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Help wanted, potentially useful images on commons

More than 400000 images of objects from ancient time found in UK are now available on commons, released by the Portable Antiquities Scheme. See Commons:Village_pump#400.2C000_photographs_of_archaeological_objects_found_by_members_of_the_public_in_England_and_Wales. Ask also User:Fæ, User:Pigsonthewing.--Alexmar983 (talk) 11:48, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

I would love to contribute, but am having a difficult time figuring out how. Or, how to best use my time. Sorry to be so dense. Please advise. Informata ob Iniquitatum (talk) 21:07, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
I am not them, I was mainly leaving messages here and there.
So many pictures take years i my experience to be processed. it is usually start slow and than after I while you see some patterns and you speed up a little. What I suggest is to open commons:Category:Portable_Antiquities_Scheme, take a look and think about 1) better categories to be inserted 2) how to reuse the file on some articles you know or you have worked on. Both steps increase the number of visits to a file, and integrating it in the workflow of wikimedians, further increasing the chance that it is going to be improved and reused.
It is always very risky to brutally insert so many files in one shot, I agree, but as long as they don't it again soon we should be able to "absorb" them. I assume that there was no other way to do it, per good faith.--Alexmar983 (talk) 12:10, 13 February 2017 (UTC)
There are some suggested ways of filtering the collection to help with sensible categorization at Searching. Fæ (talk) 20:38, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

Referencing

I've taken a liking to template:harv for modern sources, but I was wondering what everyone thought the shorthand citations for ancient sources should look like. Now, I know that I could just say: "Dio, lv. 16.1" for "Cassius Dio, Roman History, LV. 16.1", but I'm specifically curious about how to handle authors like Suetonius, where it's "Suetonius, The Lives of the Twelve Caesars, Life of Tiberius, 64.3". Often, when citing Suetonius, I find I need to cite not just one of his "Lives", but multiple. So, should I do: "Suetonius, Life of Tiberius, 64.3", or "Suetonius, Tiberius, 64.3", or does anyone have a better way that goes together well with Harvard style references?

Also, it's been a while since there's been any activity here. Anything going on? Psychotic Spartan 123 18:34, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

I would say "Suetonius, Life of Tiberius, 64.3" personally, but I think so long as it's clear what the reference is to it doesn't matter a great amount. (Actually, on checking that it seems that I might not, as we see here, where I cite "Plutarch, Pericles, 28" rather than "Plutarch, Life of Pericles, 28".)
But in cases like this, I think the primary considerations should be consistency within an article, and ease of use for the general reader. So if there already exists any vaguely sensible citation style, choose that; if not pick something which looks sensible to you and stick with it.
A related question: what is the best way to cite an ancient text if you are quoting a specific translation? Just give the text reference, so "Lysias 3.6"? Or as here? Or, as in the article on Sappho, have a note at the beginning which says "all translations are from $standardModernTranslation unless otherwise stated", and then just give the ancient reference ("Sappho 1.1")? Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 09:09, 1 April 2017 (UTC)
I personally like a "Sources" or "Bibliography" section, wherein you place a complete reference:
  • Dionysius of Halicarnassus. "Roman Antiquities". doi:10.4159/DLCL.dionysius_halicarnassus-roman_antiquities.1937. Retrieved 19 November 2016.  – via digital Loeb Classical Library (subscription required)
Then, a separate "Notes" section, with the pinpoint reference:
1"Dionysius, Antiquities, I p.79"
If you don't want to go to the trouble of creating a bibliography from scratch (understandable, especially for a larger article), you could create a "Primary sources" or "Ancient sources" section and leave the existing references as they are, and then as you add new ones, you can use the short citation style. Informata ob Iniquitatum (talk) 18:39, 2 April 2017 (UTC)
In this specific case, what I've been doing for the last couple of years is using a bibliography section with the line,
  • Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus, De Vita Caesarum (Lives of the Caesars, or The Twelve Caesars).
Giving both the full name (with a parenthetical if the usual name in English isn't obvious), and then for individual citations,
Suetonius, "The Life of Tiberius", 64.
Treating the individual lives as chapters within a larger work, therefore in quotation marks, while the main work is italicized. I don't normally bother with line/paragraph numbers, since sections are usually pretty short and easy to identify given modern typographical conventions. When there are book numbers, I use lowercase Roman numerals for all but modern texts that use uppercase or Arabic numerals. I know that's a bit of an old-fashioned convention, but it's used in a lot of my source texts, and I find it's helpful because it makes it easier to distinguish books from sections, which I've discovered can be a problem when people use all Arabic numerals for references, especially when they refer to multiple sections.
If you want to specify a particular edition or translation, place the name of the editor, edition, or translator in parentheses either in the citation (after the page/section number) or the bibliography (at the end, together with the year of publication), whichever makes more sense depending on how you're citing it. For instance, if you're quoting in English or citing to page numbers, the edition/translation is important; but for general purposes a section number will be the same in most versions. I agree with Caecilius, in that internal consistency is more important than following someone else's style. Use what you're comfortable with, as long as it's intelligible to others and consistent with other references in the article. P Aculeius (talk) 21:15, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

Requesting opinions on RM discussion: "Anti-Christian policies in the Roman Empire"

This requested move discussion has been in progress for several days, but hasn't received a lot of comments. The article was originally titled "Persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire", but was moved to its current title without discussion a little more than two years ago, on the ground that "Anti-Christian policies" was more neutral than "Persecution of Christians". The proposal is to move it back to its original title. Since this is one of the most popular topics in Roman history, it seems important to determine where community opinion really lies with respect to the title. But at this point, there are only five opinions: the nominator's, that of the editor who originally moved the article to its present title, an editor who has 0 contributions outside of this debate, and two others. If any project members see this post and have an opinion on which is the better title, please weigh in! P Aculeius (talk) 12:10, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

I understand the reason for the original move, but "policies" is not altogether free of POV. It is difficult, in a pre-modern context, to distinguish what's "policy" from what isn't; and then, under what heading do you discuss the stuff that isn't? I can imagine a future historian having similar problems when writing about certain governments in the early 21st century, but that, luckily, is outside the reach of this project.
I'd support a move back to "Persecution" ... unless an even better solution comes along. Andrew Dalby 08:51, 27 April 2017 (UTC)
Maybe it is a bit non-neutral, but they were persecuted on and off until the Christianization of the Roman Empire in the 4th century. Perhaps we could replace the word "persecution" with "oppression" or "discrimination"? Even if most Christians weren't persecuted they were seen as the other and faced discrimination as a result (at least until Constantine). Just some ideas.
Also, I apologize for not responding to the above post regarding citations. I've been away from home a lot these last few weeks. Psychotic Spartan 123 13:40, 27 April 2017 (UTC)
@Andrew Dalby and PsychoticSpartan123: Thanks, guys, but this discussion is taking place on the article's talk page, comments posted here probably won't be noticed when the discussion is closed. P Aculeius (talk) 13:52, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

Olympic winners articles

Looking through Category:Ancient Greek people stubs for articles which could productively be destubbed, I've noticed that there are about 40 articles on winners of the Stadion at the Olympics, all of which are of basically the same form, and most (all?) of which are simply never going to be expanded. Antimachus of Elis is typical of the type. They are all essentially the same: "$Athlete of $City was an ancient Greek athlete listed by Eusebius of Caesarea as the winner of the stadion race in $Olympic year."

