Talk:Gisborough Priory/GA1

GA Review

Article (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch

Reviewer: Sabrebd (talk · contribs) 12:36, 16 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I will begin the review in the next few days. At first glance there does not seem to be any obvious problems. A couple of thoughts: there are some links that need disambiguation and quite a lot of redlinks (it is fine to have these, but it might be a good idea to consider if they will all eventually get articles - in which case they are fine).--SabreBD (talk) 12:36, 16 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I've been filling in the redlinks. Unfortunately I've not been able to resolve the disambiguation for Barnham because the original source doesn't say which of the several Barnhams it is. Prioryman (talk) 21:35, 20 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I will be working through the criteria below one by one.

1. Well-written:

(a) the prose is clear and concise, and the spelling and grammar are correct;

Consistency over century. Most are in the abbreviated form (e.g. 13th century), but on a couple of occasions the long form is used. It doesn't matter which, but they need to be consistent.

Done. Prioryman (talk) 07:11, 19 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Lead

"catastrophic". Unnecessary here at it is obviously catastrophic and may be seen as hyperbole. (It probably necessary when it turns up in the main text).

OK, I've taken it out. Prioryman (talk) 07:11, 19 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Establishment

There seem to be a few commas missing and the word order is a little odd in places. Eg. "The region was, however, in a severely ~~economically~~ depressed economic state[,] caused by the devastating Harrying of the North carried out by William following the Conquest."

I've reworded this line. Prioryman (talk) 07:11, 19 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Sometimes sentences just need to be in a more straightforward order. Eg. "Robert de Brus "founded a certain Monastery of a religious order in Gysburne [sic], to the honour of God, and the holy Virgin Mary", as the founding charter of the Priory puts it.", would be better as "The founding charter states that Robert de Brus "founded a certain Monastery of a religious order in Gysburne [sic], to the honour of God, and the holy Virgin Mary".

Good idea, done. Prioryman (talk) 07:11, 19 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Logical punctuation is used most of the time, but sometimes full stops at the end of sentences appear inside quotes.
"sac and soc, thol and theam", given that there is no article to which a reader can link you may need to explain this.

I've created articles or redirects for these. Prioryman (talk) 07:11, 19 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

"advowsons". Link or explain for casual readers.

Done. Prioryman (talk) 07:11, 19 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Dissolution

"New government". It is the same king. Another term needed here to describe a change in direction in a monarchy.

Older buildings

Link Saxon and potsherds.

The first is linked earlier in the article, I've linked the latter. Prioryman (talk) 20:09, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

"in fact" No need for this, it just makes the sentence more complex.

Taken this out. Prioryman (talk) 20:09, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Henry I. Link him, first time we have come across this Henry.

Done. Prioryman (talk) 20:09, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

"no trace left of whatever might once have stood there or what it might have been used for", should this be "or indication of what it might have been used for"?

Good suggestion, done. Prioryman (talk) 20:09, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

General point

There is quite a bit of redundancy in the prose. Words like “some”, “a variety/number/majority of”, “several”, “a few”, “many”, “any”, and “all” can often be disposed of. It would be worth doing a word search for these and removing them where the sentence still makes sense.

I've trimmed these. Prioryman (talk) 23:54, 28 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

(b) it complies with the manual of style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation.

The lead/into mentions some things about place, but they probably need to be repeated at the beginning of the History section as readers may skip to that section and what is in the lead should pretty much always be in the main body.

I've added some background info about the town's origins which should help. Prioryman (talk) 06:37, 27 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Strictly speaking WP:LEAD#length suggests that an article of this length should have three or four paragraphs in the lead. Really not going to push that one at GA as this seems a perfectly adequate summary of the article and these are just suggestions, but it will probably come up at FA if the article is put forward, so it is something to think about.

I've added an extra para to cover the excavations and the present situation of the priory. Prioryman (talk) 20:09, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It would be good to remove the "redundancy" of the article title where it turns up in subheadings. "Other properties owned by Gisborough Priory" could perhaps be "Other properties of the priory" or "other properties"; "Priors of Gisborough Priory" could just be "Priors".

Good idea, done. Prioryman (talk) 20:09, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Checked for words to watch - none found.
No fiction and problems with list incorporation that I can see. The list of priors looks fine, except that some have dates of the whole office and some just date of taking office. I presume that is because this is all the information we have. Perhaps the rubric at the top should just mention that some have dates of office where known?

That's correct, the information is fragmentary due to the priory's records being lost. I've added "or periods when they held office" in response to your point. Prioryman (talk) 06:37, 27 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

2. Factually accurate and verifiable:

(a) it provides references to all sources of information in the section(s) dedicated to the attribution of these sources according to the guide to layout;

This is fine. Very slight point over consistency that the templated online sources end with a full stop, but the Harvard style references do not. It is probably easiest to put full stops at the end of all.

I think the reason for that is that the Harvard style references take up one sentence while the online sources take up two or more; the convention seems to be that one-sentence references don't get a full stop, while multiple sentences need to be separated by full stops. Prioryman (talk) 06:37, 27 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

(b) it provides in-line citations from reliable sources for direct quotations, statistics, published opinion, counter-intuitive or controversial statements that are challenged or likely to be challenged, and contentious material relating to living persons—science-based articles should follow the scientific citation guidelines;

No problems here: it is very well sourced.

(c) it contains no original research.

Cannot see anything that looks like OR.

Broad in its coverage:

(a) it addresses the main aspects of the topic;

Yes

(b) it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style).

Yes

Neutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without bias.

Yes

Stable: it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute.

Yes

Illustrated, if possible, by images:

Yes. A good balance.

(a) images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid fair use rationales are provided for non-free content;

Yes

(b) images are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions.

Yes. They will need alt text for an FA review.

OK, I'll work on that in due course - thanks for flagging that up. Prioryman (talk) 23:54, 28 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]