Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Roman-Spartan War

The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article review. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 06:03, 17 February 2007.

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Roman-Spartan War

Self nom. This article has had a previous FAC which can be seen here. The FAC was withdrawn and since then the article has been greatly improve by myself and Wandalstouring and has under gone many copy-edits by various users. I think that the article passes feature article criteria. Kyriakos 00:09, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

• Support per previous nom.--Yannismarou 17:54, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose for now. There are still issues with the writing, including:

• "The Roman-Spartan War or Laconian War (Greek:Λακωνικός Πόλεμος), occurring in 195 BC, was a military conflict in Ancient Greece…" is verbose and redundant;
• "as part of games of power" is unidiomatic;
• "official casus belli"; official?
• "the region of Laconia" otiose (Laconia is sufficient);
• "were able to capture" otiose ("captured")
• "whilst" archaism
• "later" for "latter", etc.
• Also, the bibliography needs to be all English, I think, which means replacing the Baltroush in n. 35 (which is German) and the Κουτσιλιέρη in n. 19 (modern Greek); can a better source than Kassis, Mani's History (n. 2) be found? An author in n. 4?; Smith's dictionary (n. 10) is positively archaic (1875!); Fermor's Mani: Travels in the Southern Peloponesse (n. 17) and Greenhalgh and Eliopoulos Deep into Mani:Journey to the southern tip of Greece (n. 35) are travel-guides and therefore should be replaced by something more scholarly; punctuation throughout the footnotes is erratic.
• Generally, I think the context needs clarification throughout. All the way through I get the feeling that its one fact happening after another without giving me much sense at to what it all means, how this all fits into the wider historical context. Semperf 19:07, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Response:First, I don't see why sources in other languages should be excluded. Recently featured article like Alcibiades (Greek) and Demosthenes (Greek and German) both have sources in other languages and I'm sure if I look at more FA's I'll find more FA with sources in other languages. Secondly, I dont see a problem with including Greenhalgh and Eliopoulos and Fermor. Yes both book may be tour guide books but they also deal with the history of the areas they travel through as well as the whole region. Thirdly, I don't think Smith is a problem. Smith gives a detailed description on Nabis' life which is one of the best I have seen on Nabis. As for Kassis, he gives a good description of events during the war and I don't see why I should not use him. Thats all for the moment and I'll work on your other comments ASAP. Thanks. Kyriakos 20:33, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

• Comments. On the question of sources in English, the more fundamental question is what references are for. Are they tags to say to your reader "fact x is confirmed"? Or are they sign-posts to show the reader where they can go to check things out for themselves and pursue the matter further if they wish? I incline towards the latter, which means that in English wikipedia, the references should be accessible to the readership. On whether a travel-guide is a good source, it seems to me the point is that wikipedia requires no original research because it should depend on the best modern scholarship--that is, on things that are original research. A travel guide--even an excellent one--is never going to be that, in my view. Semperf 21:52, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

I have removed Greenhalgh and Eliopulos as well as Greenhalgh from the inline citations and sources. Kyriakos 22:10, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Reply It is usus in scientific literature in this field to work multilingual, so often there is no equivalent work in other languages, but works from different languages are used. In this case it is from a scholarly book(that is part of a series written by university professor which is continuosly translated into other languages), so it is likely that one day there is an English version. However, until then we have to use whatever source we have. And to be more specific in this case the claims from this book can be verified independently(took a lot of research to retrieve). So as long as someone at least uses as much suitable English material as possible there should be no objections. Some fields of scholarly research are simply non-existent in English language (pretty much of precolonial African history and African metallurgy for example, etc.) and you have to use works in Russian, French, German, etc.(publications are often multilingual, switching between several languages if quoting other publications) like any serious English-speaking scientist working on the topic. Of course you can raise doubts if an article is completely lacking English sources, but that can be the case due to systemic bias in the world of science or someone needs a helping hand to find any English sources, what is neither the case. Wandalstouring 00:05, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Furthermore lots of native English speakers are not monolingual and scientific/university published material in other languages is available in the UK and the USA.

I will insert the page number soon. Wandalstouring 00:41, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

• Support. On the topic of source languages, it may cause confusion with a non-English source however, we have had articles even more controversial (when judging sources) like the battle of Marathon and the Greco-Persian Wars that are both A-class and are currently very close to FA with Greek and non-English sources. Therefore I don't know if it is that big a problem. Regarding the content of the article itself, it seems quite good, the lead has been trimmed down and probably for the best. The article also carries a very decent number of citations. I have been looking at the article with a hawk-eye and am finding far more difficult to find grammar errors recently. I have made several edits, including structure and word strengthening and article aesthetics but it really seems to be at the stage where it really needs no more significant improvement. Having said that, there are probably still a few minor things to look at like that will still be found in the days to come. But certainly this article is of FA class in my humble opinion.--Arsenous Commodore 06:18, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

