Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Classical Greece and Rome/Archive 29
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Statue of the Capitoline Wolf
Now that we know that the Capitoline Wolf was made in the Middle Ages (see article), should we remove it from articles on ancient Rome? T8612 (talk) 02:40, 21 July 2019 (UTC)
- It still depicts Roman figures, I'd say it can be kept, but I'm no expert.★Trekker (talk) 03:21, 21 July 2019 (UTC)
- There are many places it still works. But the appalling old lead photo should be entirely extirpated - File:Capitoline she-wolf Musei Capitolini MC1181.jpg seems the best of many far better ones on Commons, on a quick survey. The old one works ok as the logo for "This article relating to an Ancient Roman myth or legend is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it." though. Johnbod (talk) 03:50, 21 July 2019 (UTC)
- This picture is indeed ugly, but I don't know how to replace it in the "stubs".
We have authentic representations of the She-wolf suckling the Twins, especially on coins (but I suppose also sculptures); see for example here. T8612 (talk) 18:27, 22 July 2019 (UTC)
- You would fiddle at the template, but I think it works ok as a tiny logo. Johnbod (talk) 13:07, 23 July 2019 (UTC)
- Accepting that it's a medieval wolf with Renaissance twins, it would be good to know what iconography its makers had in mind. There are a lot of citations on our page but I don't know if any of them discusses this. The slightly odd idea of the twins suckling upright could very well derive from the very coin that T8612 illustrates, if an example of that coin was known at the time. The wolf, on the other hand, certainly doesn't come from that coin image. Andrew Dalby 08:39, 25 July 2019 (UTC)
- It's possible, but the She-wolf and the Twins were very common on Roman coins, the one I showed is the oldest, but this theme was last used under the Ostrogoths. Several Renaissance princes used the scene on the coins as well. I suppose there the scene also exists on other media (mosaics, paintings, etc.). T8612 (talk) 00:48, 26 July 2019 (UTC)
- The Anglo-Saxon Franks Casket has a depiction - visually unrelated, but it shows the story was about in medieval art. Mind you, there's not much medieval here, not even the Franks Casket. The image was also a symbol of Siena, which has a lot of old-looking wolves. Johnbod (talk) 12:12, 31 July 2019 (UTC)
- It's possible, but the She-wolf and the Twins were very common on Roman coins, the one I showed is the oldest, but this theme was last used under the Ostrogoths. Several Renaissance princes used the scene on the coins as well. I suppose there the scene also exists on other media (mosaics, paintings, etc.). T8612 (talk) 00:48, 26 July 2019 (UTC)
- Accepting that it's a medieval wolf with Renaissance twins, it would be good to know what iconography its makers had in mind. There are a lot of citations on our page but I don't know if any of them discusses this. The slightly odd idea of the twins suckling upright could very well derive from the very coin that T8612 illustrates, if an example of that coin was known at the time. The wolf, on the other hand, certainly doesn't come from that coin image. Andrew Dalby 08:39, 25 July 2019 (UTC)
- You would fiddle at the template, but I think it works ok as a tiny logo. Johnbod (talk) 13:07, 23 July 2019 (UTC)
- This picture is indeed ugly, but I don't know how to replace it in the "stubs".
- I'm attached to the statue, and even if it's not period it's become attached to Roman history. Despite some opinion that it might be in the Frankish style, there's little enough known about Etruscan sculptural styles that modern scholars have still attributed it to that period, so technically it could still be a copy of a lost original (and almost certainly replaced an earlier statue, according to our article). So I'd like to keep it. The photo linked by T8612 isn't the one used by our stub template; that one's slightly higher-resolution, and since it's tiny as a stub it still works well. We could edit the good photo, but I don't see the need for an icon that's less than 50 pixels wide; I wouldn't be able to tell the difference. P Aculeius (talk) 12:37, 31 July 2019 (UTC)
- There are many places it still works. But the appalling old lead photo should be entirely extirpated - File:Capitoline she-wolf Musei Capitolini MC1181.jpg seems the best of many far better ones on Commons, on a quick survey. The old one works ok as the logo for "This article relating to an Ancient Roman myth or legend is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it." though. Johnbod (talk) 03:50, 21 July 2019 (UTC)
Dispute over Pontius Pilate rewrite over historicity of Jesus
Paul Seibert is threatening to undo the extensive rewrite I have just performed of Pontius Pilate, entirely based on reliable sources, because "Otherwise, we have to admit Gospels are historical documents, and Jesus was a real person, not a Christian mythology character." See here Talk:Pontius Pilate#Recent changes. I would appreciate any support in preventing this from happening.--Ermenrich (talk) 20:53, 29 July 2019 (UTC)
- Wow. Andrew Dalby 08:58, 31 July 2019 (UTC)
- Definitely wow. -- llywrch (talk) 18:30, 5 August 2019 (UTC)
Wasn't there a movie about this? Is the movie "God is not Dead" not based on factual information? — Preceding [[Wikipedia:Signatures|ShiloShahan (talk) 07:54, 14 August 2019 (UTC)]] comment added by ShiloShahan (talk • contribs) 07:48, 14 August 2019 (UTC)
- If this is God's Not Dead (film), and if the Wikipedia article is a fair summary, it isn't about this: there's no mention of Pontius Pilate. But I haven't seen it. Andrew Dalby 08:35, 14 August 2019 (UTC)
- I don't see that film being very relevant to that discussion.★Trekker (talk) 12:29, 14 August 2019 (UTC)
Proposal to move Buthrotum to Butrint: outside opinions?
This morning I weighed in on this proposed page move for Buthrotum, an ancient Greek town that had some post-Byzantine history, but which has been deserted since Ottoman times. Butrint is the modern Albanian name for the site. The article has been moved back and forth multiple times since its creation, usually without prior discussion (but with debates occurring between moves). Soon after the discussion began, editors who opposed the move suggested that those supporting the move were motivated by Albanian nationalism, which looks credible given their editing history. On the other hand, those opposing the move seem to be mainly Greek, and now they've been accused of promoting right-wing Greek nationalism. What we need here is the opinions of editors who aren't too closely associated with either side—excluding me, since I've already given my opinion and addressed some of the arguments. There is of course the possibility of splitting the article into historical Buthrotum and the modern archaeological site, which has been done for some articles. Anybody want to lend an outside perspective to this discussion? P Aculeius (talk) 18:11, 7 August 2019 (UTC)
- Incidentally, it's interesting to see how ancient Epirus has become Greek! I hadn't noticed. Andrew Dalby 20:38, 7 August 2019 (UTC)
- I thought we learned our lesson back in the days of arguing over that seaport on the Baltic Sea, with a couple or more different names. And all of the naming fights where Polish editors realized that English speakers favored German place names simply because they were the more familiar form, & English editors realized that Polish speakers were more than slightly sensitive about placenames in their country. Oh well. A new day, a new rivalry even our most cosmopolitan editors were never aware of. -- llywrch (talk) 22:26, 7 August 2019 (UTC)
- I'm sorry to see it's been closed quickly.
- On the merits, since the article spends more time on the post-classical town than ancient Buthrotum, the change may well be justified. For what it's worth, this ngram suggests that Butrint, although I am unfamiliar with it, has been somewhat more common in English for about two decades.
- As for the charges against the various editors, I would not be at all surprised if both sides were right - about the others. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:48, 15 August 2019 (UTC)
Did Marcus Junius Brutus the Elder and Servilia have a daughter? Or daughters????
I am a little confused to if Brutus the Younger was a single child by his father and mother. I know he had at least three younger maternal half sisters (Junia Prima, Junia Secunda, Junia Tertia) and maybe a half brother. Some googeling shows some sites which claim that there was a sister named Junia Bruta Paullus who was married to Lucius Aemilius Lepidus Paullus, a few also show another daughter which there is almost no info on. Is this just some screw up which has spread to multiple places or might there be reason to look into this?★Trekker (talk) 19:19, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
- Just spent a few minutes reviewing all three Bruti, both Lepidi, and Servilia in the DGRBM, and saw nothing to indicate the name of Lucius Lepidus' wife, or that Marcus Brutus the elder had any daughters of his own. On the other hand, I don't believe I saw anything about a "Junia Prima", and "Junia Secunda" is simply called "Junia", which suggests, though it does not prove, that Junia Tertia (or Tertia Junia, as she's called on one occasion) had only one elder sister. Whether praenomen or cognomen, Tertia doesn't necessarily indicate a third sister; a third child is possible (i.e. Brutus, Junia, and Tertia), and that's assuming there isn't some reason for the name that we don't know about. I'd have to make a broader canvass of available resources to conclude that "Junia Prima" is a phantom, however.
- Assuming the above isn't a typo, if there were a sister who married Lucius Lepidus, she wouldn't have been named Paullus; first she wouldn't have assumed her husband's name; that wasn't a Roman custom (although a few early modern writers seem to have interpreted statements in ancient writers to say that they did, all of the evidence is to the contrary, and no recent source makes such a claim). And if somehow she had done so, or acquired the name in her own right, it would have been the feminine Paulla. You may occasionally find someone write a name such as "Junia Bruta Paulli", meaning "Junia Bruta of Paullus", but in this case Paulli wouldn't be part of her name; just a description. Such things have been misunderstood by Wikipedia editors and genealogists alike—which may be, as you suggest, where this claim comes from: a genealogist claiming descent from antiquity, or perhaps a scholar putting together Roman family trees out of curiosity, and perhaps mistyping a name, or mixing up Lucius Lepidus with his brother, or following some other source that did so. At any rate, I'd say it's safe to presume that this sister is a figment of someone's imagination—at least, until and unless some reputable source indicating otherwise surfaces. P Aculeius (talk) 02:46, 18 August 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks! Would you say that it's likely that Marcus Junius Silanus was Servilia's son, or is that also some confusion? As for Junia Prima, I read some sources which say that it is possible that there may have been an older cousin also named Junia instead of a sister to the other two Junias, but the general consensus seems to be that Servilia had three daughters.★Trekker (talk) 03:35, 18 August 2019 (UTC)
- Well, that's what all the sources seem to say, and it's hard to imagine why he would have borne the cognomen Silanus if he weren't the son of Decimus Junius Silanus. If he were the son of Marcus Brutus the elder, and a full brother to the tyrannicide, he would have been distinguished by his praenomen, rather than his cognomen, at this period of time, and been Lucius or Decimus Junius Brutus, not Marcus Junius Silanus. I don't see anything about Decimus Junius Silanus having had a wife or children before he married Servilia. Obviously it's easy to get confused or misstate who was who when you have two large and related families, so it could be someone has accidentally confused which was the son of whom. P Aculeius (talk) 05:00, 18 August 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks again. It's just odd, it seems like a ton of the sources I've read doesn't even bother to mention the guy when talking about Servilia. They only ever mention Brutus and the three girls for some reason.★Trekker (talk) 05:54, 18 August 2019 (UTC)
- The "Paulli" that P Aculeius uses as an example corresponds with the recent custom in Greece, by which a married woman took her husband's surname in the genitive; e.g. Penelope Delta was the wife of Stephanos Deltas. Hungarian, too, come to think of it. The parallel hadn't struck me before. Andrew Dalby 11:26, 18 August 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks again. It's just odd, it seems like a ton of the sources I've read doesn't even bother to mention the guy when talking about Servilia. They only ever mention Brutus and the three girls for some reason.★Trekker (talk) 05:54, 18 August 2019 (UTC)
- Well, that's what all the sources seem to say, and it's hard to imagine why he would have borne the cognomen Silanus if he weren't the son of Decimus Junius Silanus. If he were the son of Marcus Brutus the elder, and a full brother to the tyrannicide, he would have been distinguished by his praenomen, rather than his cognomen, at this period of time, and been Lucius or Decimus Junius Brutus, not Marcus Junius Silanus. I don't see anything about Decimus Junius Silanus having had a wife or children before he married Servilia. Obviously it's easy to get confused or misstate who was who when you have two large and related families, so it could be someone has accidentally confused which was the son of whom. P Aculeius (talk) 05:00, 18 August 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks! Would you say that it's likely that Marcus Junius Silanus was Servilia's son, or is that also some confusion? As for Junia Prima, I read some sources which say that it is possible that there may have been an older cousin also named Junia instead of a sister to the other two Junias, but the general consensus seems to be that Servilia had three daughters.★Trekker (talk) 03:35, 18 August 2019 (UTC)
Was there a gens Procula?
