Ragnar "Lodbrok" Sigurdsson - Ragnar

Dear Angelina, I agree, it is really a totally mess beyond any understanding. Seems like there are too many opiniators or even "wanna-bee's" out there. I do not know the system, but the Lodrok page should have a Key-Lock.

best regards, Heidi

Since it is a master profile it should be locked.

what have they done to my dear old grandad? Faugh!

Private User
After several hundred years of scholarly research about the only consensus is that we don't know the truth about Ragnar and likely never will. He may or may not have existed and if he did exist he may actually be a composite of several different men.
If you see a neat and tidy family tree of Ragnar anywhere it is wrong :)
The only way to achieve a neat family structure is to work with only one source because none of the sources (which are secondary at best) reconcile with each other. I went to quite some effort trying to explain this in the About section of his profile (with a lot of expert input from other Geni users), if this is not clear perhaps you could suggest some changes?
Admittedly there are out standing merges and probably some duplicates to be sorted out too and i agree that this portion of the tree needs work but the simple fact is that it will never be neat and tidy.

Kazimierz of Rús, as it is quite possible that Ragnar never existed it follows that it is highly unlikely he is your granddad what ever Geni tells you.

Efrain Ramirez Jr.
You are right and wrong. Ragnar is a MP but that does not mean that he is locked, a MP is not automatically locked in anyway shape or form. Having said that Ragnar's profile is one of, if not the most tightly locked profiles on Geni. One of the problems is not that his profile is vandalised but that so many users make duplicates of him that the Curator responsible for him can't keep up let alone dedicate time to improving the tree.

Heidi Lie
if you cannot understand the mess I suggest you peruse this other Discussion about Ragnar http://www.geni.com/discussions/129645

Also I'd suggest not making duplicate profiles of the people by copying and pasting the MP profiles into duplicate profiles of your own making... but that's just the opinion of one wanna-be.

Not sure what a "Key-Lock" is but i can assure you Ragnar's profile is about as protected as it can get.

There is a Further Reading list at the bottom of Ragnar's About section which hyperlinks to translations of the two main sagas of Ragnar as well as Gesta Danorum. Have a read and see how the closest thing we have to "sources" conflict and contradict each other (oh and note none of them have any dates!) then have a look at the last two links with are scholarly works considering the reality of Ragnar. The Discussion i linked higher up also has a lot of detail in amongst the "he's my 33rd .." comments.

Ragnar Lodbrok has never been a real life person so everything about him and the lines back to him are all fairytales. That is also why there are so many opinions and maybes. It is never possible to understand something that is not true from the beginning.

All of you claiming him as an ancestor need to check your lines back to him, because everyone of you has some fictional link in that line that you need to do something about. And find the place where you should cut the link.

You do want a truthful ancestral tree, don't you, and not a fictional one???

Yes we do! But we can also settle for things like this sometimes and maybe, just maybe feel a bit of the wings of history touching our faces.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bj%C3%B6rn_Ironside

http://www.geni.com/path/Ulf-Martinsson+is+related+to+Bj%C3%B6rn-Ra...

Yes, :) i am aware of many many differing opinions on this profile, but to see it like this in geni, is un profesional, with greatest respect, :)

is Phillip I fictional? what about Louis VI, King of France? is Sir William Murray of Tullibardine a fairy tale? maybe these were compsites of a shadowy underworld group with the sole purpose of disturbing geneaologists.

Angelina, your use of the word "unprofessional" is deliciously ironic, i hope it was intentional.

Please expand on your opinion, what do you think needs changing?

well, anyway..did you guys see grampa Rollo and gramma Gisle celebrate Epiphany last week on Vikings? wow.

Kazimierz of Rús as long as you know it is fiction and not history, I'm ok with that. I also like the show, but I know it's just fiction and that the story has no historical value.

The last season you're watching hasn't been aired in Norway yet.

Private User, you say you want a truthful ancestral tree, then why would you be ok with genealogical trees based on maybes.

Is it more important to be connected to historical persons than to have a correct tree? When you are stating: "But we can also settle for things like this sometimes and maybe, just maybe feel a bit of the wings of history touching our faces." I feel like you are ok with fictional genealogy as long as it is connected to famous persons, is that what you are saying?

Remi, I'm working constantly with correcting the tree, minor and mayor mistakes made by others, but when I reach these semi fictional profiles, there's not much I can do, because it's just like the biblical branches, it's more or less about believing and that is also what many times give us our identity, and that is a great part of being human.

