Talk:Paweł Holszański

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Notable?[edit]

Paweł Holszański -wikipedia google search of English pages gives exactly zero hits. Two links that pop-up are irrelevant to whoever this is. Please prove notabiliuty before removing the tag. --Irpen 06:33, 3 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Actually as notable as any Polish magnate in this project is. The Olshansky were a great family, rather Lithuanian than Polish, though. --Ghirla -трёп- 08:36, 3 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Very well, I think any magnate is indeed notable. It was nopt clear to me from the article. Perhaps an unusual spelling? Anyway, thanks. --Irpen 08:56, 3 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I believe that to you Irpen and Ghirlandajo it should be no surprise that particular user is pushing his polish pov. M.K. 09:36, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed, he would be notable if he wasn't Polish, but now that he is nothing can be done. Being a prince and a bishop of the second largest bishopric in Central Europe at the time is not enough to be notable. One would apparently have to be a Russian Orthodox bishop to be notable enough, right? //Halibutt 19:20, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Was he really Polish? What about Ruthenian name? Polish language was not officialy used in GDL at the time Alšėniškai/Olshanski lived Iulius 07:13, 6 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Halibutt, I apologize for doubting his notability but it was not fully my fault. Due to the unusual way his name is spelled, it received zero (!) counts in google when I restricted the search to English sites. By doubts of notability vanished as soon as I figured that he was of Olshanski family. For my non-trained mind the connection between Holszański and Olshanski is not straightforward. --Irpen 07:38, 6 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Since he was a Lithuanian magnate, wouldn't Olshanski/y be better then Holszański?-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  18:28, 6 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Discussed and, hopefully, resolved at talk:Olshanski. --Irpen 18:38, 6 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Alšėniškiai leads to Olshanski. It's poor editing, isn't it? Xx236 08:05, 11 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Paweł is Polish writing. Any sources? Xx236 08:10, 11 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Vilnius?[edit]

Xx236 11:37, 10 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

One at a time, pls. Let's first agree whether we can ammend the last name to reflect the family he came from. --Irpen 18:14, 10 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
A straw poll ? This is really stupid, I know. --Lysytalk 19:46, 10 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Requested move 12 March 2023[edit]

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

No consensus to move. After much-extended time for discussion, there is no consensus for a move at this time. BD2412 T 19:58, 26 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Paweł Holszański → Povilas Alšėniškis – He was a Lithuanian noble and Lithuanian version of his name is Povilas Alšėniškis (e.g. see: Lithuanian encyclopedic source) which is the WP:COMMONNAME (19,000 results in Google search). The Polish variant of his name Paweł Holszański gives only 12,200 results in Google search, so such Polonization of a Lithuanian noble name here is absolutely unjustified per Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines (e.g. WP:NPOV, etc.). Povilas Alšėniškis currently is a redirect page, thus this renaming should be performed by an administrator. -- Pofka (talk) 14:32, 12 March 2023 (UTC) This is a contested technical request (permalink).  — Amakuru (talk) 23:52, 12 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Google Search:
Paweł Holszański: 455 results
Povilas Alšėniškis: 104 results
Google Scholar:
Paweł Holszański gives 13 resutls in Google Scholar
Povilas Alšėniškis gives only 4 results in Google Scholar
Google Books:
Paweł Holszański gives 142 results
Povilas Alšėniškis gives only 65 results
The family was pretty early Ruthenized and adopted Orthodoxy (since Ivan Olshansky, who died in 1402) but later generations adopted Catholicism and Polish language, hence the Polish sounding name is so popular. Pretty standard story for the region. Also Robert I. Frost, The Oxford History of Poland-Lithuania, p. 84: Most were Catholics, but Vytautas assigned the greatest prize of Kyiv to his Orthodox brother-in-law Ivan Holshansky, son of one of Algirdas’s followers from the Ruthenianized Alseniskai family of Lithuanian kunigaiksciaiMarcelus (talk) 09:00, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Search of Google Books provide just 12 results (links to books) and three sources are only partly English (1, 2, 3), so we only have 9 sources which clearly is not a "significant majority" (required per guidelines of WP:COMMONNAME). Same thing with Google Scholar. -- Pofka (talk) 19:26, 16 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per my initial request because of plenty of reasons:
1) WP:COMMONNAME clearly is Povilas Alšėniškis (Lithuanian language version) per Google search: Povilas Alšėniškis (19,000 results) and Paweł Holszański (11,400 results). So nearly twice more common. The Google Scholar has too few results to make decisions based on it and to ignore Google search which provide many Lithuanian sources. Marcelus, really? In the Google search you purposefully selected "Search pages in English only" to create such result and this way excluded all sources in the Lithuanian language (and other languages)? There are no valid reasons to exclude Lithuanian sources about this Lithuanian noble.