Marie-Joseph Ollivier, writing in 1896, tried to connect the name of Pontius Pilate's wife in later legends, Claudia Procula, with a "gens Procula" [1] (in French, p. 595)). There is no Wikipedia page for this gens, and the only other reference to it (or the possibility of Claudia Procula's name being connected to it) I've found so far is in a popular book on Pilate by Ann Wroe. So my question is: was there a gens Procula/a family of the Proculi?--Ermenrich (talk) 14:45, 5 August 2019 (UTC)
- The real gentile here is "Claudia" (why Marie-Joseph Ollivier calls it a "prénom ou surnom" I don't know). "Procula" would suggest to me that there were "Claudii Proculi" in the gens Claudia. Well, there was a "Ti. Claudius Proculus Cornelianus" (here), and also a Tiberius Claudius Severus Proculus, both of them about 150 years later, but find a connection if you can! Andrew Dalby 15:34, 5 August 2019 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) I think the problem is that he's more certain about the name Procula, which appears earlier, than the name Claudia, which appears in later tradition. He mentions specifically: Gnaeus Acerronius Proculus, "Titius Proculus, ami de Silas"(?), Cervarius Proculus (member of the Pisonian conspiracy, Licinius Proculus (possibly Proculus (jurist)), Volusius Proculus (member of the Pisonian conspiracy), and ends by saying "On en trouve encore d'autres, spéculateurs, soldats, etc." Based on my (very basic knowledge) of Roman naming practices, these look more like cognomina than nomina, don't they?--Ermenrich (talk) 15:48, 5 August 2019 (UTC)
- As Proculus is a Latin praenomen, as a gentile name it would have a standard Latin gentile-forming suffix—most typically -ius, although in this case it seems to be the more Sabine-sounding -eius. There was a Proculeia gens, and Proculius, if it existed, would probably be considered an orthographic variant of Proculeius. However, there's no evidence that such a variant existed, at least in significant numbers. The Clauss-Slaby databank of inscriptions contains no entries for Proculius, Proculium, Proculii, or Proculio. Of the twenty entries that came up under Proculia, all but one were for persons surnamed Proculianus; there was one inscription for Proculiae, indicating a woman named Proculia, but I believe she appeared to be a member of the Volusia gens. So very weak evidence for the spelling Proculius and really no probability of Proculus as a gentile name. I think that Ollivier simply confused his terminology. As for whether (Claudia) Procula existed, there's nothing inherently improbable about the name, and certainly there would have been women of this name, at least in later times; but absent a mention in surviving histories or inscriptions dating to the time of Pontius Pilate, I don't think it can be either verified or refuted. She could well have been mentioned in writings that no longer exist. Bear in mind that only a fraction of the writings of antiquity have survived to the present day, and Pilate's wife wouldn't have been a particularly important person to most contemporary writers of history; Pilate's only mentioned because he was governor of Judaea, and he's not described in much detail—we don't even know his praenomen, although I remember being excited many years ago when an inscription purporting to show that it was Marcus was announced—I forget if it was determined to be inauthentic or simply misinterpreted. P Aculeius (talk) 16:36, 5 August 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks, yeah, I was just wondering if the information was solid enough to add to the article given its a 123 year-old source by a catholic priest (that's still regularly cited on the Pontii though). This confirms my suspicion that it is not for PP's article, but it could be worth mentioning in a rewrite of the Pilate's wife article I think I'll try to undertake.
- As far as I know the Marcus praenomen is one of the proposed reconstructions of the Pilate stone that hasn't really caught on, by E. Weber (1971). As far as I can tell (based on Lémonon's comments) it's just a hypothesis. I'd have to look at Weber's original article to determine why he felt he could assign Pilate that preanomen though.--Ermenrich (talk) 16:43, 5 August 2019 (UTC)
- Just looked at the stone as illustrated and discussed in the Pilate article. I'd say it's because the 'M' appears to belong to TIBERIEUM, and I wouldn't think assigning it to Pilate's praenomen a particularly plausible reconstruction. I can't absolutely rule it out without the rest of the inscription (and even then I'd defer to the experts), but I'd certainly never interpret it that way. Which is not to say that his praenomen wasn't Marcus; just that this stone doesn't look like good evidence of it. P Aculeius (talk) 16:56, 5 August 2019 (UTC)
- As given in Lémonon, Weber wasn't even using that M for a source: "[Kal(endis) Iulii]s Tiberiéum / [M(arcus)? Po]ntius Pilatus / [praef]ectus Iuda[ea]e / [dedicavit]." So without looking at Weber I have no idea why he thought it was Marcus, but it looks like (excuse my French) he just pulled it out of his ass.--Ermenrich (talk) 17:12, 5 August 2019 (UTC)
- Looking at the stone in Pilate stone, that looks like an... optimistic reconstruction, shall we say? Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 17:18, 5 August 2019 (UTC)
- As given in Lémonon, Weber wasn't even using that M for a source: "[Kal(endis) Iulii]s Tiberiéum / [M(arcus)? Po]ntius Pilatus / [praef]ectus Iuda[ea]e / [dedicavit]." So without looking at Weber I have no idea why he thought it was Marcus, but it looks like (excuse my French) he just pulled it out of his ass.--Ermenrich (talk) 17:12, 5 August 2019 (UTC)
- Just looked at the stone as illustrated and discussed in the Pilate article. I'd say it's because the 'M' appears to belong to TIBERIEUM, and I wouldn't think assigning it to Pilate's praenomen a particularly plausible reconstruction. I can't absolutely rule it out without the rest of the inscription (and even then I'd defer to the experts), but I'd certainly never interpret it that way. Which is not to say that his praenomen wasn't Marcus; just that this stone doesn't look like good evidence of it. P Aculeius (talk) 16:56, 5 August 2019 (UTC)
- The risk of using inscriptions is that few are complete, which means that the missing text must be restored. Fortunately, most inscriptions follow a stereotypical pattern, which allow experienced scholars to make amazingly accurate reconstructions. (Géza Alföldy once restored an entire lengthy inscription from a mere 10 & ahalf words; don't try this at home.) Nevertheless the reconstructions remain, in the end, a guess. There is the risk known in historical circles as "history from square brackets" -- building an argument based on speculation disguised as fact; if nothing else, this shows even the experts sometimes overvalue the reliability of reconstructions.In short, while there are some very good restored readings out there, there are also some questionable, if not downright dodgy, ones. If the restoration seems too "optimistic", IMHO there's no harm in either identifying it as the reading of a specific expert, or omitting all mention of it. -- llywrch (talk) 05:11, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
- I'm planning to include all the proposed reconstructions at a rewrite of Pilate stone. I don't know if Weber's is more hypothetical than others (besides the M. for Marcus, which is clearly just a guess), but I'll note that none of the other propoposals follow him on the Kalends of June bit at the top. That may actually be more likely than Alföldy's "nautis" (because he thinks the Tiberieum is a lighthouse) or "Dis Augustis" as proposed by a few others.--Ermenrich (talk) 13:30, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
- I'm just relieved to see that the article isn't titled "Mrs. Pontius Pilate". P Aculeius (talk) 20:05, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
- Warren Carter actually does call her "Mrs. Pilate" ;-).--Ermenrich (talk) 22:07, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
- The risk of using inscriptions is that few are complete, which means that the missing text must be restored. Fortunately, most inscriptions follow a stereotypical pattern, which allow experienced scholars to make amazingly accurate reconstructions. (Géza Alföldy once restored an entire lengthy inscription from a mere 10 & ahalf words; don't try this at home.) Nevertheless the reconstructions remain, in the end, a guess. There is the risk known in historical circles as "history from square brackets" -- building an argument based on speculation disguised as fact; if nothing else, this shows even the experts sometimes overvalue the reliability of reconstructions.In short, while there are some very good restored readings out there, there are also some questionable, if not downright dodgy, ones. If the restoration seems too "optimistic", IMHO there's no harm in either identifying it as the reading of a specific expert, or omitting all mention of it. -- llywrch (talk) 05:11, 6 August 2019 (UTC)
Re:Pilate's Praenomen. I got a hold of Weber, and he admits that "Marcus" is conjecture, but he bases it on another scholar, Degrassi (I think I'm getting a copy of his work if ILL can figure out where to find it) who says that the praenomina Sextus and Marcus are the most frequently attested ones among the Pontii. He argues that an M would have fit best in the space of the block as well.--Ermenrich (talk) 17:34, 20 August 2019 (UTC)
- Attilio Degrassi is not just a "scholar", he was the great master of Roman epigraphy during the 20th century. T8612 (talk) 18:41, 20 August 2019 (UTC)
- A really good scholar then ;-). Apparently Alföldy says that there's no way an M. could fit there though "there's at most space for an L or a T" [2] (this must be a translation into Italian of something originally in German).--Ermenrich (talk) 22:33, 20 August 2019 (UTC)
- Adding to which, the pattern just isn't clear from the Pontii in our article on the gens. Excluding a few early ones with Samnite praenomina, I see Gaius, Lucius, Marcus, and Titus represented, but no Sextus. Probably a wider study of Pontii would reveal a distinct pattern along the lines that Degrassi suggested, and from which Weber is extrapolating. However, the article as it currently stands mainly includes Pontii mentioned in ancient writers, and found in modern references (other than PW; that would require a more exhaustive process than I can handle). I could in theory start adding Pontii from inscriptions in the Clauss-Slaby databank, but I have a feeling that would take days. I generally only do that with small families where only a couple of members are mentioned in history, and even so that can be exhausting! Anyway, based only on what's already there I wouldn't feel too confident about Marcus. After all, we don't even know if Pilate was really connected with the old Samnite family, since the same nomen could arise more than once, and even old patrician families span off cadet lines and the descendants of freedmen, who might in a couple of generations make a name for themselves, but who wouldn't feel the need to be bound by another family's naming conventions. P Aculeius (talk) 00:02, 21 August 2019 (UTC)
- A really good scholar then ;-). Apparently Alföldy says that there's no way an M. could fit there though "there's at most space for an L or a T" [2] (this must be a translation into Italian of something originally in German).--Ermenrich (talk) 22:33, 20 August 2019 (UTC)
Could someone very kindly look over The contributions of this editor? A relatively small number of rather large additions to various articles, all classical, over the last 18 months or so. On a very quick, inexpert look-over, I see lots of primary sources. He has just been reverted by someone else at Venice, with the edit summary "Reverted good faith edits by Testatorsilens: Too much that is not well worded and with error-ridden wikimarkup, as well as containing excessive detail that could be kept in separate articles (especially regional history and quotes), this article already being a fairly large one" which I can understand. I didn't see other edits that have been reverted, but most of his subjects are highly obscure - lots on Hellenistic Anatolia etc. Johnbod (talk) 23:36, 22 August 2019 (UTC)
- On a quick look over, the articles in question all seem to be better for the user's interventions. Primary sources alone are obviously not ideal, but they are an improvement on unsourced articles. I see why the Venice edit was reverted but I sort of bristle at editors reverting content for that sort of reason - the point of wiki is to take content like that and actually fix the wording & syntax and find the appropriate separate articles for it. Furius (talk) 15:39, 23 August 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks - I'd suggested on his talk they get added to History of the Republic of Venice - that's very poor on that period. The reverter could have done that. Johnbod (talk) 16:14, 23 August 2019 (UTC)
Picture of Ennius in the Vatican Museums
I would be very grateful if an editor living in Rome (or visiting) could go to the Vatican Museums and take a picture of the "Head of Ennius" that is displayed there for this article that I'm expanding to FA status. Currently the picture we have on WP is copyrighted and may have to be deleted. I could not find another online. There is one picture on the Museums' website, but copyrighted. Many other artworks in the museums lack a picture on Wikimedia too. It is in the Museo Pio Clementino in the Cabinet of Apoxyomenos (see here). T8612 (talk) 17:37, 27 June 2019 (UTC)
Pyrrhus?
