Wikipedia:Peer review/Swiss peasant war of 1653/archive1

Swiss peasant war of 1653

Has been sitting quietly for about two months. It now finally also got a dearly needed map. Does that mean it were finished? Probably not; I'm sure you can come up with numerous improvement suggestions! Lupo 21:10, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

• Please see automated peer review suggestions here. Thanks, AZ _t 23:11, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
  • I was looking for human input, not some automated list which doesn't even indicate what particular phrases made the program emit its "suggestions". It wasn't even capable of determining that the lead does "adequately summarize the article". Lupo 07:37, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
    • I find that the automated output, while not exactly bullet-proof, often does provide some useful feedback regarding issues that can be raised during an FAC. I don't think you need to jump on AndyZ's case about his contribution to the cause. Thanks. — RJH (talk) 17:45, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
      • To me, posting only an automated reply comes across as incredibly rude. It conveys the message that the poster couldn't be bothered to read the article. I was asking for peer review, and a program is not my peer. Lupo 20:36, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
        • Well hopefully somebody will overlook your attitude issues and take a look at the article. Personally I'm dissuaded at this point. Bye. — RJH (talk) 21:47, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

• I'll WP:AGF and post human input:
• Sorry if anything I write below is incorrect, I'm not that great at grammar:
• The first sentence should have a comma, not a semicolon. A semicolon should be used if the rest of the sentence can be a separate sentence.
• Can we have a link for canton in the lead? (at first I thought they were people)
  • Was linked and still is.
    • LOL. I must be going blind.
• The city authorities tried to compensate for this and to cover their expenses on the one hand by increasing the taxes or inventing new ones, on the other hand by minting less valuable copper coins called Batzen. Awkward, my suggestion would be: The city authorities tried to compensate for this and to cover their expenses by increasing the taxes and inventing new ones and by minting less valuable copper coins called Batzen.
  • Maybe. I used "on the one hand ... on the other hand" to emphasize the gross discrepancy between the two measures, which I feel gets lost a bit in your version. I'll see how else I could rephrase this...
    • "one the one hand... other hand" can be kept, but I think an "and" is needed then (try reading it out loud).
• pursueing its own foreign politics I think its pursuing (unless it's different for British spellings?)
• offer, and for most—in particular…—half their fortune just vanished fortunes. By the way, are people taking advantage of the offer if the money was being devalued?
• concluded on February 26, 1653 at Wolhusen I think another comma is needed (at least according to comma (punctuation))
• The heading The treaty of Huttwil should be made Treaty of Huttwil (WP:MOS#Headings)
• their agitation doesn't match with the singular peasant delegation
  • In BrE, it does, I think. Changed anyway.
• the dissenting minority was silenced by threats of violence and sometimes violence indeed the ending of the sentence somehow bothers me, though I'm not sure if its right/wrong
  • Looks good to me...? Will think about it...
• but that precisely that rural population had turned against them one of the "thats" has to go
• in particular is used twice in the last two sentences of "The treaty of Huttwil – purpose a different word can be used?
• They raised troops ambiguous – the peasants or the cities?
• Full dates (like May 22) should be wikified, per WP:MOSDATE
  • As I understand it, "May 22" is not a full date: "May 22, 1653" would be. Added the year and linked. (Also for the few other occurrences of this.)
• for a dissolution of the Huttwil League Shouldn't it be for the, as there can't be more than one dissolutions?
• In view of this development again sounds somewhat wrong in my opinion (it sounds like the development is viewing the city of Lucerne)
  • Looks good to me...
• any armed resistance once and for all time remove the "time"
• Already three days later I don't think "already" is necessary here.
  • Maybe not strictly necessary, but emphasizes how quickly it all ended.
• In the hills around nearby around or nearby, but not both
  • Yes, both. Parse it as "In the hills around (nearby X and Y)".
• held by an army of Lucerne and the central Swiss cantons are the armies of Lucerne and the central Swiss cantons separate or combined (is the army of Lucerne also commanded by Sebastian Peregrin Zwyer?) If they are separate, then army -> armies
• claiming it was invalid on its territory two it s make them slightly ambiguous (even though its pretty easy to tell by the context of the sentence)
• Many of the exponents of the movement were incarcerated, tortured, and finally sentenced to death or to hard labour on galleys, or exiled. and salt, cattle, and horse trades use the serial comma, while often times the serial comma is not used (sorry, I can't seem to remember specific examples). Please try to make this consistent.
  • Will try, though I didn't see any on a first and second reading. Will re-read later, paying particular attention to this.
• The aristocratic Ancien Régime was abolished finally in 1848 (…), when Switzerland got its first democratic constitution. Just wondering, was the democratic constitution got (perhaps changed to drafted/wrote?) after the abolishment of the regime, or was it the reason that the regime was abolished due to the constitution (the latter of which it seems to imply)?
  • Difficult to answer. I didn't go into the details on purpose because it would go beyond the scope of this article. For the time being I have added a footnote pointing to the two articles that should explain this.
• First statues to honor The first statues to honor, or First, statues to honor?
• first, it quickly spread to cover either first->firstly to match up with the next to sentences, or secondly->second and thirdly->third.
• they had been involved in the leaders themselves involved in?
  • Sentence looks fine to me. "in which they had been involved", "they" clearly referring to the peasant leaders.
    • Oh. I thought that if the leaders had been involved in previous revolts, then they would've been incarcerated or given the death sentence.
• And thirdly, Don’t start with "and"
• There are a whole lot of red links in the articles (especially to the names of generals and leaders), perhaps create stubs for them?

