Talk:Armenian genocide

Death toll?

A 2005 paper is quoted as stating that "the figure of 1.5 million people is generally accepted as a reasonable estimate" which isn't quite the same as "1.5 million is the most published number". Taner Akçam states that "one can confidently say that the number of deported Armenians was around 1.2 million" (The Young Turks' Crime Against Humanity (2011), p. 258), of whom some managed to survive. Many sources have lower estimates. For example, They Can Live in the Desert but Nowhere Else (2015) comes up with an estimate of approximately 664,000 Armenian victims between 1915 and 1918. USHMM states, "At least 664,000 and possibly as many as 1.2 million died during the genocide."[1] According to a 2016 Springer chapter by two professional demographers, "The existing estimates are quoted as ranging ‘from 600,000 to 2 million’, and are heavily disputed." The conclusion of this paper states:

Precise knowledge of the number of Armenian victims is not possible, and striving for ‘more accurate’ estimates might be misplaced... The existing estimates roughly agree as to the order of magnitude of the number of victims, from at least 600,000, or – more likely – 800,000 to over a million during the entire period. [1915–1923]

According to Benny Morris and Dror Ze'evi in The Thirty-Year Genocide (2019):

For decades, Armenian spokesmen and historians have zoomed in on World War I and have referred to 1-1.5 million Armenians murdered during 1915–1916, the core genocidal event during the 30- year period. Recent works, including by Armenian historians, have revised that figure substantially downwards. A major initial problem is that there are no agreed figures for the number of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire in 1914. Secondly, no proper count was made of the number of Armenians who survived and reached foreign lands. Most historians estimate that on the eve of WWI, there were 1.5–2 million Armenians in the empire, mostly in Anatolia, and that between 800,000 and 1.2 million of them were deported. Raymond Kevorkian has written that 850,000 were deported and that “the number of those who had perished exceeded 600,000” by late 1916. Presumably he believes that more died during the following years. Fuat Dündar maintains that about 800,000 were deported and that altogether 664,000— consisting of those who were slaughtered in place, died during the deportation marches, or died in their places of resettlement— were dead by war’s end.3 Taner Akçam has estimated, mainly on the basis of Talât’s calculations in late 1917, that some 1.2 million Armenians were deported. Of these only 200,000 or so were alive by late 1916, implying that one million were murdered in 1915–1916.

Although these estimates don't include those who were killed after 1918, Morris and Ze'evi estimate that this is only thousands. They seem to imply that only by including the Hamidian massacres and Adana pogroms is the total likely to be more than a million, according to their estimation.

Perhaps it would be better to give a range rather than a definitive number, if the question remains to be settled and is potentially unanswerable. Another option would be "around a million, although the exact figure is disputed" (t · c) buidhe 17:22, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

References

Estimated 1 million, the infobox states. By who? Seems like the entire purpose of these discussion was to downgrade the death toll. The most widely accepted number is 1.5 million, not 1 million as falsely stated, and is officially used by the majority of (non-armenian) government and organization adopted resolutions. Addictedtohistory (talk) 19:20, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

That's why we use scholarship as reliable source rather than political resolutions, which are not reliable. (t · c) buidhe 19:51, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

1.5 million is the most accepted estimate and official estimate in most of the adopted resolutions. Taner Akçam, whom you quoted states that 1.2 million where deported only during 1915-1916, of whom about only 200 thousand survived. That already makes up 1 million. After all the genocide continued to 1923 (1918 stated by some). "Leave it to historians/scholars" is the turkish denialist policy. Governments who adopted resolution base their estimates on expert views. Addictedtohistory (talk) 21:52, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

The statement that armenian historians revised and downgraded the death toll estimates is a falsification. The armenian population estimate of 1.5–2 is another falsification. During the second half of the 19th century, in several occasion ottoman census recorded 2.4 million. The ottoman Armenian officials, i.e Migirdich Bey Dadian, put an estimate of 3.4 million. Addictedtohistory (talk) 22:12, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

The majority of historians use the word "Armenian Genocide" to refer to the killings during the First World War (especially 1915–1916, sometimes continuing to 1917 or 1918) and do not include the postwar period. For example, The Armenian Genocide: A Complete History, The Young Turks' Crime Against Humanity, They Can Live in the Desert but Nowhere Else, etc. Akcam's estimate is on the high end of what RS use. For example, Ronald Grigor Suny states that during the genocide, "It is estimated conservatively that between 600,000 and 1 million were slaughtered or died during the marches". A compromise solution is "around 1 million" because all non-FRINGE estimates are close to that to one order of approximation. I'm not going to discuss whether scholarly sources should be disregarded in favor of political resolutions. (t · c) buidhe 22:32, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

1 million is your own estimate, based on your interpretation of your chosen sources. The intro and infobox should use official estimate. Addictedtohistory (talk) 18:48, 14 March 2021 (UTC)

The majority of historians use the word "Armenian Genocide" to refer to the killings during the First World War is a WP:POV. Even the sources you rely on bags to differ. Addictedtohistory (talk) 18:56, 14 March 2021 (UTC)

• The contemporary sources use the 800,000 figure so it carries some weight, then up to 1.5million. The high figure is often cited in Congressional debates of the United States so it carries some weight too. That range encompasses most of the detailed estimates Buidhe cites. Gators bayou (talk) 20:12, 14 March 2021 (UTC)

800,000 is the death toll published by Ottoman Gazette in 1920 for the period of 1915-1918, which is considered an underestimate for obvious reasons. December 15 NY Times issue states Million Armenians killed or in exile.... American committee on relief says victims of turks are steadily increasing. Thats for the 8 first months of the genocide. Addictedtohistory (talk) 22:37, 14 March 2021 (UTC)

Two grave, inexcusable and, I suspect deliberately left, blunders in the introductory sentence: “around 1 million ethnic Armenians from Anatolia and adjoining regions”.

First, most historians (of course, excluding Turkish denialists) agree that from under 2 to over 2.5 million Armenians lived in the Ottoman Empire. Even if we assume, for a moment, that only 1.5 million Armenians lived (this is an unbelievably low figure), the first sentence in the Death Toll section states that “[t]he genocide reduced the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire by 90 percent”. Well, 90 percent of 1,500,000 is 1,350,000, that is, well over “around 1 million”. In the same section, the second sentence states that “most estimates are between 800,000 and over 1 million for the entire period 1915 to 1923”. Well, then, be so kind as to not to insult me and millions of descendants of the genocide survivors, and at least move this clause up to the introductory sentence, so it reads as follows: “The Armenian Genocide (other names) was the systematic mass murder and ethnic cleansing of between 800,000 and over 1 million ethnic Armenians […]”... if you’re so uncomfortable to repeat the figure of 1.5 million, which most genocide scholars, most professional genocide associations, and most governments that recognized the genocide had arrived at. Second, there have been no “Armenians from Anatolia”, because “Anatolia” is a relatively modern made-up Turkish toponym, invented to replace a more geographically and historically correct place name “The Armenian Highlands” or “The Armenian Plateau” . Again, if Wikipedia editors are so uncomfortable with using the correct toponyms and/or terms, you could at least replace the Turkish toponym “Anatolia” with a more neutral term “eastern provinces of the Ottoman Empire”, although genocidal extermination of the Armenians also took place in Cilicia, a part of the Armenian homeland on the Mediterranean coast, as well as in other places beyond eastern provinces.98.231.157.169 (talk) 00:35, 25 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

most historians (of course, excluding Turkish denialists) agree that from under 2 to over 2.5 million Armenians lived in the Ottoman Empire, that's simply inaccurate. The official Ottoman figure was 1,251,785, and the Armenian patriarchate's estimate was 1,915,858. Many authors argue that it is somewhere in between (such as 1,500,000), others do use the Patriarchate's figure, but that's still less than 2 million (see They Can Live in the Desert but Nowhere Else pp. 354–355). When Suny states that the population was reduced by 90 percent, he is also counting those who were "ethnically cleansed" and managed to survive the ordeal but could not live in their homeland post-1923. As for place names, we generally use what the sources use. There were also many Armenians outside the Armenian Highlands/plateau in central and western Anatolia, Cilicia, etc. (t · c) buidhe 01:51, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

“The official Ottoman figure” has genuinely made me laugh… I hope you’re not serious bringing Turkish figures into this discussion? I wrote “under 2 to over 2.5 million Armenians lived in the Ottoman Empire” based on most historians’ estimates. And it is quite correct. It is that you chose to refer only to the figures under 2 million. But there are also figures above 2 million and around 2.5 million. I’ll revisit this thread with reliable sources shortly. Hold on.98.231.157.169 (talk)Davidian — Preceding undated comment added 02:08, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

Encyclopædia Britannica (author: Ronald Grigor Suny) : “At the beginning of the 20th century, there were about 2.5 million Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire, mostly concentrated in the six provinces of Eastern Anatolia.”

“Over 2,400,000 Armenians lived in the Ottoman Empire in 1897”. Çaik, Y.G. Türk Devleti Hizmetinde Ermeniler 1453-1953 (Armenians in the Service of Turkish State, 1453-1953), İstanbul: Yeni Matbaa, 1953, p. 240.

“The Ottomans do not have a definite number. That is, we have in our hands contradictory numbers regarding the Armenian population within the borders of the Ottoman Empire. I would think […] this is to be between two and three million.” Seçil Karal Akgün, Hürriyet, 27 April 1987.

“Avant 1914, sur 2 millions et demi d’Arméniens vivant dans l’empire ottoman, il y avait un peu plus de 100,000 catholiques”. Maurice Pernot, La Question turque, Paris: Bernard Grasset, 1923, p. 207.

“En sories que l’on comptait, avant 1914, 4,160,000 Arméniens, dont 2,380,000 habitaient en territoire turc, 1,500,000 étaient sujets de l’empereur de Russie, 64,000 vivaient dans les provinces du chah de Perse et les diverses colonies à l’étranger, ce qui portait à 4,500,000 environ le nombre total des membres de la nation arménienne, nombre que les malheurs de ces derniers temps out réduit dans des proportions qu’il n’est pas possible de définir à l’heure présente.” Jacques de Morgan, Histoire du peuple arménien, Nancy-Paris-Strasburg: Berger-Levrault, 1919, p. 297.98.231.157.169 (talk) 17:45, 26 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

None of these are actually recent scholarly sources, i.e. from the last fifteen years or so. Someone's statement to a newspaper is not the same weight as peer reviewed work, and when dealing with old books from 100 years ago you have to ask—is this still supported by current scholarship? I do not think that Suny endorses such a high figure now, as in his 2015 book he does not mention any figure as high as 2 million (p. 354). Also, some of these estimates are of the Armenian population prior to 1914, which was indeed higher, given that hundreds of thousands of Armenians were massacred or emigrated prior to World War I. (t · c) buidhe 17:53, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

Where in Wikipedia policy does it say that Wikipedia: Reliable Sources must be “from the last fifteen years or so”? Where does it say that “old books from 100 years ago” have to be supported by “current scholarship” in order to qualify for RS? Please be so kind as to refer your readers to a relevant Wikipedia regulation. Next, Dr Seçil Karal Akgün is a professor of late Ottoman history and contemporary Turkish history at Middle Eastern Technical University. Therefore, by no means is she “someone”, as you chose to characterize her. What, if a scholar gives an interview to a major newspaper, it cannot be considered an RS? Where in Wikipedia’s regulations does it say that a source must be mandatorily a “peer reviewed work”, please? Further, Encyclopaedia Britannica’s Article History indicates that Suny’s article was thoroughly revised as recently as April 08, 2015. And lastly, a correction, only one estimate, found in Çaik, Y.G., pertains to the period prior to 1914. However, it is still relevant, because it was made after hundreds of thousands of Armenians were massacred or emigrated fleeing the Hamidian massacres of 1894-1896.98.231.157.169 (talk) 18:37, 26 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

There is a vast literature on the topic of the Armenian Genocide, it ranges from straight up political propaganda and/or denialism to very good quality scholarship. You can cherry pick just about anything from sources, but per WP:NPOV we strive to cover views in accordance with the amount of support that they have in relevant academic field(s), while avoiding giving undue weight to assertions that may be WP:FRINGE. In order to show that the view, that Armenian population in 1914 was greater than 2 million, is a widely held one that merits inclusion in this article, it is necessary to cite recent scholarship that reflects such a view. (t · c) buidhe 19:06, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

Okay, all I ask is to direct participants and viewers in this talk to a Wikipedia regulation that states, unequivocally, that in order to support a view (in this case, that Armenian population in 1914 was greater than 2 million), the view “must be a widely held one that merits inclusion in an article” and, especially, that “it is necessary to cite recent scholarship that reflects such a view”. Neither WP:NPOV nor WP:FRINGE refer to or in any way support your interpretation of Wikipedia’s policies in this regard, I’m sorry to say. All sources I’ve brought up, suggesting that Armenian population in 1914 was greater than 2 million, are absolutely neutral and non-fringe. Two by Turkish scholars, two by French historians, one by Encyclopedia Britannica, whose last thorough revision of the article “Armenian Genocide” was made as recently as 2015 and, mind you, none by a current Armenian author (although they are many), so it won’t be regarded as “political propaganda” or “nationalist propaganda” or what have you.98.231.157.169 (talk) 19:30, 26 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Is Ronald Suny’s article published in WWI Encyclopaedia qualifies for an RS that was published “from the last 15 years or so”? And I hope Suny is not regarded by Wikipedia editors as a biased or fringe author, is he? Well, then in an article last updated on 26 May 2015, he offers the following figure: “Some 2 million Christian Armenians lived in the Ottoman lands in 1915, most of them peasants and townspeople in the six provinces of eastern Anatolia.” Please note that the figure refers to Armenian populations in “six provinces of eastern Anatolia” only. Is a study carried out in 2015 by an internationally renowned scholar considered a “good quality scholarship” and a “recent scholarship” by unspecified Wikipedia standards?98.231.157.169 (talk) 20:08, 26 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

“The only empirical method that approaches reality is to compare the number of people counted before the war with the number of escapees. Thus, one can estimate that over two-thirds of the Ottoman Armenian population—around two million people on the eve of the First World War—were exterminated in the course of the war. Around 1,300,000 people, to which we must add victims of military operation and massacres carried out by the Ottoman Army and its paramilitary affiliates in Iranian Azerbaijan, Russian Azerbaijan, and in the Caucasus against Armenian civilian populations. This makes for a clear total of nearly 1,500,000 people.” Raymond Kévorkian, “The Extermination of Ottoman Armenians by the Young Turk Regime (1915-1916)”, SciencesPo, 3 June 2008 (published within 15 years—Davidian)98.231.157.169 (talk) 20:34, 26 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• Yes, "around 2 million" implies the Patriarchate's figures (1.9 million) are accurate, this is not a fringe view and I never said it was, but neither of these sources say it was *greater* than 2 million. (t · c) buidhe 21:01, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

Yes, but the five above did say it was greater than 2 million. But you chose to dismiss them on the grounds that they don’t “merit inclusion in this article” because they are not “from the last fifteen years or so” and that some of them are “old books from 100 years ago”. Whereas, again, I fail to see in Wikipedia: Reliable Sources that Wikipedia regulations set such limits for the inclusion of sources in an article. I earnestly think that arbitrary or frivolous interpretation of policies is less than helpful.98.231.157.169 (talk) 21:24, 26 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

As for the 1913-1914 Patriarchate census figure, there is this extensive study by Armenian researcher Robert Tatoyan, titled “The Question of Western Armenian Population Number in 1878-1914” (Yerevan: The Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute Press, 2015), unfortunately in Armenian only, which traces the census operation and factors that impacted the collection of data. Based on a meticulous examination and comparative analysis of data, the author arrives at a conclusion that for several Armenian-populated areas the census-takers relied on flawed Ottoman statistics, which resulted in a total figure below the actual population number. This became evident in the light of testimonies of the genocide survivors who would customarily increase the number of populations per their native villages or hometowns by about 20 to 70 percent, as compared to the Patriarchate figures. 98.231.157.169 (talk) 22:53, 26 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• Most scholars would agree that the official Ottoman census was an undercount. As Morris and Ze'evi state, "Most historians estimate that on the eve of WWI, there were 1.5–2 million Armenians in the empire, mostly in Anatolia", which is already stated in the article. Wikipedia attempts to capture academic consensus views. If we relax that standard, then we also have to consider denialism as a legitimate viewpoint to be included in the article. (t · c) buidhe 02:25, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

Hi buidhem, while I agree with you that the round number of a million is a good estimation for the number of victims, I don't agree with you regarding the estimates of Ottoman Armenian population. It seems that Morris and Ze'evi are assuming that there are almost no Ottoman Armenians that were living outside of Anatolia.

