Talk:Gascon campaign of 1345/GA1

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GA Review[edit]

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Reviewer: Zawed (talk · contribs) 22:07, 3 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]


I will take on this one. Comments to follow over next few days. Cheers, Zawed (talk) 22:07, 3 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Initial stuff[edit]

  • To the best of my understanding RE image licencing, the various image tags check out OK
  • Dupe links: Garonne (the 2nd appearance is in the exploitation section); Agenais (ditto); blockaded (ditto)
Done.
  • Dab links: none
  • External links check out OK

Infobox[edit]

  • No issues identified

Lead[edit]

  • "...prisoners; who...": from a style perspective, I think this would work better as two distinct sentences. Suggest "...prisoners. These were..."
Done.
  • "English occupied" : hyphen here, like with French-ruled
Done.
  • "Gascony in February...": the previous paragraph referred to the period August to November 1345 so I think you need to specify the year here for certainty
Done.
  • "This was at Bergerac...": earlier in this para, two French strongholds are mentioned but not identified. Is Bergerac one of those strongholds?
No. Reworded to clarify. (I hope.)
  • The final sentence of the lead is probably not necessary given the focus of the article.
Deleted.

Background[edit]

  • "kings of France"; perhaps refer to the French Crown if not mentioning a specific king?
  • "English king's" similar to above but could also refer to English-controlled?
Assuming that this relates too "The Gascons preferred their relationship with a distant English king who left them alone, to one with a French king who would interfere in their affairs." I would prefer to leave as is. It, IMO, more accurately reflects the reality. It wasn't a case of "the state" (or "the crown") as an organisation interfering, or not. It was the individual monarchs having more or less personal reasons to interfere, or to actively not interfere. Similarly, relationships tended to be seen, especially at higher levels, as person-to-person. (A Gascon lord of the time had sworn fealty to a specific person, who happened to be a king, not to an abstraction, even a mild one such as "the crown".
Ok, that's fair enough. Zawed (talk) 09:06, 15 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

More comments to follow. Zawed (talk) 09:00, 6 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Zawed: Many thanks for taking on another one of my efforts. Gog the Mild (talk) 10:57, 6 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Gascony[edit]

  • The sentence beginning "In most campaigning seasons..." has a few many hads for my liking. Consider revising?
Apologies for missing this section. Reworded to remove two of the three "had's".
  • "...the large majority infantry": suggest "...the large majority being infantry"
Reworded in a slightly different way.
@Gog the Mild: just checking you have considered the above two points? Zawed (talk) 09:07, 15 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Plans[edit]

  • "the Henry, Earl of Derby": The "the" needs to be dropped.
Done.
  • "France or Flanders": at the time wasn't Flanders part of France?
Well now, that depends on how you define "part of". Gascony was "part of" France in that sense. I could attempt to reword tp reflect the nuances of the situation, but suspect that this would confuse rather than enlighten en average reader.
  • I'm a little puzzled at this: "an advance force"; do you mean this is the advance force of the Earl of Derby's command?
So far as I can make out from the sources, Stafford was to operate independently with his retinue and whatever Gascon forces he could pull together, but was definitely to fall under Derby's command (he was W=Edward III;s cousin) as soon as he arrived. (They didn't get on well personally, but that didn't/doesn't seem relevant.)
  • "Edward III": there are a couple of mentions of Edward as Edward III in this article after his first mention although he is mots referred to as Edward. You need to ensure consistency of presentation.
Apologies. Done.
  • "In early 1345 the French...": I think this needs to be rephrased as Edward only decided in early 1345 to attack. I assuming this wasn't simultaneous, and the French were a bit later. Perhaps it should begin "In response, the French..."?
Good spot. I have deleted the sentence. On reflection it adds little and the paragraph flows better, from the top down, without it.
  • "they had to there": delete "to"
Done.

Initial Operations[edit]

  • "The few mobile French troops in the region immobilised themselves...": consider rephrasing due to the repetition of similar terminology for mobile?
Done.
  • link Normandy?
Done. (To me this is well into WP:OVERLINK, but experienced MilHist editors seem to consistently like a high density of links.)

Further comments to follow. Zawed (talk) 08:55, 7 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Zawed: It's like getting a free FAC assessment but at GAN. Thank for being so painstaking. Gog the Mild (talk) 11:55, 7 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
You're welcome. I do tend to apply an A-Class standard even to GA reviews. Zawed (talk) 10:12, 9 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Battles of Bergerac and Auberoche[edit]

  • RE Langdon - this should be linked on first mention, particularly since it is a English-sounding name.
It is. Last sentence of the "Gascony" section.
Oops, my bad...Zawed (talk) 09:12, 15 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Found a dupe link I had missed: Bergerac
Done.
  • Note 1 refers to a retrieval date of November 2017 but this created article much more recently than that.
Ah, that's because it comes from a template. I could attempt to skip the template and create the link from scratch, which will let me put today's date in for the access but remove its ability to automatically update.
@Gog the Mild: OK, I think it is better to automatically update, that is without a doubt more beneficial for the reader. Zawed (talk) 09:12, 15 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • "...assimilate reinforcements.[37][28]" reorder refs. I also suggest breaking the paragraph at this point, it is quite large.
Done.
  • "...hand-to-hand struggle, ended...": a missing word here I think? "which ended"
No, it was meant to read like that, but I have added 'which'.
  • "...made at least £50,000 (£45,000,000 in 2018 terms) from the day's captives."> I have a feeling that in other articles that I have seen, a note is provided for each 2018 conversion.
Possibly in one of my articles; possibly even this one. In a (very) recent FAC it was suggested that I was over-annotating and could usefully reduce them. Once a reader has had the basis of the conversion pointed out to them it seems unnecessary to remind them every time it subsequently comes up. A bit like abbreviations or Wikilinks. So I went through taking all the repeat notes on this out of all of my articles.
@Gog the Mild: No, I think it might have been articles about castles. However, I would defer to advice from a FAC rather than mine so am fine with your approach here! Zawed (talk) 09:12, 15 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Exploitation[edit]