Two articles contain an obscure link to the DAB page Pyrrhus:
- Philemon (poet). If this Pyrrhus cannot be identified because the play is lost, or because its protaganist cannot be identified from a fragment, IMO it should be unlinked.
- Cleodaeus. Clearly not Neoptolemus, unless he was his own son. This one is a mythological tangle.
Expert help would be appreciated. Narky Blert (talk) 23:44, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
- Figured them both out. The subject of the play seems to be Pyrrhus of Epirus, based on a note in The Fragments of Attic Poets; that makes sense given that he's the most prominent person of the name, and as he lived during Philemon's career. Linked thereto. If anyone wants to expand the Philemon article, the DGRBM has a lot more about him than Harper's, as well-written as the latter is (really, the prose in these books is wonderful, with occasional exceptions). The other Pyrrhus, the grandson of Achilles, doesn't seem to have any significant mythology attached to him (no entry in DGRBM; not named in article on Neoptolemus; "Lanassa" deals with the wife of Pyrrhus, the king who fought against Rome), and seems to have been mentioned in passing by Plutarch mainly because he was named Pyrrhus, after his father's byname, and the kings of Epirus were called Pyrrhidae. Delinked this one, as it seems unlikely there'll be an article about him, and reworded the passage to make it clear that it was just the name of Neoptolemus' son, not an important person the reader might want or be expected to know about. P Aculeius (talk) 02:38, 27 August 2019 (UTC)
Portal: Military of ancient Rome proposed for deletion
Just saw this in our article alerts, and took a peek. I didn't actually know that this existed, but looking over it I can see both considerable potential and significant neglect. On the one hand, an argument for deleting it is that it "only has nine articles". I'm not sure where that number comes from. It seems to me like we have dozens, if not hundreds of articles about Roman generals, wars, military campaigns, and military units. Presumably they should have some relationship to this portal. Should they be included? Do we care about having a portal for this topic? Admittedly, I don't know a lot about portals. But an argument being advanced is that the topic isn't broad enough to attract readers—and I'm certain that's not the case. On the other hand, if it's going to survive it needs to be updated and maintained. Adding a lot of relevant articles could help, as could working on the page layout so that it's a little more organized, perhaps using the chess example in "about portals" to see what a properly maintained portal ought to look like. Normally I'm happy to expand a small article in danger of deletion, but this is bigger than I can take on at the moment, and I can't do it myself anyway. However, the nominator is saying that if it's deleted, it should never be re-created, because it's been neglected for so long—and that its potential to be improved in the future is irrelevant. So if it's going to be rescued, it has to be now. So what do we, the members of CGR, think of this? Should we try to improve it and set maintaining it as a priority—or are we fine if it goes away, never to be re-created? P Aculeius (talk) 12:51, 27 August 2019 (UTC)
- I think it would be a waste of time. We are barely a dozen active wikipedians on the WikiProject Classical Greece and Rome, so I don't think enough people will spend the required time on this portal. Only large and active communities can make this work. And I do think its subject is too narrow. T8612 (talk) 16:32, 27 August 2019 (UTC)
- The problem with portals (based on reading a recent thread at WP:VPP) is that a few months ago some over-enthusiastic Wikipedians created a lot of them. Something on the order of a thousand. (Apparently there is a tool that allows newbies to create a portal page quite easily.) However, no one took on the chore of maintaining them, most of them get practically no traffic, & they look like crap. I'll readily admit that a well-maintained portal can be useful: I've often been surprised to find articles on a given subject drifting out there, unconnected to others in that subject, & not intuitively associated with the main topic. That is where having a portal to coordinate information would be a good thing. But the issue comes back to maintaining them: someone has to be willing to do the drudgery of scouring Wikipedia for material to feature, or at least link to. (Consider the problems just keeping up our Project pages.) In short, if someone wants to volunteer to maintain this portal, I'm willing do what I can to keep it; but if no one wants to do the work, best let it be deleted. -- llywrch (talk) 17:17, 27 August 2019 (UTC)
- Personally, I don't really understand what the point of portals is, and as far as I can tell barely anyone uses them. Even Portal:Ancient Greece and Portal:Ancient Rome don't get that many views. So saving a minor portal is pretty far down my list of priorities. If someone thinks that there is some value in the portals, I'm not going to tell them not to work on them – but if you want to do something of value to wikipedia and its coverage of classical Greece & Rome, I would personally look to improve one of the nearly 400 articles with no inline references, or the over 1700 articles with citation needed tags which comes under the project's purview. Or whichever other article-space problem you consider most interesting/important. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 19:13, 27 August 2019 (UTC)
- Honestly I like Portals a lot myself, but I agree with Caeciliusinhorto that I'm not sure if we're enough to maintain a bunch.★Trekker (talk) 19:19, 27 August 2019 (UTC)
Don't suppose any Catalan speakers watch this page? Or wikidata speakers?
Not en.wiki related, but CGR related, so as I don't either speak Catalan or understand wikidata, I thought I'd bring it here in the first instance.
A pretty little mess I have just discovered: there appear to be two separate wikidata items for Boeo, and correspondingly two separate articles on the Catalan wikipedia. They are Boeo (Q891047) and Boeo (Q16178470) on wikidata, and ca:Boio and ca:Boeo on ca.wiki. The wikidata thing is even a minor issue for us here because it screws up interlanguage linking: our article is missing ILLs to the better ca.wiki article, and also to de:Boio.
If the issue were on en.wiki, I would just merge the two articles; on ca.wiki I don't know enough Catalan to do it myself, and I don't even know enough Catalan to find the appropriate template to stick on the articles and let other people know about the problem. On wikidata – I just don't really understand what's going on. Can anyone a) help or b) suggest who I should be asking for help? Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 20:14, 30 August 2019 (UTC)
- Not a native speaker of either, but I have put all the useful interwikis at Boeo (Q891047), added the Catalan templates, and explained at ca:Discussió:Boio.
- This wouldn't always work, but in this case I could find the relevant template because it has an interwiki link to our own "Merge" template.
- A straight merger at Wikidata is easy, but it can't be done in cases like this. Here it was a question of deleting the Portuguese and German pagelinks from one Wikidata page, saving the result, and -- only then -- adding them to the other Wikidata page. Andrew Dalby 11:36, 31 August 2019 (UTC)
- If you find a duplicate in other edition of Wikipedia, you just need to use the equivalent to duplicate or fusion templates. Alternatively, you just need to drop a comment in the talk pages of the articles.--Pere prlpz (talk) 12:08, 31 August 2019 (UTC)
in this case I could find the relevant template because it has an interwiki link to our own "Merge" template.
Oh, hell. I knew there had to be something obvious I was missing! Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 12:56, 31 August 2019 (UTC)
- That's one way to do it. But if you look at the top of the page, you'll see a tab marked "More"; click on that & you'll be presented with options for merging. (Not a fluent speaker of Wikidata, but I know enough to order from the menu.) -- llywrch (talk) 17:55, 1 September 2019 (UTC)
- That is indeed the recommended route. It wouldn't have worked at the time when Caecilius raised the problem, because there were two Catalan pages on the same subject, each of them with interwiki links. It takes a human (or, in this case, me) to decide how to handle that.
