Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Caspian expeditions of the Rus

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Caspian expeditions of the Rus[edit]

This is a good article now, and several editors on its talk page have suggested nominating it for FA. It had a peer review by the WikiProject Military history, which is available here. The article is comprehensive, fully referenced, and well-illustrated, so it should be up to the FA standard. User:Ghirlandajo and User:Briangotts have greatly contributed to improving the article, special thanks to Briangotts for drawing two highly informative maps. Beit Or 11:23, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support per nom. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 15:22, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. I would like to note that the article is fresh. It was started on Oct. 18 and represents the most comprehensive treatment of the obscure topic available anywhere in the web. --Ghirla -трёп- 17:46, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per nom. Kmorozov 10:09, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per nom. Can a native English speaker look through the lead? I believe we can improve prose here. E.g. is there a synonym to the word spoils? It is used in every second sentence. Otherwise a very good article on an interesting topic. Alex Bakharev 10:31, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Of the six times the word "spoils" appears in the article, I have changed three of them. Now it does not appear in any section more than once. --Grimhelm 15:00, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support I just made a minor correction to clarify things about a possible connection between Ingvar's expedition and the Byzantine-Georgian conflict.--Kober 11:05, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support I tidied up one or two of the image captions, but aside from that the article seems to cover an interesting topic quite well. --Grimhelm 14:02, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per nom. Acs4b 15:50, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Per Ghirlandajo.--Eupator 19:01, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per nom. —dmytro/s-ko/© 21:50, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - excellent article, like many of the early slavic ones. Adam Cuerden talk 22:01, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Object—1a. Here are examples that indicate that the whole text needs serious copy-editing.

    • "On their way back home, the raiders from the north were attacked and defeated by Khazar Muslims in the Volga Delta, and those who escaped were finished off by the local tribes on the middle Volga." Slightly informal for this register: "back home"? Better as "On their return". "Finished off"? Very loose—what does it mean: killed? Routed? Beaten in battle?
    • "Afterwards, several more raids occurred; the last Scandinavian attempt to reestablish the route ..." Like "eventually", "afterwards" does not belong in an encyclopedic register: it's just too vague. "Further" might be better than "more". Hyphen within "reestablish".

And further down from the lead, at random:

    • "No later than in the early 9th century, the Norsemen settled in Northwestern Russia, where about six miles south of the Volkhov River entry into Lake Ladoga, they established a settlement called Aldeigja (Slavic: Ladoga)." Quirky construction at the start. Make it "By the early 9th century, the Norsemen had settled ...". Why the N for northwestern? Metric equivalent ...? Relocate the "they established" clause to straight after "where".

Not good. Tony 01:50, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Made changes suggested by Tony.--Riurik (discuss) 05:46, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
But what about the rest of the article? Mine were just examples. Tony 05:38, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The response from Ghirlandajo (see below) is that an expectation of brilliance is subjective and arbitrary and hence non-actionable. Yet, if not brilliant, is the prose compelling as stated by Wikipedia:What is a featured article? #1(a). I think Tony's objection and my comment on the issue are valid and "actionable".--Riurik (discuss) 21:19, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Maybe you could pinpoint some passages that you find to be less than well-written? Otherwise, this comment is difficult to address. Beit Or 21:53, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

No, I cannot do the the actual copy-editing. I do have two items that may be answered...Under the Destruction of Khazaria section, it is stated that several possibilities have been suggested explaining the roots of the conflict. Maybe this can be made more clear and organized. I counted three possibilities. If that's the case, a possible revision may be: "There are three explanations for x, y, z. etc, etc..."

