Talk:Hogarth Painting the Comic Muse

A fact from Hogarth Painting the Comic Muse appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 13 July 2008, and was viewed approximately 5 times (disclaimer) (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that according to X-ray analysis, William Hogarth's painting Hogarth Painting the Comic Muse originally had a dog relieving himself on a pile of old master paintings?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2008/July.

Wikipedia

Pissing dog[edit]

"X-ray analysis shows that the painting originally had a small dog relieving himself on a pile of old master paintings." (Reference: "National Portrait Gallery")

This is a very cute "Did you know", but this source is really inadequate without more information. Is this printed on the plastic plaque next to the painting? Was it in a brochure? Was it possibly invented by a mischievous intern at the Gallery? A gallery name, even a government-sponsored gallery name, cannot possibly be considered a verifiable source. Furthermore, even if the gallery's informal literature (plaque, brochure, placard) supported this statement, that could not be sufficient support. Only a reputably published source should suffice for a statement about a moderately famous 18th century painting. For bonus points, how can anyone tell if the pile of painting are "old master" paintings? Also, "old master" paintings would have been contemporaries of this artist. He would not have known that they would be enduringly recognizable. (It's no fun being a killjoy.) –BozoTheScary (talk) 13:50, 13 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Follow the link on the note, doh. Johnbod (talk) 14:04, 13 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

And the smartass award for comments made less than a minute after someone else fixed the link goes to....Johnbod! Thanks to User A1 for fixing it. –BozoTheScary (talk) 18:21, 13 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The link was there from the start, on note 1. Johnbod (talk) 18:25, 13 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

So it was: perhaps the Bozo Award goes to the smartass.--Wetman (talk) 19:28, 13 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Note that the highlighted text here contains no link. Yes, I see now that the "National Portrait Gallery" ref at number 1 already went to the supporting article. Sorry, maybe it's just me, but I actually expect the link to the supporting ref to be in that ref text, not four refs up. As Johnbod so eloquently said, "doh", silly me. Thanks again to User A1 for fixing the ref tagging so it didn't appear that the statement was unsupported. –BozoTheScary (talk) 23:41, 13 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]