- The Catalan wikipedians, however, had dealt with their end of the problem within 20 minutes ("fet" < "factum"). Once they had done that, merger from the menu at Wikidata would have worked. Andrew Dalby 08:36, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- Catalan wikipedians are clearly on the ball! Well done them! Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 08:49, 2 September 2019 (UTC)
- That's one way to do it. But if you look at the top of the page, you'll see a tab marked "More"; click on that & you'll be presented with options for merging. (Not a fluent speaker of Wikidata, but I know enough to order from the menu.) -- llywrch (talk) 17:55, 1 September 2019 (UTC)
Women's names
I feel it would be helpful if someone could clear up a little for me about naming conventions for women in ancient Rome. I would like to know how exactly the convention for pet names for women worked, for example Tertia could become Tertulla, Julia to Julilla and Tullia to Tulliola. Could these ends be added to almost any female name, for example could Servilia be called Serlilla, or a Lollia Lolliola?★Trekker (talk) 21:25, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
- In theory yes, although I've never heard of "Serlilla". I might expect "Servilla" or "Serviola". Diminutive suffixes weren't fundamentally different from how they are today. But since they weren't "official" names—the concept has limited application to the ancient world, and even more in the case of Roman women, since to the extent names had an "officialness" it was generally for political or military reasons—they had no "official" forms, and so weren't subject to any formal rules; just grammatical ones. This is why toward the latter part of the Republic, we find women referred to by cognomen rather than nomen, or a combination of both, or some other name entirely; whatever name would most easily allow them to be distinguished from other women with similar names. P Aculeius (talk) 23:13, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
- Would Serlilla be odd because it cuts of a part of the name of the family's gens?★Trekker (talk) 23:23, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
- No, thinking about it, it's because the diminutive suffix is -illus, illa, not -lillus, lilla. So the intervening 'l' looks wrong. It's not an error in Julilla because the stem of the nomen already contains an 'l'. You might also have noticed the Latin diminutive suffixes -ulus, ula (of which Chase calls -illus, illa a "double diminutive"; I think that the -ola in Tulliola is a variation of -ula), and -inus, ina (which to me usually suggests "derived from" or "descended from" rather than "little"). P Aculeius (talk) 00:35, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
- Great to know! Thank you.★Trekker (talk) 11:14, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
- No, thinking about it, it's because the diminutive suffix is -illus, illa, not -lillus, lilla. So the intervening 'l' looks wrong. It's not an error in Julilla because the stem of the nomen already contains an 'l'. You might also have noticed the Latin diminutive suffixes -ulus, ula (of which Chase calls -illus, illa a "double diminutive"; I think that the -ola in Tulliola is a variation of -ula), and -inus, ina (which to me usually suggests "derived from" or "descended from" rather than "little"). P Aculeius (talk) 00:35, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
- Would Serlilla be odd because it cuts of a part of the name of the family's gens?★Trekker (talk) 23:23, 9 September 2019 (UTC)
Third Servile War
I have nominated Third Servile War for removal from the FA list, because it almost exclusively uses primary sources. See discussion here. T8612 (talk) 21:26, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
Identity of sculptures and other
I've been trying for a while to find depictions of several figures in Roman history. Often there is a problem of having your search motor filled false positives, for example I've been looking for depictions of Servilia and there are two particular busts that keep showing up in pages claiming to be her, this one and this one, (I very much doubt they are, but would like to have confirmation). There's also this drawing, which I can not even find other examples of with TinEye. Any ideas?★Trekker (talk) 21:06, 10 September 2019 (UTC)
- I wouldn't add any picture of statues "said to be" of ancient people, unless we have a RS saying so. As I mentioned earlier, many pictures on Wikipedia repeat false attributions made before the 20th century, often by art dealers or popular writers. Filippo Coarelli wrote a lot on Roman statuary, perhaps you can start from there, although his books are difficult to find. T8612 (talk) 18:42, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Yes I'm always trying to be careful.★Trekker (talk) 18:59, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Finding a reliable depiction is a chronic problem for anyone who lived before photography became common. If one was wealthy, one could commission a portrait or sculpture of oneself. But for the rest of us, there is little to go by. For example, all we know about Odoacer's personal appearance is that he was tall, from a chance mention in one primary source. As two scholars pointed out in the 1950s, we aren't even sure of his ethnicity: names are not a reliable indicator, & his name is of dubious origins. So except for a handful of people, the best we will ever get is a painting from over a millennium later, or a misattributed contemporary painting or sculpture. (In which case, having an expert source that says "This is what X looks like" gives you the loophole to use this picture, although with the caption "According to expert ABC, X looked like this." Unless your ethics feels this is a dirty trick.) -- llywrch (talk) 22:40, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- Oh I'm not at all expecting to find actual portrayals of these people. I just want to find artwork of them. It bothers me that Servilia was Caesar's favorite mistress and freaking Brutus mother yet there are seemingly no paintings or busts made of her the last 2000 or so years!★Trekker (talk) 22:49, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- So far Magnum ac novum opus ([3], [4], [5]) has managed to yield some results for people who I assumed I would never be able to find art of, thankfully.★Trekker (talk) 23:09, 11 September 2019 (UTC)
- "I'm not at all expecting to find actual portrayals of these people. I just want to find artwork of them" - what's the distinction here? You might as well take a random head of about the right period as a Renaissance or Victorian imagined portrait. There are in fact a good number of heads (usually detached, or stuck on the wrong body) of elite Romans from this period, but almost none of them relate to inscribed names, or have very detailed findspots that might help identification. Someone like Servilia very probably had a portrait or two, but any attributions are likely to be the fanciful work of dealers or collectors. Men at least often have coins. Johnbod (talk) 03:09, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
- Because I'm interested in cultural depictions of Roman people? I like to research and find out how art has shown these individuals trough history.★Trekker (talk) 03:15, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
- Women are notably underdocumented in ancient history. See Ignota Plautia for an example. Nevertheless, I admire that you are working to address this discrepancy. -- llywrch (talk) 16:22, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks. I'm trying my best to expand on their articles and Wikidata profiles.★Trekker (talk) 17:06, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
- Are you planning to upload images from Magnum ac novum opus to Commons? (I see you already uploaded Queen Eunoe via a web page at E. J. Brill, but the manuscript itself -- your link above -- offers many more images.) Andrew Dalby 18:14, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
- Absolutely, I'm planning on uploading as many pictures as I possibly can from it. Only issue is I have a bit of a hard time being sure exactly who is being depicted sometimes, (darn Romans and their insistance on recycling names).★Trekker (talk) 18:22, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
- Are you planning to upload images from Magnum ac novum opus to Commons? (I see you already uploaded Queen Eunoe via a web page at E. J. Brill, but the manuscript itself -- your link above -- offers many more images.) Andrew Dalby 18:14, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks. I'm trying my best to expand on their articles and Wikidata profiles.★Trekker (talk) 17:06, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
- "I'm not at all expecting to find actual portrayals of these people. I just want to find artwork of them" - what's the distinction here? You might as well take a random head of about the right period as a Renaissance or Victorian imagined portrait. There are in fact a good number of heads (usually detached, or stuck on the wrong body) of elite Romans from this period, but almost none of them relate to inscribed names, or have very detailed findspots that might help identification. Someone like Servilia very probably had a portrait or two, but any attributions are likely to be the fanciful work of dealers or collectors. Men at least often have coins. Johnbod (talk) 03:09, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
Discussion of interest at NPOV board
There's a discussion of whether or not the Battle of the Teutoberg Forest can be said to be "Rome's greatest defeat" over at the NPOV board (Wikipedia:Neutral point of view/Noticeboard#Battle of the Teutoburg Forest) that could use some input from people familiar with historiography of Rome.--Ermenrich (talk) 12:45, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
Discussion of interest at Reliable Sources Noticeboard
There is a discussion of interest to this project on the reliability of the Classical Numismatic Group at WP:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#Classical Numismatic Group as a source.--Ermenrich (talk) 13:31, 28 September 2019 (UTC)
GA reassessment of Executive magistrates of the Roman Republic
I have nominated Executive magistrates of the Roman Republic for GA reassessment. See discussion here. T8612 (talk) 13:42, 28 September 2019 (UTC)
MfD nomination of Portal:Classical antiquity
Portal:Classical antiquity, a page which you created or substantially contributed to, has been nominated for deletion. Your opinions on the matter are welcome; you may participate in the discussion by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Classical antiquity and please be sure to sign your comments with four tildes (~~~~). You are free to edit the content of Portal:Classical antiquity during the discussion but should not remove the miscellany for deletion template from the top of the page; such a removal will not end the deletion discussion. Thank you. Certes (talk) 23:53, 3 October 2019 (UTC)
British Museum
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I'm going into London tomorrow, and thought while I was there I would visit the British Museum and try to get a better picture of the bronze figure to the right for Women in ancient Sparta and Heraean Games. While I am there, are there any other artifacts that it would be useful for me to photograph for Greece & Rome contributors? (I'm not tied to the BM – if there's something you want photographed elsewhere in London, feel free to make a request though I make no promises about where else I will go...) Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 12:04, 24 October 2019 (UTC)
- I have a feeling any single picture of something old you're able to take would be appreciated a lot.
★Trekker (talk) 12:18, 24 October 2019 (UTC)
- Generally we either have 5-20+ photos of particular BM objects, or none. It doesn't take long to see what we have from the Etruscan stuff at the Commons category. Plenty of gaps there; as usual smaller stuff is not well covered, if your camera & technique are up to it. In fact most of it seems to come from 2 sessions, one by sailko & one by me. Johnbod (talk) 15:00, 24 October 2019 (UTC)
- Hmm, so it turns out there are several artifacts in Category:Greek and Roman objects in the British Museum which are a) on display and b) not illustrated. So I shall see what I can do about images of the Mainz Gladius, San Sosti Axe-Head and Sant'Angelo Muxaro Patera... Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 16:27, 24 October 2019 (UTC)
- Images added to all three articles. Could be better, but at least there is something. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 21:37, 25 October 2019 (UTC)
- Hmm, so it turns out there are several artifacts in Category:Greek and Roman objects in the British Museum which are a) on display and b) not illustrated. So I shall see what I can do about images of the Mainz Gladius, San Sosti Axe-Head and Sant'Angelo Muxaro Patera... Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 16:27, 24 October 2019 (UTC)
- Generally we either have 5-20+ photos of particular BM objects, or none. It doesn't take long to see what we have from the Etruscan stuff at the Commons category. Plenty of gaps there; as usual smaller stuff is not well covered, if your camera & technique are up to it. In fact most of it seems to come from 2 sessions, one by sailko & one by me. Johnbod (talk) 15:00, 24 October 2019 (UTC)
Request for information on WP1.0 web tool
Hello and greetings from the maintainers of the WP 1.0 Bot! As you may or may not know, we are currently involved in an overhaul of the bot, in order to make it more modern and maintainable. As part of this process, we will be rewriting the web tool that is part of the project. You might have noticed this tool if you click through the links on the project assessment summary tables.
We'd like to collect information on how the current tool is used by....you! How do you yourself and the other maintainers of your project use the web tool? Which of its features do you need? How frequently do you use these features? And what features is the tool missing that would be useful to you? We have collected all of these questions at this Google form where you can leave your response. Walkerma (talk) 04:24, 27 October 2019 (UTC)
This article recently came up on reddit as a TIL feature, but the actual article barely cites anything. I've done some clean-up, but I really know nothing about the subject matter. I think this requires a look by people who are knowledgible on the topic. Harizotoh9 (talk) 22:14, 1 November 2019 (UTC)
Categorisation duplication.