Would there be any objections if I were to start redirecting the articles in this form to List of Olympic winners of the Stadion race? A number of other articles of the same form were previously redirected there following Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Pantacles of Athens... Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 18:59, 23 April 2017 (UTC)

No objection to this proposal, with any articles that don't have additional biographical detail. There doesn't seem to be any reason to keep them if all of the information can be contained in a table of one sort or another. If there's enough information to write more about some of them, the articles can be recreated from redirects any time. P Aculeius (talk) 20:24, 23 April 2017 (UTC)
What you have described is a more prevalent problem than you may think. (And it's something of a hobbyhorse of mine -- permanent stubs.) There are a lot of stubs in Wikipedia that will never be expanded beyond a sentence or two -- unless one is willing to stuff the article with a lot of redundant fluff. One way to deal with them is to find a way to merge the stub either into a larger article, such as a list, or a more generalized article, or to create a collection of related subjects under one article. (The articles on the Roman gentes is one possible example of this.) I expect the next major shift in Wikipedia curation will involve a lot of merging of stubs into larger articles, which I think could be a good thing as long as due diligence is performed. -- llywrch (talk) 06:36, 24 April 2017 (UTC)
Oh, I know it's not just limited to this. Classics appears to be one area where it's particularly bad, perhaps because every two-bit figure mentioned in Plato gets an entry in DGRBM, and these entries appear to have been basically imported wholesale from there to here. I have my preferences set to highlight links to any article under 1000B differently from larger articles, and 9 times out of 10 anything under that thresh-hold on a classical subject is just not expandable.
Ancient Olympic victors, though, seems like a good starting place because a) there's an obvious target for redirection, and b) there's a large chunk of articles with so little content that there's nothing even to merge there. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 08:47, 24 April 2017 (UTC)

Okay, I have begun to implement this only on the lowest of low-hanging fruit. Thus far I am giving any article with anything about the subject other than the fact that they won the race in a specific year a pass, so Tellis of Sicyon does enough to survive this run through. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 07:57, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Don't be shy about implementing this. One suggestion: in some of these cases where no article yet exists, & a good-faith effort indicates all we know about the athlete is his name, add a note to the name in List of ancient Olympic victors that nothing further is known of this individual. Not so much to enable a speedy AfD, but to warn anyone thinking of writing an article that information about this person will be difficult to find, if it exists. I've done the same to a few of the names in List of Roman consuls. (While something could be written for almost any of the Republican consuls, starting in the 3rd century there are consuls of whom we know only their name, e.g. Saturninus cos. 264, or Sabinillus cos. 266, which will never become articles.) If we can prevent these useless stubs from being created, it could save us time & labor down the road. -- llywrch (talk) 22:35, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Ugh, the more I look at these lists the less I like them. I've gone through List of Olympic winners of the Stadion race, redirected the worst of the substubs to that article, and removed all (I hope) of the links within the article which simply self-redirected. I've also found a few more articles of the same form not linked from that article, in Category:Ancient Greek people stubs, and redirected them. In the process, however, I have found List of ancient Olympic victors, which contradicts this list in multiple places, and where the Olympic years are a total mess: pretty much every Olympiad for which we know the result of more than one event is listed as corresponding to two different years, e.g. the diaulos at the 15th Olympiad is listed as taking place in 724 BC but the stadion of the 15th Olympiad in 720 BC. It looks like cleaning this up will be a total horror. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 16:40, 2 May 2017 (UTC)

Just spent 15 minutes sorting out the first 30 Olympiads. Hopefully these are now all correct. Only another 230 to go! Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 16:56, 2 May 2017 (UTC)
That reminds me: I need to work on List of Roman governors of Asia. Each one of those proconsular governors was, by job requirement, a consul. -- llywrch (talk) 05:08, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

Tithonos Removal Request

The page on Tithonos posits that there are two separate figures with nearly identical names, Tithonos and Tithonus. The article also says that "Tithonos" was the son of Eos (without citation) and that "Tithonus" was the lover of Eos. The same word (αγαυου) appears to be translated both as "haughty" and "lord," both of which are not very apt. I have never come across the former Tithonos and I have a feeling that whoever wrote this was confused about the Latinization of Greek names, among other things. I propose that this article be deleted. --Aflecken (talk) 13:19, 8 May 2017 (UTC)

Agreed that this seems to be the product of some sort of confusion. I'm not aware of any mythology indicating a son of Eos by this name, and the article provides no explanation. P Aculeius (talk) 15:17, 8 May 2017 (UTC)
Brill's New Pauly online mentions Tithonus as a son of Cephalus in the article on Cephalus, citing "Apollod. 3.14.3". It identifies that Tithonus with the Tithonus, lover of Eos, though. There certainly shouldn't be two articles: Tithonos should be redirected to Tithonus. DGRBM also cites Apollodorus as claiming Tithonus was the son of Cephalus and Eos. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 18:45, 8 May 2017 (UTC)
Here is the relevant portion of Apollodorus Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 18:47, 8 May 2017 (UTC)
Yep, that's pretty definitive, at least one version makes Tithonus the son, and not the husband, of Eos. I suppose you could instead say that Tithonus the husband and Tithonus the son are two different mythological personages, but that seems to be an unsolvable question (quite apart from whether one treats one version as "definitive" or "canonical"). If you so consider them, then a separate article might be justified, but in this case all we have from Apollodorus is a brief mention, which could well be the subject of a section in the main Tithonus article. But in either case, there's no justification for treating them differently based on transliteration preferences. I'd say merge into Tithonus. P Aculeius (talk) 02:16, 9 May 2017 (UTC)
I'd still prefer treating these two personages in one article. The chief difference here is that on the one hand, Tithonos is the name of the mortal whom Eos made her husband (& about whom the tale of immortality but not eternal youth is told by a number of ancient sources), while on the other the husband was named Cephalus, & they had Tithonos as their child, who is the father of Phaethon. However, other, better-known sources report the Sun was Phaethon's father (& about whom the tale of the unsuccessful journey in the Sun-god's chariot is told). And looking at the editor's notes in my copy of Library of Apollodoros, one can go deeper into the weeds from here.

What we have here are variants on an old myth, & practically all Greek myths have numerous variants; unfortunately authors like Bullfinch who have become authorities due to their long familiarity endorsed one version, thus suppressing all others. So to do justice to the subject, one would need to untangle all of the versions & present them in an easy to understand form -- which would require much work. Perhaps the best solution would be to merge the articles about Tithonos/-us into Eos, since whether husband or son he is just a supporting character in her story. -- llywrch (talk) 18:02, 10 May 2017 (UTC)
I agree that treating the two Tithonoses in one article makes sense, not least because the only secondary sources I can find talking about Tithonos son of Cephalus suggest that he is the same as the Tithonos lover of Eos. I disagree that Tithonos should be merged with Eos: the story of Tithonus is sufficiently notable on its own to deserve its own article, and I don't know that we could do Tithonus justice in an article primarily about Eos without sidelining her other lovers, such as Cephalus. In general, we have articles on lovers of Greek gods, even if they are only or primarily known for those love affairs: e.g. Ganymede, Io, Europa... Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 18:49, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

As this discussion has been open almost a week, there have been no comments in the last three days, and it looks like we've pretty much come to a consensus, I have boldly merged the two articles. Kept Tithonus as the main article and turned Tithonos into a redirect from alternative transliteration. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 08:37, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

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De Oratore

De Oratore contains two {{disambiguation needed}} tags, from as long ago as December 2012 - to Marcus Porcius Cato and to Laelius. Can anyone help solve these problems? I wouldn't want to guess wrongly. Narky Blert (talk) 11:49, 27 May 2017 (UTC)

Done. The passages in question are vague, and I did not find them cited in DGRBM, but the first one presumably refers to Cato Censorius; his son Licinianus was also a possibility, but he was famed as a jurist, not an orator, and I think Cicero would have identified him as the son, since his father was much more famous. The second one has to be Gaius Laelius Sapiens. None of the other Laelii seem to have been orators; he was a member of the Scipionic circle (Scipio Aemilianus, presumably the Scipio referred to in the same sentence); and Cicero refers to him frequently in this and other works. P Aculeius (talk) 12:42, 27 May 2017 (UTC)
@P Aculeius: TY! My money had been on Cato the Elder. As for Laelius, I thought it might be Sapiens; but your argument looks conclusive. Narky Blert (talk) 17:34, 29 May 2017 (UTC)

Germanicus

The article Germanicus has been awaiting a review for Good Article status for two months and Sturmvogel 66, who said he would do it, has been inactive for a month now. If anyone has the time to give a review it would be appreciated. SpartaN (talk) 23:34, 20 May 2017 (UTC)