• Continued oppose. The footnotes have erratic punctuation with misplaced, stray quotation marks. The Baltrush has no page number in n. 35. Some of the bibliography is of dubious value--it is not merely a question of the language (which I raised above), but also the quality. We should aim to have works that are published by academic publishing houses such as university presses. The titles of Kassis and Κουτσιλιέρη imply that they are general works covering 2000+ years of the history one small region of what used to be Laconia. For a featured article, we should expect sources that concentrate on this specific period of history written by experts. Semperf 15:19, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm reading Warfare in the Classical World(University of Oklahoma Press) and while it is generally acceptable quality in-depth research shows some flaws, so a university publishing house is no guarantee. On the other hand Osprey is generally held in high esteem, although no university publishing house. Wandalstouring 00:22, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Yes, it's true. There are many fine scholarly books written outside the university presses--Routledge, Blackwells, too. (I don't recall anything by Osprey, but that may be my failure. But I'm not convinced that the items that we're arguing about here are reliable. Here's the test: do the first rate scholars (in this case Gruen and Green and Cartledge) cite them? do handbooks and textbooks include them in their bibliographies? It they don't we shouldn't either. Semperf 01:03, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Osprey is not scientific research material, but is the *A*-class(genre-specific term for highest degree of accurate presentation) bible of the reenactment scene (most reenactors' presentations conflict with Osprey). It has an acceptable bibliography and refers a lot to findings of equipment and regions, etc.

OK, I can accept that although I'm not fluent with the aforementioned authors.(The whole subject wasn't quite my topic, I only improved the article on a few spots.) So you point out that some of the material used as a reference is possibly not reliable (lacking use by authoritative works). Perhaps we could try to retrieve another editor who is also familiar with these books, so we have more than one opinion on this delicate subject (I want to avoid bad blood and a precedence for all our national POV-pushers.).Wandalstouring 02:14, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

• Response. To me it doesn't really matter how famous the books are as long as they provide good infomation. Kassis for example is widely acclaimed as having the one of best books on the history of Mani. And those who are think what the hell Mani is it the middle leg of the Peloponnese hwere Gythium and Las are situated. Κουτσιλιέρη many not be well known by non-Greeks but his publishing house is well known in Greece. So in other words it doesn't really matter to me if a book is written by the worlds most famous author or by the world's least famous author as long as they give good info and history. Kyriakos 23:09, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

It does matter to me. Check out WP:RS#Types_of_source_material. We want to use especially primary (such as Livy) and the most authoritative secondary sources we can (here Gruen, Green, Holleaux, etc.). Kassis strikes me as tertiary. Semperf 01:03, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

The correct procedure is to track down the primary sources of the secondary(and tertiary) works and to present the exact passage in the primary source to the reader as possibility for verification of the claims. How you interpret the primary source is based on the secondary(and tertiary) works. That is the approach of Alcibiades and Pericles (have been involved in the primary source tracking process in the latter). Do both of you agree that this is acceptable? Are there any specific issues where the Kassis provides doubtful concepts to the article? Wandalstouring 02:23, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Response. I have omitted Kassis and Κουτσιλιέρη from the article and have replaced them with Livy and I have done the came with their inline citations. Kyriakos 05:27, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

• Maps. Another point, which I raise on the talk page, is that the maps aren't very helpful for this article. The map of Greece in c. 200 BC would be brilliant, but it comes before the second Macedonian War, which changed a lot. At the very least, the article needs maps that allow the reader to see the places mentioned in the article. (E.g., Argos and Gytheum are important for the article, but many readers won't know where they are without a map.) Semperf 18:44, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Even though the map does not show the exact time it is still good. They are roughly the borders of the countries except for Macedon. But also the narrative starts at around 200 BC and it ends at 188 BC which is the time period that the map shows. Plus we have put a request for a map of Greece at 195 BC so we got these maps which are the best we can do for the moment.

Maps are no FA criteria. If it is wrong, we remove it. Wandalstouring 00:34, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

• Prelude section. This section needs to be renamed, reorganized, and rewritten. What is the point of this section? I assume to acquaint the reader with the major players and important events before the war, especially Nabis and his dealings during the Second Macedonian War. But this is buried in a lot of detail--the nature of Spartan kingship, the decline of the population of Spartiates, and Nabis' reforms--that largely obscures what is important here. Much of this detail should be moved into the Nabis article; a summary should be sufficient. Semperf 19:00, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Reply: Well, we felt that this was important to understand the nature of the conflict as it is rather complicated regarding the political implications, not the campaign itself. However, it may be restructured and better implemented to support an understanding of the camapaign. If you read carefully, you will notice that the whole legal dispute who is to be king of Sparta is involved into this conflict. So without mentioning Nabis' reforms it is not very clear why the Romans didn't replace him and without this it is neither clear why the war happened at all. We have hinted the Spartan expansion there. Of course we can break down into a very detailled analyses of the argy-bargy who conquers the peninsula. The Achean League was shaken by the social unequality and Nabis offered a solution, making the fundaments of democracy shake because many people were fancying with the choice between sth. to eat in a dictatorship and the right to declare war in a democracy. I didn't know how deep we should go into Greek domestic politics and social problems. Wandalstouring 00:34, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