The most notable lowest estimate, easily verifiable, is provided by McCarthy (1,465,000 in Anatolia proper, but 1,698,301 total; for the whole Empire, many who cite McCarthy forget that part), whose work is still a reference for most (if not all, that means a source of cross-contamination that has to be taken into account when assessing the prevalence of an estimate) scholars who reject the thesis of genocide; also cited by Salt (in The Unmaking of the Middle East). While McCarthys estimates are tweaked (or "corrected") Ottoman statistics to account for undercountings, Morris and Ze'evi lowest figure in their provided range is even lower than McCarthy estimates (since they claim those figures to represent the Armenian population inside the Empire, not Anatolia alone). Even if you have to use as the lowest estimate Ottoman official figures without McCarthy correction, you will have to take into account Murat Bardakçı publication of Talat telegrams (cited in Akçam (2012)) and Talaat « correction » (because, in one form or another, they are « official » figures too… and the most up to date at that, and date of publication is a relevant criteria for academic publications) for the undercounting. And you will have to arrive at the same conclusion, again... the range provided by Morris and Ze'evi for the whole Empire dos not fully represent the range of estimates.

As much as Ottoman statistics (the one cited by Talaat in those telegrams) has to be the basis of most lower estimates (rather than historians, because there are no lesser justifications to take one historian over any other historian), the highest estimates are mostly to be drawn from Armenian sources. In this case, the Armenian Patriarchate, that provides for Anatolia alone 2.1 million Armenians (2.4 total), cited in one (or several?) Akçams work. Your assumption about the other figure (of about 1.9 million), that since it is an Armenian estimate it has to be someone at the highest range seems inaccurate, as even Justin McCarthy disagrees with you (on the origin of the 1.9 million figure) : « The most likely explanation of these statistics is that an order went out to the Armenian bishops, who took Ottoman statistics and local information from Armenian parishes, correcting them for perceived undercounts. As might be expected, this produced some exaggeration. However, comparison to Ottoman data corrected by demographic techniques does not show great differences. For some cases, the corrected Ottoman data shows more Armenians than does the Armenian data. » http://www.tallarmeniantale.com/PopulationOttomanArmenians.pdf

That statistic to close to two million is therefor not the official Patriarchate figures (the one that was cited by Akçam) but a form of middle ground based on both Ottoman statistics AND local information from parishes. Likewise, when estimates are indescribably presented, they varry from 1.5 to 2.4 or 2.5 millions, and the "Armenian" figure assessed by McCarthy sits right in between. Hemşinli çocuk 09:24, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

• Right, in Akcam's 2012 book he states, "according to the Ottoman census, was 1.3 million (according to Justin McCarthy, about 1.5 million), while according to the Armenian Gregorian Church, the figure was 2.1 million", however, he does not state which estimate he finds most accurate. (If I gave the impression of holding the Armenian patriarchate count as a high estimate, perhaps because Suny states that the actual figure "fell between the official Ottoman figure of 1,251,785, and the figure given by the Armenian patriarchate of 1,915,858".) As far as I can tell, Morris and Ze'evi are correct that most estimates in scholarship are between 1.5 and 2 million. You state, there are no lesser justifications to take one historian over any other historian I would disagree, we have to consider WP:WEIGHT as well as WP:RS, if the estimate is not widely held in scholarship it should probably be discussed in a sub-article such as Ottoman Armenian population or Casualties of the Armenian Genocide. However, based on what I can see, the figure of 2 million (Akcam 2018: "ca. 2 million Armenians in Anatolia in 1914", Kevorkian (quoted above), Suny 2015: "Some 2 million Christian Armenians lived in the Ottoman lands") seems to be more widely accepted than 1.5 million, so I will change this to "around 2 million". (t · c) buidhe 15:10, 1 April 2021 (UTC)
• Which Wikipedia regulation gives editors a right to round up various estimates found in sources? Wikipedia's policy encourages inclusion of as many RS as possible. Which regulation gives editors an authority to manipulate with estimates found in RS in a heavy-handed manner rounding them up to some absurd unsubstantiated figures? Editors do not own articles in Wikipedia, need I remind or you remember this fundamental rule?98.231.157.169 (talk) 15:56, 1 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian
  • Wikipedia's policy encourages inclusion of as many RS as possible. Nope. (t · c) buidhe 16:06, 1 April 2021 (UTC)
    • Yeap. WP:NPOV encourages editors to add alternate and multiple points of view to an article”98.231.157.169 (talk) 16:24, 1 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

@ Hemşinli çocuk How can you agree that the rounded number of a million is a “good estimation” for the number of victims if, as you yourself write, it is just a rounded number, and not an estimation per se, moreso “good”? This number is an arbitrarily approximated figure based on a single, repeat: single, source: Bijak & Lubman 2016, in which a range of estimates from selected authors is tabulated. The lower bound of that range includes just three Turkish or pro-Turkish (McCarthy) sources of around 600,000, which every self-respecting genocide scholar knows are grossly understated, and then comes a bulk of various Western and Armenian estimates ranging from 800,000 to 1,200,000 ending with the upper bound of 1,500,000. Yet Wikipedia editors chose to round up this range to a flimsy “around 1 million” in the introductory sentence, which is the most foolhardy thing to do with respect to the range of estimates and the internationally accepted figure of 1.5 million. I already proposed an edit which was disregarded by the editors. I hereby rephrase it based on Wikipedia editors’ beloved single source Bijak & Lubman 2016, so it reads as follows:

The Armenian Genocide (other names) was the systematic mass murder and ethnic cleansing of ethnic Armenians inhabiting Asia Minor and adjoining regions by the Ottoman government during World War I. According to various estimates, in the period from 1915 to 1918 and well into 1923, between 800,000 and 1,200,000 to as many as 1,500,000 Armenians have been murdered.

I hope editors understand that the most disgraceful thing to do is to round up the wide range of estimates to a flimsy figure, knowing that “the exact number of Armenians who died is not known and impossible to determine”. Well, again, then be so kind as to provide the range and not an arbitrarily approximated number.98.231.157.169 (talk) 15:04, 1 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Hi Davidian, a round number is sufficient, in this case, to give an order of magnitude (in term of human loss), to the closest million.

Regarding 1918-23, it is true that starting with 1918 there were some level of atrocities extending beyond the Ottoman borders, many of the victims were "Russian" Armenians (including Ottoman Armenians who migrated over the course of the years preceding or during the events), even if we consider that some of the reports are subject to exaggeration, the incursions into Russian Armenia caused considerable losses (both human and material). But this can be added somewhere else in the article. It’s more simple in the lede, to state that during the course of WWI out of a population of 2 million, around half died. This doesn’t mean that there was no atrocities later, but the rest of the info needs more context and can be added elsewhere in the article.

Hi Buidhe, I do agree with your more recent edit, round number of 2 million is a reasonable estimate. Hemşinli çocuk 17:57, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

Why is it necessary to round up figures? Who benefits from decreasing the number of Armenians killed, internationally acknowledged as being at or up to 1.5 million, to a hastily approximated figure of “around 1 million”? Who gave Wikipedia editors an authority to make approximations in articles containing victim- and population numbers? Please refer your readers to a relevant policy regulation in Wikipedia:PAG which binds editors to provide a first order approximation instead of providing figures in the ballpark extracted from RS? Who decides whether or not a round number is sufficient? Who decides that Ottoman Armenian population was 2 million? Who stands behind your involvement in a most unprofessional business of rounding up figures from a variety of estimates? 98.231.157.169 (talk) 21:06, 1 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• @Hemşinli çocuk When you add considerable human losses that were produced as a result of killings after the core period of genocide in 1915-1916 and incursions into the Kars province and Russian Armenia starting with 1918, as well as the elimination of the remaining pockets of Ottoman Armenians (Great fire of Smyrna, as one example) that lasted until the foundation of the Turkish Republic in 1923, you inevitably arrive at the figure of or around 1.5 million. And this must be stated in the lede, and not added “somewhere else in the article”. But at the core, it is inexcusable to round up the number of victims, instead of providing the ballpark, which in most sources ranges from 800,000 to 1,500,000 million. Please take pains to show your readers a policy guideline Wikipedia:PG that commits editors to round up sensitive figures. Still waiting…98.231.157.169 (talk) 14:34, 2 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

“The only empirical method that approaches reality is to compare the number of people counted before the war with the number of escapees. Thus, one can estimate that over two-thirds of the Ottoman Armenian population [...] were exterminated in the course of the war. Around 1,300,000 people, to which we must add victims of military operation and massacres carried out by the Ottoman Army and its paramilitary affiliates in Iranian Azerbaijan, Russian Azerbaijan, and in the Caucasus against Armenian civilian populations. This makes for a clear total of nearly 1,500,000 people.” Raymond Kévorkian, “The Extermination of Ottoman Armenians by the Young Turk Regime (1915-1916)”, in SciencesPo, 3 June 200898.231.157.169 (talk) 16:10, 2 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• The opening sentence in Death Toll: “The exact number of Armenians who died is not known and impossible to determine, but both contemporaries and later historians have estimated that around 1 million Armenians perished during the genocidal campaign carried out during World War I” is flawed in several respects.

One, it is not true that "contemporaries and many later historians estimated the number of deaths at around 1 million". In fact, several contemporaries placed the number at more than 1 million (for example, 1.5 million was mentioned in a Report Volkswirtschaftliche Studien in der Türkei submitted to the German Foreign Office on 14 July 1916; 1.5 million was mentioned in another German Foreign Office report dated 27 May 1916; 1.5 million was mentioned in a Report dated 4 October 4 1916 by Wilhelm von Radowitz, German ambassador to Constantinople; German Major Carl Franz Endres, who served in the Ottoman army, reported 1.2 million; during the Turkish courts-martial of 1919-1920, 1.2 million Armenian deaths were in circulation during the court proceedings). In 1984, the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal session “Armenian Genocide” held in Paris, considered the case of 1.2 million Armenian killed. Scores of later historians, of whom Wikipedia editors are well aware, reported more than 1 million deaths over the period from 1915 to 1923 (Akçam, Kévorkian, etc.).

Two, the genocidal campaign against Armenians was carried out during World War I and in the later years, from 1918 onwards and up until 1923.

Three, while Bijak & Lubman 2016, whom editors mention in Reference 196, do contend that “the exact number of Armenians who died is not known and impossible to determine”, in Conclusion on page 39, they specifically note that “[t]he existing estimates roughly agree as to the order of magnitude of the number of victims, from […] more likely 800,000 to over a million during the entire period. Hope this helps.98.231.157.169 (talk) 17:19, 2 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• Second sentence in this section erroneously states that “both contemporaries and later historians have estimated that around 1 million Armenians perished during the genocidal campaign carried out during World War I”. Twice in this discussion, I cited several contemporary German sources that placed the number of murdered Armenians at 1.5 million and reiterated the widely known fact that many later historians have arrived at the same figure. This sentence, therefore, is complete nonsense. But editors continue to stubbornly dismiss edits, making a reference to none other than Tom de Waal, a journalist by training. Editors, since when it has become an acumen of your professionalism to make a reference to a journalist? Do you know that there are professions more suitable for occasion, such as genocide scholar, historian, international lawyer, etc.?98.231.157.169 (talk) 20:29, 3 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian
  • You are obviously cherrypicking a few estimates that are higher than 1 million, while ignoring that other contemporaries made lower estimates. (Johannes Lepsius, the #1 pro-Armenian campaigner in Germany, estimated 1 million deaths). The book was published by a division of Oxford University Press and reviewed (positively) in multiple scholarly journals, so it meets the standard expected here. (t · c) buidhe 21:08, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

No. I’m not “obviously(?!) cherrypicking” a few estimates that are higher than 1 million. These important few estimates (there are several others in reserve, fyi) are from contemporaries who have reported 1.5 million Armenians dead. Their reports refute the laughable sentence you decided to include in this section that “contemporaries […] have estimated that around 1 million Armenians perished”. Well, the figure of 1.5 million was also reported by contemporaries. Why won’t you go ahead and—obviously—include them in this section? What keeps you from adding ‘em in? And, no. Johannes Lepsius initially estimated the number of Armenians who had died in 1915-1916 at 1,000,000, but in the 1919 edition of the Bericht he revised that figure to 1,100,000. In addition, Lepsius put the number of Eastern (Russian) Armenians killed during the Turkish invasion of Transcaucasia in 1918 at up to 100,000. This makes it about 1,200,000 Armenians killed by 1918 only. Just so you know.98.231.157.169 (talk) 00:01, 4 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Images that could be used in the article

Armenian deportations in Erzurum by Viktor Pietschmann

Armenian refugees in Palestine, 1918

Armenian orphans arrive at a Near East Relief orphanage

"The refugee home, a few feet of earth or stone: its occupants waiting for death or deliverance as they slowly starved."

Armenian refugee children LCCN2014710005

[2]

4/24 redirect

Hi. 4/24 currently redirects here, but I doubt whether it should. While April 24 is the commonly accepted starting date of the Armenian Genocide, I wonder whether anyone intending to read about it would search for "4/24". April 24 is also the Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day, so that article would probably already be a more suitable target than this one. But even then, I wonder whether redirecting a variation of a date to a specific observance on that date instead of to the date itself is justified. It should also be noted that 24/4 redirects to April 24. Lennart97 (talk) 17:04, 14 January 2021 (UTC)

Lennart97, I would agree that April 24 is probably a better redirect because other events also happened that day. You can boldly retarget yourself or else try WP:RfD if it's contested. (t · c) buidhe 17:14, 14 January 2021 (UTC)

@Buidhe: I see you've already retargeted, thanks! I figured it would be an uncontroversial retarget, but that if there were any serious argument against it, this would be the place to find out. Seems there isn't :) Lennart97 (talk) 21:28, 14 January 2021 (UTC)

Location: Anatolia

• "Taken in their entirety, Ottoman and Western archives jointly confirm that the ruling party CUP did deliberately implement a policy of ethnoreligious homogenization of Anatolia that aimed to destroy the Armenian population" — Taner Akcam
• "This imperial violence was followed in 1915–17 with the forced deportation and subsequent destruction of almost the entire Armenian population of Asia Minor." — Fatma Muge Gocek, Denial of Violence (Asia Minor -> Anatolia)
• "Between the years 1915 and 1923 the vast majority of the Armenian population of Anatolia and historical West Armenia was eliminated."—Rouben Paul Adalian[3]
• "The persistence of genocide or near-genocidal incidents from the 1890s through the 1990s, committed by Ottoman and successor Turkish and Iraqi states against Armenian, Kurdish, Assyrian, and Pontic Greek communities in Eastern Anatolia, is striking." —Mark Levene[4]
• "Thereafter, in a wave spreading westwards and southwards throughout the empire from the provinces of eastern Anatolia - the areas of heaviest Armenian population - the Turkish government, led by the Ittihad ve Terakki Cemiyeti (Committee of Union and Progress: CUP), implemented an increasingly radical programme of deportation and murder."—Donald Bloxham[5]
• "Hans-Lukas Kieser, Kerem Öktem and Maurus Reinkowski argue that while the Ottoman Empire officially ended in 1922, when the Turkish nationalists in Ankara abolished the Sultanate, the essence of its imperial character was destroyed in 1915 when the Young Turk regime eradicated the Armenians from Asia Minor."[6]
• "Finally, a comprehensive scheme for the removal of the Armenian communities of Anatolia to Syria began in May 1915."[7]

I share this in relation to Diranakir ongoing reverts on the grounds that "Anatolia and adjoining regions" in inaccurate when referring to the location where the genocide took place. (When I search Armenian Genocide Turkey—their preferred terminology—on Google scholar, most results are discussing modern-day Turkish reactions to the genocide.) (t · c) buidhe 04:07, 20 January 2021 (UTC)

I touched on this in the proposed edits for the Death Toll section above, but will expand on “Armenians from Anatolia” here too. If Wikipedia editors, or the authors they chose to cite here, were to tell the Ottoman (Western) Armenians that they were “Armenians from Anatolia”, those Armenians would more likely than not laugh in their face. “Eastern Anatolia” is a relatively new toponym which has become increasingly more recognizable in literature. However, it is an innovation, not to say that it is a tautology meaning “Eastern East” and is essentially a Turkish invention to replace a more geographically and historically correct toponym “The Armenian Highlands” or “The Armenian Plateau”. Well, obviously, because the place name contains the ethnonym “Armenian”. Like I said above, there were no “Armenians from Anatolia”. Armenians were living for thousands of years in their native autochthonous habitat, most of which encompassed the Armenian Plateau. If this correct place name is for some unknown reason uncomfortable for the respected Wikipedia editors, I suggest replacing the absurd phrase “Armenians from Anatolia” with “Armenians living in the eastern provinces of the Ottoman Empire and adjoining regions” or “Armenians living in eastern Asia Minor” or “Armenians living in the northern part of Western Asia”.98.231.157.169 (talk) 01:20, 25 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