@SpartaN: Now that I have disposed of Proconsul, I'm willing to take that on. -- llywrch (talk) 21:49, 1 June 2017 (UTC)
Just saw that Parsecboy beat me to it. Nevermind. -- llywrch (talk) 21:51, 1 June 2017 (UTC)
It's good and, if you're interested, I plan to bring Germanicus to FAC, but in the mean time Drusus Julius Caesar is waiting for Peer Review, and I plan to (hopefully) make all members of Augustus' family Good Articles. Gaius Caesar and Lucius Caesar are next in that order, and Britannicus is in my sandbox. I'm doing one article at a time, because with work and the family I just don't have the time to return any favors. Not expecting you personally to review them, but letting the project know what's up. There's so much information on the domus augusta that it is conceivable to make them all at least Good Articles if not Featured, but of course this takes time. SpartaN (talk) 00:53, 3 June 2017 (UTC)

termini post quem: can I have a sanity check?

re. the article Theoris of Lemnos, but this issue doesn't require any specialist knowledge of Theoris. (Raising this here on the grounds that there are probably more watchers of this page than there are of Talk:Theoris of Lemnos)

Our article currently follows Collins 2001 in saying that Theoris died "sometime before 338" (Collins 2001, p.477). That's fine so far as it goes, but I was looking today at Eidinow 2016, who says that the terminus ante quem for Theoris' trial and execution is 323 (Eidinow 2016, p.12). Normally I'd just deal with that by putting both dates in the article, with an explanation, but looking back at Collins he defends his terminus ante quem with a note which reads

The trial of Aristogeiton, during which Theoris' case is mentioned, took place sometime between 338 and 324, hence 338 is only a terminus ante quem.

He gives exactly the same date and explanation in Collins 2000, an earlier version of the paper. An even earlier version of the paper was delivered in 1997. Given my understanding of termini ante quem, it seems that Collins is wrong, and he means to have said that the terminus ante quem for Theoris' trial is 323. The fact that it wasn't pointed out in four years and two peer reviews, however makes me wonder if it is me who is making the basic mistake here. Especially as Collins 2008 once again gives 338 as the terminus ante quem, though this time without elaboration (Collins 2008, p.137).

So: is Collins making a mistake, which I should use my WP:DISCRETION to ignore? Am I being stupid? Should the discrepancy be mentioned in the article? Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 16:22, 10 June 2017 (UTC)

I don't like to discourage technical terms provided their meaning or context is apparent, but in this case I think they may be confusing the issue. The question is, "when did Theoris die?" If her execution is mentioned (or its date can be inferred from the mention of his trial) in the course of the trial of Aristogeiton, which is known to have taken place between 338 and 324 BC, then we know that Theoris could not have died after 324. However, unless we know that the two trials took place contemporaneously, we do not know whether Theoris was still alive in 338, or whether she might have been put to death earlier. If Theoris' trial is known to have occurred at the same time as Aristogeiton's, then Theoris died some time between 338 and 324 BC. If this is what Collins is saying, then it shouldn't matter if he uses the wrong term once or even more than once. You might footnote such an error in the article if it seems likely to confuse other readers; but that seems improbable unless you quote the passage, and even then it might go unnoticed. So I would simply apply logic. If Collins clearly explains how the date of Theoris' death can be established, it doesn't matter if the terminology he uses implies something different, and I see no reason to suggest uncertainty because of an error of this type. P Aculeius (talk) 17:07, 10 June 2017 (UTC)

Usefulness of a specific page?

In my surveying of Rome-related articles, I found List of people mentioned in the works of Tacitus. Admittedly in its present state it's not a useful article -- viz. it merely lists names without providing any information who these people are or where their names appear in his works -- but with some determined work I can see how it could be useful to some people. However, if this page is developed to include all of Tacitus' works & provides the necessary information for finding these people -- & keep in mind that editors do alter the names as found in the manuscripts, so specific editions or translations may also need to be indicated -- it will doubtlessly lead to similar list articles being created for other important authors (e.g. Homer, Thucydides, Dio Cassius, etc.) Would having articles like this be a good thing, or should we follow the not yet formulated guideline that "Wikipedia is not a finding list of names"? -- llywrch (talk) 20:18, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

WP:NOTDIR might be relevant? I am sure that a list of people mentioned in Tacitus might be useful, but I'm not so convinced that it's encyclopediac... Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 20:24, 22 June 2017 (UTC)
Well, if you take a look around you'll find numerous pages in the form of Index of Italy-related articles, just to grab a convenient example. No real encyclopedic function for it, but these kinds of pages were very useful in the early days of Wikipedia for figuring out where we needed articles written; that's one of the problems when your work area is intermingled with the public-facing area. Now their primary usefulness appears to be to keep an uncountable number of articles from becoming orphans. I don't see much usefulness for index/list articles than that; I rarely use them, & after a month of mulling on it I'm tempted to nominate for deletion this article. I expect that sooner than later someone will start nominating the other index/list articles for deletion because WP:NOTDIR. So if someone is actually using this article in some way, I'm not going to bother with listing it at WP:AfD; the hard-core deletionists who want to enforce standards will do that soon enough. I might even devote the effort to make the page useful. But if no one actually is using it, or finds no potential value in this article, then I'm willing to list it there & let that crowd decide whether it lives. -- llywrch (talk) 21:01, 22 June 2017 (UTC)
My instinct is that it's potentially a useful article, although right now more the germ of one needing a lot of work. For instance, "Cornelius Sylla" should presumably be one of the Cornelii Sullae, and some of the other entries need to be reformatted, and doubtless many already have articles they could direct to, but don't because the articles postdate this article, or the individuals weren't readily identifiable (as with one of the queries listed above). And that's a good argument for keeping it: it's not always apparent who the individuals mentioned in a historical work are, independent of the work itself. Maybe there will be other similar articles, but if there aren't many right now, I wouldn't worry about that. Chances are if an article like this were created now, it'd be much more complete. I don't personally need this article for anything I'm doing, but I do refer to Tacitus fairly often (usually citing him as the source for a person whose identity has already been established). If I were working on or reading Tacitus-related articles, in much greater depth than the article on Tacitus himself, then this would be a useful resource, if more names were added, the existing ones were cleaned up and pointed to articles, and perhaps some context given for each entry. While it doesn't have what it needs yet, it could if someone spent some time on it. And while my hands are full right now, I have to admit some temptation to work on it myself! So I wouldn't want to discourage anybody else. P Aculeius (talk) 01:55, 23 June 2017 (UTC)
Well, for the time being I won't touch it, & by "time being" I mean 6+ months. If ever. (I have some merge proposals I opened a couple of years ago that I need to check back on, so there really isn't a rush on my part to act on this.) I'm already up to my elbows cleaning up a group of Imperial-age biographies that have all sorts of headaches in their citations: either the citations are to crappy genealogical websites -- which cite Wikipedia, causing a vicious circle of unreliability -- or quoting a specific -- but described -- edition of Tacitus & thus not being useful to verify against. And there's always the issue that there is accurate information in these articles so I can't just delete them & start from scratch. Oh, the joys of being a conscientious & responsible Wikipedia editor! :-/ llywrch (talk) 22:14, 23 June 2017 (UTC)

Proposal to move "Roman Kingdom"

There's an ongoing debate about what the title of this article should be, with some people suggesting the title is clear enough and useful enough to stay where it is, others arguing that it's not preferred in scholarly sources, and arguing for "Regal period" (with or without any mention of Rome), or perhaps a third option. I imagine several of the regulars here might want to give their opinion, but may be unaware of the discussion. Please, feel free to jump in, no matter what your opinion is! The more opinions there are from interested editors, the easier it'll be to determine whether a consensus exists for moving the article, and if so, to what title. P Aculeius (talk) 01:50, 20 June 2017 (UTC)

The discussion was recently closed, but shortly afterward a new proposal was added to move the article to a slight variation on one of the many proposed terms from the previous debate. Since the proposer didn't place a notice here, I'm letting people know that there's a new discussion on the Roman Kingdom talk page, to which they might wish to contribute. P Aculeius (talk) 00:58, 28 June 2017 (UTC)
How did that 60's song go? "Second verse, same as the first." -- llywrch (talk) 20:23, 29 June 2017 (UTC)

Please keep an eye on Religion in ancient Rome

Some idiot well-meaning person has requested a copyedit from the "Guild of copy editors" and one has just accepted. No changes yet, but on past history changes may not be for the better. Johnbod (talk) 01:53, 8 July 2017 (UTC)

Duplicate article: Marcus Furius Camillus (II)

