User talk:R Prazeres

Victorian Turkish baths

Hi R Prazeres, As I'm sure you know by now, I uploaded the first part of my revised page on VTb. I wanted to thank you, first for being so supportive, two years ago, of my suggestion to split Hammam into two. And second because I have tried to use your Hammam page as a structural model and hope I have not moved too far away.

But I also owe you an apology for not first sending you my comment on the Hammam Disambiguation Talk page. Quite apart from the fact (as was gently pointed out to me) that I had misunderstood the purpose of a disambiguation page, it was a lack of courtesy which I had not intended. Ishpoloni (talk) 12:26, 19 February 2024 (UTC)

Hi Ishpoloni, no apologies are needed, I don't think you've done anything wrong. Trying to improve articles is what Wikipedia editing is about, and you don't need my specific input unless there's something you think I can help with. The occasional error or misunderstanding is pretty normal, and that's what other editors (and talk pages) are for. Thank you for your continued work and I'm glad I was helpful in the past.

PS: The only immediate feedback I have for you at Victorian Turkish baths, if you weren't already planning to do so, is to add more citations for the last section (the "(...) today" section). Cheers, R Prazeres (talk) 18:13, 19 February 2024 (UTC)

   Hello again. I'm not really sure whether the following should be on the Turkish baths (Disambiguation) page, or here on your page, so I've copied it to both, I'm afraid. It's my belated reply to your note on the former:

It's very unusual for me to take ten days to reply to something, but in this case I've had to think through my problem carefully and learn a bit more about Wikipedia, and I've finally realised that I asked the wrong question before. So let me start over by stating the problem.

   Anyone familiar with hammams will tend to look up hammam(s) in any dictionary or encyclopaedia, so they have no problem.
   Similarly, anyone familiar with Victorian Turkish baths will also have no problem.
   The ones with problems are those unfamiliar with these terms who wish to find out about one or other of them. Currently, if a searcher enters Turkish bath(s) s/he is willy-nilly redirected to Hammam. Fine if that is what is wanted, but not if it's Vtb that's wanted because s/he is still directed only to Hammam, without even a 'See also:' reference. But what is needed is a reference to both options so either one (or even both) can be chosen.
   You write " If someone is searching Turkish baths, it will currently lead them to Hammam, the assumed primary topic…" But while this might be so for the Islamic world, it is not necessarily so for those in the so-called Western world. Most of those wanting information about hammams will easily find it, those searching for the western or Victorian type will get nowhere. There is not even a 'See also:' reference to it at the end of the Hammam page, only a Main article link reached after reading more than half the Hammam page. (There is one to Hammam at the bottom of the VTb page!)
   Given the comprehensive revision of the VTb page, I see only two choices, not a primary one alone. Otherwise there seems little point in providing a VTb page which few are directed to. This seems to be borne out by a wiki guidance note which says "If no primary topic exists, then the term should be the title of a disambiguation page (or should redirect to a disambiguation page on which more than one term is disambiguated)."
   So to conclude (you will be pleased to see!) I suggest that the redirect from Turkish bath(s) to Hammam be removed and replaced by (the guidance note's second option), a redirect page straight to "a disambiguation page on which more than one term is disambiguated", ie, to Turkish bath (Disambiguation). This should enable searchers easily to make a choice of either of the two main general articles (plus all the smaller more specific ones) or both.
   Hammam (disambiguation) seems to serve its purpose perfectly. However, I wonder whether it might be clearer if one changed:
   "A hammam, or Turkish bath, is a type of steam bath…"
   into:
   "A hammam (often known in the West as a Turkish bath) is a type of steam bath…"
   though if I wasn't afraid of pushing my beginner's luck, I'd much prefer:
   "A hammam (often inaccurately known in the West as a Turkish bath) is a type of steam bath…"
   All the bestIshpoloni (talk) 09:00, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the reminder, I've replied at Talk:Turkish Bath (disambiguation) to keep the discussion all in one place (and so other potentially interested editors can more easily see it there). Feel free to ping me in the future if you need my attention; I get notifications from potentially hundreds of articles, and sometimes I only have time to focus on a few, so it's not uncommon for me to miss new messages. Cheers, R Prazeres (talk) 16:21, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for the open-ended neutral wording of your redirect notice. That is much appreciated. Ishpoloni (talk) 13:50, 20 April 2024 (UTC)