Who are you to judge over other peoples beliefs, no matter if you claim that King David never existed, or Jesus, or say that Muhammad's experienced epileptic seizures, people will continue to believe.

It doesn't matter if you are totally right or wrong, but when we are 100% sure and can easily sort out fictional profiles from any real, we wouldn't build any line to any such person, but when there is just a tiny fraction of doubt ordinary people doesn't hesitate one split second to add such a figure even if they are consisting of a mix up of two or more persons and some of them are likely to be just mythical.

If you see profiles like the seven dwarfs, Wilhelm Tell, Superman or Batman here on Geni, feel free to lay all your gunpowder on that!

LOl, Alex, i know what you are getting at, i dont care whether they are real or unreal. i can move past this, my main beef is the doubling up and more often the sets of 3 or 4 of the same profile,, along one line,, there is no doubt what so ever that some of these characters were real, living beings, Those are the profiles that could be kept solid , as for the others , one is free to believe or expand on them, if they can find valid historical evidence, ,it is not my will to tell people what to do, but to encourage well documented historical fact,, within the documented characters,, i was just passing by ragnars profile and happened to look beyond it, and noticed the many many many same profiles. and this is what i meant as being un professional, at this time, and head space. :)

I agree Angelina, as Ulf says chipping away at problems in this part of the tree is quite difficult for non-Curators and the problem is further exacerbated by the fact that it is an ongoing battle, duplicates are constantly being made.

I also agree with your sentiment regarding historical characters (if not Ragnar himself), Ivar is an example where we know he existed but we can't be certain what his relationship to Ragnar was, if any. Currently we have a "Ivar in the sagas" profile attached to Ragnar as a son but there is a completely different profile from a different family for the historical person that Ivar is most likely based upon.

Kazimierz of Rús

Was Epiphany when she demanded a divorce?

The whole Rollo character annoys me for so many different reasons which i wont bore you with except to say that there is no way Ragnar and Rollo were brothers every other "mistake" on the show can be explained away with a shrugs and a maybe but that is a huge glaring error that they could have avoided easily just by naming the character Sven... or Remi :)

As for your previous question, Remi was not suggesting for a second that your entire pedigree was false just that Ragnar is a shadow/myth sitting right at the intersection of history and story.

The oldest "records" of him that we have are stories that were written down hundreds of years after he allegedly lived, and as i said the other day even those stories dont cross correlate.

I think you are aware of that already tho.

I think Geni would be better off without Ragnar's profile, or perhaps not connected to any descendants but the issue with that is that Geni is a crowd source site, someone will reattach him or make a duplicate within minutes if we tried to sever.

People keep on adding profiles of Ragnar and when they are to be merged in it takes a tons of time to clean up. I used to do it every week, but do not have the time lately.
It is locked but when merged in the wrong and conflicting data still shows. All Curators can merge in. Not all have the knwolegde to clean his profile up.
It would be a lot easier if people would not add the many copies of him and simply ask to be manager

Sensible idea Anette

Alex, the show is definitely "Hollywoodized" and there for the masses, no doubt. If it provokes any interest in history there is some redeeming value. The Epiphany episode looked more like a noisy celebration of their union to me. Quite saucy.

I do like that show, :)

Personal like all royal peerage they claim to be from greatness and the all mighty powerful. Like Ragnar I do believe he was some kind of great fearless warrior or France and England would have never feared the Viking siege, and somebody lead them and maybe his name was miss understood or misspelled and like all stories it is always half true.

Yes, Efrain. It's actually a point that i made to my (very paitient and understanding) wife that Rollo is not even a Scandinavian name so while he is remembered that way today it is not the name his own family would have addressed him with.

The "bear" scene was a bit of a embarrassment but only because i watched The Revenant a week before, if you've watched DiCaprio's movie you'll understand what i mean and my point of view.

Generally I think that this season is better than the previous one though still not as good as the first couple.

Efrain Ramirez Jr. , yes it's half true, roughly you have a man who was active during 760-815, mixed up with another man who were active during 815-850, but the thing is that we are probably directly descendants to the first one and at best uncle to the second one, so in a way, it's not that important to dismiss Ragnar to the full, but as I said previous, he would have been between 90 and 100 years old if he took part in the the raid of Paris in 845, try to picture that scene in the Vikings with Travis Fimmel as Ragnar, with a crutch instead of a sword!

:)