This article seems to be an obvious duplicate of Marcus Furius Camillus (consul of 8 AD). It escaped notice as a one-paragraph stub from 2009 until today, with no other edits for over three years. Today a user called "D A R C 12345" expanded it with somewhat; the additions go off on a few tangents, and don't seem to add anything that needs to be in the other article; they're also badly phrased, spelled, and punctuated. This is a very prolific editor, but he seems to be under the impression that the subject was a different man from the consul of AD 8. He also edited the article on the Furia gens, adding the duplicate in the wrong place, and linking a person with no article to a redirect to the person's father. Wondering what the next step to take with this article is. Merger, assuming there's anything to keep from the duplicate? P Aculeius (talk) 04:20, 12 July 2017 (UTC)

Well, someone has cleaned it up a bit already, so it's not quite as bad as you make it. (And the "(consul of 8 AD)" article, while good enough, probably could benefit from some cites to the primary sources -- or any inline references.) Still it's full of many of the problems I find I have been cleaning up while improving articles on Imperial Consuls: bad formatting, useless citations, pointless details. (One article improvement I'm a little proud of is Aulus Didius Gallus Fabricius Veiento -- compare before & after.) But to your question. Looking at this user's talk page, I'm not confident discussing the issue would be productive. (This would be my first step in any other situation.) My next step would be mark this for merging & see what happens -- which appears to be the right way to start. Wait a while to see if anyone objects. If no one comments, wait a little longer. Then merge. -- llywrch (talk) 07:09, 16 July 2017 (UTC)

A-Class review for Germanicus needs attention

A few more editors are needed to complete the A-Class review for Germanicus; please stop by and help review the article! Thanks! AustralianRupert (talk) 07:51, 16 July 2017 (UTC)

Wars of Augustus

I came across Wars of Augustus, it started in 2011, but the article is still in startup phase. What to do with it? Marcocapelle (talk) 18:19, 21 July 2017 (UTC)

It could certainly use some cleanup and expansion, but it's a useful-looking article. I don't see any reason to take action other than improving it. P Aculeius (talk) 22:44, 21 July 2017 (UTC)

types of gladiators?

parmularius (gladiator) and scutarius: both created by Waerloeg in 2015, but neither actually appear to be words for distinct types of gladiator. None of the sources given in either article support the claim that they are, and the sources I have found rather seem to suggest that they refer to factions who favoured thraeces and murmillones respectively. For instance Carter (2006), "Palms for the Gladiators" p.651, who writes "supporters of thracian gladiators were known as parmularii, so-called after the shield carried by their heroes [...] and supporters of myrmillones were known as scutarii".

It seems like the best thing to do would be to redirect the articles to thraex and murmillo respectively, but gladiators aren't really my strong point, so I wanted to check here before doing so in case I am missing something, or someone thinks that there is a better solution. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 20:49, 24 July 2017 (UTC)

I was going to agree, but I'm not sure now. Harper's and the DGRA have an extensive list of types of gladiators, not including either of these, but Marcus Aurelius does seem to be referring to gladiators when he uses these words; the index to the Haines translation specifically identifies them as such. So far, I haven't found any independent confirmation that the terms referred specifically to gladiators, but guards equipped with the scutum or parma could be so called, so I expect gladiators so equipped could be too. P Aculeius (talk) 03:12, 25 July 2017 (UTC)
Scutarii are mentioned in Vegetius' De re militari (2, 11) as "fabricas scutarias" (lit. "shield-makers"), and are found in gaffiot as:
  1. de boucliers (lit "of shields", meant to follow an action word as a descriptor)
  2. fabricant de boucliers ("shield-makers", lit. "makers of shields").
  3. pl. scutaires [soldats formant la garde des empereurs] ("soldiers forming the imperial guard")
According to Charlton T. Lewis:
  1. Of or belonging to a shield: “fabricae,” shield-factories,
  2. Subst.: scū-tārĭus , ii, m.
  1. A shield-maker,
  2. In the times of the later emperors, a sort of guard, armed with the scutum
I did find a link to Source Book of the History of Education for the Greek and Roman Period by Paul Monroe p. 378 distinguishing between a parmularius and scutarius, with the parmularius wielding a small round shield and a scutarius wielding a large scutum shield.
I know the links and dictionary definitions are unnecessary, but I'm a bit weary of keeping articles on words that apply equally to a type of gladiator as they do to anybody using that type of shield (scutarius uses scutum, parmularius uses parma). I'm especially leery of using scutarius in this context, because it seems more common in the context of shield-makers than to anyone using a scutum. While I concede that Emperor Aurelius does indeed refer to them as gladiators as do a few other sources as P. Aculeius points out, it's the exclusive usage of the term as though it only referred to a breed of gladiator that I object to. In any event, are either scutarii or parmularii notable? SpartaN (talk) 04:04, 25 July 2017 (UTC)
In the sense that the terms are worth defining and describing in the gladiatorial context, they're undoubtedly worth describing. But they could probably be folded into the List of Roman gladiator types, which already mentions them, although the sections could perhaps be slightly expanded so as to explain how the terms often or more typically applied to other persons, and perhaps also included under the section listing other persons associated with gladiators. P Aculeius (talk) 05:05, 25 July 2017 (UTC)
My vote would be to merge them into that List article P Aculeius mentions. Whenever I see the word scutarius, I think of a fighter armed with sword & shield, not necessarily a gladiator. (Germanic warriors in ancient Roman times could be properly called scutarii.) As for parmularius, I doubt anyone will miss the stand-alone article. There has been a very obvious typo in the article[1] that dates to the article's creation almost 2 years ago; had it received any serious attention that typo would have been corrected long before now. -- llywrch (talk) 16:22, 25 July 2017 (UTC)

Anicia

Another one for the hivemind. The article's sources (such as they are) all lead back to the Index of Women of the World by Norma Olin Ireland (not a classicist). I don't have access to that, but I can't find anything in any of the usual places. Brill's New Pauly has nothing. The OCD has nothing. Smith's DGRBM has nothing. Plant's Women Writers of Ancient Greece and Rome, with its supposedly comprehensive list of attested ancient women writers, has nothing. I can't find anything on google or google scholar which doesn't derive from the Index of Women of the World. What am I missing? Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 09:00, 28 July 2017 (UTC)

I managed to find a copy of the volume of the main Pauly, and scanned all of the Anicii, as well as the entries immediately before and after that family. My German is minimal, but I didn't see any entries that looked like they matched this. No idea where it really comes from. P Aculeius (talk) 15:22, 28 July 2017 (UTC)
You found a definite puzzle here. Doing a bit of lateral comparison, it appears that the original article created in the French Wikipedia by an active editor in good standing, but the source the article cites is a dead link; a mirror of the source is offered at Wikiwix, but that link is dead too. Next article written was the English article (Caeciliusinhorto already queried the editor who created that article), then the Portuguese translated from the English one. (Despite that neither is a sonnet. ;-) When I have a moment, I'll verify P Aculeius' research in Pauly (I need to finish breakfast & meet a friend in a short while today) but otherwise I trust his findings. Frankly, I'd label this a hoax -- there is no poetess/philosopher Anicia -- because the evidence otherwise doesn't support her existence. Except that there is a crater on Venus named for her. Maybe the person who named the crater was in error? Or maybe we need to search on the Greek form of the name, viz. Ανικια ? -- llywrch (talk) 17:19, 29 July 2017 (UTC)
I found an archive of what is cited on fr.wiki here; it doesn't seem to give us anything new... Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 22:49, 29 July 2017 (UTC)
I couldn't find anything on google that definitively points to a Greek poetess and physician active in the 300s BC named Anicia. I'll contact User:Gene.arboit at the French wiki to see if he knows anything. I don't think a user in good standing would contribute false information on purpose, but I also don't see why he would cite a source that doesn't even include the information being cited. SpartaN (talk) 17:50, 29 July 2017 (UTC)
I didn't mean to disparage the reputation of any Wikipedian. What I meant to say was that the person who named the crater on Venus may have been thinking of someone like Hypatia, but confused her with Anicia Juliana & on top of that put the date in the wrong era. Which is very easy to do if you are only vaguely familiar with Classical history. (I know I've done something about as bad, but managed to avoid it before the final click by fact-checking myself first.) And I suspect this is where the problem lies. -- llywrch (talk) 22:28, 29 July 2017 (UTC)
I've looked for "Anikia" without finding anything; possibly Ανικια would come up with something. I'm not prosopographically inclined, but I've never heard Ανικια as a Greek personal name, though, and the online Persons of Ancient Athens doesn't give any hits whatsoever. I've put in a request at WP:RX for the relevant entry from the Index of Women of the World, so we'll see what turns up... Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 21:46, 29 July 2017 (UTC)
The source that was used for most craters on Venus is [2], and Anicia's entry is on p.12. It says "Greek physician, poet (fl. c. 300 B.C.). " so the dates aren't close to Hypatia's. Also, we have found that this source has many spelling mistakes for non-English names. Gene.arboit (talk) 00:29, 6 August 2017 (UTC)
How about Anyte of Tegea? If you took "Anyte" through a secondary source in some modern European language, and then back to English, you might end up with something like Anicia, especially if you had Anicia Juliana at the back of your mind. But how to prove that Norma Olin Ireland's Anicia came into being in that way, I don't know. Given that, somehow or other, she did, it's surely likely that Ireland's book was a desk reference for the people who decided on the names of geographical features of Venus.
The text (not the pagename) of the Catalan article on her has already got her as far as "Anita". It also gives the required date, c. 300 BC. Andrew Dalby 09:16, 6 August 2017 (UTC)
I think you might be onto something there, Andrew. Not only do the dates check out, and Anyte is the Hellenistic woman poet whose name is closest to Anicia, but a story about her preserved in Pausanias has her visited by Asclepius and healing a blind man – which would explain where the "physician" part of the description comes from. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 10:58, 6 August 2017 (UTC)
Very good! that's the detail I couldn't explain! Andrew Dalby 11:13, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