Hi R Prazeres, Help! I'm submerged! I've just seen [[1]] and don't understand anything apart from the first three red sidelined paras. Do I need to do anything in response, ie, with regard to the 'good-faith creator' bit? I've realized that this is the page now reached on searching for 'Turkish bath' in place of 'Hammam', but searching for the plural 'Turkish baths' still redirects to 'Hammam'. Is this correct? Best wishes. Ishpoloni (talk) 08:04, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

Turkey#Architecture

Hi R Prazeres! I see that you have done an amazing job in Ottoman architecture. I am trying to improve Turkey to GA and then FA, I was wondering if you'd be interested in going over the architecture section in Turkey. 3 short paragraphs around 100 words each would be great, if you are interested.

Btw Ottoman architecture looks great. The only thing is that it is too long, with 20k words. If you were to copy paste some of the details into sub articles, you could easily get it promoted to FA. Bogazicili (talk) 16:13, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

Hi, and thanks! I am in a busy period but sure, I'll see if I can make time in the near future to revise that section. I'm most familiar with Seljuk & Ottoman periods, which I can cover easily, but I'll try to dig up a more balanced overview of Byzantine and modern architecture too.

And for Ottoman architecture: yeah, its length has been on my mind for a while. I've already created subarticles for most periods and I've been thinking about creating another, so I think the major sections can be condensed accordingly. R Prazeres (talk) 01:34, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

The thing with Featured Articles is that your work would be more recognized. Also if you lose interest in Wikipedia in the future, it makes it more likely that your work is maintained by others. Because if an article is FA but degrades over time, sometimes people try to "save" it if it goes through FA review again.

As for Turkey article, I think a paragraph about Ottomans could work? I can try to cover Republic period with another paragraph. And maybe a 3rd paragraph for Seljuks, Byzantines etc? Bogazicili (talk) 15:53, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

Cool. I'll focus on the those periods. If I have time and references for more, I'll add more and let you decide whether to keep it, revise it, etc. R Prazeres (talk) 16:48, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

Great, thanks! Sounds good! Bogazicili (talk) 09:46, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

Hi R Prazeres! Btw, if you were planning to make any changes to architecture part, can you wait until June? I entered Turkey into Wikipedia:The Core Contest/Entries. Thanks! Bogazicili (talk) 14:05, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

Hey, no problem! I have drafted two architecture paragraphs (one on the Seljuk period, one on the Ottoman period), but just haven't had time to trim them and figure out how to integrate them into the existing content; so I'm in no hurry. Thanks, R Prazeres (talk) 16:16, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

God in Islam

I just opened a discussion on the topic of God in Islam. I am waiting for your attention. Maybe it will also help you understand my point of view.NGC 628 (talk) 07:59, 28 March 2024 (UTC)

Peristyle, arcade, gallery...

Hi RP, and I'm glad we crossed paths.

I guess the terms I'm looking for in English are quite fluid in common parlance, and perhaps even in more rigurous contexts. Or maybe not. When you have rows of colums/pillars and straight lintels, it's a peristyle - but only if it has four sides to it and fully surrounds the courtyard. Plus it's antiquated, not commonly used for more recent or even modern architecture. Rows of curved arches are - arcades? But arcade seems to work with straight lintels too. Is there any word for rows of curved arches? You have stoa, arcade (btw: only if covering both sides of a street?), colonnade... Each with its specific use, but related and overlapping.

Today I got stuck with another dilemma: if you have a caravanserai, what are the four "wings" around the courtyard called in English? Wing tends to be an added building, with an accessory role to the main building, while these are the original, essential residential parts of any coutyard house.