I believe "Asia Minor" is a synonym of "Anatolia", and have no reason to prefer one of these over the other, but I disagree that there is anything wrong with "Armenians in Anatolia"; there are many scholarly sources which use such language and apparently see nothing wrong with it.[8] I agree that "Armenian Highlands" or "Armenian plateau" is a good term for what it refers to, and I used it in the article, but 1) the genocide also occurred in other parts of the empire; according to Kevorkian about 1/3 of the Armenian villages in the empire were located outside the Armenian Highlands 2) the genocide did not occur in Eastern Armenia which is also part of the Armenian Highlands. (t · c) buidhe 14:43, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

Anatolia, according to Wikipedia’s own article Anatolia is “a large peninsula in Western Asia and the westernmost protrusion of the Asian continent”. Sorry, but most Ottoman Armenians lived in easternmost protrusion of the Asian continent. If you believe that Asia Minor is a synonym of Anatolia and have no reason to prefer one of these over the other, then what stops you from replacing this relatively newly cooked term “Anatolia” with a more ancient and thus more geographically and historically correct term “Asia Minor”? Or, in the case of Armenians, “eastern Asia Minor”, to be exact?98.231.157.169 (talk) 14:58, 25 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

One reason there are many scholarly sources which use “Anatolia” and, as you say, apparently see nothing wrong with it, is that, like I said, in the recent decades this made-up toponym has become more recognizable in the literature. However, it does not mean that this relatively new toponym was there throughout most of the history of the region. Not to say, as I noted already, that the phrase “Armenians from Anatolia” is a misnomer. Most Ottoman Armenians did not live on a large peninsula in Western Asia and the westernmost protrusion of the Asian continent (this is Wikipedia’s own definition of “Anatolia”). And, fyi, many other scholarly sources continue to use more ancient and more geographically and historically correct toponym “Asia Minor”, and not the Turkish novelty of “Anatolia”. But, for some reason, Wikipedia editors chose to use “Anatolia” with its wrong application to the habitat of most Ottoman Armenians. Why?!98.231.157.169 (talk) 16:10, 25 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Now replaced with "Asia Minor" per request. (t · c) buidhe 01:49, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

Thank you. Anatolia was dead wrong in all respects. Eastern Asia Minor would be more correct.98.231.157.169 (talk) 13:57, 26 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Concern about Article's Quality

It seems that over the past month or so User:Buidhe has done a massive, and frankly questionable overhaul of this article, removing a lot of information. His edits have gone mostly unquestioned, and I am concerned that his edits, in what essentially amount to mass deletion and rewriting, have had no oversight. I was wondering if anyone else noticed this issue. It's like someone's taken a hatchet to the article out of personal spite. Not to assume bad faith, however. 2601:85:C101:C9D0:5489:B4D0:54:EC11 (talk) 22:14, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

I think Buidhe has been doing a pretty good job at improving the article recently. Maybe you could point to some specific edits that you disagree with? Lennart97 (talk) 22:19, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

The Demographic losses section has been halved. Perhaps I missed his explanation, but I see no reason for the removal of all that text. Not to sound combative, but was there a reason for that removal? 2601:85:C101:C9D0:5489:B4D0:54:EC11 (talk) 22:36, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

When I started editing the article in early November last year, (old revision) the section in question cited questionable sources such as those from more than 1 century ago and news articles about political resolutions, which are not reliable sources for historical events. It also gave undue weight to one source, the "Talat Pasha's Black Book", when there are many sources historians use to calculate these figures. (There was also original research, with claims of academic consensus that were not found in the cited sources.)

I have rewritten the section based on recent scholarship and to follow WP:SUMMARYSTYLE (i.e. the details of what these estimates are based on belong in the dedicated sub-article, Casualties of the Armenian Genocide) (t · c) buidhe 23:18, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

I see, and so far your work has been good. But I would disagree with your removal of the Pasha book and the accompanying text. Not only did you remove it from this article, but it is nowhere to be found on the casualties page. The sources used in that paragraph are from the NYT and an Armenian research foundation studying the genocide. They don't seem unreliable to me. And there is also no issue with presenting a primary source about a historical event. This text should have been kept too: "While Ottoman censuses claimed an Armenian population of 1.2 million, Fa'iz El-Ghusein (the Kaimakam of Kharpout) wrote that there were about 1.9 million Armenians in the Ottoman Empire,[156] and some modern scholars estimate over 2 million.[157]" I also couldn't find any OR in the two middle paragraphs that you deleted from Demographic losses. At a minimum, retain this information in the casualties page. 2601:85:C101:C9D0:5489:B4D0:54:EC11 (talk) 23:44, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

I have also noted that Buidhe made some improvements, and usually they are pretty impressive and rather well sourced to describe it modestly. If what you claim is based on recent scholarship, you can just add it if the source is reliable.Paradise Chronicle (talk) 23:58, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

Agreed about Buidhe, and I would have added them back (as the sources are reliable), but unfortunately I cannot. I am a dynamic IP (I have personal reasons for not creating an account), and this article is locked, so I am unable to edit. 2601:85:C101:C9D0:5489:B4D0:54:EC11 (talk) 00:00, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

OK, I've moved the content on the Black Book to the Casualties of the Armenian Genocide as well as added a section for prewar population estimates. The issue is that this article is supposed to be concise. Its current length, 8792 words, is about the recommended WP:Article size so one should be careful about adding more information that may not be necessary for the reader to understand the overall topic. (t · c) buidhe 00:03, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

You can also request edit on protected articles using Wikipedia:Edit requests. (t · c) buidhe 00:06, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

Thank you! And keep up the good work! 2601:85:C101:C9D0:5489:B4D0:54:EC11 (talk) 03:15, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

Plans for improving the article

OK, just to clarify what I am trying to do in the long run for the interest of transparency:

1. Improve sourcing There has been a lot of recent scholarship on the genocide so there's no reason to cite older or non-scholarly works, especially since they aren't necessarily in line with the current academic consensus. There should be a focus on books that are widely cited and represent mainstream interpretations, such as The Young Turks' Crime against Humanity, They Can Live in the Desert but Nowhere Else, The Armenian Genocide: A Complete History, or Talaat Pasha: Father of Modern Turkey, Architect of Genocide. If information is not covered in recent academic sources (last 10–15 years), it is likely WP:UNDUE.
2. Improve comprehensiveness without increasing length the aim is to keep the article about the same length as it is now (below 10,000 words). This will involve trimming in some areas as well as expansion to other topics not currently discussed. For example, right now the details of how deportation was carried out are kind of sketchy, as is what happened to Armenians in the camps in the Syrian Desert. What happened to the survivors after the genocide (as discussed by Keith David Watenpaugh among others[9]) is hardly mentioned at all.
3. Focus on analysis, rather than primary source evidence the purpose of an encyclopedia article is to explain the subject, not prove it. Therefore, the focus should be on what historians know and not how they know it. Primary source quotes can be deployed occasionally but the focus needs to be more on a coherent sequence of events according to reliable sources.

If these things can be accomplished the article will be close to WP:Good article status. (t · c) buidhe 02:54, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

Topics whose coverage needs to be added or improved

• 1914 Armenian reforms
• 1914 Greek deportations
• Effect on Germany/Nazism
• Legacy of the genocide in Turkey, effect on political culture, later repressions, etc.
• CUP ideology
• How did the CUP go from cooperating with Armenian politicians to considering them the greatest danger?

(t · c) buidhe 08:24, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

Sounds good! I was actually very surprised to find out just now that Hitler's Armenian reference isn't mentioned anywhere. Keep up the good work! Lennart97 (talk) 11:19, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

Bodil Biørn's photograph

It's a striking photograph. There doesn't seem to be a date, but given that the individual in the image is looking at decomposed bodies and bones, it most probably was taken not long after the war and thus sometime when Dayr al-Zur was incorporated into French Mandate Syria. It's not entirely implausible that that is Vahan Papazian in the photograph (the only "Armenian leader" I can think of that Bjorn would be referring to). Marshal Bagramyan (talk) 16:03, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

• Marshal Bagramyan Perhaps he was, but "Papazian" is a common enough Armenian surname that I worry that we might be going into OR by trying to identify who it is without a reliable source that states so clearly. (t · c) buidhe 16:04, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

That's a shame. Wish we could learn more about that photo. Thanks, by the way, for your recent edits to this article. It's been in want of thorough editing and trimming for more than a decade and it's good to see it shaping up along proper form. Marshal Bagramyan (talk) 16:53, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 3 March 2021

Change "about 1 million" to "1.5 million." This page has historically reflected the fact that 1.5 million died. That number is the consensus among respectable historians, and rounding the number down is an insult to the memory of my ancestors and an act of complicity in the denial of this genocide. AerialIncrease (talk) 03:03, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

•  Not done Please see above discussions where editors decided to use a figure of 1 million based on recent, scholarly sources. (t · c) buidhe 04:03, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

Popular support and participation

• Akçam 2018 says: "The lack of an ideological mass-movement to provide popular support within Ottoman society for a genocidal policy seems to be another reason [for denial]." (p. 3) In the footnote, he adds: "As Mahmut Kamil Pasha’s telegram below shows, there was considerable popular disagreement with the government’s treatment of the Armenians. On this topic see George N. Shirinian, “Turks Who Saved Armenians: Righteous Muslims during the Armenian Genocide,” Genocide Studies International, 9, no. 2 (2015): 208–227; and Burçin Gerçek, Akıntıya Karşı: Ermeni Soykırımında Emirlere karşı Gelenler, Kurtaranlar, Direnenler (Istanbul: Iletişim, 2016)."
• Suny 2015 says: "The decisions, permission, and encouragement of a few in power provoked and stoked emotional resonance below. It turns out that a few killers can cause enormous destruction. Thugs, sadists, fanatics, and opportunists can with modern weaponry (or even with axes, clubs, and daggers) slaughter thousands with little more than acquiescence from the surrounding population. They in turn can inspire or let loose the rage of thousands of others who will carry out even greater destruction. Genocide in particular is an event of mass killing, with massive numbers of victims but not necessarily of massive numbers of killers."
• Ungor 2016 emphasizes the role of paramilitaries (rather than ordinary people) as killers. "In studies of the Armenian Genocide and accounts of the killings, the perpetrators, from the organizing elites to the rank-and-file executioners, have figured as evil faceless killers, undifferentiated and unexplained. The paramilitaries and tribesmen appear in the killing fields of Anatolia ex nihilo and murder people for no apparent reason other than intrinsic (Turkish or Islamic) cruelty and malignance. This chapter has challenged this essentialist convention by arguing that the involvement of seasoned criminals and militiamen hardened in years of (low-intensity) conflict in the Balkans, accounts for the cruelty of the genocide."

Are there any sources saying that genocide was generally popular among average Ottoman subjects? (t · c) buidhe 21:15, 9 March 2021 (UTC)

We may want to be more exact in what precisely we mean when we write that the genocide had (or did not have) popular support. Yes, paramilitary groups, gendarmes, and bands were responsible for a great deal of the bloodletting. But in many first-person accounts, there is evidence than in the midst of the deportations many a common man and woman had a hand in the looting, and, at times, even in the violence inflicted against the civilian population. How do we gauge popularity from that feigned or provoked by authorities to those genuine feelings of enmity that some among the Muslim population felt (and which aligns with Suny's own theory on the affective dispositions of people)? That's a tough one, given the nature of the sources. But there are countervailing facts that suggest that this was not just top-down imposed violence. Marshal Bagramyan (talk) 00:02, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

That's a fair criticism. Perhaps it would be best not to mention popular support or lack thereof, since it's very difficult to measure. (t · c) buidhe 09:15, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

I'd be happy with a different formulation but, no doubt, studies on the Armenian Genocide are only recently acquiring a level of sophistication on par with those on the Holocaust so, hopefully, in time we will have works that address important issues such as this one. Marshal Bagramyan (talk) 16:09, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

@Buidhe: It's a very important question you have raised. Communication and hate propaganda is crucial in the study of genocides. We may have some lost information about the native language publications. Most of what we know about this genocide comes from the international observers. As User:MarshallBagramyan correctly states above, we have very sophisticated studies on the Holocaust (Der Stürmer) and Rwanda (Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines) but here we are in the infancy of such studies. Gators bayou (talk) 19:41, 14 March 2021 (UTC)

First arrival of Turks to Anatolia

Rs4815, in his 1993 book, Suny states that Turks arrived "nearly a thousand years" after the Armenians did.[10] The sentence in the article refers to Turkish presence as opposed to Turkish *rule* over the area. But if you can find other reliable sources that disagree with Suny's timeline, please feel free to post them here with citation and quotes. (t · c) buidhe 10:56, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

Misleading map, Just look at Nagorno-Karabakh. For the record, in 1910 (and before the massacre of 1920) Armenians accounted for almost 60% of the population of Shushi and about 90% of the population of Hadrut (south of NK). And in Turkish Armenia, according to this map, Armenians lived only in Van, that's just a nonsense

Detailed more informative map

Buidhe, on what basis did you remove a more detailed map of the distribution of Armenians in Turkish Armenia? This article is about the Armenian genocide, the subject of the article is Armenians and not the settlements of Kurds in the Middle East. The British map doesn't show the detailed distribution of Armenians in the Armenian Highlands (for example, regions where Armenians made up 10-50% of the population), instead it shows the territory of the settlement of Kurds in the Middle East, where wherever the Kurds were at least a relative majority is colored yellow. This is a completely inaccurate and misleading map. The part of the map that shows Eastern Armenia is just a tragicomedy, as there are Russian census data that show a different picture. The German map is more detailed and shows the distribution of Armenians by region and their percentage in the population. --Rs4815 (talk) 11:52, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

I think that what's relevant to this article is not just where Armenians live, but also other populations, otherwise there's no context to the situation they are living in and the various land conflicts etc.. It's also preferable to use english-language maps than non-English ones, as this is English wikipedia and that makes things accessible for our readers. On the British map, if you look closer, it does make an effort to show minority populations as well and shows Armenians living in various places, hardly suggesting that "Armenians lived only in Van". Lastly, the 1910 population is more relevant to this article than the 1896 population. IDK much about the demographics of Russian Armenia, but I also don't see how that's relevant here. (t · c) buidhe 19:49, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

Also, the killings of Armenians in the Caucasus are already discussed in the "postwar" section, which is consistent with most scholarly sources. I do not support citing Britannica as it is not a scholarly source, is no more reliable than Wikipedia according to research, and has published denialist articles about the Armenian Genocide in the past.[11] (t · c) buidhe 02:04, 14 March 2021 (UTC)

• "what's relevant to this article is not just where Armenians live ... also preferable to use english-language maps", no, this is exactly what is relevant for this article. The ethnic distribution map of Arabs and Kurds in Iraq and the Levant is irrelevant to this topic. And German is not so different from English that English-speaking readers would not understand the context of the map and the meaning of the words "darüber 50%" (upper/above) and "unter 10%" (under). When we have a detailed German map (which also shows not only the distribution of Armenians, but also Christians in the region) and an uninformative, inaccurate English map, giving preference to an English map, just because of the language, is not constructive.
• "On the British map, if you look closer, it does make an effort", poorly made effort and most readers will not open the map in full size and zoom to see these little squares next to some settlements, they will just look at this yellow and brown oceans (btw why are Azeris and Turks represented by the same color?) and think that there were almost no Armenians in Western Armenia (Eastern Anatolia).
• "the 1910 population is more relevant to this article than the 1896 population ... IDK much about the demographics of Russian Armenia, but I also don't see how that's relevant here", I showed you above, using the example of Karabakh, that this map distorts the real demographic situation in the region, not in favor of the Armenians. If the creators of this map incorrectly reflected the situation even in those regions for which we have accurate census data, then what did they do with the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire, for which there are only estimates, the official Ottoman statistics were biased and underestimated the number of Armenians. --Rs4815 (talk) 10:54, 14 March 2021 (UTC)

  I don't think that most readers understand German or could be expected to figure that out. Furthermore, even if it was useful information to have, the German map does not in fact display the Christian population in a legible way even if you zoom in.

  If you actually look at the British map at the given size, you can easily see many green/Armenian areas besides Van. Also, to the contrary, it absolutely matters whether Turks, Kurds, or Arabs lived in a given area since that has a lot to do with what happened in 1915 and afterward. In fact there were not many Armenians in Anatolia compared to the non-Armenian population (around 10% overall). If that's what the reader takes away, that's an accurate impression.