So what is the best solution here? Simply turning Anicia into redirect?--Kmhkmh (talk) 11:45, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

Anicia should probably redirect to the Roman gens, unless there's a very important historical or mythological figure who should be primary for the name. If this instance of the name is simply an error or alternative orthography for someone whose article appears elsewhere, it could be listed in the article under an "others" subheading toward the end (doesn't look hatnote-worthy given its obscurity). P Aculeius (talk) 12:27, 6 August 2017 (UTC)
If turn into a redirect to the Roman gens, which makes perfect sense, we should nevertheless add a short explanation/reference to the discussion here on that talk page of the redirect. This might help to avoid potential future reruns of the problem.--Kmhkmh (talk) 13:17, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

The easiest solution is probably, as P Aculeius says, turning Anicia into a redirect to Anicia (gens). The slightly more elegant solution is to move Anicia (gens) to Anicia (as there is nothing to disambiguate, there is no need for the parenthetical "gens"), which will require an admin to perform the move, as the target page already exists. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 17:00, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

All pages on Roman gentes are consistently identified as such by the title. In most cases this was done with parentheses, as in this case, but in a few instances following page moves by other editors, the parentheses have been removed. If I were beginning this project from scratch I probably wouldn't use parentheses, but I still think consistency is useful in this series of articles (although I don't particularly care about the parentheses). Including "gens" leaves the bare nomen available for notable women (and there are some Aniciae of note, although not currently under this title), and forestalls the articles being moved due to the existence of a genus of spiders (apparently arachnologists love using Roman gentes for names). It simplifies linking and keeps the series from becoming a hodgepodge of article titles. So until such time as a particular person (or spider) becomes primary for "Anicia", it should be a redirect to "Anicia (gens)", the same as "Anicius". Oh, wait. Apparently that's already a genus of spiders. P Aculeius (talk) 18:36, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

So what should be done with the Anicia entry in List of craters on Venus? Even if we delete the Anicia page, the crater will still be named Anicia by the International Astronomical Union after the "Greek physician, poet"... Fornadan (t) 19:42, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

That's easy enough. It would go under some list of astronomical features (craters, craters on Venus, whatever's appropriate), probably with a brief mention in the article on the gens, probably toward the end, that there's a crater of this name, and perhaps linking to said list. P Aculeius (talk) 22:01, 6 August 2017 (UTC)
With or without a note that the name "Anicia" was likely an error for "Anyte of Tegea"? -- llywrch (talk) 08:03, 7 August 2017 (UTC)
I'm not really convinced of mentioning Anicia in the article on the gens other than in a hatnote/disambiguation template case, as there seems no relation to the gens whatsoever and the standard way to deal with same/similar names by chance is the disambiguation template or page.
However in the case of the list of venus craters article I don't see why we need to or even should link to Anicia. Instead we should have a footnote in that article explaining the situation. The footnote should link to Anyte in its explanation.--Kmhkmh (talk) 09:18, 7 August 2017 (UTC)

Just to give everyone closure:

The Supplement to Index to Women of the World has this entry: "Amyte (Anicia) fl. 300 BC. Greek physician, poet, writer". Amyte is a fairly obvious misspelling for Anyte, so our conclusions were correct. It is cited to Kate Campbell Hurd-Mead, A history of women in medicine from the earliest times to the beginning of the nineteenth century p.34, which cites Pausanias. I can only get the snippet view of Hurd-Mead from Google Books, though, so I can't track that any further. Loeb and Teubner editions of Pausanias both clearly say "Anyte" rather than either "Amyte" or "Anicia", though. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 15:02, 7 August 2017 (UTC)

Appius Claudius Pulcher (consul suffectus) & Publius Claudius Pulcher (consul suffectus) nominated for deletion

I've just nominated these two articles for deletion because I'm convinced they're hoaxes, created by a now-banned user. Feel free to weigh in on the conversation. And if you can read French, please check to see if either person is actually mentioned in Christian Settipani's book -- although I strongly suspect they are not. (But I honestly would like to know.) -- llywrch (talk) 19:09, 22 September 2017 (UTC)

I can't really read French (well, I can read it... I just have no idea what most of it says!), but I'm reasonably sure that they're not deliberate hoaxes, but actually found in Settipani. However, I suspect they're individuals whose existence is merely inferred from various sources, such as filiations or other indications that someone was the son, grandson, father, or grandfather of someone else. For example, "this woman and her sister were of consular rank and descended from the family of so-and-so, who had been consul two generations earlier, therefore their father must have been consul at some time, and he would have been the son of the earlier consul and named after his father. His wife's name must have been so-and-so, because that's how this name borne by one of the daughters and her descendants probably came into the family". Without seeing Settipani's sources, I can only guess what they really say, but chances are these are individuals who "probably" existed, or of whom traces exist, possibly even the name of someone who might be the same person (or maybe some other member of the same family who happened to live at the same time). They're probably not worth articles of their own, but might be worth mentioning in the articles of the notable (and reasonably certain) individuals who seem to be connected by them. But I don't think they're actually hoaxes. P Aculeius (talk) 23:41, 22 September 2017 (UTC)
@Llywrch: Can you explain why you think they're hoaxes? thanks for your contributions :-) Informata ob Iniquitatum (talk) 07:55, 23 September 2017 (UTC)
Simple. All historical personages -- even hypothetical or inferred ones, such as the two wives of Gnaeus Domitius Tullus, to name an example that came immediately to mind -- tend to be mentioned by more than one writer if they have any plausibility of existing. Unless Settipani was recording new inscriptions or discovering new manuscripts of ancient writers, he had to be using prior work -- which would be mentioned in the standard references I cited in the nominations. And I suspect that either Settipani didn't claim these two existed, or the person who wrote the articles could barely read French & filled in the gaps of his understanding of Settipani with his imagination.

Moreover, what I find damning about these articles is that they are so similar in what they present: there's a birth & death date (when even we don't know this for otherwise well-documented individuals of the period), lots of genealogical information (usually connecting the person to someone better known), an absence of other personal detail, & the same useless citation of Settipani's book. Here let me emphasize the importance of that penultimate point, an absence of other personal detail. In every case of a notice of a person from Classical history, there is a reason we know they existed: an anecdote or two from a literary source, an inscription, an inference from facts in the imperfectly known lives of two or more other individuals. We know part of their lives for certain, much more from inference, & nothing about most of them. (There are only a very few ancient Romans whose lives are known in enough detail one could write a proper biography about them: Cicero, Augustus, Marcus Aurelius, & Julian the Apostate. Biographies about all the rest are a series of fragments tied together with a much larger share of conjecture.) We rarely know the year a given person died, & are lucky if we can pin it down to an approximate decade; even even less often know when that person was born. Yet all of the biographies G.-M. Cupertino wrote (either under his own username or one of his socks) has dates of their births & deaths -- yet not a clue how those dates were determined.