Ignore if you feel I'm abusing your time. Cheers, Arminden (talk) 21:52, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

Hey @Arminden, sorry for missing this earlier. I generally follow the example set by the sources, but in my experience authors do indeed seem to differ on their preferences. When it comes to the roofed side areas of a courtyard, for example, I've seen authors use "gallery", "porch", "portico", "arcade", "peristyle", and maybe others... all referring to essentially the same feature. As I understand, in Arabic the term is usually riwaq ([2]). I'm guessing that there are practical reasons why the terminology isn't completely consistent (e.g. different traditions in different fields, there aren't always sufficiently precise terms in English, some terms overlap in meaning, etc). I've tried to use terms that are general enough to be understood by most interested English readers but still accurate in context. I probably don't always succeed, so feedback is welcome.

For some of your other specific questions: I understand "arcade" as meaning a row of arches, but I see it used sometimes in contexts of columns that don't support "true" arches (like lintels or corbelled arches, as you mentioned), so it seems a little flexible. Likewise, I've seen "wing" used very flexibly, including in the way you mentioned; whereas the Wing (building) article refers to a more narrow meaning. "Peristyle", to my knowledge, is applicable to any era, it's just more traditionally associated with historical/ancient Mediterranean architecture. Technically, in the context of Riad (architecture), there are also examples where the courtyard is only flanked by galleries on two sides instead of four, so "peristyle" is arguably too narrow for what I did here. Something like "arcaded galleries" or just "portico" might still be preferred.

I think in most cases, many of these terms are clear enough for general purposes. It depends really on the desired balance between precision vs conciseness/readability. The inclusion of photos helps too, of course. R Prazeres (talk) 20:32, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

Hello RP. I truly appreciate your detailed answer, thank you very much! I'm neither a native English speaker, nor an architect, so questions like this do suddenly come up: when I'm speaking, I do it by instinct and it's fine, but in written it's a different story. Thanks again, and have a great day! Arminden (talk) 03:10, 6 April 2024 (UTC)

DYK for Khalij (Cairo)

On 30 March 2024, Did you know was updated with a fact from the article Khalij (Cairo), which you recently created, substantially expanded, or brought to good article status. The fact was ... that the Khalij, an ancient canal in Cairo, was replaced by a boulevard in the 1890s? The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Khalij (Cairo). You are welcome to check how many pageviews the nominated article or articles got while on the front page (here's how, Khalij (Cairo)), and the hook may be added to the statistics page after its run on the Main Page has completed. Finally, if you know of an interesting fact from another recently created article, then please feel free to suggest it on the Did you know talk page.

—Ganesha811 (talk) 00:02, 30 March 2024 (UTC)

Reversion of cleanup tag

Hi! In Christianity in Africa, I would ask you to reconsider this reversion. A screenshot on an image hosting website is an unacceptable source per WP:UGC, and I put a "better source needed"-tag after the reference. You reverted the addition per WP:EDITWAR, even though no user had removed the tag nor objected to it before your reversion. I suppose there is a misunderstanding? —St.Nerol (talk, contribs) 19:05, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

Oh, thanks for pointing that out. Yes, I reverted to the wrong version; I meant to revert the addition that you quite reasonably objected to. (I meant to go to the 1 April version by Internet archive bot but I guess I clicked on the 3 April version by Citation bot instead.) I've just fixed it by removing it manually ([3]). Sorry for the confusion. R Prazeres (talk) 19:18, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the explanation! —St.Nerol (talk, contribs) 15:02, 6 April 2024 (UTC)

Thank you!

Thank you for your immense help and going the extra mile at Abu al-Abbas al-Nabati. Thanks,Neuropol^Talk 23:39, 9 April 2024 (UTC)

Insufficient reversion?

Hello!

I noticed that you recently made this reversion at the article on Abu Muslim. Judging by your edit summary, I get the impression that you intended to reverse everything the IP user had edited and not merely his last small edit (where he changed "Abumuslim" to "Abu Muslim". Is that correct?