  Even if you're right about Eastern Armenia (you haven't cited any verifiable, reliable sources), what is most relevant to this article is the populations of Western Armenia, as close to 1914 as possible. The 1896 population is certainly inaccurate as a representation of the 1914 population. (t · c) buidhe 11:15, 14 March 2021 (UTC)

• "I don't think that most readers understand German", it's ok, we will give them a short description in English - the distribution of the Armenian population in the eastern vilayets of the Ottoman Empire
• "or could be expected to figure that out", most people have finished elementary school and understand that "%" is a percent sign.
• "German map does not in fact display the Christian population in a legible way", that is, small squares for the Armenian population are a "legible way" of representation, but the German map is not legible? I am beginning to have doubts about your constructive attitude on this topic, sir.
• "look at the British map at the given size", most readers will not zoom in on the map and will only see a yellow ocean with a small island near Van.
• "it absolutely matters whether Turks, Kurds, or Arabs lived in a given area", in the article on the Armenian genocide, an accurate representation of the Armenian population is much more important than what kind of Muslims they were neighbors with, Turks, Kurds, Circassians or Arabs. The German map is specifically about the Armenians, while the English map does not set itself the goal of a correct representation of the distribution of the Armenian population in the region, as you can see from the distorted representation of the situation in Eastern Armenia.
• "In fact there were not many Armenians in Anatolia compared to the non-Armenian population (around 10% overall)", I am not interested in Anatolia as a whole, but by claiming that Armenians constituted only 10% of the population of Eastern Anatolia (Western Armenia), you repeat the theses of the propaganda (lies) of the Turkish genocide deniers.
• "you haven't cited any verifiable, reliable sources", so you want me to cite here sources that the Armenians constituted the majority of the population in Shushi, Hadrut, Akhaltsikh or Artvin (etc.)? 111 years have passed since 1910, do you want to say that this English map is a reliable source of information for the modern encyclopedia? How many scientific works on the Armenian genocide have been published since then? Modern historians (not Turkish) estimate the number of Armenians in the empire to be 2-2.5 million people, while official Ottoman statistics greatly underestimated the Armenian populaton. The English map could be based on Ottoman propaganda. In fact, we now have in our hands two very old maps, both of questionable reliability (since... they are old), the only difference is that we can prove, using the data of the Russian censuses of the population of Eastern Armenia, that the English map underestimates the number of the Armenian population (even when they had access to Russian census data! What can we say about Western Armenia, where there were no such accurate censuses), while the German map is less controversial. --Rs4815 (talk) 19:01, 21 March 2021 (UTC)

(t · c) Buidhe, Suny did not state that “Turks arrived nearly a thousand years after the Armenians did”. What?! Here’s what he wrote, figuratively speaking, in black ink on white paper in his 1993 book “Looking Toward Ararat: Armenia in Modern History”. On p. 30 in Chapter 1, “Armenia and its Rulers”, we read: “By this inhuman policy the Turks tried to eliminate a people who had lived in eastern Anatolia for nearly a thousand years before the Turks had arrived.” The key word is had lived, meaning, if I may elaborate, that the Armenians had been living on their lands before the Seljuk Turks "arrived" from Inner Asia and the Central Asian steppes in the 10th century AD invading most of Western Asia and the Middle East. There is no "Armenians arrived" in sight.98.231.157.169 (talk) 01:58, 25 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

On the other page cited he gives the date when Armenian population is first recorded in the area, in the sixth century BCE. (t · c) buidhe 02:20, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

Suny is likely referring to the Behistun Inscription Behistun_Inscription dated sixth century BC, where Armenia is recorded by order of Persian King Darius I as “Armina”, although the ethnogenesis of the Armenians well predates sixth century BC. Even if we assume, for a moment, that Seljuk Turks “arrived” a thousand years after that arbitrarily selected date, it will make their “arrival” date at sixth century AD. Well, there is no way that such a respected historian as Suny cannot know that there were no Turks in sight in Western Asia and the Middle East in the sixth century AD. All historical records indicate that Seljuk Turks invaded these regions from Inner Asia and the steppes of Central Asia beginning in the tenth to eleventh century AD.98.231.157.169 (talk) 02:37, 25 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

I'm happy to change this if you can find a scholarly source that gives a different date of 1) Armenians first being recorded in Anatolia and/or 2) Turks first being recorded in Anatolia. (t · c) buidhe 03:35, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

Gladly. On one "condition", so to say, that there has never been such a place name as "Anatolia" at the time when Armenians were recorded in the ancient chronicles or when new-comer Turks appeared in the indigenous habitat of the Armenians, Pontic Greeks, Assyrians, Kurds and others in eastern Asia Minor or northern sector of Western Asia. Anatolia is a relatively modern toponym purposefully introduced by the Turks to substitute any mention of Armenians in Asia Minor, such as the Armenian Plateau. "Armenians from Anatolia" in your introductory sentence is an affront to serious geographers, topographers, historians, genocide scholars, and to the memory of the millions of descendants of the genocide survivors. Consider revising. I offered several neutral variants in the "Anatolia" section above.98.231.157.169 (talk) 14:26, 25 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Also, what is meant by “arrival” of the Turks? What, the indigenous autochthonous peoples of the region had been waiting for thousands of years for the nomadic Seljuk Turk tribes to “arrive” in the 11th century AD? Oh, and they forgot to roll out the red carpet for them… It was an invasion, not arrival, from the Turks' original habitat in Inner Asia and the steppes of Central Asia. Things must be called by their true names.98.231.157.169 (talk) 14:38, 25 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

If it was an invasion rather than a more peaceful settlement/migration, and sources back that up, I have no objection to changing to "invasion". (t · c) buidhe 14:47, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

Gladly. I'll collect data sources and revisit this thread. Fyi: Peaceful settlers/migrants do not come to foreign lands with fire and sword. See, for example, Wikipedia's own article Battle of Manzikert (talk) 15:33, 25 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Recent edit

Hi, first I'd like to thank Gators bayou for their efforts to improve the article! However, there are a few concerns I have about this edit:

Lead

• Although a majority of historians accept the facts of the Armenian genocide I think this wording could be improved since it does not tell the reader which facts. Perhaps we could say that "Most historians acknowledge that a genocide took place"? ("Majority" would understate the support for this preposition.)
• Turkish government denies that these events constituted a genocide. That's accurate, but it makes it sound as if the main dispute is around the use of the word "genocide". In fact, the crux of the issue according to various RS is whether the events that make up the genocide can be considered a legitimate state action in response to rebellion or a criminal act on the part of the government, intended to destroy the Armenian people.
• ethnically homogenous state It may be misleading to imply that Turkey in 1923 was an "ethnically homogenous" country, given the many immigrants from various countries, Kurds, etc. It was however based around Turkish ethnic nationalism.

Background

• In this section, a book from 1967 was cited. As stated in one of the sections above, I was trying to write the article based on recent scholarship only. If I were reviewing this article at FAC source review, I would question the use of a source that's so old and wonder if what's cited to it is backed up by current scholarship.
• "Armenian Plateau" is the same place as "Armenian Highlands". I don't think it's helpful to give the name of the place in Turkish (the relevant language here would actually be Ottoman Turkish.) Both Suny and Kévorkian use the term "Armenian plateau" instead of highlands so I wouldn't be averse to changing as long as we're consistent.

Aftermath

• I believe that the Treaty of Sevrès deserves a mention here since it is mentioned by all sources that discuss the postwar era, even Suny who doesn't go into much detail at all. Perhaps a bit more explanation of why it's significant to this article would help.
• The section split is not very helpful IMO, you end up with several minuscule sections which is strongly discouraged by MOS, and causes some other issues:
  • Incorrectly implies that vorpahavak only took place in the Middle East, when actually it happened wherever Allies exercised some control
  • the part about blockading and invading Armenia is cut off from the discussion about the responsible party.
• Most of the material in your "Turkish Republic" is about the time period before Turkey was founded (in 1923).

Legacy

• The "Turkey" section is not supposed to cover just denialism but also long term effects of genocide on Turkey's economy, politics, culture, international relations and so forth.

(t · c) buidhe 22:16, 14 March 2021 (UTC)

Your edit summary said you reverted all my changes 'per talk page discussion'. I restored it because you edit has undone more than what you have explained here and because your substantial changes to the article are new and don't yet have consensus. I think my changes were an improvement over the version you reverted to. You removed the sections for Soviet Armenia and Diaspora, which I have tagged for expansion based on your objection above. The content about the establishment about Soviet Armenia should not be in the section about the Turkish War of Independence, and the section being short is no excuse for that. I am going to address the rest of your objections one by one to work towards the consensus version, but please do not do these reverts of other editors work. Other editors are also allowed to contribute. Gators bayou (talk) 16:30, 17 March 2021 (UTC)

No, you should make one paragraph sections and tag them for expansion. This article needs to be kept fairly short and on-topic, not expanded with tangential subjects.

Yes, the establishment of Soviet Armenia is closely tied to the Turkish war of independence. As you can see by the fact that it's discussed in the chapter of books on the subject.

Yes, anyone can edit. However, that does not mean that you should restore changes that are disputed without even explaining why the objection is wrong. Yes, your changes do include more than is strictly discussed here, but the other changes aren't helpful either in my opinion. For example you removed mention of the Armenian Question from the lead, but this is absolutely crucial to understanding why the genocide occurred. (t · c) buidhe 20:15, 17 March 2021 (UTC)

Also, it's bad form to change the article so it doesn't meet the Good article criteria while it's up for review. (t · c) buidhe 21:10, 17 March 2021 (UTC)

As someone who's been seeing these changes happen but is not directly involved with this article, I have to say I agree with Buidhe on this one. She reverted your edits only after raising specific objections to them at this talk page. It's on you to address these concerns, not to simply re-instate your edits when there's a clear lack of consensus for them. And you certainly shouldn't be going around placing tags like these without as much as an edit summary. I also agree that it's disruptive to make bold, drastic changes like these just now that the article is up for a GA review, after Buidhe has been working for months to get it up to GA status. Lennart97 (talk) 11:07, 18 March 2021 (UTC)

I don't know what GA status is but there has been a lot of objection to Buidhe's edits on the talk page. There are multiple sections started by different editors with objections to Buidhe's edits. She is reverting everyone else's changes to the article. This includes altering the death toll to an "Estimated one million" (despite objections in other sections of this talk page, it is still in the article). I also don't know why I should not be placing tags on the article where they are needed. Why are Armenia and Azerbaijan discussed in one section? It is vague whether the sentence is talking about protests in Yerevan against the genocide or against the Nagorno-Karabagh conflict. I don't think it can attain any "GA status", whatever that is, by Buidhe reverting everyone else's changes and forcing her version through. Gators bayou (talk) 12:00, 24 March 2021 (UTC)

• If you check closely these are editors who are not citing scholarly sources (or when they are, misrepresenting them), but instead their own unsubstantiated opinion, which doesn't count for much. In the meantime, you seem to have ignored and not even replied to what I wrote above, since you're still making the same undesirable changes: "ethnonational" -> "national" when the former is meant, unlink a notable phenomenon sedentarization of Kurdish tribes against WP:REDLINK, understate the support for this event being a "genocide"—it's an academic consensus rather than simple majority—create stub paragraphs, insert irrelevant content about Australia and Israel, and more. Since you don't seem to be familiar with what's expected of a good article, perhaps it would be a good idea to suggest changes on the talk page rather than change the article so it doesn't meet the criteria. (t · c) buidhe 13:32, 24 March 2021 (UTC)

Here we go again. The source doesn't say ethnonational but it means "ethnonational" according to Buidhe and any editor who disagrees has all their contributions reverted. I am removing this unsourced content from the article. Gators bayou (talk) 11:02, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

That is untrue, I quote from Suny 2015: "The Armenian Genocide was a central event in the last stages of the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire and the foundational crime that along with the ethnic cleansing and population exchanges of the Anatolian Greeks made possible the formation of an ethnonational Turkish republic" (t · c) buidhe 11:17, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

Thank you for giving us that quote. It's on page 349. The page you cited was 364. Gators bayou (talk) 11:41, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

• • FYI your edit summary, "massacres are always indiscriminate" is dead wrong. Sometimes only villages that are rebelling are massacred or only certain segments of the population are massacred, as in Srebrenica massacre. (t · c) buidhe 13:39, 24 March 2021 (UTC)

That is a good point about Srebenica. Gators bayou (talk) 11:41, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

• FYI I find "definitions" better than "historians" for the sentence about Turkish war of independence. Historians either include or (more often) exclude this era from the "Armenian Genocide", but other people who are not professional historians may also define the "Armenian Genocide" as including this period. "Definitions" is inclusive of other people besides professional historians. (t · c) buidhe 12:13, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

It makes it sound like there are different definitions of genocide. You should not be explaining this on the talk page but in the article. The only statement about this in the article says that it is the opinion of some historians, or maybe just one historian. I don't remember now. As a separate issue, I'm not sure that is due weight in the lead. Gators bayou (talk) 12:48, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

Gators bayou, per MOS:LEAD all significant aspects of the article should be covered in the lead. Since there are "Postwar" and "Turkish war of independence" sections in the body we need to say at least something minimal about what happened after the war. (t · c) buidhe 13:05, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

The article doesn't discuss definitions of genocide at all. Almost all scholars use the same definition "systematic destruction in whole or part" AFAIK. Gators bayou (talk) 13:37, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

??? This has nothing to do with the definition of genocide but the temporal boundaries of a historical event, where different opinions exist as to start and end dates. (t · c) buidhe 14:41, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

• Gators bayou I do not think "denies the Armenian Genocide" is a clear expression at all. What does it mean to deny the Armenian genocide? It's considerably more than rejecting the use of the word "genocide" to describe the event, but it is less than claiming the events described in this article never occurred. If you read the article on Armenian Genocide denial you can find the nuances of it, but the crux of the matter is, according to Akcam, that denial "takes as its starting point the assumption that the events of 1915 were derived from governmental actions that were, in essence, within the bounds of what are considered normal and legal actions for a state entity and cannot therefore be explained through a recourse to criminality or criminal law." (2012 p. 451) If you don't like the Bloxham quote, perhaps you could pick something from Armenian Genocide denial#Consequences that you think works better? (t · c) buidhe 12:24, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

"Denies the Armenian Genocide" is a fact, it's concise and encompasses the points you raise. The linked article is the where the reader can find out more about these additional nuances. The style of linking "denies a crime was committed against the Armenian people" this change was needed because the link should not be obscured. Does this change go against the criteria? Gators bayou (talk) 12:48, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

Gators bayou, I don't think it does. The issue is that people will be more familiar with other forms of denialism such as Holocaust denial or climate change denial, both of which assert that the event (Holocaust or manmade climate change) simply did not/is not occurring. This is not the case with Armenian Genocide denial, so "denies the Armenian Genocide" can be misleading to the average reader who is not familiar with the topic. I don't see anything in MOS:LINK that discourages such clarification. (t · c) buidhe 13:02, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

I was hopeful that we would reach a compromise or consensus but you are forcing your preferences into the article and reverting without explanation. Gators bayou (talk) 13:11, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

The previous version of the article before I edited it stated "Turkey denies the word genocide is an accurate term", which understates the issue but is at least less misleading than the versions you are proposing. (t · c) buidhe 14:41, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

Death toll and map

I wanted to correct the article as there are lack of sources. The death toll of the armenian genocide is around 1.5 million used by common sources. The death toll ranges to 1.4-1.6 million. The map is not correct, the one I wanted to add is a map made by a German ethnographic Richard Andrée in 1914, showing areas of Armenian settlement in blue: source=https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ethnic_map_of_Asia_Minor_and_Caucasus_in_1914.jpg. Thank you for your attention — Preceding unsigned comment added by Aidepikiwmeca (talk • contribs) 12:47, 19 March 2021 (UTC)

• No, most academic sources cite a somewhat lower number than that. This has been discussed above. The 1914 map is low quality and the level of detail is much lower than the British one making it not ideal. (t · c) buidhe 13:51, 19 March 2021 (UTC)

There was no consensus whatsoever, 1 million is as WP:POW estimate based on selective period of selective sources. Contemporary sources, e.g. NY Times desember 1915 issue, puts the death toll at 1 million and steadily increasing 8 month after the start of genocide Addictedtohistory (talk) 14:56, 19 March 2021 (UTC)

I can give you the link for a better quality map: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d0/Armenians_ethnic_map_1905.png?1616162475524. Taner Akçam, an historian of turkish origin give the death toll at least of 1.3 million armenian and explains that this number is given by the telegram of Talat Pasha. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Aidepikiwmeca (talk • contribs) 14:07, 19 March 2021 (UTC)

This map is low resolution and is in much less detailed than the British map, for instance there are many placenames marked on the British map and its showing of ethnic locations is more fine-grained. Also, the German map shows Armenians and Kurds in almost the same color, making it hard to get an accurate picture esp. some of our readers are color-blind.