2) Article about this person in the Universal Lithuanian Encyclopedia use name Povilas Alšėniškis (see this article here). Of course if you search English-only sources in the Google search it will exclude such notable Lithuanian encyclopedic source.
3) Article about this person in the Lithuanian Wikipedia also use Lithuanian version of his name (see: lt:Povilas Alšėniškis).
4) He was a Lithuanian noble. See dedicated article about this Lithuanian noble family: Alšėniškiai.
5) Polonization of Lithuanians names is not WP:NPOV, especially when it clearly violate WP:COMMONNAME.
6) Polish variant of his name (Paweł Holszański) should be presented in brackets in the text of this article. I do not oppose that. -- Pofka (talk) 17:45, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Ad 1) WP:COMMONNAME: Wikipedia does not necessarily use the subject's "official" name as an article title; it generally prefers the name that is most commonly used (as determined by its prevalence in a significant majority of independent, reliable English-language sources); also I don't know how you are doing your google test, because not limiting it to English only pages it's still 2,820 results for Paweł Holszański, and 1,230 results for Povilas Alšėniškis.
Ad 2) That's great, but it isn't English-language source, also Lithuanian source often Lithuanize names that aren't, for example Napoleon I is called there Napoleonas I
The rest is explained by the WP:COMMONNAME, Alšėniškiai or rather Holszański family was Polonised in 15th century and Paweł Holszański was a Polish-speaking Lithuanian noble, that's why the Polish version of his name is so popular, because that's the name he was using himself. Marcelus (talk) 18:11, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Evidence regarding Google search by Google searching today (see screenshots). And about your statement that "Holszański family was Polonised in 15th century and Paweł Holszański was a Polish-speaking Lithuanian noble": can you provide WP:VERIFIABLE WP:RS precisely stating that this Lithuanian noble (and bishop of Lithuania's capital Vilnius) Povilas Alšėniškis spoke only Polish language and not Lithuanian? Otherwise, it is your personal WP:OR and you should cross that out. -- Pofka (talk) 18:31, 14 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I have totally different Google result, nonetheless English only pages matters, because it's English Wikipedia Marcelus (talk) 20:28, 14 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
No, all pages matters. So will you provide WP:VERIFIABLE WP:RS I requested to support your claim with exact quote stating that "Paweł Holszański was a Polish-speaking Lithuanian noble" (your edit)? -- Pofka (talk) 20:45, 14 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Unfortunately not, WP:COMMONNAME: Wikipedia does not necessarily use the subject's "official" name as an article title; it generally prefers the name that is most commonly used (as determined by its prevalence in a significant majority of independent, reliable English-language sources) Marcelus (talk) 20:59, 14 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
@Marcelus: Are you saying that all sources given in the Google search by selecting "Search pages in English only" in it are "independent, reliable English-language sources"? The first page of such Google search provide links to Wikipedia, Wikidata, Wikiwand, Wikimedia, while the second page gives results from Pinterest, Wikimapia, etc. So are you sure?
Your test of Google Scholar clearly proven that there are not enough "reliable English-language sources" to determine "significant majority". So "generally prefers" exception is clearly not applicable in this situation about Povilas Alšėniškis.