Also, the first sentence: The Caspian expeditions of the Rus were military raids undertaken by the Rus between 864 and 1041 on the Caspian Sea shores. Is there another way to say the same thing without using the Rus twice? I made one alternative change, but was accused of being an anti-Normanist. I was not even aware of either position (Normanist and anti-) until then. Are the Rus not the East Slavic people?--Riurik (discuss) 23:26, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support Kyriakos 01:53, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment the article can benefit from copy-editing, for example, currently the prose is not "compelling, even brilliant", but the content is superb.--Riurik (discuss) 06:05, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Looks great! Khoikhoi 06:25, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Terrific article, looks like a featured one. Hello32020 13:27, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per nom. --Boguslavmandzyuk 06:02, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comments. In general, the article is informative, well-structured, well-researched and well-referenced. These are my remarks about the article:
  • The "See also" section has only two links. I think you could easily get rid of this section by incorporating the two links into the body of the text.
  • Is it ibn Khordadbeh or Ibn Khordadbeh, because the title of his article is Ibn Khordadbeh?
  • The first letter of the title of WP articles is ALWAYS capitalized. The correct usage is ibn Khordadbeh. --Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 04:03, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • There is an inconsistency concerning the books mentioned in references. Some of them published after 1990 have ISBNs, while others also published after 1990 do not have.
  • ISBNs added, where applicable. Beit Or 10:04, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Persons and terms come and go without any information about them. Who is ibn Khordadbeh and who al-Masudi? Yes, you link them, but I think that you shhould clarify in this article that they are prominent Muslim historians of the X or Z century. Again what is the Primary Chronicle? I want an explanation in this article!
  • For me the writing is OK. But I'm not a native English speaker, while Tony is one, and I take seriously into consideration his remarks (and Riurik's as well). Maybe a slight copy-editing by an external native English editor would be helpful for the article. I'm sure the article's prose is "good", but I'm not sure it is "brillant".--Yannismarou 09:45, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    I have been reviewing the evolution of Yannis' FA standards for quite some time and I advise everyone to take them cum grano salis. Per WP:POINT, Wikipedia is not consistent and it should not be. Any attempt to force consistence on Wikipedia articles is ill-advised. Our articles are not expected to repeat general information on every ABC term that is mentioned in the text. If you want to know what Primary Chronicle is, it's enough to click the link to this article. That's how online encyclopaedia works, as opposed to a paper encyclopaedia. The concept of "brilliance" of prose-writing is inherently subjective and arbitrary, hence non-actionable. Furthermore, following Yannis' self-imposed standards makes the article overlong and basically unreadable as his own articles are. I believe this is the issue for Wikipedia:WikiProject Extra-Long Article Committee. I am surprized that they have not split Demosthenes or El Greco into three nice 32K articles as yet. --Ghirla -трёп- 11:12, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Huh? Not sure why you're lashing out at Yannismarou here...I particularly don't see where Wikipedia:WikiProject Extra-Long Article Committee comes into play...I don't think Yannis suggested any expansion of this article... Gzkn 11:18, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    What is this if not a request for expansion where it is not needed: "Persons and terms come and go without any information about them. Who is ibn Khordadbeh and who al-Masudi? Yes, you link them, but I think that you shhould clarify in this article that they are prominent Muslim historians of the X or Z century. Again what is the Primary Chronicle? I want an explanation in this article!" Yannis' premise that every article mentioning Leo Tolstoy (or al-Masudi) should introduce him as "the Russian novelist of the nineteenth century" (or "the Arab historian of the tenth century") is fundamentally wrong. --Ghirla -трёп- 11:22, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    Oh...thought you meant Yannis wanted new sections in the article or something. Anyway, I don't see what the big fuss is all about...I'm sure Yannis means well...he is a very friendly editor, and he did preface his comments with "the article is informative, well-structured, well-researched and well-referenced". :) Gzkn 11:34, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    My remarks have nothing to do with expanding the article. I speak about a few more words, not even adding 1 kb to the article. And I proposed these minor explanations (which is a minor issue anyway), because here we do not have to do with Tolstoi, but with some historians, institutions etc., which are not known to the majority of the readers. Who has a clue about the "Primary Chronicle" outside Russia? Not me and I think not many other readers. I must say I'm surprised by the personal attacks against me; taking into consideration the fact that I did not comment negatively on anybody here, but I made some (mostly minor) remarks about the article. If Ghirla thinks that by insulting others and attacking their contributions in Wikipedia, serves this FAC he is wrong. I'm even more surprised, because I did not object, but, on the other side, I lauded the high quality of the article. Nevertheless, I'm happy, because the nominator does not follow the same tactics with the above mentioned user; this is something very positive and I have to stress it. I also thank Briangotts and Beith for their swift and accurate responses on their remarks. At least, they know which is the right attitude towards a FAC reviewer.--Yannismarou 14:33, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    Yannis, where do you see an insult or a personal attack? I often call into question your nebulous standards of what FA should look like and I don't believe my criticism of your approach qualifies as a personal attack. Also, there is no insult in pointing out that many of your articles are extremely long. Please cool off and don't resort to ad hominem arguments and comparisons. Best, Ghirla -трёп- 15:14, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    Thanks for your interest in me cooling off. Whatever you may say about my "nebulous FAC standards", I feel vindicated, when, for instance, I see the level of referencing of this article (where you are an editor, if I'm not wrong). You were saying in the past that inline citations are not necessary, while this article (whose you are an editor) has citations in almost every phrase. According to your previous arguments, this shouldn't happen, and this article should be regarded as "extremely referenced". Anyway, I'm happy, because your actions negate your words and vindicate my positions. I'll be always here, in order to offer you guidance that you will first ridicule and then implement. Best, --Yannismarou 07:35, 12 December 2006 (UTC)--[reply]
  • Support. Seems good enough to me. --PaxEquilibrium 13:16, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - Can someone put a ref for the first para of section "Raid of 913"? Blnguyen (bananabucket) 04:31, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I have done so. Briangotts (Talk) (Contrib) 21:34, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. A superb piece of work. --Irpen 06:51, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
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