I'm looking at the classification structures employed by "Ancient Roman buildings and structures in Foo" (e.g. Category:Ancient Roman buildings and structures in Germany) and by "Roman sites in Foo" ((e.g. Category:Roman sites in Germany) and struggling to see a difference. Is there an extant ancient Roman structure in Germany that is not also a Roman site in Germany? Laurel Lodged (talk) 15:47, 3 November 2019 (UTC)
- Well, yes - Roman Bridge (Trier) for example. Eifel Aqueduct is tiresomely in Category:Archaeological sites in Germany but not the sub-cat. The archaeologists tend to ignore all other non-archaeological categories when doing their thing, so an excavated knife, say, will be in an artefact category but not a knife one. One might say the same is true of the building & structures people. Category:Ancient Roman buildings and structures in Germany is at least parented by Category:Roman sites in Germany, which won't always be the case. Johnbod (talk) 17:06, 3 November 2019 (UTC)
- I'm afraid that I don't understand your point. Take the Trier Bridge example; it is reasonable to assume that in its most recent renovation that some archaeological evidence was uncovered (a knife, a coin). Would that not make it a Roman site? Laurel Lodged (talk) 12:49, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
- That might well be the case, but there is no mention of anything like that in the short article, failing which it should not really be categorized as a "Roman site". We should not categorize on reasonable assumptions. Johnbod (talk) 16:40, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
- Presumably an archaeological site could contain multiple structures, each of which might theoretically be noteworthy in itself. For instance, a Roman settlement in Germany (or anywhere else) might contain one or more temples, a Roman bath, one or more villas, and a cemetery, all of which could be considered part of the same site, although in many cases specific structures there might be archaeologically important. For example, let's say that the temple is the only known instance of the worship of the goddess Fooina outside of the Mediterranean region, or the bath is one of the earliest instances of a particular type of hypocaust, or the funerary inscriptions indicate that the place may have been the headquarters of the lost Legio XXXI, or there are particularly detailed and beautiful mosaics preserved at the villa, etc. Freestanding structures, like a bridge, might well fall into both categories, but many other structures would not. A Roman road might make more sense as a structure than a site. There may be significant overlap within the categories now, but that might be expected to decrease over time, as individual structures receive their own articles. P Aculeius (talk) 13:37, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
- I'm not entirely convinced by these Jesuitical distinctions and and more than a little inclined that for the few articles in which a distinction might possibly be made, that it is not worth the bother is creating otherwise specious distinctions. For the moment though, I'll drop it. 21:21, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
- I'm afraid that I don't understand your point. Take the Trier Bridge example; it is reasonable to assume that in its most recent renovation that some archaeological evidence was uncovered (a knife, a coin). Would that not make it a Roman site? Laurel Lodged (talk) 12:49, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
Name of Brutus
The article Brutus the Younger doesn't use the WP:COMMONNAME. The use of the elder/the younger was widespread on Wikipedia in its beginnings to distinguish between Romans of the same name, but is not attested in the sources (apart from the two Catos). Google Scholar only returns 45 results with this name, while there are 1.020 for Marcus Junius Brutus (granted, there were some other people with the same name). Question is, what is the common name for him? Most of the literature simply uses Brutus, but is it distinguishable enough? Alternatively, we could use Marcus Junius Brutus, but as I said, there were other people of that name (like his father). In order to make the name unique, we could say Marcus Junius Brutus (Caesar's assassin), as he is primarily known for this murder. What do you guys think? T8612 (talk) 20:24, 26 October 2019 (UTC)
- I would move it to Marcus Junius Brutus. There were a number of important Bruti, but the most important (or at least, best-known) by far are Lucius Junius Brutus, the first consul, and Marcus Junius Brutus, the tyrannicide. There were other men named "Marcus Junius Brutus", but none of them had as significant an effect on Roman history (at least, insofar as modern history focuses on the end of the Republic, due to the dramatic changes to Roman society, and perhaps to the vast number of surviving sources), none are as well-known, and all could reasonably be found using either a disambiguation page, or just linking to the article on the Junia gens. There's nothing wrong with referring to him as "the younger" when it might be unclear if you're referring to the father or the son. But in the absence of context, I think nearly everyone would expect "Marcus Junius Brutus" to refer to Caesar's murderer. "Brutus" would be vague, because Lucius Brutus was an even more legendary figure throughout Roman history; and until he took charge of one faction in the aftermath of Caesar's murder, Marcus was really no more significant than Decimus Brutus—who, after all, led Caesar to his death. And of course there are significant post-Roman subjects named "Brutus". And "tyrannicide", besides being a traditional appellation, would be more succinct as far as disambiguation in the title goes. But I think that "Marcus Junius Brutus" is the clearest and most logical title. P Aculeius (talk) 22:44, 26 October 2019 (UTC)
- I honeslty move it to simply Brutus. When a person says "Brutus", it's likely 99% sure they're refering to Caesar's killer. Just take a gander at a google images search, only once does Lucius Junius Brutus show up in the first page, same thing on the main Google and on Google Books. Lucius may have been an important historical figure to the Romans, but to modern day people and academia he is a mythical footnote. (He didn't even have a category before I created Category:Cultural depictions of Lucius Junius Brutus a few days ago.) Lucius Brutus was famous in Rome for about 600 years, Marcus Brutus has been iconic in the western world for over 2000 years now. I would gander most people don't even know that "Brutus" wasn't his given name and that it' actually his cognomen, we should move the current Brutus page to Brutus (cognomen) and expand it, then create a Brutus (disambiguation) page for the other stuff. We should treat his father's article the same way as his mothers, Servilia (mother of Brutus) and Marcus Junius Brutus (father of Brutus).★Trekker (talk) 04:37, 27 October 2019 (UTC)
- I don't think Google Images is a terribly useful way to assess the relative importance of the topics, particularly as it skews toward pop culture references. I think you'll find that Lucius Junius Brutus didn't stop being famous or revered at the end of the Republic, or even after Roman times. With the notable exception of John Wilkes Booth, I think that most people taking on the persona of "Brutus" in modern times were thinking of Lucius, not Marcus. Here we're discussing one of the most important figures in Roman history (Lucius), and another who actually wasn't very important at all relatively speaking (Marcus), but who was primarily famous as an "example of betrayal" (which is why Dante consigned him to one of the most miserable fates in literary history). And the chief characteristic used to distinguish them in the context of Roman history (and I mean by modern writers as well as ancient) is their praenomen; using the tria nomina to title the majority of Roman biographical articles makes finding and linking to them more predictable than having to guess which ones are mononymous, apart from exceptions such as Cicero and the more famous emperors. To most people familiar with Roman history, "Brutus" out of context is ambiguous, just as it would have been to the Romans. That's supposed to be the default policy for article titling in this area, and I think that in this case we should stick with the default, and vary from it only when there's little or no risk of confusion. P Aculeius (talk) 13:43, 27 October 2019 (UTC)
- I never claimed he stopped being famous, just that by comparision to Marcus Brutus he's not really important or well known, well, anywhere.★Trekker (talk) 14:28, 27 October 2019 (UTC)
- I don't think Google Images is a terribly useful way to assess the relative importance of the topics, particularly as it skews toward pop culture references. I think you'll find that Lucius Junius Brutus didn't stop being famous or revered at the end of the Republic, or even after Roman times. With the notable exception of John Wilkes Booth, I think that most people taking on the persona of "Brutus" in modern times were thinking of Lucius, not Marcus. Here we're discussing one of the most important figures in Roman history (Lucius), and another who actually wasn't very important at all relatively speaking (Marcus), but who was primarily famous as an "example of betrayal" (which is why Dante consigned him to one of the most miserable fates in literary history). And the chief characteristic used to distinguish them in the context of Roman history (and I mean by modern writers as well as ancient) is their praenomen; using the tria nomina to title the majority of Roman biographical articles makes finding and linking to them more predictable than having to guess which ones are mononymous, apart from exceptions such as Cicero and the more famous emperors. To most people familiar with Roman history, "Brutus" out of context is ambiguous, just as it would have been to the Romans. That's supposed to be the default policy for article titling in this area, and I think that in this case we should stick with the default, and vary from it only when there's little or no risk of confusion. P Aculeius (talk) 13:43, 27 October 2019 (UTC)
- Are we sure that Brutus the Younger isn't the common full name, in the same way Pliny the Younger is? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:56, 28 October 2019 (UTC)
- Yes. There are only two Pliny, but dozens of Brutus. T8612 (talk) 01:00, 29 October 2019 (UTC)
- The only reason a Roman source would call him that would be to contrast him with a contemporary bearing the same name. But his father was not his contemporary, having died some years earlier, and the two are likely to have been mentioned together only in passing (which might account for the few occurrences). And he could be distinguished from Decimus Junius Brutus by his praenomen. Decimus also had an extra cognomen—Albinus—but that wouldn't have been any help if you were discussing Marcus. P Aculeius (talk) 11:43, 29 October 2019 (UTC)
- I must have received a defective education, since one of the first people I think of when I hear the name "Brutus" is the adversary of the cartoon character Popeye, also known as Bluto. -- llywrch (talk) 21:10, 31 October 2019 (UTC)
- I have that same problem! I just didn't know if anybody else made the same association. One more reason I'd just as soon use the tria nomina for the title! P Aculeius (talk) 21:53, 31 October 2019 (UTC)
- I must have received a defective education, since one of the first people I think of when I hear the name "Brutus" is the adversary of the cartoon character Popeye, also known as Bluto. -- llywrch (talk) 21:10, 31 October 2019 (UTC)
- Can we have more opinions on this? T8612 (talk) 22:12, 2 November 2019 (UTC)
- I think just Brutus matches what we do with other similarly well-known Late Republican figures: Sulla, Pompey, Cicero. Two of the biographies of him have been titled simply Brutus which seems to be decisive evidence that he is the primary referent of the name: [6], [7]. Furius (talk) 00:41, 3 November 2019 (UTC)
- Since other views are aked for ... (a) Brutus is not such a pivotal figure in Roman history as the three just named (he just did one big thing with his dagger and got deleted fairly soon afterwards) (b) there is another famous Brutus as well. We sometimes fixate on the first century BC, and remember Shakespeare and "Et tu ...", but there's life beyond. So on the whole I'd go for "Marcus Junius Brutus", redirected from "Brutus (Caesar's assassin)". "Brutus the Younger" is handy -- even if not used as much as we thought -- because it remains true whichever older Brutus you might be thinking of! Clearly it too would remain as a redirect. Andrew Dalby 09:16, 3 November 2019 (UTC)
- I disagree, Brutus is hugely important, if he had not agreed it's likely Caesar's assassination would not have happened. And "the Younger" is just confusing because one assumes that clearly there should be an article with "the Elder" as well. And I'll say it again, the other Brutuses in history simply are not as well known or overall important to Western history as this Brutus is. There is a reason people focus a lot on the late republic, because it's the most noteworthy part of Roman history, this is not recency bias, there is a lot of history afterwords which is nowhere near as focused on.★Trekker (talk) 09:33, 3 November 2019 (UTC)
- I believe you're mistaken. I just had a look at our primary accounts of the plot and assassination: Suetonius, Plutarch, and Nicolaus Damascenus. None of them ascribe any particularly great role to Marcus Brutus, apart from the magnitude of his betrayal, given his close relationship with Caesar and the various signs of favour that Caesar had shown him. The closest I could come from looking over the accounts was where Plutarch refers to the "plot of Brutus and Cassius", a somewhat vague description that may owe more to the emphasis on their betrayal than to their centrality to the conspiracy, in which there were several dozen participants. None of the sources clearly indicate who initiated the plot or how they proceeded, although some passages imply that Cassius may have been one of the leaders. On the other hand, Decimus Brutus is the indispensable figure of the assassination itself; the sources agree that it was he who went to Caesar's house and persuaded him to ignore the various warnings he had received, and go to meet the senate; he conducted Caesar to the senate house, again preventing Caesar from being diverted by various warnings; and once he had delivered Caesar, he waylaid Marcus Antonius, who might have tried to prevent the assassination had he not been diverted. But my central point remains, there's no particularly good reason for hosting this article at "Brutus" rather than "Marcus Junius Brutus", when there are at least three other figures in Roman history of equal or greater significance, all surnamed "Brutus" (I'm adding Gaius Junius Bubulcus Brutus; he was consul three times, dictator twice, and censor, during and in the aftermath of the Second Samnite War). P Aculeius (talk) 17:04, 3 November 2019 (UTC)