I'm going to stop here & apologize for not being more clear about my point. It's late here, & I'm letting my emotions rule instead of my reason. Maybe I'm entirely wrong here. But having read a few dozen of his "contributions" over the last few months, I can tell you they all have an identical feel to them, including the worthless cite of Settipani, while all of the biographies I've written are always very different in terms of what is said about their subject due to the different sources available, even when drawn from the same book. This similar feel leads me to conclude they're complete fabrications. -- llywrch (talk) 08:57, 23 September 2017 (UTC)

The dates are really suspect, here. Appius Claudius Pulcher (triumvir monetalis) was apparently born "c. 35 BC"; his son c. 5 BC; his son c. 30 AD; his son Publius Claudius Pulcher (consul suffectus) born c. 60 AD; his son, c. 90 AD; his son Appius Claudius Pulcher (consul suffectus), c. 120 AD; and his daughters c. 145 and c. 150. All nice round numbers, all 25, 30, or 35 years between generations. I suspect that some of these people existed (the triumvir monetalis?), and the rest have been extrapolated to fill in the gaps. (And I don't have time to dig into this right now, but does the link to Pupienus check out? Even our article just attributes this to Settipani's speculation! Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 09:50, 23 September 2017 (UTC)
Agreed, but that doesn't mean they're not still based on possible persons in Settipani (or even Settipani's guesses or principles). The problem is that they're still just guesses. Reconstructed family trees, in essence, in which names, dates, marriages, and even whole generations are inferred rather than known with certainty. IMO it's bad genealogy, and worse as the basis for Wikipedia articles. At best existing articles about known persons could note what Settipani's guesses are, but there shouldn't be articles about people whose existence, or at least whose entire biography, consist of guesses about who they were based on other information. P Aculeius (talk) 10:50, 23 September 2017 (UTC)
Oh, I'm perfectly prepared to believe that they're based on Settipani's guesses. "Settipani's guesses" isn't good enough to base a wikipedia article on, though, unless other reliable sources have discussed them. So while I don't agree with Llywrch that they are hoaxes (which implies a degree of intention to deceive that I don't think has been established) I don't think they're really suitable for inclusion... (and, I suspect, you probably agree with me on that) Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 12:32, 23 September 2017 (UTC)
Well if the names aren't in Settipani in the first place, then they're hoaxes. Which is my contention: truth is often messy, while lies sound too good to be true. As for the link in Pupienus, that meets my standard: someone can verify the assertion. On the other hand, it seems just too convenient that not once did G.-M. Cupertino bother to provide a reference to a single page in a book where "the organization within each chapter, with various sections treating different branches and allies, is not readily apparent. The hierarchical subheadings are difficult to interpret, even with recourse to the table of contents."A review of Settipani's book (And this is an otherwise favorable review.) It's the equivalent of claiming Ronald Syme said something, but providing a citation only to his Roman Papers -- one of the collections of his published articles. FWIW, I stumbled across this page at the Hathi Trust which allows you to do a search for phrases in Settipani's book. I've found a number of pages where the string "Appius Claudius Pulcher" appears, yet not once does "Publius Claudius Pulcher" appear in the book -- which is suspicious. -- llywrch (talk) 16:21, 23 September 2017 (UTC)
Agreed with both of you. I'm just not calling them "hoaxes" until someone can figure out if there was some basis for believing such persons existed. I know that G.-M. Cupertino et al was banned for numerous reasons, but it still looks like he was trying to contribute useful information. I know people aren't always rational, but it would just be weird to take the time and trouble to create these out of whole cloth, if he didn't honestly believe that they existed. P Aculeius (talk) 16:48, 23 September 2017 (UTC)
@Llywrch: Giving the benefit of the doubt and accepting that the articles aren't the product of an intentional fabrication, I have other concerns. The source isn't available online. There are also a bazillion Romans who shared an exact or very similar name. There's no in-line citations, therefore I'd say they fail WP:RELIABLE. With that in mind, I am further concerned about WP:NOR and without any sources, there's no way to tell. Also, @P Aculeius:, is Settipani legit? His own article is... je ne sais pas... etrange ;-) Anyway, I hate deleting articles. I really hope that someone can find some support for them. But for now my vote is...
Thanks, but it only counts if you add it here. ;-) llywrch (talk) 03:39, 24 September 2017 (UTC)
I don't know if Settipani is "legit": I have never had to use his work. It is interesting, perhaps ironic, that all his material so often cited on Wikipedia was written long before he got his doctorate. His 2013 dissertation was (according to the title) specifically about claims of genealogical relationship, a topic on which he was by that time excellently qualified :) Andrew Dalby 14:49, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

Caecilia Metella

There's a link to a DAB page in Virtus (virtue) which has been flagged as needing fixing since January 2013 – "[Cicero] uses [virtus] once to describe Caecilia Metella when she helps a man who is being chased by assassins". I can't work out which one it is. Cicero seems to have mentioned all six of them at one time or another. Can any expert here help solve the problem? For convenience, here's the relevant page of DGRB. (FWIW, I'm placing a small bet on the Vestal Caecilia Metella Balearica (priestess), whose person was sacrosanct.) Narky Blert (talk) 19:55, 23 September 2017 (UTC)

The reference appears to be to Pro Roscio Amerino. According to the Loeb edition, "there is little doubt that she was the daughter of Metellus Balearicus", which likely makes her the Vestal Virgin (although I suppose it could be her sister, Caecilia Metella Balearica?) Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 20:16, 23 Senptember 2017 (UTC)
@Caeciliusinhorto: - I got a Roscio vibe from the context. Can you provide a full citation to Loeb? If the identification is in doubt, the best way to resolve a problem like this can be by an editorial footnote, saying "no-one knows for sure, but Loeb said this <here>", while including all other options to avoid WP:OR. I've written that sort of footnote before, so feel free to {{ping}} me if you think that that might be the best solution. (It's all about the readers. If no-one's sure, tell 'em so.) Narky Blert (talk) 02:27, 25 September 2017 (UTC)
@Narky Blert: the full footnote reads She was the daughter of Q. Caecilius Metellus, who obtained the name of Balearicus from his conquest of the Balearic Islands during his consulship in 123; of her uncles, Marcus suppressed a revolt of the Sardinians and Gaius defeated the Thracians. Her brother was Q. Caecilius Metellus Nepos, who was consul in 98. The mss. vary as to her name. In § 27 she is described as “Nepotis filiam,” here as “Balearici filia, Nepotis soror.” But since there is little doubt that she was the daughter of Metellus Balearicus, the text has been altered to correspond. It can be found on p.255 of Cicero. Pro Quinctio. Pro Roscio Amerino. Pro Roscio Comoedo. On the Agrarian Law. Translated by J. H. Freese. Loeb Classical Library 240. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1930.
Looking into this further, Arthur Kaplan, in "Sulla's 'Watergate'", The Classical Outlook (1976) p.101 says that the Caecilia Metella who sheltered Roscius was "very probably[...] also a priestess of Juno Sospita". Dyck, in his edition of Pro Roscio in the Cambridge Greek and Latin Classics series identifies her (p.96) as the wife of Appius Claudius Pulcher, i.e. the younger sister of the vestal virgin. So perhaps her sister, Caecilia Metella Balearica is the relevant one. (Though in our article Caecilia Metella Balearica (priestess), she is the protector of Roscius!) Supporting this is Brill's New Pauly, whose entry on Roscius says that he was protected by Caecilia [8] Metella; Caecilia [8] Metella is the wife of App. Claudius Pulcher (the vestal virgin does not apparently merit an entry). Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 17:39, 25 September 2017 (UTC)
@Caeciliusinhorto: Magnificent research! I've summarised it in this footnote in the Virtus article. Narky Blert (talk) 19:04, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

The problem of suffect consuls

One of the quirks of the office of consuls under the Empire is how suffect consuls became an actual position. And that it makes a headache with those navigation boxes that appear at the bottom of many of the articles about the individual consuls.