• formatting issues in notes. One thing that I've noticed is that there are a lot of minor typos and formatting problems in the footnotes. One consistent problem is that many of the titles are put in italics with the double-single-quotemark '', but the italic is not ended with another, but with a single double-quotemark ("). The result is this:v Holleaux, Rome and the Mediterranean; 218-133 B.C", 190. This needs to be fixed throughout. (Note also the punctuation in the notes: B.C needs another period here.) Semperf 13:34, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

• Remaining issues Can you suggest what needs to be done in detail with the remaining issues? Wandalstouring 02:02, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

• Support, all the issues seem to have been adequately resolved. Kirill Lokshin 17:43, 5 February 2007 (UTC)
• Oppose, this is too small article and don't be Featured article.--Absar 13:07, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

If this comment is intended to make sense you must point out what is missing. The article length itself is absolutely sufficient for FA criteria. Wandalstouring 14:39, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

I think that comment is useless. Many article of lesser size have become FA's. For example just look at the Cretan War which passes FAC 2 months ago. Kyriakos 20:04, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

• Comment. I find it a bit strange that 3/4 of the article focuses on the background, preparations and aftermath, while the actual war is addressed rather briefly in comparison. Jaqu 02:17, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
• Reply. I you have read the article you would see that the campaign itself only goes on for a month or two which answers the shortness of the actual campaign. Kyriakos 03:49, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
• Support; the serious concerns seem to have been addressed, and the sources strike me as quite sufficient. --Robth^Talk 06:39, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
• Comment An excellent article on a very little known war. I have a couple of very minor suggestions for improvement:

• I think most readers would be unfamiliar with terms such as "helot", "perioeci", "phalangite", "agoge", "syssitia" and others and ideally I would like these to be (very briefly) explained in-line in the article. I feel a user not familiar with the topic should ideally be able to understand everything in the article in a self-contained manner without having to consult other articles except if they wanted further detail. - this has now been done
• My second comment is more to do with the format of the military conflict infobox - I know this is not specific to this article but for complicated conflicts such as this the list of combatants is listed but a name is not assigned at the top of the list for how the "side" as a whole is referred to. This makes it confusing sometimes since a single term is not established for each side that can then be used elsewhere in the article. I would love for the military conflict infobox template to be altered to allow a name to be assigned as a whole to all the combatants on one side eg "Spartan Coalition" and "Anti-Spartan Coalition" or similar, in this case.

I don't think that is very useful. Wandalstouring

Can you elaborate, Wandals? its only marginally useful to this FAC, agreed (and maybe we should move discussion elsewhere), but I feel this would be really useful in several of the battle and war infoboxes and articles.

• I love the system of separate notes and citations
• I know that neither of the main editors speak English as a first language and despite their grasp of English being extremely high there are a certain number of very slightly awkward-sounding sentences in the article. I shall work through and try and re-word some of them. If anyone else is able to copyedit the whole thing that would be best.
• If a map exists showing the route of advance of the Laconian campaign, I think this would be a more fitting image than the current line drawing of the onager.

The onager is there to illustrate the siege engines which played an important role. Wandalstouring

I don't have a real problem with the onager graphic, I just think its difficult to visualise the troop movements without a campaign map, especially if you're not familar with Greek geography.

• Is it worth mentioning in summary at the beginning of the background Sparta's long and proud military history?

I don't see the long and proud military history mentioned, rather the decline and the creation of a new military system. There were two reasons for including this: the old élite was still around and wanted their power back and the Cretan fighting style, although they were a similar Doric culture, was totally different. If these changes are not mentioned most readers with a bit of background on Sparta would assume that there were these élite hoplites fighting Rome. Wandalstouring

Again, I'm not saying anything that is there needs taking out but, as you point out, the common perception is of Spartan hoplites. I think it might be worth mentioning more clearly in a throwaway sentence in the intro that the old Spartan military culture of hoplite citizens was big before but was at this point a thing of the past. - PocklingtonDan (talk) 13:28, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

• A few "why did they do that?" questions occurred to me when reading the article, that the article didn't answer:

• Why did the Roman army initially march past Sparta on their way to Mount Menelaus, instead of investing Sparta immediately?

Sparta was utterly unimportant. The whole affair was about Gythium and the other naval bases of the Cretan pirates. There is a note somewhere about a later invasion of Crete by the Roman army and the subsequent freeing of thousands of enslaved Romans. If I assume correctly it was part of Pompeys struggle against pirates, however I couldn't find it in the campaign list. Will continue searching. Wandalstouring

I wasn't asking for my knowledge so much as saying that it could do with being explained in the article. - PocklingtonDan (talk) 13:28, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

• Why were the Cretans willing to suport Sparta militarily? What did they have to gain?

Sparta was the host bearing the brunt of attacks for their share in piracy. I lack sources(I didn't research much), but you could say that Sparta was a Cretan puppet state. The Cretan pirates furnished the mercenaries that established Nabis in power and in exchange had free access to establish their naval bases. From these naval bases they could much easier venture on their expeditions. Wandalstouring 13:01, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

PocklingtonDan (talk) 09:03, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Again, this could do with being explained as clearly as this in the article.

Only the few little niggles above to clear up and it's a big 'ol Support vote from me - PocklingtonDan (talk) 13:28, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article review. No further edits should be made to this page.