- And I believe you are very mistaken. You bringing up but dissminsing the fact that Plutarch refers to the plot as "the plot of Brutus and Cassius" is not evidence in your favour, Plutarch also included Brutus as one of the subjects of his Parallel Lives, something wich none of the other assassins got, not Decimus, not Cassius, just him, this part of Parallel Lives. Decimus or Lucius simply are not even half as historically notable as Brutus has become (earned or unearned). Even if we ignore all that, it doesn't change that fact that overall the man is more often refered to as simply Brutus far more often than Marcus Junius Brutus, hell even Marcus Brutus is used more often. In the end it doesn't matter even remotly matter why Brutus is the most notable of his name, just that he clearly is.★Trekker (talk) 17:17, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
- My point is that Plutarch's opinion of an individual isn't very probative. Marcus Brutus may have been an interesting person, but hardly anything he did up to the time of the assassination is historically significant; the most important thing he seems to have done in furtherance of the assassination was to participate; and the most important thing he did afterward was to be defeated at the Battle of Philippi. He's hardly a towering figure of Roman history compared with the other men who've been mentioned, and Plutarch failed to write lives of a great many important Romans—including Cassius, whom he regarded as the instigator of the plot. If I may quote from our article on the subject, "Plutarch was not concerned with history so much as the influence of character, good or bad, on the lives and destinies of men." The main reason why Brutus is remembered is because his betrayal seemed so monstrous, not because he was the most important of the assassins, or as historically significant as his ancestors. If dealing with any period of Roman history other than the life of Caesar, "Brutus" out of context invariably refers to Lucius, viewed by the Romans as the founder of the Republic; if dealing with the assassination, "Brutus" is as likely to refer to Decimus as Marcus. I fail to see any compelling reason for making Marcus the primary topic for "Brutus", when there are clearly other equally important or more important persons named "Brutus" in Roman history—not to mention the various examples from pop culture. P Aculeius (talk) 18:37, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
- I'm sorry, but I feel like all of your replies are pretty POV based, you don't feel Brutus was actually important, that doesnt matter in the slightest, the truth is (deserved or not) he's far more well known than anyone else by the name. There are dozens of books about the man, maybe a few about Lucius, and non (as far as I've been able to find) about Decimus. And again, the main point is that he is most often just refered to as "Brutus", not "Marcus Junius Brutus".★Trekker (talk) 19:27, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
- My point is that Plutarch's opinion of an individual isn't very probative. Marcus Brutus may have been an interesting person, but hardly anything he did up to the time of the assassination is historically significant; the most important thing he seems to have done in furtherance of the assassination was to participate; and the most important thing he did afterward was to be defeated at the Battle of Philippi. He's hardly a towering figure of Roman history compared with the other men who've been mentioned, and Plutarch failed to write lives of a great many important Romans—including Cassius, whom he regarded as the instigator of the plot. If I may quote from our article on the subject, "Plutarch was not concerned with history so much as the influence of character, good or bad, on the lives and destinies of men." The main reason why Brutus is remembered is because his betrayal seemed so monstrous, not because he was the most important of the assassins, or as historically significant as his ancestors. If dealing with any period of Roman history other than the life of Caesar, "Brutus" out of context invariably refers to Lucius, viewed by the Romans as the founder of the Republic; if dealing with the assassination, "Brutus" is as likely to refer to Decimus as Marcus. I fail to see any compelling reason for making Marcus the primary topic for "Brutus", when there are clearly other equally important or more important persons named "Brutus" in Roman history—not to mention the various examples from pop culture. P Aculeius (talk) 18:37, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
- And I believe you are very mistaken. You bringing up but dissminsing the fact that Plutarch refers to the plot as "the plot of Brutus and Cassius" is not evidence in your favour, Plutarch also included Brutus as one of the subjects of his Parallel Lives, something wich none of the other assassins got, not Decimus, not Cassius, just him, this part of Parallel Lives. Decimus or Lucius simply are not even half as historically notable as Brutus has become (earned or unearned). Even if we ignore all that, it doesn't change that fact that overall the man is more often refered to as simply Brutus far more often than Marcus Junius Brutus, hell even Marcus Brutus is used more often. In the end it doesn't matter even remotly matter why Brutus is the most notable of his name, just that he clearly is.★Trekker (talk) 17:17, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
- I believe you're mistaken. I just had a look at our primary accounts of the plot and assassination: Suetonius, Plutarch, and Nicolaus Damascenus. None of them ascribe any particularly great role to Marcus Brutus, apart from the magnitude of his betrayal, given his close relationship with Caesar and the various signs of favour that Caesar had shown him. The closest I could come from looking over the accounts was where Plutarch refers to the "plot of Brutus and Cassius", a somewhat vague description that may owe more to the emphasis on their betrayal than to their centrality to the conspiracy, in which there were several dozen participants. None of the sources clearly indicate who initiated the plot or how they proceeded, although some passages imply that Cassius may have been one of the leaders. On the other hand, Decimus Brutus is the indispensable figure of the assassination itself; the sources agree that it was he who went to Caesar's house and persuaded him to ignore the various warnings he had received, and go to meet the senate; he conducted Caesar to the senate house, again preventing Caesar from being diverted by various warnings; and once he had delivered Caesar, he waylaid Marcus Antonius, who might have tried to prevent the assassination had he not been diverted. But my central point remains, there's no particularly good reason for hosting this article at "Brutus" rather than "Marcus Junius Brutus", when there are at least three other figures in Roman history of equal or greater significance, all surnamed "Brutus" (I'm adding Gaius Junius Bubulcus Brutus; he was consul three times, dictator twice, and censor, during and in the aftermath of the Second Samnite War). P Aculeius (talk) 17:04, 3 November 2019 (UTC)
- I disagree, Brutus is hugely important, if he had not agreed it's likely Caesar's assassination would not have happened. And "the Younger" is just confusing because one assumes that clearly there should be an article with "the Elder" as well. And I'll say it again, the other Brutuses in history simply are not as well known or overall important to Western history as this Brutus is. There is a reason people focus a lot on the late republic, because it's the most noteworthy part of Roman history, this is not recency bias, there is a lot of history afterwords which is nowhere near as focused on.★Trekker (talk) 09:33, 3 November 2019 (UTC)
- Since other views are aked for ... (a) Brutus is not such a pivotal figure in Roman history as the three just named (he just did one big thing with his dagger and got deleted fairly soon afterwards) (b) there is another famous Brutus as well. We sometimes fixate on the first century BC, and remember Shakespeare and "Et tu ...", but there's life beyond. So on the whole I'd go for "Marcus Junius Brutus", redirected from "Brutus (Caesar's assassin)". "Brutus the Younger" is handy -- even if not used as much as we thought -- because it remains true whichever older Brutus you might be thinking of! Clearly it too would remain as a redirect. Andrew Dalby 09:16, 3 November 2019 (UTC)
- A check on Google Books about non-fiction works on the three most notable Brutuses; Marcus, Lucius, Decimus, gives us:
- The Epistles of M. T. Cicero to M. Brutus, and of Brutus to Cicero (here he is named with his initials in the title when Cicero is, when Cicero is not named with his titles, Brutus is likewise named without them)
- Remarks on the Epistles of Cicero to Brutus, and of Brutus to Cicero (here in the 1745 version they're both just called by one name)
- Brutus: The Noble Conspirator "In this comprehensive and stimulating biography Kathryn Tempest delves into contemporary sources to bring to light the personal and political struggles Brutus faced." (here he is named just Brutus in the title)
- Marcus Brutus by Max Radin (here he is refered without his nomen)
- The Brutus Revival: Parricide and Tyrannicide During the Renaissance "In a discussion of the Renaissance revival of classical culture, Piccolomini considers the period’s mythologizing of Brutus, Caesar’s assassin." (once again called just Brutus)
- Lucius Junius Brutus by Nathaniel Lee (one book about Lucius so far, here he is refered with his full name)
- The Epistles of M. T. Cicero to M. Brutus, and of Brutus to Cicero (here he is named with his initials in the title when Cicero is, when Cicero is not named with his titles, Brutus is likewise named without them)
- Further googeling gives
- Brutus: Caesar's Assassin
- Brutus: Assassin Par Idéal
- Brutus: Notorious Assassins
- There are also several non-fiction books about Cicero's Brutus which is about Marcus
- I have yet to find a single book just about Decimus (which makes me sad)★Trekker (talk) 19:45, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
- Take a look about "Brutus" on JSTOR, you'll find quite a diverse picture. A lot of the results deals with the artworks/literary works named Brutus (especially Shakespeare's), but you'll also find articles with "M. Brutus" and other derivatives. I found three instances among the first two pages of results that use "Brutus" only for Lucius Junius Brutus (1, 2, 3). Moreover, the three last books you mention all use an additional title referring to the assassination of Caesar; in my first post I proposed Marcus Junius Brutus (Caesar's assassin) for this reason (many sources use this additional "title"). T8612 (talk) 21:06, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
- Having his full name and a disambiguation is completly pointless. His father/relatives by the same name are not anywhere as notable so having (Caesar's assassin) would be worthless. Also, JSTOR is not more of a seniority on what is someones COMMONNAME than Google.★Trekker (talk) 00:08, 7 November 2019 (UTC)
- We're clearly not going to agree on whether Marcus is the most historically significant of the Junii Bruti. But I think we can agree that he was the most significant Marcus Junius Brutus. And I agree that using the tria nomina, no additional disambiguation would be needed in this case; however, it is necessary for his father and any other Marci who have their own articles. But I don't think that T8612 would object to that. The question now seems to be whether we can come together on any of the proposals. P Aculeius (talk) 01:21, 7 November 2019 (UTC)
- I've placed a survey/poll topic at Talk:Brutus the Younger, since I think it's desirable to discuss/decide the issue there, so there'll be a record with the article's talk page. Since a lot of us have threshed out our arguments here, I suggest those of us who've already weighed in try to keep our arguments concise there, so we can see whether we're able to reach a consensus. P Aculeius (talk) 15:08, 7 November 2019 (UTC)
- Having his full name and a disambiguation is completly pointless. His father/relatives by the same name are not anywhere as notable so having (Caesar's assassin) would be worthless. Also, JSTOR is not more of a seniority on what is someones COMMONNAME than Google.★Trekker (talk) 00:08, 7 November 2019 (UTC)
- Take a look about "Brutus" on JSTOR, you'll find quite a diverse picture. A lot of the results deals with the artworks/literary works named Brutus (especially Shakespeare's), but you'll also find articles with "M. Brutus" and other derivatives. I found three instances among the first two pages of results that use "Brutus" only for Lucius Junius Brutus (1, 2, 3). Moreover, the three last books you mention all use an additional title referring to the assassination of Caesar; in my first post I proposed Marcus Junius Brutus (Caesar's assassin) for this reason (many sources use this additional "title"). T8612 (talk) 21:06, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
Problems with Maria Radnoti-Alföldi
I would fix it by myself, but for an encyclopedic article is my english not good enogh. I wrote about the problems of this article at the talk page. The problems are so big, that this must be fixed in a short time or this article needs to be deleted. It provides so false things, that it's a shame for Maria Radnoti-Alföldi. All the provided false informations are not sourced by the given links. To have an article about this really important numismatist would be to be welcomed. But not such an article. de:WP has an article based on literature. -- Marcus Cyron (talk) 22:02, 2 November 2019 (UTC)
- Is the article on the German Wikipedia correct? T8612 (talk) 22:12, 2 November 2019 (UTC)
- Ours is only a stubby article. "Could do better", but ... The German and Italian articles certainly are better (and similar to one another); they are probably based on a biography in her Festschrift, perhaps not available on line. I have not searched enough to be sure that there are no good biographical sources on line, but they don't leap out at me.
- Our article contains one big mistake (I am 99.9% sure) -- surely she studied numismatics not at Monaco of all places, but at Munich -- which proves that our article was translated from Italian, in which the two places have the same name! Andrew Dalby 09:34, 3 November 2019 (UTC)
- PS -- this is the Festschrift, in case anyone is near a library or has £80 to spend:
- Hans-Christoph Noeske et al, ed., Die Münze. Bild - Botschaft - Bedeutung. Festschrift für Maria R. Alföldi. Peter Lang, Frankfurt am Main 1991. ISBN 3-631-42640-2
- Peter Lang is an academic vanity press, but this would be their star publication of 1991 and any biography contained in it would be a first-class source. Andrew Dalby 09:49, 3 November 2019 (UTC)
- Slightly off-topic, but lol, as an academic who works in German literature I can say that Peter Lang is a scourge... Unfortunately the stuff they publish has to be taken seriously, it just is often very bad.--Ermenrich (talk) 13:35, 3 November 2019 (UTC)
- Also slightly off-topic, but it would help this article avoid deletion if her work were cited in the relevant articles. There is only one clue to her area of numismatic interest -- her treatise on coinage of the age of Constantine -- which I missed the first time I read this article. -- llywrch (talk) 21:00, 8 November 2019 (UTC)
- I think I've fixed up the factual issues, using the de.wiki article. Obviously it would be great if someone with access to the Festschrift was able to expand it further. Furius (talk) 22:30, 8 November 2019 (UTC)
Question about new categories: ancient Roman men?
