Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ardneil (Ardnell) Hunter

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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 speedy delete per WP:G3 by ST47. Chompy Ace 23:02, 22 December 2020 (UTC) (non-admin closure)[reply]

Ardneil (Ardnell) Hunter[edit]

Ardneil (Ardnell) Hunter (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)
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unverifiable. I have some concerns about the edits by the article creator, User:DingoFilter, in general, but this one especially caught my eye.

In the sources given which I could verify, and elsewhere, I can find no trace of Ardnell or Ardneil Hunter.

  • Bernard Burke, 1879, on page 835[1] discusses some lands from the Barony of Arnele which were granted to Norman Huntar: said lands were afterwards known as "Arnele-Huntar". No mention is made of a person named Ardneil, Ardnell, or even Arnele; nor of someone in the Hunter clan born in 1220.
  • I have no access to Familysearch, and have no interest in looking at this genealogy site either.
  • The Scottish Family encyclopedia has 2 pages about the Hunter clan: perhaps someone with access can check whether it discusses this Ardneil at all?
  • The transactions[2] mention Hunters, but not Ardneil, Ardnell, or anything similar, as far as I can see.
  • Patterson basically has the same info as Burke[3], and again discusses "lands it (Arneil) is bounded with", and "the lands of Arneil-Hunter", i.e. the name of some piece of land, not a person.

Simply misreading the source and interpreting the name of the lands as the name of a person could perhaps be understood; inventing all kinds of fanciful extras, like a year of birth and death, a battle they fought in, the variation "Ardnell de Huntar", ...

Can some people check whether this is a hoax, or something found in some sources but just not the ones accessible online (both those mentioned in the article, and others)? Fram (talk) 13:42, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of People-related deletion discussions. Fram (talk) 13:42, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of History-related deletion discussions. Fram (talk) 13:42, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Scotland-related deletion discussions. Fram (talk) 13:42, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]


FamilySearch is an official respected LDS website and it clearly shows the family linage and his name is Ardneil Hunter https://www.familysearch.org/tree/person/details/L6QR-77P https://ibb.co/DKZGLDg https://ibb.co/ZMc44CP https://ibb.co/vmNcKxd — Preceding unsigned comment added by DingoFilter (talkcontribs) 14:12, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Just to be clear, FamilySearch is a large website that includes a range of information and cannot be dismissed with a broad brush (e.g. it includes primary records, which theoretically could be cited as WP:RS, but only as consistent with WP"PRIMARY, and also published books but as with Google Books, we cite the actual books). However, what is being cited here is FamilySearch Tree, a crowdsource, uncurrated genealogy database. As Fram says, anyone can add anything to this, and the same genealogical nonsense gets added back almost as quickly as it can be corrected. The only sources given for this entry are 1) a personal family tree posted on Ancestry, which is worthless, and 2) a personal submission to the precursor of FamilySearch Tree, which is worthless. This is of absolutely zero value to Wikipedia and should be immediately removed anywhere on Wikipedia it is cited. Agricolae (talk) 16:05, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment FamilySearch is garbage as a source, especially when there are no documents to back up the claims. DiamondRemley39 (talk) 16:10, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Leaning hoax or just tendentious genealogy. DiamondRemley39 (talk) 15:36, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete while I don't have access to the Collins reference either, I seriously doubt he has sufficient information to merit this page - notability usually requires multiple sources giving significant coverage. It is worse here, though, as the supposed individual, Ardnele Huntar, is actually a place name and not a person at all, but someone got it confused and put it in there genealogical database, then uploaded it into the internet genealogical echo chamber. Wikipedia shouldn't be touching this material with a 10-foot pole. I would further suggest that the pages made for the father, grandfather and great-grandfather should also be removed, as they all appear to be based on a combination of sloppy 19th century antiquarianism, passing reference of people of the same name in rare primary records, and loads of bogus genealogy from online genealogical sites. (Example - I just removed the claim that the granddaughter married a niece of William the Conqueror, which is a misreading of Burke's statement, when describing Norman Venator, that King David of Scotland married the niece of William.) They should all go, but particularly this one. Agricolae (talk) 16:05, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Agricolae, I'll have the Collins source in about an hour--will scan at least some pages relevant to this clan so we can answer the question for the other articles created by DingoFilter. It looks like a great many of them have notability concerns. DiamondRemley39 (talk) 16:10, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • strong delete as bad genealogy bordering on a hoax. Just checked the Collins source and the two pages don't mention someone even close to this name or a fifth chief. The closest I find is "Aylmer le Hunter of the county Ayr signed the Ragman Roll in 1296 as one of the nobles of Scotland submitting to Edward I of England". But even if the name were right, this guy is dead by then. All of the creator's other articles should be scrutinized. I will chime in with info from the Collins source for those as well. DiamondRemley39 (talk) 16:50, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Collins seems to be taking this Aylmer claim from Burke, who says something similar, and Burke is of highly dubious reliability when discussing the 13th century (and before). Setting aside all of the other issues, such a passing mention doesn't make someone notable. Oddly, DingoFilter placed a banner on the Talk page saying: "Out of Copyright Content - All content dates from the 13th to 19th century so well out of copyright and now public domain." This would be bad practice even were it true, but given the cites to Collins and FamilySearch, it is patently false. Clearly this material on this page and much on earlier generations primarily derives from FamilySearch Tree - in other words, is entirely worthless in establishing notability. Agricolae (talk) 17:03, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Word. DiamondRemley39 (talk) 17:12, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Suggest merging All British peerages have an article on the title. This might be extended to Scottish clan chiefs. The dates quoted in this article look like estimates. The ultimate source may well be an orally-transmitted genealogy. This person does not merit an article, as there is far too little known about him, but plain deletion is also unsatisfactory. I am thus suggesting that Clan Hunter have a list of early chiefs added to it. Peterkingiron (talk) 18:49, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Peterkingiron, I think we're more concerned that he isn't real--that someone misread the name of a place as the name of a person in an old book and uploaded it to a social family tree, and that person or possibly someone else is trying to fabricate a biography of someone for whom there is no record. Should we merge something that in the verification process is revealed to be an out and out lie? That is what the Collier reference is. DiamondRemley39 (talk) 20:06, 21 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete - If we can't readily figure out whether it's a hoax or not, that should be a strong indication we ought to delete. NickCT (talk) 19:09, 21 December 2020 (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.