Sincerely, Nikolaj1905 (talk) 12:40, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

Sigh, yes, thank you for spotting that. I forgot the IP was slightly different across the edits, so "rollback" only undid one of them. Fixed it now. R Prazeres (talk) 16:45, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

Serial copyvio by sockpuppets of Vvven

Hi R Prazeres, you may recall that I posted on your talk page regarding my concerns about user LaGuairabeach being a sockpuppet of indefinitely blocked editor Vvven, the prolific editor who added tons of copyvio all across WP under that username and several others, not to mention various IPs. Well, my suspicions were correct, as you can see by this investigation. This guy Vvven was (is) a huge pain in the ass, and I've wasted many hours trying to repair damage done by him. I have no doubt that he'll be back, considering his editing history, if he isn't already. I wanted to alert you that if you come across new, poorly written content in articles relating to Spanish history that appear to be modified machine translations of Spanish text, there's a possibility it was his work. Carlstak (talk) 14:02, 30 April 2024 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll keep an eye out when I'm looking at page histories. Cheers, R Prazeres (talk) 16:26, 30 April 2024 (UTC)

Mosque-Cathedral of Córdoba

Hello! it's been a while since I talk to someone here, so I'm unsure how the notifications work. I left you a message on the talk page of the mosque regarding our recent edits. Thanks! Fernando 12:52, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, in this case I do see notifications on the talk page over there, and you can indeed ping someone as you did already, to make sure they notice a new discussion concerning them.

I've replied over there, but I'll add one minor piece of advice separately here: in the future, if you're making multiple significant but different types of changes to an article, especially to a long article, I recommend splitting this into more than one edit. For example, use one edit to revise the infobox, then another edit to revise images; or do the changes in stages (e.g. first half or first sections of the article in one edit, second half in another). This is not an official policy, it's just a recommendation to make it easier for others to keep track of what you did, and it can make it easier to adjust rather than revert. (In this case, I initially tried to manually restore some images after your edit, but it quickly became too complicated to keep track of everything that had changed; so once I saw some problems, it was safer to revert and then manually restore what was clearly constructive.) R Prazeres (talk) 17:57, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

Correction: forget most of comment above! I looked again and you already did split those two edits ([4], [5]). It was still difficult to track everything done in the second edit, but there's probably not a clearly better way to do it, so nevermind that. Sorry for the confusion, R Prazeres (talk) 19:00, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

Islamic Art

Greetings, I wanted to apologize for my hasty removal of content. You are completly right that the paragraph is much more than that. I was not paying enough attention.

best regards VenusFeuerFalle (talk) 23:51, 21 May 2024 (UTC)

No worries, I figured as much, and the sentiment is of course right; that generalization is often repeated with insufficient context. R Prazeres (talk) 23:57, 21 May 2024 (UTC)

A barnstar for you

		The Checkuser's Barnstar
		For your persistent, tireless, and not very enjoyable efforts in keeping articles free from highly active and disruptive sockpuppets, please accept this small token of respect. Constantine ✍ 18:28, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

Thank you kindly! R Prazeres (talk) 18:33, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

Turkey

Hello R Prazeres! Wikipedia:The Core Contest is now over, so please feel free to edit Turkey#Architecture. I didn't have time to work on architecture during the context. Bogazicili (talk) 18:34, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

Minor pedantries

Hi RP. Really minor stuff, I enjoy and respect too much your contributions to mention it elsewhere & other than briefly.

I only have my cellphone to go online from for now. Adding an interval before long words helps keep the outlook balanced. Doesn't harm others, helps phone editors, so please kindly leave them there.

URLs disrupt the ref details, are for the machine, not the human. I consider that they, along with the ISBN and other numerical IDs, belong at the very end, only followed by the access date if at all. Author, title, page etc. are for the human editor, who looks them up and works with them. So here too, re-placing them more to the front helps no-one.

Quotation marks for the ref name serve no purpose if the ref name is one "word" (no spaces). They're just ballast, as are long & detailed ref names.

I'm happy to yield to better counter-arguments, but if it's just about preserving old habits - I'm constantly changing mine once I learn about better ways, so no.