Until recently, all our biographical articles on individual Romans were included in non-gendered categories by century. In 2018, Dimadick created categories for Roman women specifically, but not for Roman men. So far this seems consistent with Wikipedia's general guidelines on categorization by gender, since Roman women are a topic of special interest. However, just in the last two months, *Treker has created corresponding categories just for Roman men, and is now removing both men and women from the non-gendered Romans categories. Now, I certainly see the advantage of having "Roman women" as a separate category, whether or not they're broken down by century—as the majority of all our Roman biographical articles are. I don't see any advantage to categorizing Roman men separately from women, and this form of category seems to contravene the above Wikipedia guidelines for categorization by gender. Just because there's a category for women belonging to a certain group doesn't mean there ought to be a corresponding one for men. And in neither case should individuals be removed from non-gendered categories simply because these alternatives exist—in my opinion it does a disservice to our readers if they have to search separate categories to find both men and women. But perhaps that's only my opinion—what do the other members of this project think? P Aculeius (talk) 15:00, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
- What is the norm for modern nationalities? 'Category:Spanish Men', ':German Men' exist but but seem to be carefully regulated. I don't understand exactly how this works in practice? Furius (talk) 15:11, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
- The norm is to to split up the same way for each gender. I'm honestly confused that anyone would think of it as odd that I created these categories for Romans.★Trekker (talk) 15:24, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
- It's not my impression that in practice "the norm is to split up the same way for each gender", and the relevant guideline (WP:CATGENDER) specifically says that it isn't necessary. Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 15:35, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
- The norm is to to split up the same way for each gender. I'm honestly confused that anyone would think of it as odd that I created these categories for Romans.★Trekker (talk) 15:24, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
- I am not a member of the project, but the women by century categories are part of a wider scheme on Category:Women by century. Such categories are typically covered by the scope of Wikipedia:WikiProject Women's History. We don't really have a counterpart for men's history. I am not certain strictly gendered category for men correspond to an audience interest. Dimadick (talk) 15:12, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
- Normally modern categories for men only exist when they constitute a subject of special interest; not when, as throughout most of history, they occupy most of the space. The categories "Spanish men" and "German men" are "container categories" that are meant to include only subcategories, rather than replace "Spanish people" and "German people"—although those also consist largely of subcategories. They state specifically that individual people shouldn't be included; those who are probably were either categorized by mistake, or because they didn't obviously fit in any of the subcategories. P Aculeius (talk) 15:30, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
- The "Roman men" category is also a container category, there are tons of child categories to it so I don't see what point you're trying to make. Having only ".... women" is enforcing misogyny and there is zero reason for why Wikipedia should ever do that just because people in the past being were hugely sexist.★Trekker (talk) 15:42, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
- Having a project specifically for men is neither here nor there when it comes to categorization. (Honestly considering how male centric Wikipedia is one could argue that every project is a men's project in practise.......)★Trekker (talk) 15:18, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
- Normally modern categories for men only exist when they constitute a subject of special interest; not when, as throughout most of history, they occupy most of the space. The categories "Spanish men" and "German men" are "container categories" that are meant to include only subcategories, rather than replace "Spanish people" and "German people"—although those also consist largely of subcategories. They state specifically that individual people shouldn't be included; those who are probably were either categorized by mistake, or because they didn't obviously fit in any of the subcategories. P Aculeius (talk) 15:30, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
- Treating women as a "deviation" from the norm, and men as a kind of "default" is straight up misogyny (something Wikipedia has a huge problem with) and I don't see any reason for a non-gendered category to be placed on a page in which a gendered category exist, that's the reason child categories exist, to avoid overpopulation on parent categories. Almost no one searches for categories, they click on the ones placed on a page and naviage onwards from there. There are tons of other cases of people being categorized by gender, century and even occupation in a single category, Category:18th-century American male actors, Category:19th-century male actors of the Ottoman Empire, Category:21st-century British male actors exist for example.★Trekker (talk) 15:18, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
- Okay, a few things in scattered replies to answer here. First, the obvious problem with what you're doing is that you're removing categories such as "2nd-century BC Romans" as you go, and replacing them with gendered categories. If this continues throughout the project, then "2nd-century BC Romans" will simply be emptied and of no use to anyone, while anyone interested in that category will need to go to separate pages to see a list of articles on Roman men and Roman women of the second century BC. That's not helpful to anyone. A second issue is that the great majority of Roman biographical articles are about men—that's not misogynistic, it's history—so men don't need a separate category excluding women. There's no reason for it to exist. And if you're worried about misogyny, then why create a category that excludes women, effectively limiting them to their own separate category instead of including them with other Romans? Whatever your intention, this creates a false equivalency: if there's a category specifically for women, then there needs to be one just for men—whether or not it serves any useful purpose. I don't think this is a good idea. P Aculeius (talk) 15:54, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
- That's an utterly nonsensical complaint, the "2nd-century BC Romans" category will still contain "2nd-century BC Roman men" and "2nd-century BC Roman women". You keep peddeling the "we should enforce the sexism that existed in the past" argument as if it was anything but laughable and egregious.★Trekker (talk) 16:24, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
- Please stop putting words in my mouth. I'm not advocating sexism: I'm arguing that segregating Roman women by removing them (and men) from non-gendered categories—which you are—is what produces the inexplicable result that Roman women are nowhere to be seen among all of the men. Creating categories for men alone solely because there are categories for the special topic of women elevates men to the status of a "topic of special interest", which they're not. If you think that every category for women of one group or another needs to have a corresponding category for men alone, you should make that argument at categorization by gender, which says that's not how it should be done.
- If you want the categories gone then I recommend you to put them up for CFD instead of trying to convince me of something I fundamentally disagree with you on. (If you do put them up for CFD, please don't leave me 20+ notises on my talkpage, I will be aware.)★Trekker (talk) 16:35, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
- I didn't bring this here to convince you. I brought it here to ask the members of this project whether it was a useful categorization, and whether emptying the older, non-gendered categories was a mistake, since this directly affects potentially hundreds of articles that project members have written and maintained. And since I never left "20+ notises" on your talk page, and had neither the intention of doing so nor any reason to, I don't see why you felt it was necessary to warn me about it. P Aculeius (talk) 16:53, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
- Forgive me if this is unnecessary, but I think it's worth quoting an example and attached comment from the page already linked above. Quote:
- As another example, a female heads of government category is valid as a topic of special encyclopedic interest, though it does not need to be balanced directly against a "Male heads of government" category, as historically the vast majority of political leaders have been male.
- The existence of "Female politicians etc." categories doesn't have anything to do with reinforcing current sexism, and certainly not with prolonging past sexism: it helps potential users with specific questions (it is "of special encyclopedic interest") and it also helps those who are working to make Wikipedia less sexist. That's all good. There's no disadvantage.
- The question, then, for those who want to introduce "Male politicians etc." categories is, what practical benefits do they offer? Are there disadvantages? The implication of the example and comment I quoted is that it isn't always necessary, and that there may be disadvantages.
- So this is an important subject for discussion here. But let's keep cool. Arguments on both sides are legitimate. Andrew Dalby 13:37, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
- That's an utterly nonsensical complaint, the "2nd-century BC Romans" category will still contain "2nd-century BC Roman men" and "2nd-century BC Roman women". You keep peddeling the "we should enforce the sexism that existed in the past" argument as if it was anything but laughable and egregious.★Trekker (talk) 16:24, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
- Okay, a few things in scattered replies to answer here. First, the obvious problem with what you're doing is that you're removing categories such as "2nd-century BC Romans" as you go, and replacing them with gendered categories. If this continues throughout the project, then "2nd-century BC Romans" will simply be emptied and of no use to anyone, while anyone interested in that category will need to go to separate pages to see a list of articles on Roman men and Roman women of the second century BC. That's not helpful to anyone. A second issue is that the great majority of Roman biographical articles are about men—that's not misogynistic, it's history—so men don't need a separate category excluding women. There's no reason for it to exist. And if you're worried about misogyny, then why create a category that excludes women, effectively limiting them to their own separate category instead of including them with other Romans? Whatever your intention, this creates a false equivalency: if there's a category specifically for women, then there needs to be one just for men—whether or not it serves any useful purpose. I don't think this is a good idea. P Aculeius (talk) 15:54, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
- Regardless of whether there should be a category tree for ancient Roman men (I am unconvinced, personally), it is my understanding that categorisation by gender should be non-diffusing unless there is an extremely good reason otherwise. So all of the pages which appear in e.g. Category:2nd-century BC Roman women should also appear in Category:2nd-century BC Romans. This does not appear to currently be the case – some articles are correctly categorised in both, but not all, and Category:2nd-century BC Roman men is not marked as non-diffusing. Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 15:31, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
- This strikes me as key; the main harm that has been identified been P Aculeius is thereby eliminated. I don't have an opinion on whether the categories should exist or not, except that we should be broadly consistent across the encyclopedia and - therefore - it might be best to bring the WikiProject on categorisation into the mix, rather than deciding it between the 5-6 people who regularly come by this page. Furius (talk) 16:11, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
- Agree with all that - they should be non-diffusing. Unfortunately you might not get that much sense out of the dwindling band of WP:Cfd regulars, but it's worth trying. Johnbod (talk) 16:50, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
- Categories exist to assist navigation in the encyclopedia, not to advance external political agendas. It is not for Wiki to deplore the cultural norms of a people now or the past; Wiki's role is simply to record and describe. Ideas of "equality" or "balance" are largely irrelevant to categorisation; Wiki does not exist to promote normative behaviour. If the articles do not exist to support a category, them in the main, categories should not be created for them. Categories exist for Roman women and so should have the proper categorical parentage. It will usually be the case that such women are notable for being the spouse of a Roman man. As such, it is unlikely that they will be also found in the categories for actors, aediles, architects, artists, assassins or astrologers, to take just the "A" list of 36 occupations. It would be fatuous to create such categories for women simply to have a spurious balance. The proponderence of notable men at that time versus the dearth of notable women is what guides the decision here. To have a generic category for occupation etc in which men and women are equally dispersed is simply a reflection of this underlying reality. Empresses, both as consorts and regnant, are an obvious exception. If women are "lost" in such a category, let a sub-category be created for them, else, if the numbers mitigate the creation of such a sub-category, let them them remain in the main category. Wiki describes the world; it doesn't wag a finger and try to right historical wrongs, as may be supposed by some present day interest groups. Laurel Lodged (talk) 20:57, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
- Nobody's arguing that there shouldn't be categories for Roman women. The question is whether the existence of categories such as "2nd-century BC Roman women" needs to be balanced by the creation of categories such as "2nd-century BC Roman men", with gender-neutral categories such as "2nd-century BC Romans" depopulated by replacing that category in biographical articles with the other two. I think it's fine to have categories for Roman women specifically; I don't see the point of having separate categories for men in place of general categories including both men and women. P Aculeius (talk) 22:14, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
- I agree - the sheer numbers of articles about Roman men (and the relative paucity of Roman women) mean that persons who are studying or researching ancient roman women would need them grouped in a subcategory so that they can be easily located, and not buried under the vast numbers of men in non-gendered categories. I very much doubt the same is needed for Roman men as a group. Oatley2112 (talk) 21:41, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
- Since there seems to be broad consensus here, someone needs to a group nom for deletion of the "men" categories (or rather merges to the non-gendered categories) at WP:CFD, and notify it here. Johnbod (talk) 05:13, 30 November 2019 (UTC)
- I think that this is the required list. Does anybody see a gap? Laurel Lodged (talk) 10:32, 1 December 2019 (UTC)
- Since there seems to be broad consensus here, someone needs to a group nom for deletion of the "men" categories (or rather merges to the non-gendered categories) at WP:CFD, and notify it here. Johnbod (talk) 05:13, 30 November 2019 (UTC)
- Categories exist to assist navigation in the encyclopedia, not to advance external political agendas. It is not for Wiki to deplore the cultural norms of a people now or the past; Wiki's role is simply to record and describe. Ideas of "equality" or "balance" are largely irrelevant to categorisation; Wiki does not exist to promote normative behaviour. If the articles do not exist to support a category, them in the main, categories should not be created for them. Categories exist for Roman women and so should have the proper categorical parentage. It will usually be the case that such women are notable for being the spouse of a Roman man. As such, it is unlikely that they will be also found in the categories for actors, aediles, architects, artists, assassins or astrologers, to take just the "A" list of 36 occupations. It would be fatuous to create such categories for women simply to have a spurious balance. The proponderence of notable men at that time versus the dearth of notable women is what guides the decision here. To have a generic category for occupation etc in which men and women are equally dispersed is simply a reflection of this underlying reality. Empresses, both as consorts and regnant, are an obvious exception. If women are "lost" in such a category, let a sub-category be created for them, else, if the numbers mitigate the creation of such a sub-category, let them them remain in the main category. Wiki describes the world; it doesn't wag a finger and try to right historical wrongs, as may be supposed by some present day interest groups. Laurel Lodged (talk) 20:57, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
Merge candidate Merge to...
