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From: Reedpcgen< >
Subject: Agafiya Yaroslavna [Agatha]
Date: 14 May 1999 19:53:21 GMT


I post the following on behalf of Dr. Norm Ingham:

It is sad to see that Gabriel Ronay, a writer whom I admire, has joined
those few who have very unfairly attacked the ideas and scholarly integrity
of Rene Jette. In a letter to the British magazine HISTORY TODAY (May
1999), Ronay charges that Jette's article about the origin of Agatha, wife
of Prince Edward the Exile (NEHGR [1996]) offered nothing new and instead
took material from Ronay's book, misrepresented the "Leges Edwardi
Confessoris," and made a "leap in the dark" to conclude that Agatha was a
daughter of Yaroslav of Kiev. The truth is that Rene made insightful use
of materials from Ronay and several other sources (with full
acknowledgement) to argue brilliantly for an important NEW conclusion--one
which Gabriel Ronay himself came very close to saying but inexplicably
backed away from, missing the chance for a scoop. Unfortunately, Jette's
article had to go through translation and layers of editing and ended up so
concise that some readers have not followed the incisive argument. And
Gabriel Ronay fails to mention that my own small contribution in NEHGR
(1998) introduced at least two significant new pieces of evidence in
support of Rene's case.

Consulting with Jette, several other genealogists, and leading specialists
in relevant fields (historians, Latinists, linguists), I subsequently
undertook a fundamental review of the whole question of Agatha's origin,
going back to the original sources and the scholarship about them. My full
article "Has a Missing Daughter of Iaroslav Mudryi Been Found?" (nearly 40
pages in length) is just about to appear in the delayed no. 3 (1998) of the
journal RUSSIAN HISTORY/HISTOIRE RUSSE. Among other things, I attempt to
show step by step why Szabolcz de Vajay's conjecture is unproven and
unconvincing, as is also the variant of it suggested very tentatively by
Gerd Wunder. Rene Jette is almost certainly right that Agatha/Agafiya was
a daughter of Grand Prince Yaroslav the Wise of Kiev and his Swedish wife
Ingigerd-Irina. Dare I hope that readers will be patient enough to wait
for my article, and that they will try to read it objectively and without
prejudice?

Norman W. Ingham
May 1999

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