To paraphrase Ronald Syme, prolegomena is unavoidable. Originally, a suffect consul was simply the person who replaced a consul when the latter died in office or resigned, & this was the practice for almost the entire Roman Republic. However, following Augustus' victory at Actium, he found he was in great need of men who had held the fasces to fill certain senior positions. As a result, candidates would serve as consuls for only part of the year; the last person to serve as consul an entire year was Nero in 57. At first, these shorter terms (which came to be known as a nundinium) were for six months; then for three months; then two. In the year 69, as each new emperor took office, the nundinia were sliced & diced quite randomly. (I suspect the year 190, with 25 consuls, is even worse.) This was an issue inasmuch as the office of consul had increasingly assumed more of a titular role than an actual one, & the suffect consul was a titular form of a titular office. Its chief importance was its use in dating the year, which could be identified either by the pair of ordinary consuls associated with it, or the pair of suffect consuls for the relevant part of the year: e.g., for August 56 one would indicate the pair Annaeanus & Ciltus not, say, Avitus & Paetus (this is the only way we know the names of many of these suffect consuls) -- although use of the ordinary consuls for any part of the year was often practiced.

Follow me so far?

So the question is how does one properly indicate which consul precedes & succeeds a given consul in the period 31 BC to AD 206, the year of the last known dated suffect consul? (The series of Republican consuls is quite simple -- just treat them all as the same. And the series of imperial consuls after AD 206 is relatively simple: since we don't know the name of most of the suffect consuls, we can simply ignore them.)

What I'm proposing for the consuls who held the fasces in the years 31 BC through AD 206 is the following:

  1. For the reigns of Augustus & Tiberius, where suffect consuls were considered about the same as ordinary ones, there is no problem. Continue doing this as we have been.
  2. Around the reign of Gaius a.k.a. Caligula, when the difference in honor between the two first clearly emerges, if the next consul is a suffect include him, as well as the next ordinary consul. (An example of what I mean can be seen in the article Pomponius Mamilianus, as well as a few others.

Add to this the usual work-arounds for when we don't know the names of the immediate successor. Maybe just ignore the existence of suffect consuls in those years where we don't know any names, such as 104, 136, 137, etc.

I'd like to think adding this information means something to people beyond odd pedants like me. However, I spent a bit of time figuring out how to do this on a handful of articles (it is an example of complex manipulation of templates) & would like to get some feedback before modifying hundreds of articles only to find I'm making a distinction that really isn't a difference. -- llywrch (talk) 07:25, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

I can see the value in indicating this, but to me the succession box at the end of Pomponius Mamilianus is confusing, even having just read 300 words of explanation as to why you are doing it this way. And if it's confusing to someone who has read the explanation and has a reasonable working knowledge of ancient Rome, then it's likely to be even more confusing to the average reader. Unfortunately, I don't really have a clever solution. (Of course, you might consider that anyone reading an article on as minor a figure as Pomponius Mamilianus appears to be would have a better knowledge of imperial consulship than I do, in which case you might not care...) Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 07:50, 31 August 2017 (UTC)
My instinct would be to include only the immediate predecessors and successors, where known, and not the ordinarii in either case, unless they immediately preceded or followed the individuals in question. However, I note that succession boxes may not be ideal for cases like this in the first place; I've always thought they looked clunky and provided limited value, as there's usually little to no continuity between consulships and no good way (or reason) to memorize them the way you might, say, a list of kings or presidents. It makes me question whether Roman consuls should have succession boxes at all. However, I defer to you on that matter. But as for filling them in, I'd use strict chronological order, instead of dividing each end as was done for the example, Mamilius, in order to insert the ordinarii. P Aculeius (talk) 12:41, 31 August 2017 (UTC)
I would have thought that the way to go would be to have the previous ordinary consuls appear at left, the next ordinary consuls appear at right and all the suffect consuls for the year in question appear in the central box. That way, everything about the year in question is right in front of the viewer. I grant that that may mean some large boxes, especially in 'special' years like 69, but it seems easier for the reader to untangle that complexity with everything in front of them, than by flicking through several tabs at once. Furius (talk) 13:42, 31 August 2017 (UTC)
I could see placing all of the consuls for the year in one box, but in this case it shouldn't have consuls from the previous year or the succeeding year. It would make sense to include the immediate predecessors and successors, but not all of the consuls for a year plus the consuls immediately preceding and following the year. Mixing the two concepts doesn't make sense, IMO. P Aculeius (talk) 14:36, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

Having read the responses, & thought about it some more, I realized there was one more reason not to adopt the scheme I suggested: it requires an expertise with Wikimarkup that discourages casual users. While it's reasonable to insist on some familiarity with Wikimarkup to edit Wikipedia, understanding how that template was configured, let alone how to change it to accommodate changes in knowledge isn't reasonable. So I'm falling back to P Aculeius' suggestion of simply listing the consuls immediately before & after the consul -- & his colleague. And having revised a fair number of navigation boxes (from the set around 30 BC to AD 30 right before I started typing this), just simply listing those names results with enough complications. For some years, there are no fixed pairs of suffect consuls, for others there is only one suffect consul. There are some navigation boxes I'm not satisfied with, but at least what I'm doing is an improvement over what was there.

As for P Aculeius' comment about "whether Roman consuls should have succession boxes at all" -- I'll simply note someone else started adding these, probably around the time succession boxes were first added as a feature to Wikimarkup. I believe that if we are to have them, they might as well be correct. And they do look nice. As an aside, while I'm not keen on having infoboxes in biographical articles for the vast majority of consuls -- for most consuls, whose biographies will never amount to more than a few succinct paragraphs, having an infobox feels to me inappropriate -- there is some information which is best presented though an infobox, such as the voting tribe a given person belonged to. But that's a matter fit for another discussion.

Anyway, my thanks to everyone for their input. -- llywrch (talk) 06:52, 6 September 2017 (UTC)

Update: I've finished adding mising navigation boxes to all of the articles for the period 30 BC - AD 208, which is where the swamp of the suffect/ordinary consul problem lies. Feel free to have a look & condemn/praise my efforts. If nothing else, it was a beneficial exercise because I found two articles on consuls that had been floating out there, & allowed me to propose names for potential articles so that when they are created, they don't conflict with existing articles. (Whether or not these proposed names are adopted is another matter.) There are some boxes I'm not happy with because some suffect consuls were appointed to office individually, not in tandem, forcing me to improvise. I'm sure some of my improvisations aren't as successful as others. I also read quite a few existing biographical articles, which has lead me to the (diplomatically expressed) opinion that some articles are researched a lot better than others, some articles are written a lot better than others, & some articles aren't better than others in both categories. There is still a lot of work needing to be done. -- llywrch (talk) 22:22, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for your apparently tireless efforts, Llywrch. I only hope my contributions will eventually be as useful as yours! P Aculeius (talk) 22:57, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

Second opinion on article creation

Hi! I don't know a lot about ancient Greece, but I wrote a stub, Spintharus of Corinth, because I noticed someone had a link to the spider genus Spintharus intending it to go to an article about the architect. I figured I'd alert the relevant wikiproject about this article just in case I did anything wrong whilst being bold and creating it.

I was also going to write a proper disambiguation page instead of the janky hatnote, but looks like there are at least 6 people by the name of Spintharus, and I'm not entirely sure if any are the same person and which if any should be mentioned in a disambiguation page:

  • a tragic poet
  • father of the Athenian statesman Eubulus
  • father of Aristoxenus
    • I believe it's this one that someone red-linked in List of ancient Greeks#S with "Spintharus (philosopher)", and the one the Italian article it:Spintaro is about. Someone had already conflated the italian article with this article in wikidata which suggests a disambuation page or hat note is useful, even if an article doesn't exist for this Spintharus yet.
  • a Phyrgian man mocked in The Birds (may or may not be the poet, I've seen sources differ?)
  • a pentathlete mentioned by Pliny
  • Cicero's scribe

And there might be more! So I think I'll avoid a proper disambuation page for now, especially since it'll be full of mostly red links.