Moreover, so will you provide WP:VERIFIABLE WP:RS I requested to support your claim with exact quote stating that "Paweł Holszański was a Polish-speaking Lithuanian noble" (your edit)? -- Pofka (talk) 18:00, 15 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I'm certain that if you choose "Search pages in English only", all of them aren't reliable most likely, but the same goes for your results. Although I am certain that if you make search for English only results in Google Scholar then you will get mostly "independent, reliable English-language sources". That's why I proposed it in the first place Marcelus (talk) 19:20, 15 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
@Marcelus: My Google search without selecting "Search pages in English only" provide the most common version used in all sources in addition to a version used by the Universal Lithuanian Encyclopedia because there are not enough "reliable English-language sources" to determine "significant majority".
By the way, so will you provide WP:VERIFIABLE WP:RS I requested to support your claim with exact quote stating that "Paweł Holszański was a Polish-speaking Lithuanian noble" (your edit)? -- Pofka (talk) 18:38, 16 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
A few hundred results from English Google Search pages, plus 142 vs. 65 from English Google Books seems like good enough numver to settle WP:COMMONNAME. Marcelus (talk) 18:44, 16 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
@Marcelus: Your given search of Google Books (link) provide just 12 results (links to books) and three sources are only partly English (1, 2, 3), so we only have 9 sources which clearly is not a "significant majority".
So will you provide WP:VERIFIABLE WP:RS I requested to support your claim with exact quote stating that "Paweł Holszański was a Polish-speaking Lithuanian noble" (your edit)? -- Pofka (talk) 19:25, 16 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
No, it's 142 results in Google Books, try to open the link in incognito mode. (Also all relevant info about Holszański are within the article you can find it there, I expand it quite significantly recently). Marcelus (talk) 19:59, 16 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
So, Google counts are getting really weird. I clicked on your links and I get 1,070 for Povilas Alšėniškis and 2,530 for Paweł Holszański. After I added quotes, we get 937 and 1,160, more balanced. But I have always been uneasy with this type of counting. Poland is several times more populous than Lithuania, that skews the count. We should control for English results only, but when I do so I don't get a count at all. And I see below you guys got a count at Google Books - I can't see it in my GBooks interface :( Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 15:39, 17 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
It's better to use incognito mode, than the results aren't skewed, to see the results count you need to click "Tools" button Marcelus (talk) 16:12, 17 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per nom.--Cukrakalnis (talk) 17:57, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose per Marcelus and per comments by GizzyCatBella. It is most unfortunate that the much-smaller Lithuania (population less than 3 million to Poland's 38 million) has had, to a degree, its historical personages and other detail dating from the royal marriage in 1386 and continuing through the 1569 Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and the 1772 First Partition, subsumed into Polish-Lithuanian identity, but each instance needs to be considered case by case. This Lithuanian bishop was apparently both Lithuanian and Polish, with his entry appearing in Belarusian Wikipedia, Belarusian Taraškievica Wikipedia, Esperanto Wikipedia, French Wikipedia, Lithuanian Wikipedia, Polish Wikipedia, Russian Wikipedia and Ukrainian Wikipedia, with the Lithuanian Wikipedia being the only one to use the Lithuanian name form. —Roman Spinner (talk • contribs) 22:46, 13 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    Povilas Alšėniškis died in 1555 and the Union of Lublin which created the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth was only in 1569, so it is way too early to speak about the Polish-Lithuanian identity. Moreover, we cannot compare current numbers of countries' populations (3 million versus 38 million) when speaking about 16th century Lithuanians because many Lithuanians died over the centuries due to plagues, wars, etc. and at the time of Povilas Alšėniškis Lithuania was a much larger state than Poland (and was a completely separate sovereign country from Poland). So I don't understand based on what you conclude that "This Lithuanian bishop was apparently both Lithuanian and Polish" (so all Lithuanians currently living in Lithuania are Poles as well?). Usage of Polish version of his name in other languages articles within Wikipedia do not deny the fact that the WP:COMMONNAME per Google search clearly is the Lithuanian version (Povilas Alšėniškis) and these other articles were created (translated?) after this article was created in the English Wikipedia back in 2006 by Polish user from Warsaw. -- Pofka (talk) 18:06, 14 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    Interesting point about 1555 predating Union of Lublin. But this reminds me of the oooold discussion at the top of this page, in which I participated back then. Maybe instead of Polish vs Lithuanian name, the correct one to use would be Ruthenian (Old Belorussian)? Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 18:17, 15 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    Why not simply describe Lithuanian noble from a Lithuanian Alšėniškiai noble family with a Lithuanian name which is WP:COMMONNAME per Google search? Why prefer Polish/Ruthenian versions instead? Or the Lithuanian language did not exist in 1555 and earlier? -- Pofka (talk) 19:51, 15 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    Old Ruthenian was the official language, many families were Ruthenized at this point, Holshansky family for certain at least since Ivan Holshansky. That's why most RS I know uses Slavic forms of their names. Marcelus (talk) 20:00, 15 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    Spoken, yes, but written, hmmm. Shouldn't we use Church Slavonic then? :> Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 15:41, 17 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    Church Slavonic was used only in religious purposes, for documents, letters and other purposes used was Ruthenian language, it was vernacular language Marcelus (talk) 16:14, 17 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    Then might Ruthenian be better than Polish or Lithuanian for spelling his name? Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 11:14, 18 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    In that case it should be something like Pavel/Pavlo Holshansky/Olshansky/Halshansky; but really none of the combinations give any results. There is one result for "Pavel Golšanski". Marcelus (talk) 11:59, 18 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    No, Ruthenian language version is not suitable here because Latin was used in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania alongside Ruthenian for written communication with Central/Western Europe. The Lithuanians did not send Ruthenian language letters to the Holy Roman Empire, Pope, etc. Moreover, many highest-importance Lithuanian documents were written in Latin (e.g. Letters of Gediminas, Gediminas' letter which has the oldest known mentioning of Vilnius, privilege to the Vilnius Cathedral by Jogaila, etc.). The Ruthenian language only was one of the most important languages alongside Latin and Lithuanian.
    The Lithuanian language complemented Latin and had very high importance in Lithuania. For example, during the Council of Constance it was recorded as one of council's participants languages (Lingwa Lietowia - 1, Littowelch - 2). I remind that the Lithuanian language is currently called lietuvių kalba, so Lingwa Lietowia clearly is not Ruthenian/Polish. -- Pofka (talk) 20:59, 18 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    Hmmm. Effectively what I am reading here is that there is no "good" choice. Do we know what language the subject used in every day life? Do we have any written documents in which the signed their name? Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 02:23, 19 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    There are possibly some his Ruthenian texts, possibly Polish; what I found so far is this document from 1527, where he titled himself Paulus Dei gratia Episcopus Luceoriensis et Dux Olschanensis, which is arguably much closer to any Slavic form of his name than Lithuanian Marcelus (talk) 10:32, 19 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    Maybe Paulus Olschanensis would be a compromise? It probably doesn't make anyone happy :P Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 10:33, 19 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    I think we should, however, rely on WP:SECONDARY written in English, from my brief reconnaissance it seems that even Lithuanian authors writing in English often use the form "Paweł Holszański" ([1], or [2]) Marcelus (talk) 10:41, 19 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    Fair point. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 10:46, 19 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    I believe that in this context, one cannot focus too much on the Union of Lublin, because the two countries were already in a union (and contrary to popular belief, it was not just a personal union, ties between the countries were not broken even if the two countries had separate rulers). Moreover, the Polonization of the Lithuanian elite took place before 1569.
    But we are moving away from the topic, it is necessary to focus on what form prevails in English-language RS. Marcelus (talk) 20:10, 15 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. My Google search suggest Polish name is used more often. I am not opposed to considering some Ruthenian variant, but it's the issue of Commonname in English vs Realname... and I think WP:COMMONNAME is the relevant policy here. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 10:46, 19 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose The primary argument floated by the OP is based on a misunderstanding of best practices; the GoogleTest should have been performed for "Paweł Holszański" vs "Povilas Alšėniškis", the quotes being vital. That said, almost all reliable English language sources use the current name - see The Oxford History of Poland-Lithuania for an example. I offer no comments on what should have been his name given the historical context because such considerations are irrelevant to policy. TrangaBellam (talk) 13:30, 19 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    Even if I take non-English RS, Holszański is in the clear majority. TrangaBellam (talk) 13:31, 19 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.
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