Editing Battle of Clontarf (section)

==Historical debate==
[[File:Stair-ċeaċta. sgéalta gearra ar neiṫiḃ and ar ḋaoiniḃ i seanċas na hÉireann (1905) (14775892202).jpg|thumb|Illustration of the Battle of Clontarf, from a 1905 book]]
In modern times there has been a long-running debate among historians, which is now 250 years old, about Ireland's Viking age and the Battle of Clontarf. The standard view, and the "popular" view, is that the battle ended a war between the Irish and Vikings by which Brian Boru broke Viking power in Ireland. However [[Historical revisionism|revisionist]] historians see it as an Irish civil war in which Brian Boru's Munster and its allies defeated Leinster and Dublin, and that there were Vikings fighting on both sides.<ref name=RTE2018-01-24a>{{cite web |url = https://www.rte.ie/news/newslens/2018/0124/935551-battle-of-clontarf/ |title = Network science shines new light on Battle of Clontarf |publisher = RTE |date =24 January 2018  |access-date =24 January 2018 }}</ref><ref name=IT2018-01-24a>{{cite news |url = https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/heritage/battle-of-clontarf-it-s-a-mathematical-question-1.3365898 |author = Kevin O'Sullivan |author-link = Kevin O'Sullivan (journalist)|title = Battle of Clontarf: It's a mathematical question |newspaper = The Irish Times |date =24 January 2018  |access-date =24 January 2018 |quote= Centuries-old debate continues as social media analysis used to explore Viking-Irish strife ... The debate has carried on for the past 250 years.}}</ref> In January 2018, researchers from the Universities of [[University of Coventry|Coventry]], [[University of Oxford|Oxford]] and [[University of Sheffield|Sheffield]], led by Coventry University [[theoretical physicist]] Professor [[Ralph Kenna]], published a paper<ref name=RSOS-2018-01-24a>{{cite journal |last1=Yose |first1=Joseph |last2=Kenna |first2=Ralph |last3=MacCarron |first3=Máirín |last4=MacCarron |first4=Pádraig |author-link2=Ralph Kenna |title=Network analysis of the Viking Age in Ireland as portrayed in Cogadh Gaedhel re Gallaibh |journal=[[Royal Society Open Science]] |volume=5 |issue=1 |pages=171024 |doi= 10.1098/rsos.171024 |pmid=29410814 |pmc=5792891 |quote=This delivers a picture that lies between antipodal traditional and revisionist extremes; hostilities recorded in the text are mostly between Irish and Viking—but internal conflict forms a significant proportion of the negative interactions too.|year=2018 }}</ref> in the journal ''[[Royal Society Open Science]]'', that used [[network science]] to mathematically analyse a medieval text, ''Cogadh Gáedhel re Gallaibh'' (The War of the Gaedhil with the Gaill, meaning invasions of Ireland by the Danes and other Norsemen), that listed over 1000 relationships between about 300 characters, and concluded that the standard and popular view was broadly correct, but that the picture was nevertheless more complex than "a fully 'clear-cut' Irish versus Viking conflict".<ref name=RTE2018-01-24a/><ref name=IT2018-01-24a/> However one of the paper's co-authors,<ref name=RSOS-2018-01-24a/> PhD student Joseph Yose, added that "Our statistical analysis ... cannot decisively resolve the debate".<ref name=IT2018-01-24a/>