Akcam found that the number of Armenians deported was 1.2 million and the number of deportees who died was less than that. See the "death toll" section. (t · c) buidhe 14:48, 19 March 2021 (UTC)

The number is completely WP:POW and contradicts the contemporary sources. NY times, December 1915 issue puts the death toll to 1 million and rising after first 8 month of the genocide. The death toll of modern historian, Akcam, is 1 million during first year of the genocide. Addictedtohistory (talk) 08:56, 23 March 2021 (UTC)

• "Range" implies a single estimate of between 800,000 - 1.5 million. Buidhe's attempt to find the middle ground of that range obscures the scholarship. It is not a "range" but more precisely "Estimates range" and because that is how it is described by the majority of scholarly works it would be the most fitting for the infobox of Wikipedia. Gators bayou (talk) 12:39, 24 March 2021 (UTC)

  Nah, not really, if we were really doing a range it would start lower, since there are some noteworthy estimates around 600,000. But, since it would be difficult and perhaps impossible to find the legitimate outer points of a range (as Morris and Ze'evi state, 1.5 million is also too high an estimate for such a range, and I have not seen such a figure validated with recent estimates), I prefer to leave the detailed discussion to the "death toll" section. (t · c) buidhe 13:37, 24 March 2021 (UTC)

I appreciate your work on this article but I don't find it an acceptable proposal that we leave "estimated 1 million" in the infobox without citation. I fully appreciate the difficulty (impossibility?) of knowing the death toll, but you should at least have the citations to the infobox proving the word "estimated" is used by recognized scholars. This is a controversial article and it's expected that editors will make objections to these types of changes. A footnote may be one option to let readers know there is more detailed discussion in the article. Gators bayou (talk) 11:25, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

Maybe something as simple as "Estimated around 1 million (see death toll)"? Lennart97 (talk) 11:56, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

This talk has not been constructive. A single wiki editor does not WP:OWN the article. The estimate of 1 million has not met consensus. I specifically referred several times above to the contemporary source, the December 15th 1915 issue of NY times, that puts the death toll at 1 million and steadily increasing 8 month through the genocide, which invalidates the estimate of 1 million. Addictedtohistory (talk) 23:19, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

Israel, being one of the main Armenian Genocide denial states, has put a lot of effort, specially in US, to prevent Armenian Genocide recognition. Israeli sources for that mater, e.g. Ze'evi, are hardly considered a WP:RS source. In it, both the death toll and Armenian population census is heavily underestimated and contradicts the contemporary sources. Taner Akçam puts the death toll at 1 million during the first year of genocide, NY Times December issue put it at 1 million 8 month through the genocide. What about the years ahead? Addictedtohistory (talk) 17:22, 27 March 2021 (UTC)

 Done (t · c) buidhe 12:31, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

Introductory Sentence

The introductory sentence, as it appears in the text, is imperfect, to say the least. First, the time period is lacking, thus the duplicity with “around 1 million”. The core period was in 1915-1916, but the genocide had continued well into 1918 and on into 1922 (Great fire of Smyrna). Therefore, “around 1 million” is an incorrect way to put the approximate total number of victims. The figure of 1.5 million is generally accepted as a reasonable estimate for the whole period of genocide (1915-1923). Besides, what is counted as “around”? Is 1.5 million anywhere near “around 1 million”? I don’t think so. Next, “Armenians from Asia Minor and adjoining regions” creates an impression as if Armenians just happened to be in Asia Minor before being mass murdered. Whereas, Asia Minor and adjoining regions was Armenians’ historical habitat thousands of years before the intrusion of Seljuk Turks in 10th and 11th centuries AD. I suggest the introductory sentence be changed as follows:

The Armenian Genocide (other names) was the systematic mass murder and ethnic cleansing of ethnic Armenians inhabiting Asia Minor and adjoining regions by the Ottoman government during World War I and until the foundation of the Turkish Republic in 1923. According to various estimates, from 800,000 to as many as 1,500,000 Armenians were murdered.98.231.157.169 (talk) 17:53, 27 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• Only a minority of scholars include the post-world war I period as part of the "Armenian Genocide", although they acknowledge that atrocities against Armenians continued during this period. Among the sources that define it to be only the World War I period include Suny (2015), Kevorkian (2011), Taner Akcam (2012), Wolfgang Gust[12], Donald Bloxham[13] and others[14], The Oxford Handbook of Genocide Studies, Kieser in the Routledge Handbook of the Holocaust[15] etc. There are some who do include the postwar period in "Armenian Genocide" but that's a minority view in scholarship. (t · c) buidhe 18:52, 27 March 2021 (UTC)

The World War I period lasted until 1918, fyi.98.231.157.169 (talk) 19:58, 27 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Around a million is fine, for the date "mostly during First World War" or similar is OK. Thanks, buidhe, for the great work. Hemşinli çocuk 19:21, 27 March 2021 (UTC)

@Hemşinli çocuk. In this talk, there are several readers who suggest valuable edits. So, not only the editors, but people concerned with improving the article are doing a great work. In case you didn't notice, çocuk...98.231.157.169 (talk) 19:58, 27 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

@(t · c) buidhe. Wrong. Many scholars include the post-world war I period as part of the "Armenian Genocide", not a minority. But from previous contributions I fear if I provide the extensive list, you may dismiss them, just as you dismissed several reliable sources in contradiction of [[16]] regulations. Not a very "great" work, I'm sorry to say.98.231.157.169 (talk) 20:06, 27 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

The figure of “around 1 million” is absolutely unacceptable, to put it mildly, because:

1. As correctly stated in the Death Toll section, “the exact number of Armenians who died is not known and impossible to determine […]”. In such cases, may it be known to Wikipedia’s editors, it is always more professional to give a range based on various estimates rather than an arbitrarily approximated number. In the Death Toll section, editors do provide a range between 800,000 and over 1 million for the period 1915 to 1923, but this range represents “most” estimates extracted from a single source that they so love to refer to throughout the text, Bijak & Lubman 2016. By doing so, editors conveniently dismiss several estimates found in Bijak & Lubman, stigmatizing them as “outliers”, which point to 1.5 million killed. Yet in no way can 1.5 million be an “outlier” because, as I’m sure the editors are well aware, this is a figure on which governments, parliaments, professional associations, academic societies, human rights groups, as well as many individual scholars draw their resolutions or base their expert recommendations. Therefore, the approximated “around 1 million” must be replaced with a more correct “between 800,000 and 1.5 million”.
2. The clause “between 800,000 and over 1 million for the period 1915 to 1923” in the Death Toll section is discriminatory to the upper bound of the estimates. Why, if I may ask, is the lower bound specified (800,000) but the upper bound approximated (over 1 million)? In Bijak & Lubman you have 1.2 million, 1.5 million, etc. based on various sources. So what is the reason the editors are so uncomfortable with specifying the upper bound of the death toll? Why not consider “between 800,000 and 1.2 to as many as 1.5 million” based on Bijak & Lubman’s charts?
3. The flimsy figure “around 1 million” is appearing in conjunction with “during World War I”. Sorry, but several sources that the editors cite in the article, such as Akçam, Kévorkian et al, specifically indicate that “around 1 million” refers to the core period of genocide, that is, to 1915-1916. I’m sure editors know that the war lasted until 1918, and that many scholars cited in the article point out that during the entire period of war and before the foundation of the Turkish Republic the death toll was higher than “around 1 million”. If editors, for some unknown reason, choose to stick to this flimsy approximated figure, then at the very least they must add in the introductory sentence that this figure refers to the core period of genocide in 1915-1916 and does not include killings that continued well into 1918 and 1923.
4. The clause “ethnic Armenians from Asia Minor and adjoining regions” must be changed to a more correct “ethnic Armenians inhabiting Asia Minor and adjoining regions”. Otherwise, linguistically, the whole sentence makes little sense: murder and ethnic cleansing are not perpetrated against a people from Asia Minor, but against a people inhabiting Asia Minor.

Hope this helps.98.231.157.169 (talk) 16:28, 31 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

How come that in the Death Toll section, the editors give a range indicating that “[h]istorians estimate that 1.5 to 2.5 million Armenians lived in the Ottoman Empire in 1915”, but when it comes to the introductory sentence they choose to round up the number of killed to "around 1 million" instead of providing a range found in sources? Curious to know.98.231.157.169 (talk) 16:45, 31 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Between 800,000 and over 1 million

This is a flawed and, I suspect, politically motivated, downsized figure. Wikipedia editors chose to state that “most estimates” for the Armenians who had been murdered within the period from 1915 to 1923 range from 800,000 and over 1 million. This is in and of itself untrue. And yet they cite only one (!) reference to the work by Jakub Bijak and Sarah Lubman titled “The Disputed Numbers: In Search of the Demographic Basis for Studies of Armenian Population Losses, 1915–1923”, disregarding the fact that in the introductory paragraph these authors unequivocally state that “[t]he existing estimates are quoted as ranging from 600,000 to 2 million […]” for the said period. Wikipedia editors thus allow themselves to be drawn into an arbitrary selection of sources to cherry pick only those that support the figure between 800,000 and over 1 million. Whereas many, MANY other sources indicate that in the period between 1915 and 1923 the number of Armenian dead was approaching 1.5 million.98.231.157.169 (talk) 15:11, 29 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• A different page of Bijak and Lubman is cited, which states, "in the existing data, there is evidence of mass-scale killings and displacements of the Armenian population in 1915–23. The existing estimates roughly agree as to the order of magnitude of the number of victims, from at least 600,000, or – more likely – 800,000 to over a million during the entire period." (In a table elsewhere in the chapter, they give 6 estimates, of which the majority are below 1 million, the lowest is 584,268 and the highest is 1,150,000). SOME sources do give 1.5 million as an estimate but this is an outlier. (t · c) buidhe 15:17, 29 March 2021 (UTC)

Well, then be so kind as to add that in the single work that you cite to support the flawed view that “most estimates are between 800,000 and over 1 million”, some sources do give 1.5 million as an estimate. If “most” estimates are between 800,000 and over 1 million, how come you cite only ONE source to support this view, if I may ask? Don’t you think it is preposterous? Wikipedia regulations encourage ALL reliable sources to be listed, and its editors do not own the articles so they cherry pick the desired ones and dismiss others.98.231.157.169 (talk) 15:33, 29 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Bijak and Lubman's paper is a survey of other estimates in published sources, it is not one person's estimate. (t · c) buidhe 17:03, 29 March 2021 (UTC)

I understand that, thank you. But as a survey of other estimates in published sources, Bijak and Lubman’s piece lists several sources that place the death toll at 1.5 million (and, by the way, only 3 (!) sources—mostly Turkish or pro-Turkish—place it under or around 600,000) and states that “the existing estimates are quoted as ranging from 600,000 to 2 million” (see p. 26). So, I still wonder how did the wide range from 600,000 to 2 million metamorphose into “around 1 million” in your introductory sentence? Doesn’t the average obtained from 600,000 to 2,00,000, based on our lower school grades’ knowledge, make it 1,300,000? Is 1,300,000 anywhere near “around 1 million”? Also, how come 3 (three!) Turkish or pro-Turkish sources suggesting 600,000 or lower deaths are not "an outlier", but several sources that offer 1.5 million are "an outlier"? Curious to know...98.231.157.169 (talk) 17:52, 29 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• You're misrepresenting the source; the authors do not cite a single reliable source that supports an estimate of 2 million. Whether a source is "Turkish or pro-Turkish" is does not answer the question of whether it's reliable. I will not respond to any more posts based on bad-faith assumptions.
• I maintain that "about 1 million" is the best way of representing the estimates that we have and the degree of uncertainty. All reliable estimates, when rounded to one significant figure, are 1 million. Some reputable historians, such as Suny, argue that the true figure was probably less than 1 million, others such as Akçam say it was probably more. (t · c) buidhe 18:52, 29 March 2021 (UTC)

@(t · c) buidhe: All I wanted to propose was for you to provide the range, and not to approximate. I hope you understand that approximation serves to the detriment of the numbers higher than 1 million. And, no, Turkish or pro-Turkish does answer whether a source is or is not reliable, because most non-Turkish (and non-Armenian) authors admit that these figures are understated. Again, that is why I propose placing a range based on various sources, not to approximate it to a flawed figure of "nearly 1 million". This is WRONG98.231.157.169 (talk) 19:06, 29 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

This will be my last attempt to appeal to reason. If you have a degree of uncertainty about the death toll and an enormous pool of various estimates, I most earnestly believe that the best way to deal with it is to provide a range and not round it up to an unsubstantiated figure of “around 1 million” without even mentioning the core period of genocide. Besides, how do you even round up the number of people subjected to the most vicious forms of violence to a “significant figure”? Do you think it’s acceptable from the moral and ethical point of view? Please consider revising to: “According to various estimates, from 800,000 to as many as 1,500,000 ethnic Armenians have been murdered in the period from 1915 to 1923”. You cannot disregard the fact that governments, parliaments, professional associations, academic societies, human rights groups, and many individual scholars across the globe have acknowledged the Armenian Genocide based on the figure of 1.5 million. How do you think Wikipedia’s Jewish readers would react if I introduced an edit to The Holocaust page, stating that “around 4 million” Jews were systematically murdered across German-occupied Europe?98.231.157.169 (talk) 19:54, 29 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Actually the Holocaust article already gives a point-based estimate of "some six million" (t · c) buidhe 16:50, 31 March 2021 (UTC)

Yes, based on US Holocaust Memorial Museum data, a mostly Jewish institution. And in the Death Toll, the article restates the most commonly cited death toll being six million based on data from Yad Vashem, an Israeli institution. But here, not once did the editors mention that the most commonly cited death toll among Armenians, or the most internationally recognized one, is 1.5 million. How about that?98.231.157.169 (talk) 01:06, 3 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Okay, then, since Wikipedia readily included the figure of six million Jews killed during the Holocaust provided by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, here is the figure of 1.5 million Armenians killed supplied by the Armenian Genocide Museum of America. Please embed in the article.98.231.157.169 (talk) 01:22, 3 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Oh, and since Wikipedia’s Holocaust article contains data from Yad Vashem, here’s the figure of 1.5 million supplied by Armenia-based Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute. Please embed in the article.98.231.157.169 (talk) 01:33, 3 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Over 1 million vs Around 1 million

If “most” estimates are between 800,000 and over 1 million for the entire period 1915 to 1923, as arbitrarily selecting Wikipedia editors state in the Death Toll section, how did “over 1 million” metamorphose into “around 1 million” in the Introductory Section? I wonder…98.231.157.169 (talk) 16:20, 29 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• First, your premise is wrong. Second, some estimates are lower, others are higher, but all scholarly estimates are in the ballpark of 1 million to one order of approximation. (t · c) buidhe 17:04, 29 March 2021 (UTC)

"Some estimates are lower, others are higher". Well, then please go ahead and mention all of them. Don't cherry pick. Next, "All scholarly estimates (what?!) are in the ballpark of 1 million". This is dead wrong. Most scholarly estimates until your current article were in the ballpark of between 800,000 and up to 1.5 million in the period from 1915 to 1923.98.231.157.169 (talk) 17:19, 29 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Perhaps you don't know the meaning of "first order of approximation". Consider looking it up. (t · c) buidhe 17:45, 29 March 2021 (UTC)

Perhaps you don’t know that when it comes to such a sensitive issue as the number of mass murdered people during a genocide, the most appropriate way of putting the death toll is to provide the range based on various estimates, and not to “approximate” it. Consider widening your knowledge base.98.231.157.169 (talk) 18:05, 29 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Armenian presence in Asia Minor "almost a millennium" prior to Turks

The following clause in the Background Section needs to be revised:

The presence of Armenians in Asia Minor is documented since the sixth century BCE, almost a millennium prior to the Turkic migrations to the area.

