Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Peer review/Siege of Eretria

Siege of Eretria

A recently created article, I would like to see what can be done to improve it. Kyriakos 23:31, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

• Please see automated peer review suggestions here. Thanks, Senators^{Talk | Contribs} 00:19, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Kirill Lokshin

Off to a good start. Some comments, in no particular order:

• The heavy reliance on Herodotus is not necessarily unacceptable, but it would be better if additional (secondary) sources could be found. I don't know what might be available, but the Greco-Persian Wars are certainly a topic that modern historians have written something about.
• The writing style is very simplistic, with almost no complex sentences. Whether this is a good or bad thing is quite subjective, I suppose; but I would suggest making at least some efforts in this regard.
• I'm not a fan of having two separate footnote sections; but this is, again, likely quite subjective.
• The images should probably be staggered along both margins.

More generally, this will likely need considerable copyediting in the future, regardless of how you decide to proceed with the other points. Kirill Lokshin 02:52, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

StudyAndBeWise

I just updated the article to use Harvard citations and references. However, I left the sources. In any event, the main suggestion I have is to cut back on the citations. For example, I saw one case where several consequtive sentences had the same citation to the same page. You might want to consider only citing the last sentence in such cases. I know citing each individual sentence might make others less likely to remove sentences, but I don't think this will be an issue for the Siege of Eretria article, unless it is controversial. I'll look through a history book and see if it is commented on, and add some more (just to get a larger variety of references). However, any history book is likely to have relied on the same primary source you did. Anyway, thanks for the good work.

If you have some time to review The Origin of Species, I would appreciate it.

StudyAndBeWise 01:42, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Yannismarou

• "In 490 BC, Darius organized a fleet of around 600 ships and an army of between 20,000 to 60,000 men." Important assessment and controversial estimation needing some citing.
• ", the instigator of the revolt, went to mainland Greece to seek support for the Ionians' cause, and the Athenians gave him twenty ships and the Eretrians five." Stubby paragraph.
• Kirill is correct when he says that the lack of complex sentences leads to a "simplistic" or "choppy" prose. Check for instance this half-paragraph, which IMO is an example of this choppy prose: "Also part of the fleet was Hippias, the former tyrant of Athens who had been overthrown in 508 BC. He had been promised Athens in return for assiting the Persians.[17] The fleet which consisted mainly of Phoenician and Ionian ships met the army in Cilicia and from there they sailed to Samos.[18] From Samos they sailed Icaria and from Icaria they attacked Naxos.[19] The Naxians were not prepared for the attack and when they saw the advancing Persians they fled to the hills.[20]" Another example:"They soon reached Euboea and they demanded soldiers from the city of Carystus.[23] The Carystians refused to supply soldiers as they didn't want to be involved in a campaign against their neighbours, Eretria and Athens.[24] The Persians after a brief siege eventually forced the Carystians to surrender and supply troops to the growing Persian army.[25] The next stop after Carystus was Eretria."
• The heavy reliance on Herodotus could be a problem. I'd prefer a parallel use of secondary sources; they often offer interesting prespectives.
• "The failed attack caused Aristagoras to lose his favor in the Persian court so he decided to stir up a revolution amongst the Ionian Greek cities." Doesn' this sentence need a , or a ; ?
• Why do you mention the same references twice; once altogether and then divided in primary and secondary sources?--Yannismarou 19:32, 18 January 2007 (UTC)