Wiki is for the user, rules are subject to constant improvements (slower than I'd like them to, but they are). If respecting a rule is sometimes a disservice to the user, I'll happily ignore it. Anything else would be Bismarckian militarised bureaucracy, which led to nasty outcomes in far too many respects :)

Thank you and keep up the good work! Arminden (talk) 06:56, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

Hi again Arminden. Forgive me, but I don't think I understood what you're saying about ref URLs, ISBN, etc. Which edit or issue are you referring to? R Prazeres (talk) 07:05, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

Dome of the rock

Hi! I quoted the exact text from the source:

In objective point of view, apart from wooden material context of the Dome of the Rock, its well-designed proportion and primary pointed form became consequently a design model for the construction of pointed domes, such as Muntasir mausoleum or Qubbat al-Sulaybiyya (862 AD) at Samarra in Iraq which was later erected as the second earliest sample of the pointed domes

Hu741f4 (talk) 07:06, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

Hi Hu741f4. Thank you for the response. That quote isn't very clear and if you read more of the article it seems to suggest pre-Islamic pointed domes already existed (although the authors aren't using very clear wording either). Quoting the beginning of the same subsection: "Historically, the use of the pointed domes as the earliest form of domes was totally unknown in Islamic architecture. In fact, such an architectural item rooted in long-term developments of both ideology and form by various pre-Islamic civilizations and cultures which inhabited in this particular region (Creswell 1958; Grabar 2006)." It then goes to speak of the "the earliest samples" by referring to various ancient (pre-Islamic) cultures. You also cited Hillenbrand 1994 without a page number; can you clarify where the author make this claim? (As I couldn't find it when I looked). Thanks, R Prazeres (talk) 07:18, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

The authors nowhere claimed that these pre-Islamic domes were pointed domes. These were false domes lacking proper geometry of a truly pointed dome. I think they simply mean that these pre-Islamic domes influenced the construction of pointed domes (for example the ogival domes of ancient persia). They clearly stated, citing Hillenbrand, that Qubbat al-Sulaybiyya was the second earliest sample of the pointed dome, the first being dome of the rock. Hu741f4 (talk) 08:06, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

The wording suggests otherwise, but even if I'm wrong (which is plausible), then it's not clear enough to cite for this claim. The solution would be to find another high-quality source that states this more clearly. If Hillenbrand says this, please provide the page number. R Prazeres (talk) 08:12, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

The author writes "...Qubbat al-Sulaybiyya (862 AD) at Samarra in Iraq which was later erected as the second earliest sample of the pointed dome" after discussing the pointed dome of the Qubbat as Sakhra, which clearly implies that the first sample was the dome of Dome of the Rock. Hillenbrand discussed it in

Chapter V, The Mausoleum

(pp. 253-330), Do you have access to this book? Hu741f4 (talk) 09:06, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

We've already covered what Ashkan et al says, and I'm sorry but that's at best a dubious reading of their text, so it's not acceptable. Yes, I have Hillenbrand's book, both in print and online, and nowhere can I see him make this claim. Again, if you have a specific page number where he says this, please provide it. Otherwise, we cannot cite an author to support a claim they do not make. This would become a WP:OR/WP:VER issue. I've also tried (briefly) looking for the same claim elsewhere and couldn't find it so far. R Prazeres (talk) 17:02, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

What does this passage from the paper mean: "...Qubbat al-Sulaybiyya (862 AD) at Samarra in Iraq which was later erected as the second earliest sample of the pointed domes"? Hu741f4 (talk) 18:24, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

As I said above, the "earliest samples" they speak of appear to be pre-Islamic, so the "second earliest" seems to refer to Islamic-era domes. If that's not what the authors intended to communicate, then they did a poor job of communicating, and it's not up to us to decide for them. I'm not going to dwell on this further. I take it from these responses that you have not found the claim in Hillenbrand's book. Lacking any other reliable sources saying this, the claim does not satisfy verifiability. R Prazeres (talk) 18:55, 24 June 2024 (UTC)