The intrusion or penetration (the term “migration” would make serious historians and anthropologists laugh—migrants do not come to foreign lands with fire and sword Battle of Manzikert) of Seljuk Turks into Asia Minor in the eleventh century AD does not make it “almost a millennium” after the cuneiform inscription, dated sixth century BC, had mentioned Armenia (Armina) on the Behistun rock Behistun Inscription. Suny’s statement “By this inhuman policy the Turks tried to eliminate a people who had lived in eastern Anatolia for nearly a thousand years before the Turks had arrived” does not make it “nearly" a thousand years. Consider simple math: sixth century BC + 1,000 years = sixth century AD. There were no Turks in sight in Asia Minor or anywhere near the region in or around sixth century AD. All empirical evidence indicates that Seljuk Turks appeared in the region in the eleventh century AD. Below please find a few selected sources testifying to the fact. I hope they won’t be dismissed, in breach of Wikipedia’s own regulations Wikipedia:Reliable Sources, on the flimsy grounds that they are not “from the last 15 years or so” or are not “recent scholarly sources” or are not “the same weight as peer reviewed work” or are “old books from 100 years ago”:

1. Encyclopædia Britannica https://www.britannica.com/topic/Seljuq;
2. New World Encyclopedia https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Seljuk_Turks;
3. Beihammer, Alexander, “Patterns of Turkish Migration and Expansion in Byzantine Asia Minor in the 11th and 12th Centuries”, in Migration Histories of the Medieval Afroeurasian Transition Zone, Chap. 6, 166-192;
4. Beihammer, Alexander, “Defection across the Border of Islam and Christianity: Apostasy and Cross-Cultural Interaction in Byzantine-Seljuk Relations”, Speculum, Vol. 86, No. 3 (July 2011), 597-651;
5. Brand, C., “The Turkish Element in Byzantium, Eleventh-Twelfth Centuries”, Dumbarton Oaks Papers 43 (1989), 1-25.
6. Vryonis, S., The Decline of Medieval Hellenism in Asia Minor and the Process of Islamization from the Eleventh through the Fifteenth Century, Berkeley: 1971;
7. Vlyssidou, V.N. (ed.), The Empire in Crisis (?): Byzantium in the 11th Century (1025–1081) Athens: Institute for Byzantine Research, International Symposium, 11, 2003;
8. Doğan, Gürpınar, Anatolia’s eternal destiny was sealed: Seljuks of Rum in the Turkish national(ist) imagination from the late Ottoman Empire to the Republican era, European Journal of Turkish Studies, 2012;
9. Nicolle, David. Manzikert 1071: The Breaking of Byzantium. Oxford: Osprey Publishing, 2013;
10. Barin, Filiz, Othello: Turks as “the Other” in the Early Modern Period, The Journal of the Midwest Modern Language Association, Vol. 43, No. 2 (Fall 2010), 37-58;
11. Margarian, Hayrapet, The Nomads and Ethnopolitical Realities of Transcaucasia in the 11th-14th Centuries, Iran & the Caucasus, Vol. 5 (2001), 75-78;
12. Roche, Jason T. In the Wake of Mantzikert: The First Crusade and the Alexian Reconquest of Western Anatolia, History, Vol. 94, No. 2 (314) (April 2009), 135-153;
13. Kafadar, Cemal, Introduction: A Rome of One’s Own: Reflections on Cultural Geography and Identity in the Lands of Rum, Muqarnas, Vol. 24, History and Ideology: Architectural Heritage of the “Lands of Rum” (2007), 7-25;
14. Kaegi, Jr., Walter Emil, The Contribution of Archery to the Turkish Conquest of Anatolia, Speculum, Vol. 39, No. 1 (Jan., 1964), 96-108;
15. Dashdondog, Bayarsaikhan, “Mongol Noyans in Greater Armenia (1220-1245)”, in The Mongols and the Armenians (1220-1335), Brill: 2011, 43-7098.231.157.169 (talk) 18:56, 29 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• Hi, thanks for providing these sources. I will take a look. Hopefully you don't mind that I reformatted your list so it is easier to read, if you do mind I will revert it. (t · c) buidhe 19:11, 29 March 2021 (UTC)

Thanks to you too for taking a look. The list is very short, there are tons of literature on the Seljuk Turk invasion of Asia Minor and most of the Middle East. Is is an undeniable historical fact that Seljuk Turks have penetrated into the region in the 11th century AD. This does not make it "almost a millennium" after the first inscription recording Armenians had been found.98.231.157.169 (talk) 19:15, 29 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Hi I checked #8, #10, and #13, and unfortunately I don't see that any of them answers the question, "When (and how) did the Turks begin to live in Asia Minor?" The closest thing I can find is in Barin, which states "The Battle of Manzikert in 1 07 1 , under the command of Alp Arslan, ended in a decisive victory for the Seljuk Turks over the Byzantine Empire and opened up Anatolia for further Turkish advance." But, this does not inform whether there were Turks living in Asia Minor prior to the battle of Manzikert. It would be helpful to maybe start with just one source that does clearly answer this question and give a page number and quote if possible. (t · c) buidhe 19:44, 29 March 2021 (UTC)

So, let me get this straight... Out of fifteen sources, you chose to take a look at the ones that were written by Turkish authors? Still, it looks like you weren’t paying close attention.

In Barrin, opening para.: “The Battle of Manzikert in 1071 […] opened up Anatolia for further Turkish advance. In 1095, Pope Urban II launched a military campaign to push back Turkish forces from Anatolia”. In Gürpınar, p. 39: “The Turkification and Muslimization of Anatolia occurred within two centuries, mainly in two waves: the first in the second half of the 11th century […]” In Kafadar, p. 8: “[…] the Turks naturally get to be the descendants of Inner Asian nomads and warriors, […] there were many who emigrated from […] Central Asia and Khorasan […]. Manzikert 1071 happens (according to Seljuk designs), and Turks pour into Asia Minor […]”98.231.157.169 (talk) 20:21, 29 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

@(t · c) buidhe. I don't have much time to spare in order to restate the widely known fact of Seljuk Turk appearance in Asia Minor in only the 11th century AD, but I think checking your own articles Byzantine–Seljuk wars and Seljuk Empire would help. If you're still unconvinced, here are just a few extracts from several selected works. Oh, I forgot, most of them are from the last 15 years or so:

1. Andrew C.S. Peacock, Early Seljuq History: A New Interpretation, Routledge, 2010, p. 2: The subject of this book is the rise of a group of Turks from their origins as an obscure tribe living in the west Eurasian steppes to rulers of an empire that dominated the Middle East and Central Asia. Led by the descendants of the chief Seljuq b. Duqaq, in the first half of the eleventh century the Turks captured the established centres of civilisation of the Islamic world — the great cities of Transoxiana, Iran and Iraq — and reached far into Anatolia and the Caucasus. The Ghaznavid, Buyid and Byzantine Empires that dominated Central Asia, Iran and Iraq, and Anatolia all met defeat at the hands of the armies of Turkish nomads.
2. Alexander Beihammer, 2020, p. 166: After various expansionist stages that culminated in the reign of Basil II the [Byzantine] empire’s eastern provinces stretched from the western coastland of Asia Minor as far as northern Syria, the Upper Euphrates region, and the Armenian highlands. A ruling clan […] called Seljuk and superficially Islamized nomadic warriors, who drew their origin from the Turkic Oghuz tribes dwelling in the steppe lands of Transoxania, formed the driving force of this new [Seljuk] empire. In the 1040s, Turkmen hosts made their first raids into the region south of the Anti-Taurus range and invaded the Armenian highlands between the Araxes and the Arsanias (Murat) Rivers.
3. Alexander Beihammer, 2011, p. 603: [t]he overall situation after the first great wave of Seljuk invasions from the 1040s until the late 1070s and throughout the twelfth century […] can be characterized as highly unstable and, in certain periods, even relentlessly hostile.
4. David Nicole, 2013, p. 14: […] under the loose leadership of the Seljuk family, substantial numbers of Turkish tribal groups crossed [River] Syr Darya [from Inner Asia] early in the 11th century, then spread into Transoxania, eastern Iran and Afghanistan. While the early Seljuks pressed south and west, other Oghuz [people] migrated westwards, north of the Black Sea until they reached the Byzantine frontier in the Balkans.
5. Charles M. Brand, 1989, p. 2: [t]he integration of Turks into the Byzantine ruling class, from the mid-eleventh century, when Turks first made serious inroads into Byzantine Anatolia […]
6. Hayrapet Margaryan, 2001, pp. 75-77: […] Turkic nomads […] coming to Transcaucasia from Central Asia had had little to do with land tillers or urban life in their home countries. A retrospective look at the 11th-14th centuries realities yields a well-substantiated conclusion on the differing natures of military actions undertaken by the Turkic peoples […] in Transcaucasia. […] A military action with an intention to seize the territory and to eliminate or partially absorb the existing population can be termed as invasion. [It] is in this sense that the invasions of the Seljuk and later the Turkic tribal confederations […] have to be understood. Following the seizure of most Transcaucasia and Asia Minor, the Seljuks started to actively reclaim the occupied areas.
7. Jason T. Roche, 2009, p. 135: This article […] seeks to address […] general histories of the Byzantine empire concerning the Turkish invasion of and settlement in western Anatolia after the battle of Mantzikert in 1071. […] Historians have addressed the eleventh-century Turkish incursions into Anatolia, which were the initial source of the turmoil […]
8. Walter Emil Kaegi, 1964, p. 96: [t]he Byzantine loss of Anatolia to the Seljuk Turks in the second half of the eleventh century. In 1050 the peninsula seemed to be the firm keystone of the Byzantine Empire; the Byzantines had been defending it successfully […]. By the accession of Alexius Comnenus to the emperorship in 1081 the Seljuks had overrun most of Anatolia.
9. Bayarsaikhan Dashdondog, 2011, p. 43: [t]he Seljuks (Saljuqs) of Rūm had been in power in the western part [of the Caucasus] since the end of the twelfth century.98.231.157.169 (talk) 22:34, 29 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• Wikipedia has a strict policy against original research: all content must be supported by sources that "directly support the material being presented". You seem to start with the assumption that there are no Turks living in Asia Minor prior to the Seljuks, but we cannot assume that the arrival of the Seljuks is equivalent to the arrival of the Turks without a source that clearly says so. The question I am trying to answer is "When (and how) did the Turks begin to live in Asia Minor?" Fifteen sources are not necessary, just one or two that explicitly answer the question. (t · c) buidhe 01:07, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

@(t · c) buidhe, you need to read multiple pages in sources in order to form an idea about the original habitat of various nomadic Turkic groups and their intrusion into Asia Minor. Seljuks were just one group representing Turkic tribes living in what is now areas around the Altai Mountains in Russian Siberia. Scholars cannot ascertain when the Turks first used that name to describe themselves. But what they all agree is that it was only in the eleventh century when nomadic Seljuk warriors penetrated the lands of the sedentary peoples living in Asia Minor. I believe you know this well, because two of Wikipedia’s own articles above testify to the fact. And, again, peaceful settlers or migrants do not “arrive” to foreign lands with fire and sword. There is a specific term for this in the English language: intrusion. I’ll see if I can find sources that say in clear and massive print written in black letters on white paper what is known as a widely accepted historical fact: Turkic nomads started appearing in Asia Minor only in the eleventh century AD. There were no Turks or however these groups called them before that time on the lands of ancient autochthonous people such as Byzantine Greeks, Armenians, Assyrians, and the Kurds.98.231.157.169 (talk) 14:45, 30 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Could the material being presented be supported more directly than the way Andrew Charles Spencer Peacock, a renowned British historian specializing in the history of the Seljuks, has put it?: “[A] group of Turks (Seljuks, that is-Davidian) [rised] from their origins as an obscure tribe living in the west Eurasian steppes to rulers of an empire that dominated the Middle East and Central Asia. Led by the descendants of the chief Seljuk Dukak, in the first half of the eleventh century the Turks captured the established centres of civilisation of the Islamic world — the great cities of Transoxiana, Iran and Iraq — and reached far into Anatolia and the Caucasus.” What is "more direct" way of stating a simple and widely known historical fact?98.231.157.169 (talk) 15:03, 30 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Hi IP, why don't you just create your own profile and edit yourself? You seem to be fairly informed on the topic and your knowledge would probably be welcomed on Wikipedia also in other articles.Paradise Chronicle (talk) 15:24, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

Why won’t you go to Paradise and edit yourself?98.231.157.169 (talk) 15:40, 30 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

@(t · c) buidhe. This will be my last contribution in this thread, because I cannot waste time proving to Wikipedia editors that yoghurt is white. Below please find a few selected Reliable Sources, which directly support the material being presented by outlining in clear and massive print written in black letters on white paper: (a) the place of original habitat of the Turkic tribes (Seljuks and Türkmens or Turkomans); (b) the time period of their westward movement to foreign lands; and (c) the exact century when they intruded Asia Minor and the Caucasus. Oh, I forgot, most of them are sources form the last fifteen years or so:

1. Andrew C.S. Peacock, Nomadic Society and the Seljūq Campaigns in Caucasia, Iran & the Caucasus, Vol. 9, No. 2 (2005), pp. 205-230
2. Roderic H. Davison, Essays in Ottoman and Turkish History, 1774-1923: The Impact of the West, University of Texas Press, 2013, pp. 1-3
3. Leonard, Thomas M. (2006). “Turkey”, in Encyclopedia of the Developing World, Volume 3. London; New York: Routledge, 2006, p. 1576.
4. Sahadeo, Jeff; Zanca, Russell (2007). Everyday Life in Central Asia: Past and Present. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2007, pp. 22-23.
5. A. Sevim and C.E. Bosworth, The Seljuqs and the Khwarazm Shahs (Part One: The origins of the Seljuqs and the establishment of Seljuq power in the Islamic lands up to 1055), in M.S. Asimov and C.E. Bosworth (ed.), History of Civilizations of Central Asia Volume IV, UNESCO Publishing, 1988, pp. 145-175

Cheers98.231.157.169 (talk) 16:03, 30 March 2021 (UTC)Davidian

While I don't care for the IP's tone of voice (highly unsuitable for WP [or anywhere else]), they appear to be right regarding content. Some of the quotes they provide talk about "Turks", not just Seljuks. Saying that Turks didn't enter Anatolia before the 11th century seems entirely unproblematic, and the onus would be on anyone making the opposite assertion (I don't believe anyone has). Jeppiz (talk) 22:59, 31 March 2021 (UTC)

As you can see I already corrected the article accordingly. (t · c) buidhe 23:24, 31 March 2021 (UTC)

• The introductory sentence in the Background (Armenians in the Ottoman Empire) is still imperfect. It needs to be further revised for more clarity, as follows:

The presence of Armenians in Asia Minor is documented since the sixth century BCE Behistun Inscription, around 1,500 years prior to the Turkic incursions to the area. Cheers,98.231.157.169 (talk) 15:04, 2 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

If we can't explain how some historical detail is related to genocide than it shouldn't be in this article because it gives readers an incorrect impression that is detriemtnal. Many of the Jews killed in the Holocaust and indeed the Jews who were disproportionately effected in the early stages of the Holocaust were Jews who were rendered "stateless" by political upheavals in Orthodox lands (for more on this see Ze'ev Jabotinsky who was affiliated with the Young Turks in 1908) Many authors cited in the article have never written about genocide in general or any genocide other than the history of Armenians in Turkey (and sometimes also the Soviet Union), and others, like A.C.S. Peacock, have no recognized expertise in genocide whatsoever. Some of those errors are extremely, such as the current discussion about whether the Armenians lived in Asia Minor before the Turks. Gators bayou (talk) 17:18, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Yes, the Armenians had inhabited Asia Minor millennia before Turkic nomads penetrated into the area. This is quite relevant to the section “Armenians in the Ottoman Empire” and thanks for including a clause in it. Authors cited for the edit I proposed above are not genocide scholars, of course, but all agree that first appearance of Turkic tribes in Asia Minor pertains to the 11th century AD. This makes it 1,500 years after the documented inscription of the presence of Armenians in the region was found. Eastern Europe was not the historical habitat of the Jews. For Armenians, Asia Minor was. Bringing Jabotinsky into this discussion is not a very good idea, as it unnecessarily brings up a new subject of Jewish/Dönmeh conspiracy in the genocidal extermination of the Armenians.98.231.157.169 (talk) 17:51, 2 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

IP's tone on this talk page accusing editors of sinister motives is inappropriate. Jabotinsky is relevant for any discussion of the the pogroms, which were committed by the Russian army and its auxiliary forces. It's depressing how uneducated people still are about the facts of the Holocaust. Many of the Jews who fled from Orthodox lands were murdered in the early stages of the Holocaust. When they were caught crossing borders without papers countries like France turned them over to the Germans who slaughtered them. This line of reasoning that "Eastern Europe was not the historical habitat of the Jews" has a long history and is pervasively odious. Gators bayou (talk) 18:19, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

What tone? Where did you find a hint of accusation? And I’m sorry for you that from all my contributions to this talk you got an idea that I’m an “uneducated” person. What is wrong with reiterating that the historical habitat of the Jews is in Israel and Judah? What is wrong about it from the historical point of view? Did you notice the word “historical”? Armenians are also a Diasporan nation, but their historical habitat is not in France, but on the Armenian Plateau and the adjoining regions. Take it easy.98.231.157.169 (talk) 18:41, 2 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

