, and translated form), and reference to reliable sources and scholars. Scholars like Aleksandar M. Petrović, who is not a historian or linguist but philosopher, and especially Živko D. Petković, an anonymous scholar with extremily outdated source for such a topic, are not enough competent and reliable to cite. It results with finding Serbian name in toponyms everywhere, even in the territory of present-day Egypt and Southern Turkey, which is nonsense. This toponyms, like eg. Serbinum, which is mostly mentioned with root "Serv-" ie. Ancient Greek "b" is often read as "v" in Modern Greek "v", have linguistical meaning which have nothing to do with Serbian ethnic name. The city Serbinum or Servitium come from Latin servi "servant", and located near river Sava, a natural boundary in Roman province of Pannonia, it meant "city of servants" ie. part of limes defended by serving population. Similarly in Proto-Indo-European *ser-u-o ‎(guardian), and *ser- ‎(to bind, put together). The related and first etymology of the Serbian name, which is not mentioned neither in respective article Names of the Serbs and Serbia and must be neverthless (even if mostly considered wrong) of personal editors feelings toward it, by Constantine VII Porphyrogennetos: "Serbs, in the language of the Romaioi, is the word for ‘servants’, whence the colloquial ‘serbula’ for menial shoes, and ‘tzerboulianoi’ for those who wear cheap, shoddy footwear. This name the Serbs acquired from their being servants of the emperor of the Romaioi." (cite pg. 157, Tibor Živković, De Conversione Croatorum et Serborum)

3) It is hard to believe that 10th century tribes of Krevatades and Sarbani have something to do with with 10th century Croats and Serbs. However, in the references are names of the (a bit outdated) scholars whose names should be mentioned in the article.

4) There too many Petković cites, and his identifications are ridiculous (eg. with Siberia) and should not be cited at all.

5) Migration of the Serbs and work De Administrando Imperio have better sources ie. are covered by work(s) of Tibor Živković.

6) Some "Iranian theory" statements need cites and additional sources for confirmation, and "It is possible..." as well "In Polish history..." are an example of WP:OR, which if there's no source to claim that, it must be removed.

7) "Autochthonic theory" needs additional reliable sources for confirmation, and clear stance that is a fringe theory (especially Jovan I. Deretić).

8) I don't see any scholar theorizing "Proto-Slavic theory", it is prone to speedy deletion. Josef Dobrovský, Pavel Jozef Šafárik, are scholars from the 18th and early 19th century, they are outdated and not reliable, we don't even cite them. Same goes for journal Prosvjeta released 1908. On Wikipedia we cite what modern scholarship has to say, not those from centuries ago. This same mistake was done in the Sporoi article. It must be distinguished the old from modern science, and unreliable from reliable sources - North American Society for Serbian Studies of course would put forward own subjective nationalistic agenda.--Crovata (talk) 03:47, 26 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Orbini

If editors can make referenced connection between theory and Orbini's work, please, do that in separate paragraph, with mainstream acceptable RS.--౪ Santa ౪^99° 20:56, 5 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Orbini was one of the first modern proponent of Serbs as autochtonic people on Balkans, so it is much more correct to place him instead of author that doesn't even have page on Wikipedia. You can read Orbini's work and see it for yourself. Слободар (talk) 01:30, 6 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

There can be no clearer expression of the main point here than in my first post above: you are welcome to write about Orbini's connections, as long as you can provide RS, and only in a separate sentence or paragraph, so that sentence about the three mentioned persons, who are considered originators of this theory, remain as it is.

However, the most important is to emphasize that Wikipedia in English is not open to the inclusion of the statements based of personal opinions, liking or sentiments - you must provide a reliable source. So, I would like to ask you to refrain from “edit warring” on article after article, because that's considered disruptive editing. Maybe it would be the best way forward if you take some time to familiarize yourself with some of the basic policies and guidelines (WP:OR, WP:RS, WP:CON, WP:3RR, WP:EDITWAR).--౪ Santa ౪^99° 21:22, 6 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

(Personal attack removed) Слободар (talk) 11:36, 7 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]