Template:Did you know nominations/Marcu Cercel

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Yoninah (talk) 22:07, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

Marcu Cercel

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Presumed portrait as a child

... that Marcu Cercel (presumed portrait pictured), who ruled over Moldavia in 1600, was probably born to a Turkish Muslim apostate? Source: Rădulescu, p. 52: Într-un articol recent apărut, Constantin Rezachevici afirmă că Petru Cercel ar fi fost căsătorit cu o turcoaică, creștinată, mama fiului său Marcu. [...] într-un raport (telhis) din anul <1589> al marelui vizir Kodja Sinan paşa către sultanul Murad al III-lea, Petru Cercel, învinuit de nesupunere şi trădare [...], era acuzat, în acelaşi timp, şi de faptul că, pe când se aflase la Istanbul, în cartierul Galata, în aşteptarea numirii ca domn, „aducea pe ascuns multe doamne şi femei musulmane, pe care nu numai că le-a posedat, dar, atunci când i s-a dat domnia Ţării Româneşti, a ales trei femei musulmane culte şi le-a dus în vilaetul Ţara Românească. După ce le-a posedat câţiva ani, a trecut cu forţa <aceste femei> în credinţa ghiaură, iar apoi le-a căsătorit cu ghiauri. ("In a recent article Constantin Rezachevici argues that Petru Cercel was married to a Christianized Turkish woman, mother of his son Marcu. [...] a report (telhis) of ca. 1589 by the grand vizier Koca Sinan Pasha, addressed to Sultan Mahmud II, Petru Cercel, singled out for disobedience and betrayal [...], is also accused for things relating to his stay in Istanbul's Galata quarter, when he awaited his appointment as prince, and 'secretly brought in many a Muslim woman and lady, whom he not only possessed, but also, when he was given to reign over Wallachia, he selected three cultured Muslim ladies and took them to the vilayet of Wallachia. After he possessed them for a few more years, he imposed [on these ladies] the giaour faith, and then married them off to giaours.'")

Reviewed: Tom Cox (highwayman)
Comment: This scratches the limit for DYK noms, as it is nomination on the very last day. I'll understand if it is rejected on such grounds. Thanks.

Created by Dahn (talk). Self-nominated at 09:54, 10 December 2017 (UTC).

I'm going to review, but relief immediately: we have 7 days, you are comfortably within. I'm doing this as qpq for one that really is last day ;) --Gerda Arendt (talk) 15:05, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

Substantial article on plenty of good sources, offline and Romanian sources accepted AGF, no copyvio obvious. - The image is licensed, doesn't show much, but that's what it shows well: that much is unclear. Thank you for the collection of various historians' ideas! --Gerda Arendt (talk) 15:18, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

Thank you! To be sure: part of Cercel's life is very well documented, but in his part of the world the beginnings and ends of one's life, as well as what people looked like, were woefully underdocumented, unless people were horribly killed or such. In the case of princes, births are often obscure because the customary law allowed any son of a prince to take the throne, whether born to the wife or to whomever. Marco was openly claimed as the son by his father, though his maternal lineage was left blank (we can guess why that is); we are pretty sure that his father was also the son of a prince, though we don't know if he was born to the wife of said prince, or to some other woman; we are entirely unsure whether Marco's grandpa was the son of a prince, as he claimed; we are even more unsure whether his presumed great-grandfather (this guy) was himself the son of a prince or just someone on the street who said "yeah I'll have a go". One has to wonder how they administered "proof" for/against someone who said "I was born to Prince X, who had intercourse with my married mother". All of this is entertaining except it doesn't sit well with those nationalists who see Marco's alleged uncle as a saintly hero, and have to deal with the fact that he (also) may have been a fraud. Dahn (talk) 15:30, 11 December 2017 (UTC)