• About your comments above (it wouldn't hurt to be more WP:CIVIL next time though):

About your statement that It conveys the message that the poster couldn't be bothered to read the article.: first off, its on every peer review (if you scroll down the page), but your statement makes it sounds like I'm singling out your article. Second, the reason why I present them is to be helpful, not rude by presenting suggestions that could be overlooked by peers and as a starting point while waiting for the response of other editors (I have received and read LOTS of complaints about nobody ever reviewing things on WP:PR, so having some semi-automated suggestions is an improvement). Besides, its only a 1-line note, I don't go about emphasizing that you must follow them or anything (they're just suggestions, after all). Sorry about not indicating which specific phrases were being indicated, however I think that most can be found using Cntrl + F and I'm still working on implenting that for other suggestions. And I named it a "peer reviewer" just in order to note specifically its purpose. (Oh and about the " adequately summarize", thanks for pointing that out, I just realized that it would be better on some other template – though in any case it would be hard (esp. with JavaScript!) to determine whether a WP:LEAD would be a good summary for an article – follow the footnote). (PR instructions: please do not discourage reviewers by ignoring their efforts , though I invite helpful criticism) After all (especially with my shaky JavaScript skill level), it isn't easy writing a script to accurately parse the text of an article and come up with great suggestions.

And about not bothering to even read the article, well…. I don't spend my entire day sitting in front of my computer reading thru every article there is (as unfortunately many people hope) being posted on WP:PR – when I did try that I got through some 20 articles before realizing it was hopeless. AZ _t 23:19, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for these comments. I've fixed most of the grammar issues you pointed out; where I didn't, I noted above why. Stubs on the many red links are forthcoming... I'm at a loss as to why you perceived my criticism as uncivil—it may be blunt, but hardly uncivil. As to not being able to read any article here: nobody demands you did. Anyway: were there any other points in the article where you would have liked to read more on the background? Or points where the meaning was unclear or not clear enough? Lupo 14:47, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

• Sorry for calling your response incivil–I mistook "incredibly rude" as being rude in itself, but now with a fresh view I'm sorry for that. (Though the poster couldn't be bothered to read the article put me on the defensive, but let's just put it behind us:)
• I re-read the lead again, and somehow the colon in the first sentence doesn't seem to fit in perfectly well. An alternative would be to break it up into two sentences.
• If you haven't already read Tony's amazing guide about criterion 1a of WP:WIAFA, I would suggest reading it. For example, taking the sentences: The peasants' movement had begun in the Entlebuch and Emmental valleys between Berne and Lucerne and spread from there to other parts of these two cantons, but also to Solothurn, the Aargau (then not a canton but partly belonging to Berne and partly being commonally administered as a condominium), and to Basel. The peasants united in the treaty of Huttwil, forming the "League of Huttwil", and also tried—but failed—to make the subjects of Zürich to join their cause.
  • "and spread from there" – from there is largely redundant, as it was already stated that the movement started there, and can be removed.
  • "but also to" "but" is not used when (from Tony1's guide) The second idea doesn’t contradict the first. Spreading to Soloturhun and Aargau doesn't contrast with the beginning of the sentence, so instead use an additive link.
  • the last list should use parallelism: removing the parenthetical phrase and you get: but also to Solothurn, the Aargau (…), and to Basel". A "to" is missing in front of Aargau.
  • "The peasants united in the treaty" I think under would be the better word here.
  • " make the subjects of Zürich to join their" the to is unneeded here.
• The last sentence of the lead: In the long term, the peasant war of 1653 prevented the development of absolutist excesses in Switzerland like they occurred elsewhere in Europe and in particular at the French court.
  • like they occurred development (not absolutist excesses) is singular. Also, it sounds pretty awkward IMHO.
  • The "and" seems to imply that France is not in Europe (though hopefully readers will know about that!), perhaps change it to "in Europe, particularly…". Not that important, but perhaps "at the French court" would be better as "in France" to be parallel.
  • Finally, I'm wondering about the phrase "absolutist excesses". I don’t know if it is appropriate to call monarches "excesses", and I think "absolutist" should be replaced with "absolute" (since it seems that "excesses" refer to the monarchs, which would be absolute monarchs).
• Maybe I'm just overanalyzing these sentences, but I think you get the idea.