Category:Cultural depictions of Ancient Roman men Category:Cultural depictions of Ancient Roman people
Category:Cultural depictions of Byzantine men Category:Cultural depictions of Byzantine people
Category:Cultural depictions of male Roman royals Category:Cultural depictions of Roman royalty
Category:Male Roman monarchs Category:Roman monarchs
Category:Male Roman royals Category:Roman royalty
Category:8th-century BC Roman men Category:8th-century BC Romans
Category:7th-century BC Roman men Category:7th-century BC Romans
Category:6th-century BC Roman men Category:6th-century BC Romans
Category:5th-century BC Roman men Category:5th-century BC Romans
Category:4th-century BC Roman men Category:4th-century BC Romans
Category:3rd-century BC Roman men Category:3rd-century BC Romans
Category:2nd-century BC Roman men Category:2nd-century BC Romans
Category:1st-century BC Roman men Category:1st-century BC Romans
Category:2nd-century Roman men Category:2nd-century Romans
Category:3rd-century Roman men Category:3rd-century Romans
Category:4th-century Roman men Category:4th-century Romans
Category:5th-century Roman men Category:5th-century Romans
Category:5th-century Roman men Category:5th-century Romans
Category:Roman men by century Category:Roman people by century
Category:4th-century Byzantine men Category:4th-century Byzantine people
Category:5th-century Byzantine men Category:5th-century Byzantine people
Category:6th-century Byzantine men Category:6th-century Byzantine people
Category:7th-century Byzantine men Category:7th-century Byzantine people
Category:8th-century Byzantine men Category:8th-century Byzantine people
Category:9th-century Byzantine men Category:9th-century Byzantine people
Category:10th-century Byzantine men Category:10th-century Byzantine people
Category:11th-century Byzantine men Category:11th-century Byzantine people
Category:12th-century Byzantine men Category:12th-century Byzantine people
Category:13th-century Byzantine men Category:13th-century Byzantine people
Category:14th-century Byzantine men Category:14th-century Byzantine people
Category:15th-century Byzantine men Category:15th-century Byzantine people
Category:16th-century Byzantine men Category:16th-century Byzantine people
Category:Byzantine men by century Category:Byzantine people by century
Category:Byzantine men Category:Byzantine people
Category:Men of the Roman Kingdom Category:People of the Roman Kingdom
Category:Men of the Roman Republic Category:People of the Roman Republic
Category:Men of the Roman Empire Category:People of the Roman Empire
Category:Roman men Category:Roman people
Category:Roman men has been nominated for discussion
Category:Roman men, which is within the scope of this WikiProject, has been nominated for value. A discussion is taking place to decide whether this proposal complies with the categorization guidelines. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments at the category's entry on the categories for discussion page. Thank you. Laurel Lodged (talk) 12:42, 1 December 2019 (UTC)
Scansion
Hi, classicists. I don't notice that there are currently any guidelines for presenting scansion of quantitative verse. Allow me to fire an initial salvo with this essay: User:Phil wink/Short schrift. This is more detailed than any guideline should be, but I wanted to present clear rationales so you can better agree or disagree with my recommendations. Likely there are additional issues that might be covered, too. I've chosen to try to start the discussion at this WikiProject because it seems to be quite active, but I'll post notices with WP:POETRY, WP:LATIN, and WP:GREECE too. Cheers. Phil wink (talk) 15:47, 13 December 2019 (UTC)
- I think you've made a strong case for x, –, u, |. The certainty of display and ease of typing seem decisive to me. Furius (talk) 16:39, 13 December 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks, I hate it. Ideally I would love to see people using the correct unicode characters as recommended by Brill, but I accept that it's not going to happen. I am surprised that a specialist font is required to display unicode's metrical symbols – both my android phone and my windows 10 work computer display them correctly (in firefox on both; in Edge on the desktop), and neither has to my knowledge any non-standard fonts installed.
- I also note that there is a fourth choice for a long symbol: if you are using a diacritic breve for a short, the corresponding long could be the macron (¯, U00AF)... Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 17:06, 13 December 2019 (UTC)
- Caecilius: I support your ideals 100%, and the time may not be that far off in which we can implement them. But in my view, we're not there yet. I'd argue that the criteria for recommending these "specialist symbols" (and I'll defend my continued use of this term in a bit) are:
- 1a. We have reason to believe that a very large majority of readers will see the given symbols displayed correctly. I think, for example, that saying "this will only fail for 20% of our readers" would not be good enough.
- 1b. Correct display includes monospaced contexts. (I'm happy to expand upon my obsession with monospace; but unless asked, I'll take this as read.)
- 2. Any hard-to-type but important symbols we recommend are included in Wikipedia's "insert character" widgets (both in the text and visual editors). For our purposes, likely this would only extend to the metrical breve. (I suspect this milestone will be by far the easiest, but should not occur until after the others are passed.)
- I'm running Windows 7 (yeah, I know), so I'm not surprised that we're having different experiences. I've reviewed the germane pages on my phone, and indeed the specialist characters do appear there ... except ... they are still not monospacing correctly. This means that at least in some contexts (monospacing for sure, but I suspect in most contexts), the device is normally displaying a string of (say) Consolas characters; then, coming to a character which does not exist in that font, it substitutes the germane glyph from another font that does have it (and this may well be either a specialist font such as New Athena Unicode, or at least a "Math" font). This is all done invisibly, so there's no reason any user would be aware of the switcheroo... unless it's visually apparent, as it is in monospace. I'm appending a handy test below, so anyone can easily judge for themselves how their systems are displaying this stuff.
- I don't think, though, that this is a reason to put off having a standard now. When the day comes that we can confidently use proper symbols, it will be a tedious but very doable job to find most instances of hideous lowercase u's and evolve them. Cheers. Phil wink (talk) 20:35, 14 December 2019 (UTC)
- Caecilius: I support your ideals 100%, and the time may not be that far off in which we can implement them. But in my view, we're not there yet. I'd argue that the criteria for recommending these "specialist symbols" (and I'll defend my continued use of this term in a bit) are:
Display test
Below are 3 display examples testing whether certain characters appear at all, and if they do, whether they monospace correctly in given contexts. The first 2 lines of each example (and almost certainly the final line) will display 10 properly monospaced characters. Lines that display proper symbols (rather than, say, boxes or question marks) pass my criterion #1a. If they line up perfectly with the first 2 lines, they pass my criterion #1b. In the case of the biceps, I don't believe this is a glyph that could ever pass #1b, as it is a single glyph that in principle should have the width of 2, which is a contradiction in terms for monospace. I don't mean this to prevent forever the recommendation of correct symbols, but I do want to suggest that even when that day comes, we will still have display challenges in certain situations. Phil wink (talk) 20:45, 14 December 2019 (UTC)
FONT-FAMILY:MONOSPACE (depending upon user settings, this is very likely to be identical to one of the the families below)
1234567890
uuuuuuuuuu (U+0075 u LATIN SMALL LETTER U)
∪∪∪∪∪∪∪∪∪∪ (U+222A ∪ UNION)
⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑ (U+23D1 ⏑ METRICAL BREVE)
⏔⏔⏔⏔⏔ (5× U+23D4 ⏔ METRICAL LONG OVER TWO SHORTS)
uuuuuuuuuu (5× markup biceps)
FONT-FAMILY:CONSOLAS
1234567890
uuuuuuuuuu (U+0075 u LATIN SMALL LETTER U)
∪∪∪∪∪∪∪∪∪∪ (U+222A ∪ UNION)
⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑ (U+23D1 ⏑ METRICAL BREVE)
⏔⏔⏔⏔⏔ (5× U+23D4 ⏔ METRICAL LONG OVER TWO SHORTS)
uuuuuuuuuu (5× markup biceps)
FONT-FAMILY:COURIER
1234567890
uuuuuuuuuu (U+0075 u LATIN SMALL LETTER U)
∪∪∪∪∪∪∪∪∪∪ (U+222A ∪ UNION)
⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑⏑ (U+23D1 ⏑ METRICAL BREVE)
⏔⏔⏔⏔⏔ (5× U+23D4 ⏔ METRICAL LONG OVER TWO SHORTS)
uuuuuuuuuu (5× markup biceps)
- All of the examples display just fine for me, and I suspect they may for a good many other fonts as well, even though only a few fonts supposedly include some of these characters. I don't know if that's the browser improvising with available characters from other fonts. However, I suspect that the overwhelming majority of users will have little difficulty with breves and macrons in general, or with multiplication signs or pipes, single or double. We do have numerous pages on Wikipedia that warn readers that certain symbols may not display properly if they don't have appropriate fonts installed, so that's always an option. I also note that it's desirable for whatever symbols are used to be somewhat larger than the default display size for article text. But I don't think it's a good idea to prescribe a particular subset of symbols from among the accepted standards, while proscribing the rest. I certainly wouldn't want to find that we're creating a policy, or even a guideline, telling editors not to use breves, or justifying other editors coming in and replacing breves with u's wherever they occur, based on such guidance. Doing so would be certain to lead to heated battles at all levels of the encyclopedia, and likely some editors who "lose" the debate leaving the encyclopedia altogether—a lose-lose situation for us all. So if the end result of this discussion will become a policy or guideline, or is likely to be treated as one by other editors, it really should be flexible as far as it's possible to be flexible in areas people have strong feelings about. P Aculeius (talk) 21:46, 14 December 2019 (UTC)
Two bad links
In Perseus, Cleopatra is implausibly and Laodice ambiguously linked among his fourth generation descendants. Expert attention in solving these puzzles would be welcome. Narky Blert (talk) 11:55, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
- Cleopatra should be Cleopatra Alcyone, which I fixed. Laodice is presumably the "daughter of Agamemnon" mentioned in the DAB page, though it's not clear to me that Laodice is a different daughter rather than an alternate name for Electra... Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 12:34, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
- Many thanks. I've resolved the {{dn}} tag using a footnote. Narky Blert (talk) 18:43, 20 December 2019 (UTC)