It's not some innocent fact of history when you are claiming it is relevant to an article about genocide but can't (or won't) explain why it's relevant. Israel may be the historical habitat of the Jews, in some sense, but it doesn't diminish the wrong that was committed against the countless refugees who were run out of their ancestral homes by hateful Orthodox mobs. Many of those Jews died in the Holocaust simply because they were Jewish and they weren't wanted for that reason... After that Israel was founded. The experience of the Armenians in diaspora was dissimilar. I'm not seeing the connection you are drawing with the concept of Israel as a home for Jews which is about more than a "historical habitat" (mostly a religious connotation). Gators bayou (talk) 19:08, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

As a descendant of genocide survivors, I fully understand. No need to tell me simple things related to human suffering and human compassion, especially since the Shoah happened also because the Armenian Genocide, the precursor, has never been condemned and its state perpetrator never punished. In this sense, yes, the Armenian experience is indeed dissimilar. I hope the State of Israel finds the balls to acknowledge the similar sufferings of other people... eventually. I’m gonna stop here. Cheers.98.231.157.169 (talk) 19:29, 2 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Armenians in the Ottoman Empire

Another frivolous approximation based on a single source, Suny 2015, was introduced by editors in this section, stating that “[a]round 2 million Armenians lived in the Ottoman Empire on the eve of World War I”. Whereas several RS indicate that there were 2.5 million and more Armenians prior to the genocide. Because Wikipedia editors appear to be fixated on rounding up wide ranges of numbers of victims of genocide, Armenian population numbers, etc., this recent edit is in sheer contradiction with Wikipedia’s own article Ottoman Armenian population, where it says in black letters on a white background that “[m]ost estimates by Western scholars range from 1.5 to 2.4 million. According to Britannica prior to 1915 and Samuel Cox, American Embassy in Istanbul from 1880-1886, it was 1.75 million and 2.4 million, respectively”.98.231.157.169 (talk) 17:04, 1 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Except that it takes into account 1.5 to 2.4 million by being in-between. Hemşinli çocuk 18:11, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

Why is there a need to provide an in-between number instead of ballpark numbers? Please refer your readers to a relevant Wikipedia:PAG98.231.157.169 (talk) 21:10, 1 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Specially for Wikipedia editors, who first include in the article the figure “from 1.5 to 2.5 million Armenians” and then downsize it to “around 2 million” and to those gentlemen who rush to back this reduction by stating that 2 million “is a reasonable estimate”. Well, below please find Armenian population numbers based on Ottoman census and population update results:

1844 Ottoman census: 2,400,000 Armenians

1876 Ottoman census: 2,400,000 Armenians

1875-1876 Ottoman census: 2,500,000 Armenians

After the 1877-1878 Russo-Turkish War, Europe witnessed the internationalization of the Armenian Question. Treaty of Berlin was signed in 1878 containing Article 61, which read:

“The Sublime Porte undertakes to carry out, without further delay, the improvements and reforms demanded by local requirements in the provinces inhabited by Armenians, and to guarantee their security against the Circassians and Kurds. It will periodically make known the steps taken to this effect to the powers, who will superintend their application.”

Unsettled by European powers’ involvement with Ottoman Armenians in terms of guaranteeing their security against Muslim groups, from 1878 onwards Turkish authorities resorted to gross undercounting of the Armenian population. From 1878 to 1914, two censuses and one population update were carried out.

1881-1885 Ottoman census: 1,169,960 Gregorian, Catholic, and Protestant Armenians

1903-1906 Ottoman census: 1,194,443 Gregorian, Catholic, and Protestant Armenians

1914 Ottoman population update (carried out by the Young Turks on the basis of 1903-1906 census): 1,294,851 Gregorian, Catholic, and Protestant Armenians

An appeal to reason to Wikipedia editors. How is this even possible that the Ottoman state counted 2,500,000 Armenians in 1876, but already in 1885, that is, just nine lousy years after, listed only 1,169,960 Armenians?! Where did 1,330,040 Armenians go in the short course of nine years? Evaporated?... Mind you, the first case of mass violence against Ottoman Armenians, in which tens or hundreds of thousands were killed, took place in 1894-1896 during the Hamidian massacres. And if you bring the Patriarchate census figure, I will have to reiterate that for several Armenian-populated areas the census-takers relied on flawed Ottoman statistics, which resulted in a total figure below the actual number. When genocide survivors made their testimonies, they would customarily increase their populations per village by about 20 to 70 percent as compared to the Patriarchate figures.

It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that the pre-genocide Ottoman Armenian population was greater than 2.5 million people, does it?98.231.157.169 (talk) 01:39, 2 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Hi Davidian, to answer your question, there were border changes, population transfers, obviously migrations, the Hamidian massacres, etc. Those affected the demographic makeup of the region. The Oxford Handbook of Genocide Studies (the chapter that was written by Hilmar Kaiser) p.382 estimates that there were at least (he writes "lowest estimate" in the note 70) 1,718,132 Armenians using Multu estimations of +34% (to account for the undercounting), similarly to Talaat estimation of +30%. Therefore, the Armenian population can be anywhere between 1.7 million to a little over 2 million that's further supported by the figures Kaiser provides, since he writes: An Armenian census arrived in 1913 at 1,914,620 Armenians while leaving out some communities. Seems to me that when taking into account the available material on the subject, 2 million is reasonable, and does the job. Hemşinli çocuk 03:52, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

No, it doesn’t. And here's why. Wikipedia editors seem to have been tasked by whoever give them policy orders to decrease both the number of Armenians killed during the genocide and the size of Ottoman Armenian populations. They do this by rounding up various estimates, instead of providing the range. One doesn’t have to be an Armenian to understand these cheap stunts. I presented data from primary sources, or secondary sources that used data from primary sources, and not a secondary source, such as Hilmar Kaiser. Please indicate what border changes, population transfers, migrations, etc. took place in the course of nine years from 1876, when an Ottoman census recorded 2,500,000 Armenians, and 1885, when the next Ottoman census listed 1,169,960 Armenians? Curious to know. Hamidian massacres, as you know, but still decide to bring up because you’re running out of arguments, occurred in 1894-1896. Kaiser doesn’t know, while Armenian scholars do, that the 1913 Patriarchate census (using “Armenian census” is wrong, doesn’t Kaiser know?) not only left out several areas, but also for several other areas relied on flawed Ottoman statistics, which resulted in a total figure below the actual number. Therefore, rounding up estimates that range from 1.7 million to 2.5 million and more is not only unreasonable, but totally unprofessional. Give the range, don’t approximate. I provided several rare primary sources that you won’t find in Kaiser or Suny.98.231.157.169 (talk) 14:15, 2 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Wikipedia editors are simply trying to reach clarity on an opaque and difficult point of contention. I'm in agreement with other editors that we should be giving the range. Secondary sources talk about "estimates" and give ranges. I don't think there is any other option when primary sources conflict that we should be giving the range like secondary sources. Gators bayou (talk) 17:40, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Hi Davidian, lets go back to the previous discussion (that's much more constructive), the most obvious problem with the use of a range, is that someone can say 1.3 – 2.5, another 1.8 – 2.1, and be referring to the same Wikipedia rules to justify their change by using the author that each think is more notable, or more credible. Each individual author, alone, is just one sample.

Here a set of ten different range (all supportable by different sources biased on one side or the other), from different permutations and combinations, you are free to add more, same goes for other editors.

• 1.3 – 1.8
• 1.5 – 1.8
• 1.5 – 2.0 
• 1.3 – 2.5
• 1.8 – 2.1
• 1.5 – 2.5
• 1.7 – 2.5 
• 1.8 – 2.4
• 1.8 – 2.5 
• 2.1 – 2.5 

• Mean range: 1.63 – 2.26 million
• Mean of Means: 1.945 million
• Variance : 0,052

• At a confidence level of 95 %, margin of error is of ± 0.146 million.

If I mistyped something in my sheet and got the calculation wrong, correct me.

And if everyone contributes and adds all possible combination of ranges from every side of the spectrum, it seems that it will level out to about that number (that is, close to 2 million).

And now, do the same exercise for the number of victims.

• A note, this exercise can only be done in the case of the Armenian genocide, because actors here have some form of freedom no matter the opinion they espouse, covering all the spectrum and mitigate several form of bias to arrive to a form of long-standing consensus. No one can then claim that one authors point of view was not considered in the building of that consensus (since statistical tools aren't in dispute here). As the information flows and knowledge become more decentralized, scholars with that freedom they enjoy can be revisiting other historical events to apply the same standards. Hemşinli çocuk 19:28, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

This set of range variants needs to be amended by (a) sources used (apparently Turkish sources mingle amongst them reducing the mean range); (b) to which period sources referred (if pre-genocide, immediately prior to it or years/decades before it?); (c) to which area sources referred (six Armenian-populated eastern vilayets or Ottoman Empire in general?); and (d) combinations based on newly-introduced late 19th-century population data are likely absent. If you expand on (a), (b) and (c), I’ll do the rest.98.231.157.169 (talk) 21:18, 2 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Hi, that's my last reply. They are randomized but with constraints (the constraints being set of used well known figures) to compose ranges. Turkish sources are necessary to cover the whole spectrum and form as much as possible a Gaussian curve (but I didn’t analyze the data to verify if it did). Selecting and removing any of the figures used because they are Turkish or Armenian will taint the results (but we can be rejecting extremes for both sides, that’s already done when analyzing samples). Data analyses can show narrowing of the curve, asymmetry or other anomalies and that give clues that the data was filtered, processed, there was cross contamination, etc. Everything being wholly disclosed and can be replicated. Editors who have a position could be hunting for all the sources they can find, collecting them similarly to when it’s done in data-mining. That’s better than relying on one single author or some authors or editors judgement and standard (those are undisclosed). But I don’t hold my breath that that’s going to happen anytime soon, because all articles here have to be reassessed and edited appropriately. So I prefer spending my time developing applicable models to make that possible then editing articles here. And that’s also why I won’t be continuing this discussion any further. Hemşinli çocuk 22:25, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

• Last note, if you or anyone else want to contact me for more info on those models, you can email me from Wikipedia (you need an account and enable emailing for that). Hemşinli çocuk 22:32, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

In addition to pre-1878 Ottoman censuses above, in which Armenian population size ranged from 2,400,000 to 2,500,000, here are population data found in Armenian primary sources and secondary sources that used primary data. Together with pre-1878 Ottoman census figures, these primary data are intended to infuse new blood, so to say, into ossified figures by Suny et al that editors so love to make reference to:

2,660,000 Armenians in 1882 (this figure was provided to European powers by the Security Committee at the Armenian Patriarchate of Constantinople, which was entrusted with drafting the reforms in Armenian populated provinces

2,026,700 Armenians in 1912

2,100,000 Armenians in 1913

2,382,336 Armenians prior to genocide

1,915,560 Armenians in 1914 (Patriarchate data available to Kévorkian and Paboudjian. Please note: 1,914,620 mentioned in their work must be a typo, because the resulting total from the charts on pp. 57-60 comes to 1,915,560

If added to the set of ranges above, these Ottoman and Armenian figures will no doubt bring mean of means to more than 2 million. If Turkish sources are out (all those laughable 1.3s), because crime perpetrators, need I say?, tend to grossly underreport numbers, I can say on a prima facie basis that mean of means may reach up to or about 2.3-2.5 million Ottoman Armenians. Hope this helps.98.231.157.169 (talk) 00:35, 3 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• This line of investigation is based on original research. One cannot assume that the numbers of Armenians in 1882 is similar to later figures because emigration, massacres, and Islamization were already leading to a decline. We base our estimates on what is said in recent academic sources, particularly those which summarize other estimates (e.g. Morris & Ze'evi as well as Bijak & Luban), indicating academic consensus. Wikipedia editors should not be looking at the original census figures and trying to divine it for themselves. (t · c) buidhe 01:15, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

If you looked closely, you’d see that all sources cited in this thread are reliable secondary sources containing primary data, such as censuses or population updates. May a reliable secondary source contain census data? It may? Tha-a-a-ank you. No WP:RS guideline says that sources must be recent. Stop making things up. And lastly, this last edit was meant to be an addition to the set of different ranges offered by Hemşinli çocuk. No one asked you to look at the original census figures and divine them.98.231.157.169 (talk) 01:52, 3 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Please illuminate us about instances of emigration, massacres, and Islamization between 1875-1876 Ottoman census, which reported 2,500,000 Armenians, and the next census in 1881-1885, which downsized their number to 1,169,960. Where did 1,330,040 Armenians go in the short course of nine years? Might you know?98.231.157.169 (talk) 02:03, 3 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• In a fit of approximation of figures (perhaps they were good at that at school), editors rounded up various estimates for Ottoman Armenian populations ranging from 1.5 to 2.5 million and more, to a lousy figure of “around 2 million”, providing one (one!) reference to Suny’s 2015 work. Please be aware that in Encyclopedia Britannica which features Suny’s article “Armenian Genocide: Turkish-Armenian history”, this same author has stated: “At the beginning of the 20th century, there were about 2.5 million Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire”. Please enlighten Wikipedia readers, based on WP:PG and not a frivolous interpretation or a caprice, as to how editors should handle the conflicting numbers supplied by the same author at the same time? In Article History, Britannica informs their readers that Suny has made the last thorough revision on 8 April 2015.98.231.157.169 (talk) 20:12, 3 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Not a single mention of 1.5 million Armenians killed

Despite the widely known fact that most governments, parliaments, provincial administrations, municipalities, clerical Christian organizations, professional associations, academic societies, human rights organizations and advocacy groups, as well as many genocide scholars, historians, and international lawyers used 1.5 million as the estimate of Armenians killed in their resolutions, statements, declarations, condemnations, proclamations, and scholarly works, there is no single mention of that figure in this article. It’s really a shame.98.231.157.169 (talk) 21:47, 1 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

We should be giving the range. The lead gives the range from 800,000 to 1.2 million but Buidhe has refused to budge on the "Estimated around 1 million" in the infobox. She has expressed some opposition to increasing the range from 800,000 to 1.5 million because she says it is "too high". Sorry if I'm getting this wrong Buidhe, it's what I remember from our earlier discussion, feel free to jump in here. Gators bayou (talk) 17:44, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Actually, 800,000 to 1.2 million refers to the number estimated deported in various sources, which is different than the number killed (some survived deportation, others were massacred without being deported also). (t · c) buidhe 18:09, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

I'm gonna copy and paste Thomas de Waal's discussion of casualties here because it's highly relevant:

Almost every element of this has become highly politicized, even before we get to the use and abuse of the word “genocide,” invented in the 1940s. Inevitably, a gruesome game of numbers looms over the issue of the Genocide. Politicized historians inflate and diminish the casualty figures, count and discount corpses, seeking to prove that greater or smaller numbers of Armenians died. Again, there are no big secrets here. During World War I, observers estimated that one million Armenians had been killed. The postwar Allied-backed Ottoman government of 1919 put the figure at 800,000, a number that Kemal Atatürk apparently accepted.