• About the actual content of the article, I think the prose is clear and I followed it with ease. AZ _t 16:46, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

  Yes, I see what you mean. I am well aware on Tony's guidelines and exercises, but I'm afraid I don't have his or your expertise: I just do not spot such problems as easily as you seem to do. I do my best, but it would certainly be good if a native English speaker copyedited the article. Lupo 15:26, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

• I think the lead needs to be reworked. It goes into so much detail that you really need "Background" before you read the lead itself. Also the first sentance is quite strange with the :.

  Thank you for your comments. I wonder... the background section basically just briefly details the structure of the Old Swiss Confederacy. For the lead, I think it's ok to ask the reader to follow that link if he isn't familiar with the Old Swiss Confederacy. I wouldn't know what to cut in the lead. Lupo 15:26, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

  Actually, I found a few things that could go. That the Aargau was a condominium is now explained in the Background section, and one other sentence ("communications were cut") is gone completely as being too detailed for the lead. It's still mentioned in the body ofd the article. Lupo 10:41, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

  And cut it some more... Lupo 21:01, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

• I think you need the mention how the copper coins were devalued in the background. by minting less valuable copper coins called Batzen. doesn't make any sense until I read the details of devaluation later on.

  Tough one. I tried linking to face value and intrinsic value, following these links should make it clear where the problem was. As I understood it (but I'm not a specialist in monetary economics :-)), Berne minted coins made of cheap copper, but with the same face value. The population wasn't stupid, though, and soon the copper money lost value with respect to the silver money. People started hoarding the silver coins. In any trade, people clearly favoured getting "hard" silver coins, and soon demanded higher nominal prices if you paid with copper money. Thus an exchange rate of, say, 2 copper coins = 1 silver coin, was established, even though the face value of both was the same. Holenstein calls this "Der Batzen war Ende 1652 wirklich kein Batzen mehr" and mentions that the other cantons, where this Bernese money was also in circulation, were forced to also devaluate the Bernese Batzen because otherwise everybody would have exchanged their cheap copper money against silver money from e.g. Lucerne. (Gresham's Law: "bad money" drives "good money" out of circulation). I don't know yet how I could explain this in a few sentences. If somebody has an idea, go right ahead. But basically minting cheap copper coins didn't yet cause the devaluation, in a first step, it only caused a hyperinflation from the 1620s on. Some time later, this then caused a de facto devaluation, and that in turn prompted the official devaluation by the Bernese authorities. Lupo 15:26, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

  I think this can be explained in a few sentances. by minting copper coins called Batzen. Despite having the same face-value as other silver coins, in practice many people would not honor this value and counted around two copper coins as being worth a single silver. This led to an official devaluaton which had a greater affect on the rural areas. --Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 17:24, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

  Uh... the 2:1 ratio was just an example; my sources don't give any exact exchange rate, and I would suspect it would have been changing quite rapidly anyway. I've tried explaining this again, but I still stand by the separation of first explaining the inflation and then later the final official devaluation, because it was that latter event that ultimately sparked the uprising. Lupo 10:41, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

• There are some weird uses of e.g. I don't know that is wrong, but is strange.

  Eliminated most of the "e.g."s. Lupo 15:26, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

• There are some areas that leave me wanting more detail. An example: The Bernese army defeated a last peasant army of about 2,000 men on June 7 at Herzogenbuchsee; the city went up in flames Ok the peasants lost but a city is on fire. Is it a peasant city; I thought they were rural? Is the fire battle related or afterward for retaliation? There are a couple of areas like this where the article seems to being telling part of a narrative which is not really in the article. --Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 00:54, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

  There were several places in the countryside that had gotten town privileges, such as Herzogenbuchsee. Usually, these were larger villages and locally important marketplaces. Especially the smaller ones of these towns were rural in character despite having city walls. Do we have an article on the medieval concept of "town" anywhere that might be linked to? I feel trying to explain this in this article might go too far... The conflict was basically between the ruling cities and the countryside. Maybe "rural" isn't the right term... I don't know. For the time being, I've used "town" instead of "city" for these smaller towns.

  I've tried to expand a little on the march of the Bernese army. What other places are there where you feel more information was needed? (For me, that's the hardest part: I've read so much about this topic that I may just be incapable to spot such places in the text, as I already have all the background and thus just don't notice where I may have skipped something. So I'd really appreciate it if you could point out precisely where I should elaborate more.) Lupo 15:26, 19 November 2006 (UTC)