  • "...ongoing sieges of other Anglo-Gascon garrisons.": in the previous section you refer to these as strongpoints, I think you should use the same language for sake of consistency.
Done.
  • "...Anglo-Gascon force Normandy..." suggest referring to "Duke of Normandy" here, this initially threw me as I thought it was a typo referring to the location rather than a person. You do refer to Duke of Normandy later in this section.
Done.
  • "The citizens of several French garrisoned towns persuaded the French to withdraw": repetition of French, suggest replacing the second mention with "soldiers"
Done.
  • "By March almost the entire province...": better mention the year here, I assume it is 1346.
Done. (Yes.)
  • "in Chroniques de quatres premier Valois.[45]": I note this is cited to a modern source. It may be helpful to mention a date of publication for "Chronicles" so the reader assess how contemporary it is.
A topic of much scholarly debate, but I have given an indication which I think is accurate enough.
  • Note 3 refers to 1945 not 1345.
Done.

Notes, citations and sources[edit]

  • Oxford University Press should be linked on first mention. At the moment it is 3rd or 4th.
Done.
  • DeVries is the only ref that states a country (actually two, also a state for US)
Done.
  • Note 40 (Rogers) lacks a page number
Correct. The whole chapter/paper is "a summary of the contemporary accounts, their discrepancies, and the treatment of these by modern historians". Should I give the page numbers anyway?
@Gog the Mild: I think yes, add the pages particularly since pages of Rogers are cited elsewhere. Note that if the page range is quite broad, it may attract attention if you go to FA with this, so try and be relatively precise if you can. Zawed (talk) 09:06, 15 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I have done my best. Still, broad, but IMO now defensible. A good point re FAC (or ACR), I was pretty much painting a target on that reference as it stood.
  • For the Ormrod ref, shouldn't first duke be First Duke? Also are you relying on the book, rather than the website since there is no page number. If the website, it may be better to move that into the notes to leave the sources for the books only.
Ormrod dispensed with.
  • The Lacey ref doesn't have an isbn number but not sure if Folio Society books get these.
Me neither. At least, I have been unable to track one down for the edition referred to.
  • There are a few isbn numbers without dashes.
And which I have no idea how to correct. Rather than guess I could remove them from everywhere except after the leading 978, which would at least be consistent. Would that be satisfactory?
Have you tried Googling the book and seeing if you can get an image of the publication page or jacket with the ISBN number? Zawed (talk) 08:31, 11 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • I've been advised in previous reviews that there is no need to mention the status of the publisher so Vale doesn't need the Ltd
Done.

Something I've just noticed about the inbox, and in particular the French commanders, these don't seem to be in order of seniority.

Correct. They are in chronological order. Should I change that?
To my mind, I think it should be in order of seniority. Zawed (talk) 08:31, 11 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Conclusion[edit]

That's all from me (phew!). You do a good job with these complex medieval articles, and they also interesting to review. It is one of the reasons I like doing reviews, the learning of history/events/people outside my own areas of interest. Cheers, Zawed (talk) 10:12, 9 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Zawed: Phew" indeed. Thanks again for wading through it. And for the reassurance that I am getting the level of explanation about right. (I sometimes think that every other sentence could do with half a chapter of explanation of the nuances.) With this being only the third Wikipedia article I have written from scratch I was profoundly unsure that I was hitting the appropriate level and tone.
At the peril of appearing pushy, the fourth (of four) article I have written from scratch is the sequel to this one - Siege of Aiguillon - and it is currently a GAN. I wrote it with the possibility of it one day perhaps being up to FA in mind, so it could do with a rigorous assessment.
Gog the Mild (talk) 13:47, 9 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
@Zawed: Both done. Where my hard copies only give 10 figure ISBNs adding a leading "978-" generates an ISBN checksum error so I have left them as they are on the publication page. Gog the Mild (talk) 12:26, 11 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
@Gog the Mild: apologies for the multiple pings, but with the length of the review I thought the pings would make it easier for you to locate my replies to certain of your comments above. Cheers, Zawed (talk) 09:15, 15 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
@Zawed: No worries. (Although my first thought when I saw the red bell with 5 next to it was a guilty "What have I done now?" A problem with being new to Wikipedia and so never sure when I might inadvertently commit a faux pas.) My responses, where one is required, in colour above. Gog the Mild (talk) 10:50, 15 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Good Article review progress box
Criteria: 1a. prose () 1b. MoS () 2a. ref layout () 2b. cites WP:RS () 2c. no WP:OR () 2d. no WP:CV ()
3a. broadness () 3b. focus () 4. neutral () 5. stable () 6a. free or tagged images () 6b. pics relevant ()
Note: this represents where the article stands relative to the Good Article criteria. Criteria marked are unassessed
Looking good, passing as GA now. Cheers, Zawed (talk) 08:24, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
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