(t · c) buidhe 18:11, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

"During World War I, observers estimated that one million Armenians had been killed." This is not true, Mr de Waal. In fact, several contemporaries placed the number at 1.5 million. For example, 1.5 million was mentioned in a report titled Volkswirtschaftliche Studien in der Türkei submitted to the German Foreign Office on 14 July 1916. 1.5 million was mentioned in another field report dated 27 May 1916 dispatched to the German Foreign Office. Wilhelm von Radowitz, German Ambassador to Constantinople mentioned 1.5 million in a report dated 4 October 1916.98.231.157.169 (talk) 02:32, 3 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

“The postwar Allied-backed Ottoman government of 1919 put the figure at 800,000.” This is another falsehood, Mr de Waal. During the Allied-backed Turkish courts-martial of 1919-1920, 1.2 million Armenian deaths were in circulation throughout the court proceedings.98.231.157.169 (talk) 02:37, 3 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Nope. (t · c) buidhe 02:46, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

Vahakn N. Dadrian, The Turkish Military Tribunal’s Prosecution of the Authors of the Armenian Genocide: Four Major Court-Martial Series, in Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Vol. 11, No. 1 (Spring 1997), p. 34.98.231.157.169 (talk) 03:04, 3 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Postwar Ottoman government was not led by Humayak Khosrovian but rather by Damad Ferid who actually did put the number of Armenian deaths at 800,000. (t · c) buidhe 04:13, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

The postwar Ottoman government would accept just about anything to get away with the murder of a people. In this sense, Tom de Waal’s statement, in his capacity as a journalist, is hogwash. Most self-respecting genocide scholars and late Ottoman era historians outrightly dismiss Ottoman figures because, as crime perpetrators, Turks customarily understate the number of deaths. It must be understood, therefore, that Turks would happily admit lower bounds to the actual number of dead. Thus, 800,000. To make this clearer to you, Turkish courts-martial under the government of Damad Ferid were Allied-backed and, during the court proceedings, prosecution introduced the figure of 1.2 million. Mind you, this is 1919, and the genocidal extermination of the Armenians would continue up until 1923, thus increasing the death toll.98.231.157.169 (talk) 16:26, 3 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

This is becoming radicilous, a single editor does not WP:OWN the article. Most of non-denialist/non-turkish/non-israeli estimates rage 800.000 to more than 1.5 million. Even the underestimated 800.000-1 million is usually used for the first of 8 years of the genocide. Not to mention that dosens of countries officially use 1.5 million as estimate. The current death toll, population estimates in the article are based solely on a single editors interpretation of selected sources. Addictedtohistory (talk) 18:25, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Oh, and journalist Tom de Waal has now metamorphosed into a genocide scholar, huh? And his unprofessional mumbling is regarded by a Wikipedia editor as "highly relevant"? Nice...98.231.157.169 (talk) 18:59, 2 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• I think @Buidhe:'s numbers seem quite accurate. I will cite a paragraph by David Nicolle, The Ottomans Empire of Faith: "By the time the war ended the easternmost provinces of Anatolia had a minimal Armenian minority. The Allies claimed that over a million Armenians had been massacred; Ottoman documents indicated that around 400,000 were deported and 500,000 fled to the Caucasus with the Russians. Today, western historians put the Armenian genocide at around 600,000 dead; others estimate that 200,000 Armenians perished as a result of famine, disease, war action, and deliberate murder during a period in which a far greater number of Muslims perished."--Visnelma (talk) 06:59, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

@Visnelma:Even genocide deniers do not stick to your grave numbers. Your arguments are examples of Turkish official denialist policy, that's not accepted by any dissent scholar, not even to mention Western. Addictedtohistory (talk) 15:00, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

And it was apparent from article nomination date that they seem to have deliberately put it under lock, under the pretext of “protection from vandalism”, so that reasonable and educated Wikipedia readers won’t be able to make edits of their stupid number approximations.98.231.157.169 (talk) 17:18, 4 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

@Addictedtohistory: There is nothing to say much if you don't care about what a prominent academician on Middle Eastern history says. Everything seems reasonable to me. By the way, David Nicolle uses the word "genocide" so he is not a denialist :) --Visnelma (talk) 15:36, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

@Visnelma:I'm not going to discuss or give a weight to genocide-denialist turkish propaganda promo here. Addictedtohistory (talk) 16:32, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

@Addictedtohistory: lol because I cited a RS, I'm being accused of denialism. By the way your "genocide-denialist turkish propaganda promo" attack is completely baseless and I think you should read WP:NPA.--Visnelma (talk) 22:05, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

@Visnelma: My comments targeted the denialist literature you quoted, not you.

David Nicolle is not a denialist. He uses the word genocide.--Visnelma (talk) 07:30, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Addictedtohistory (talk) 12:48, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

To post an article on Armenian Genocide and not to mention in any way the internationally recognized figure of 1.5 million circulating in the academia, executive and legislative bodies, human rights and advocacy groups, professional genocide associations, etc., amounts to denying the crime. Wikipedia editors, you should be ashamed of yourselves. I think the time has come to consider forwarding this article to major Armenian lobbying and advocacy organizations.98.231.157.169 (talk) 17:57, 3 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

I'm sure you wouldn't do that as it would be WP:Canvassing and WP:Meatpuppetry. (t · c) buidhe 18:09, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

Oh, now you’re bringing up WP:PG? When you were asked several times to refer your readers to Wikipedia guidelines that give editors an authority to approximate numbers, you were as silent as a grave.98.231.157.169 (talk) 18:23, 3 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Whataboutery is not a productive discussion method.--Visnelma (talk) 22:30, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

• @Visnelma: Wrong. @Buidhe:'s numbers do not seem "quite accurate", because numbers provided by military historian David Nicolle are overshadowed by numbers supplied by professional genocide scholars, such as Tessa Hofmann: “Contemporaries predicted in 1915 that roughly more than half the deportees would perish en route to their destinations. An early estimation, based on an extrapolated survey by Sister Rohner and communicated through the German embassy to the German government, established that out of 2.5 million Ottoman Armenians, 2 million had been deported; of the deportees, 1.5 million had perished by early October 1916. This calculation is entirely in line with the figures established by Raymond Kévorkian, the main expert on the final two stages of the deportation. According to him, about 870,000 survivors arrived in Mesopotamia, most of them being interned in concentration camps near the Baghdad Railway, while a smaller percentage succeeded in staying in the cities of Aleppo, Dayr-az-Zawr, Ras-ul-Ayn, and Mosul. Out of the 870,000 deportees who did reach Mesopotamia in 1915, 630,000 died during the second and third phases of the deportation, by fall 1916.”98.231.157.169 (talk) 00:59, 4 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian
  • “Today, western historians put the Armenian genocide at around 600,000 dead”. Dearest military historian David Nicolle, whom Visnelma so ecstatically brought in here, below are just a few Western historians (more are in reserve) who "put the Armenian genocide" (lol, what sort of English language is this: “western” in lowercase, “put the Armenian genocide at certain number of dead”? And this is an "expert" whom Wikipedia editors chose to cite here? Jesus Christ…) at or up to 1.5 million:

1. Israel W. Charny (ed.): “In all, it is estimated that up to a million and a half Armenians perished at the hands of Ottoman and Turkish military and paramilitary forces and through atrocities intentionally inflicted to eliminate the Armenian demographic presence in Turkey.”
2. Wayne H. Bowen: “The genocide of 1.5 million Armenians was made possible by collaboration”.
3. Alfred de Zayas: “The Armenian civilian population in Eastern Anatolia was then subjected to massacres and deportations that cost 1 to 1.5 million lives”.
4. Samuel Totten and Paul R. Bartrop: “A genocide committed against Armenians by the regime of the Committee of Union and Progress (Ittihad ve Terakki Jemyeti), also known as the Young Turks, in the Ottoman Empire in the period following April 24, 1915 (1915-1923). According to most accounts, at least 1 million—though, on the balance of probabilities, closer to 1.5 million—Armenians were slaughtered as a direct result of deliberate Turkish policies seeking their permanent eradication from the empire”.
5. Armen Marsoobian (Southern Connecticut State University, the US): “This ‘numbers game’ has been played out with regard to the Armenian genocide. The Turkish government’s position is that only 300,000 Armenians perished during the ‘troubles,’ while most historians place the number somewhere between a million and a million and a half”.

• Britannica also states:" Conservative estimates have calculated that some 600,000 to more than 1,000,000 Armenians were slaughtered or died on the marches." which alignes with the source I cited and what Buidhe says. Also as far as I could found about them, Charny and Marsoobian are not specialised in history but rather in psychology and philosophy.--Visnelma (talk) 02:07, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

No, Sir. Another falsehood. Israel W. Charny is an Israeli psychologist and genocide scholar98.231.157.169 (talk) 17:45, 4 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

This clause in Britannica refers to the period of 1915-1916, in case you didn’t notice. If you open your eyes wider, you’ll see that Britannica specifically uses the term “conservative estimates” and, in contrast to Wikipedia editors, provides a range, and not a lousy approximation, between “some 600,000 to more than 1,000,000 Armenians”. Did you notice more than for the period of 1915-1916?98.231.157.169 (talk) 17:53, 4 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• Yet, it doesn't mention 1.5-1.8 million deaths and Britannica's "600.000-1.000.000" range is perfectly in line with David Nicolle's numbers: "The Allies claimed that over a million Armenians had been massacred; (...) Today, western historians put the Armenian genocide at around 600,000 dead" I don't think you read the text carefully.--Visnelma (talk) 19:26, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

No one here suggested 1.8 million deaths. Don’t put words in my mouth that I’ve never uttered. For the third time, Britannica’s entry on the Armenian Genocide refers to the core period of 1915-1916. You’re either not able or, more likely, not willing, to read carefully the text of the para. that starts with “Soon after the defeat at Sarıkamış”. It describes, in black letters on a white background, the period from May 1915 and to the massacres that continued into 1916. Hence, the range “some 600,000 to more than 1,000,000 Armenians”, that is for the period of 1915-1916 only. And, mind you, Britannica specifically uses the term “conservative estimates”. Do you see this important specification, conservative estimates? Nowhere in the text do I see “600.000-1.000.000”. I see “some 600,000 to more than 1,000,000 Armenians”. Might you have a reading comprehension predicament? I'm worrying... And please stop parroting an unprofessional clause by a military historian. I can provide tons of western genocide scholars and late Ottoman era historians who can beat him to pieces.98.231.157.169 (talk) 20:27, 4 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Marsoobian is a philosopher. But, in contract to military historian David Nicolle, who "puts the Armenian genocide at a number of dead" in a "very eloquent" English language, he has a remarkable amount of peer-reviewed publications on the Armenian Genocide which earned him an award from the Hrant Dink Foundation Prize for Historical Research for studies on the Armenian Genocide.98.231.157.169 (talk) 18:02, 4 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• • Is Raphael Lemkin, the father of the term “genocide”, considered a “Western genocide scholar” based on Wikipedia editors’ inimitable standard of thinking? Well, then, this clause from his autobiography is specially for these editors @Buidhe: and @Visnelma::

“In Turkey, more than 1.2 million Armenians were put to death for no reason other than that they were Christians. They were driven from their homes along the Euphrates River and then, suddenly, the escorting gendarmes started shooting at both ends of the long line of deportees. […] Then one day I read in the newspapers that all Turkish war criminals were to be released. I was shocked. A nation was killed, and the guilty persons were set free.”98.231.157.169 (talk) 19:14, 4 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

I'm glad if I was able to bring some enlightenment.98.231.157.169 (talk) 01:34, 4 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

• I don't know why you are spending so much time arguing here rather than tackling the many articles on Ottoman/Turkish history that are seriously whitewashed. (t · c) buidhe 20:52, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

Because I have reasonable grounds to suspect that Wikipedia editors have been tasked with deliberate downsizing both the number of Armenian genocide victims and the size of Ottoman Armenian populations by behind-the-scene powers who pull your strings. P.S. I’m not "arguing", I’m suggesting edits supported by RS, in case you didn’t notice.98.231.157.169 (talk) 21:04, 4 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

If you know there are many articles on Ottoman/Turkish history that are seriously whitewashed, why are you using their figures or make reference to them here?98.231.157.169 (talk) 21:12, 4 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Hi IP, your talk page edits aren't delivering the result you aim for it seems. Usually an argument is made in only a few edits and then the editors move on to create content. You have made more than a 100 edits to the Armenian Genocide talk page and the last ones weren't really constructive. Everybody can edit on Wikipedia, improve the Ottoman/Turkish articles you want and have patience at the talk page, we'd be grateful.Paradise Chronicle (talk) 23:29, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

I use a penname “Davidian”, so next time you scribble something here, make sure you address me by this penname and not an “IP”, okay? Otherwise I’d have to address you “Hell Chronicle”, how about that? If you’re interested why my edits aren’t delivering the result I aim for, please ask your BFF colleague (t · c) buidhe as to why she keeps dismissing valuable, constructive, RS-based edits, sinking to rounding up various estimates of victims and population size to stupid unsubstantiated approximations, okay? Also, please ask her as to why she’s not responding to Wikipedia readers' inquiries about various WP:PG guidelines. Oh, I forgot, I cannot edit on this article, didn't you know?, it has been put under the lock “due to vandalism”, lol. I’ll keep on fighting genocide deniers and Armenian victim number diminishers. Make no mistake.98.231.157.169 (talk) 00:08, 5 April 2021 (UTC)Davidian

Copyedit

@Buidhe: Some prose notes:

• I removed "in international diplomacy" but maybe that detail is important
• Vocab words I found hard: "sedentarization", "Sublime Porte", "gendarmes". Probably should introduce the second
• Should be clear that "Dashnaks" are the party from earlier
• Maybe put quotes around Turkify ?
• "The mass confiscation of Armenian properties was an important factor in forming the economic basis of the Republic of Turkey by endowing its economy with capital." This is wordy, but I found it hard to reduce without changing the meaning slightly. So please check what I did
• "war criminals" I changed it to this from something like "people who committed war crimes" but I'm not sure if it's too direct, since I guess they're not convicted at that point in time

Let me know if you're satisfied, as this is my first GOCE request; I can take a second pass. Maybe I should have chosen a shorter request! Great article, by the way... sobering. Sincerely, Ovinus (talk) 04:50, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

• Ovinus Your edits were very helpful; I am entirely happy with them. I have checked them all and addressed most of the points above. Thanks so much! (t · c) buidhe 05:59, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Location: Anatolia, Asia Minor, Turkey, Ottoman Empire?

Anatolia

• "Taken in their entirety, Ottoman and Western archives jointly confirm that the ruling party CUP did deliberately implement a policy of ethnoreligious homogenization of Anatolia that aimed to destroy the Armenian population"[17] — Taner Akcam
• "Between the years 1915 and 1923 the vast majority of the Armenian population of Anatolia and historical West Armenia was eliminated."—Rouben Paul Adalian[18]
• "The persistence of genocide or near-genocidal incidents from the 1890s through the 1990s, committed by Ottoman and successor Turkish and Iraqi states against Armenian, Kurdish, Assyrian, and Pontic Greek communities in Eastern Anatolia, is striking." —Mark Levene[19]
• "Thereafter, in a wave spreading westwards and southwards throughout the empire from the provinces of eastern Anatolia - the areas of heaviest Armenian population - the Turkish government, led by the Ittihad ve Terakki Cemiyeti (Committee of Union and Progress: CUP), implemented an increasingly radical programme of deportation and murder."—Donald Bloxham[20]
• "Finally, a comprehensive scheme for the removal of the Armenian communities of Anatolia to Syria began in May 1915."[21]

Asia Minor

• "This imperial violence was followed in 1915–17 with the forced deportation and subsequent destruction of almost the entire Armenian population of Asia Minor." — Fatma Muge Gocek, Denial of Violence (Asia Minor -> Anatolia)
• "Hans-Lukas Kieser, Kerem Öktem and Maurus Reinkowski argue that while the Ottoman Empire officially ended in 1922, when the Turkish nationalists in Ankara abolished the Sultanate, the essence of its imperial character was destroyed in 1915 when the Young Turk regime eradicated the Armenians from Asia Minor."[22]

Ottoman Empire

• Marc David Baer defines the Armenian Genocide as "mass murder of Armenians carried out in the Ottoman Empire in 1915"[23]
• According to United States Holocaust Memorial Museum "the Armenian genocide refers to the physical annihilation of Armenian Christian people living in the Ottoman Empire from spring 1915 through autumn 1916."[24]
• Stefan Ihrig refers to "The Armenian Genocide, as a historical event... happened in the Ottoman Empire in 1915/1916"[25]

Other

• Ronald Suny put it as follows: "The canvas on which the mass deportation and massacre of Armenians and Assyrians took place was a landscape that stretched from Istanbul almost 1,000 miles to the east, beyond the eastern ends of the Ottoman Empire into Persia and the Caucasus." (Edit: Suny also counts Western Armenia as part of Anatolia: "Particularly difficult to control were the easternmost provinces of Anatolia, what had been historic Armenia and where most of the Ottoman Armenians lived.")

The IP editor objected to "Anatolia", so I changed it to "Asia Minor". I would also be OK with Ottoman Empire as that is also used in sources, but I have not been able to find scholarly sources referring to the genocide by the present day territory of Turkey. (t · c) buidhe 23:27, 8 April 2021 (UTC)

Anatolia and Asia Minor are names for the same land mass. It lies west of a diagonal line stretching (approximately) from Batumi on the Black Sea in the north to Dortyol and the Mediterranean in the south. To the east of that line lies most of what comprised the heart of historic Western Armenia, with famous towns and cities such as Van, Moush, Bitlis, Erzeroum, Diarbekir, Kharpert, Yerzingan and too many others to list here. This was ground zero for a vast proportion of Armenian victims of the genocide. Placing them in the “adjoining regions” category is a travesty. The setting for the Armenian Genocide was the national territory of the state that arose from the extermination of the Armenian people. That is the most accurate and informative way to describe it.Diranakir (talk) 02:51, 10 April 2021 (UTC)

It's true that some sources do define Anatolia as the area farther west but most Armenian genocide scholarship (see above) does include Van, Bitlis, and Erzurum etc. in "Anatolia". (t · c) buidhe 03:18, 10 April 2021 (UTC)

Buidhe from edit summary today: ' "Anatolia" according to relevant RS goes at least as far east as Ottoman borders in 1914.' Possibly into Iran and who knows where else?