Talk:Famous people born in Prussia

You know, this seems to be yet another way of pushing irredentist theory onto the site through the proverbial back door. There have already been extensive discussions in other areas on whether some of these people were Prussian (the original article title was 'Famous Prussians') with the conclusion that some may not have been. I changed that, and changed the beginning to point out that some of the people may not have actually been born in the Prussia of the time, but in a greater 'area that was at one time or another a part of the entity known as Prussia' -- but that just sounds dumb. Can anyone see a clear way out of this? JHK

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Also, it should be noted that, although born in areas once or presently part of Prussia, the areas in which they were born may not have been part of Prussia at that time

This was removed. All people listed were born in Prussia. People born outside of Prussia, who later came to live or work in Prussia, are not listed here. Also people in other parts of the Prussian states in western Germany are not listed, because that would make the list way too lenghty. As it was originally stated, when this article was started, these are only Famous Prussians from East of the Oder and Neisse. Unfortunately this clarifying statement was removed. H. Jonat

Except that Copernicus was born in Torun, and we've had this discussion before. How would I know which are really born in the Prussia of the time without checking for myself? JHK

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You look at maps, church records, birth certificate , PRU- Preussische Urkundenbuch, Prussian document books etc etc etc H. Jonat

My point, Helga, is that this needs to be trustworthy. I know very well how to research where someone was born. By creating this page, you are implying that all the people listed were born in what was Prussia at the time of their birth. We know that that is not true for Copernicus. When a person looks at this list, he or she will assume it's correct. What I am asking is, "how would a person who doesn't know for a certainty and generally trusts the wikipedia know that the material on this page may not be accurate"? I doubt that you are implying that every user should have to check your contributions for accuracy. JHK

FYI, Hevelius was also born in territory under Polish rule at the time of his birth. JHK

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I added a comment about the inaccuracy of the list. I think this article is really quite pointless and should be either removed or divided into separate lists for each period of Prussian history. I started out thinking I could edit the list by removing a few of the obvious errors, such as Copernicus, but Prussia changed boundaries so often during its history that that the research involved would be enormous. Rather than contribute to inaccurate history, just remove the list. Graham Chapman

Agreed. This meaningless list is a disgraceful attempt to abuse Wikipedia as a platform for H Jonat's ridiculous and utterly discredited attempts to deny any past Polish sovereignty over areas that she thinks were "Prussian" when they were part of no Prussian state. Her preposterous assertions have been thoroughly refuted elsewhere; now she proposes to circumvent them by just creating nonsense entries whose only purpose is to advertise her ahistorical prejudices. It's vandalism not of an article but of the encyclopedia, and it - and she - should go. David Parker

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I'd appreciate it very much, that, whoever pillaged the list,restores it to its full lenght. Thank you H. Jonat

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If the list continues, which I am afraid is likely as there are now fewer admins with the power to delete pages (plus, there have already been cases where consensus has agreed that a title be deleted, title gets deleted, irredentist user re-creates page), maybe we should just add "under Polish sovereignty", "under the sovereignty of the Margraves of B". It's klugey, but in the long run would be a good demonstration of how complicated this history is.

In the case of Helvetius and Copernicus, no one seems to doubt a Germanic ethnicity, or that they were born in Prussia -- what Helga can't seem to get her head around is the fact that, at the time, most of Prussia was under Polish rule, and that these men seem to have considered themselves politically allied to Poland. (and we all know by now that she will cite maps saying the birthplaces are in Prussia, so they were Prussian -- even though the maps themselves say Prussia was under Polish sovereignty)

Any thoughts? JHK

My concern was with the misleading impression the article gave to me as a non-historian. The Wikipedia article on Prussia starts off: The term Prussia (German Preussen, Latin Borussia) has had a wide variety of meanings over the last millennium. At times it has been a regional name, a dukedom and a kingdom united with Brandenburg, and a kingdom of the German Empire. This tells me its darn confusing working out if some historical person from the area was Prussian or not.

Take Alsace-Lorraine, now part of France. If I read a history article about a person born there in 1872, lived there all their life and died in 1910, I would assume that person to be regarded as German. Maybe the French would argue a lot about that, but it is simply based on the nation of which the person was regarded as being a citizen.

Prussia has a few more attributes to consider, because it is has a variety of meanings. To take the meaning in the "Famous People born in Prussia" article stated at the start: ...or in lands at one time part of Prussia is so broad as to make it impossible for me to tell if any person concerned really had anything to do with the culture or development of anything Prussian. For all I know the area where a given person was born and lived their whole life may be been Polish for 1000 years except for 5 minutes when a troop of Prussian cavalry stopped off for a tea break.

I therefore conclude that either the article should be scrapped, or it should be structured in such a way as to show the relevance of the area to Prussia at the time. I'd go further than just stating sovereignty at the time, I'd state the relevance to Prussia of the area and of the person at the time. Maybe Prussia only owned the town for 5 minutes, but maybe the person promptly moved to the centre of the Junkers estates and became a national Prussian hero. If I know this then I can judge the relevance.

Anything less than this and I would want to see a prominent warning at the start, which I put there, warning readers not to expect historical accuracy. If the warning is prominent and remains there, maybe then we could just leave it to include just anyone (hey, did you know the Zulu warriors actually came from Prussia? - just kidding!).

Sorry to rave on. I agree with the irredentist bit. Graham Chapman

I agree, Graham. This is a silly, silly article. MichaelTinkler

OK -- let's say goodbye to it. Besides, Helga is moving the links to city pages any way. JHK