Anyway, hopefully this guy is notable for a wikipedia entry and I did a decent enough job with the stub. And apologies if this is unnecessary, but I figured better to be safe and give a heads up since I'm out of my element.

Cheers! :) Umimmak (talk) 03:06, 30 September 2017 (UTC)

A quick perusal of the Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, which only has articles on the tragic poet and the architect (although it mentions that there were other authors of the name), and of some of the articles relating to the other connections, suggests that they're all distinct people, with the possible exception of the character from The Birds, who could perhaps be the poet. Given the fact that the poet was regarded as a barbarian from Phrygia (Heracleia Pontica, to be precise), he's unlikely to be the father of either Eubulus or Aristoxenus, who are also likely distinct from each other (Aristoxenus' father is said to have been a learned musician, so less likely to have fathered an important statesman). Neither is likely to have been a pentathlete, and the chronology forbids any of them being contemporary with Cicero. I agree that the Italian article would probably be about the father of Aristoxenus.
Not sure if the character in Aristophanes would be the poet, notwithstanding the mockery and that he was also Phrygian; he could have been a contemporary of Aristophanes, or perhaps lived a little later, as The Birds was written in Sophocles' lifetime, and Spintherus is said to have tried to pass off his work as that of Sophocles, and fooled few, but among them was a certain Heraclides (presumably Heraclides Ponticus, from the same town as Spintherus, who's also supposed to have accepted other spurious works as those of Sophocles). This suggests that Spintherus might have been active later than the period when The Birds was written, although perhaps he was a contemporary and mocked by Aristophanes in that play.
Not really any need to doubt notability. There's a philosophy that suggests anyone from classical antiquity whose name is known is notable, but in this case we know not only the name, but significant facts about him. He's included in other reference works, and wouldn't fit better as a mere footnote in another article, since there's some debate over when he lived and which version of the temple he built (or started). Thanks for the heads-up; hope this is some help! P Aculeius (talk) 12:33, 6 October 2017 (UTC)
Thanks! Do you think there should be a proper disambiguation page listing all/some of these classical personalities, or do you think the hatnote suffices, especially since only one of the other individuals has a Wikipedia article at the moment (and only in the Italian language version)?Umimmak (talk) 12:46, 6 October 2017 (UTC)
As we only have an article on the architect, I don't think that there should be a DAB page. One can always be created if more articles are written. (WP:TWODABS discourages creating DAB pages when there are only two articles to disambiguate!) Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 13:00, 6 October 2017 (UTC)
Do you think the hat note should be removed then as well? None of the others were from Corinth so there shouldn't be confusion, I guess. Umimmak (talk) 13:06, 6 October 2017 (UTC)
No, leave the hatnote. Readers might not know which the one from Corinth was, that there were other notable persons named "Spintherus", or they might simply encounter someone by that name, and have no idea whether he was from Corinth. Hatnotes are for similar topics that might be confused, and that's what we're dealing with here. P Aculeius (talk) 21:37, 6 October 2017 (UTC)
Great thanks for the advice everyone! :) Umimmak (talk) 22:14, 6 October 2017 (UTC)
Always glad to help! P Aculeius (talk) 22:39, 6 October 2017 (UTC)

Plato reference to the Adonia?

I'm making some notes at the moment on the Adonia and looking to improve it a bit, and I was wondering if anyone could help me track down the source of this claim, currently in the article:

During this festival, ad-hoc groups of women only—according to Plato, who disapproved of the essentially non-Greek and female cultus, especially loose women, prostitutes and mistresses—gathered on the rooftops, wailing, drinking and singing.

The only reference to the Adonia in Plato I can find is a throwaway mention of the Gardens of Adonis in Phaedrus, and none of the works I have read on the Adonia so far have shed any light on the matter. It could perhaps be a mistake for Plato Comicus, who apparently wrote a play on the Adonia, though I don't know his fragments at all. Any clues?

Almost certainly Plato Comicus -- I didn't know of him or his fragments until now, but if you've online access to it, the Loeb library seems promising. And if you can read German, there's this. Haploidavey (talk) 09:56, 11 October 2017 (UTC)
Hmm, I can get access to the Loeb online. I'll have a dig through their fragments later when I have a chance. (My German is non-existent, which is a really failing in a classicist.) Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 12:22, 11 October 2017 (UTC)
Well, a look through the Loeb doesn't give me any joy. It looks like the claim was first added to the article by Wetman in this edit (ten years ago!). Wetman is still active, so I have pinged him in case he can shed any light on the matter, though given that it is ten years since he made the edit I don't have high hopes. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 18:55, 11 October 2017 (UTC)
Damn, I'm surprised the Loeb yielded nothing helpful. The text you quoted does read as commentary, though, and seems much more than a footnote, so maybe not so surprising. Haploidavey (talk) 19:01, 11 October 2017 (UTC)
Have you tried [3] It seems both scholarly and thorough, though it might not entirely support the text as given above. Plato might be correct, after all, and the Plato Comicus fragment might count for little more than an optional footnote. Haploidavey (talk) 19:12, 11 October 2017 (UTC)
Definitely Plato Comicus. Pg. 67 in the German book you linked to. He cites "Diph 42 & 49 PCG". Informata ob Iniquitatum (talk) 23:17, 11 October 2017 (UTC)
I can read German passably, & the page Caeciliusinhorto links to quotes a passage from Aristophanes' Lysistrata. The speech that the writer quotes from, in English, is:

Well, then! Has all this womanish pandemonium finished yet? Have they all finished with their lunatic drum beating and their vulgar drunken orgies and their rooftop wailing over their poor little Adonis? All this stuff reminds of the day--may we never see that day again!--when Demostratus talked us into sailing against Sicily. Remember? His drunken wife began an orgy of lamentations about her little Adonis. [Mocking her] "Oh, my poor, poor, little Adonis, my poor little Adonis! Oh, my poor, poor, little Adonis." She squealed and squealed interminably. Then Demostratus, the old piece of dung went on with "we need to enlist soldiers from Zakynthos!" and off she went again! She got up onto her roof this time and began screeching, "Cry, cry, ye all, for our poor, poor Adonis!" She screamed and carried on like this until the old ball-busting, wrath-straddled, God-cursed bastard, Demostratus, to spite her, pushed his vote through the Assembly! Such are the wild, undisciplined doings of women!

To be honest, the German quotation does not map accurately over this speech; the quotation may be from the scholia on the play. In any case, there is something in Aristophanes' play about the Adonia. (The third edition of the Oxford Classical Dictionary has an entry that mentions this festival, which helped me understand this.) -- llywrch (talk) 17:16, 12 October 2017 (UTC)
The only mention of the Adonia by Plato the philosopher seems to be Phaedrus 276b. It isn't disapproving, it simply uses the "gardens of Adonis" as an example of something that isn't serious farming. Fair enough, it isn't.
No modern writer, discussing the Adonia, cites Plato in support of any particular view of the Adonia. Robert Parker in Polytheism and Society at Athens (p. 283) says at the outset "The one named festival which, beyond a doubt, women of all types were free to attend was the Adonia." Exactly the point that's relevant here, and if Plato had said precisely this (as our sentence seems to claim) surely Parker would have cited him.
So, if there's anything at all in this sentence in our article, it must be about Plato Comicus. Well, the only relevant citation from his fragments is fr. 3 Kock = fr. 3 Kassel and Austin. This fragment is quoted by Athenaeus (Deipnosophists 456a). Quoting from Gulick's translation of Athenaeus:
"Plato, in Adonis, says that an oracle was given to Cinyras concerning his son Adonis ... '... The son that is born to thee is fairest and most admirable of all men, yet two divinities shall destroy him, the goddess driven with secret oars, the god driving.' He means Aphrodite and Dionysus; for both were in love with Adonis."
Plato Comicus enjoyed making up parodic hexameters, so there's no reason to suppose the oracle antedates him. Of this fragment Parker boldly says that it "makes Adonis a pathic, though also a seducer of women" [Parker p. 287 footnote 63]. It would take a very bold scholar to go further on this basis and say that Plato Comicus disapproved of the Adonia. How could we possibly know? We don't even know what the speaker is supposed to have thought (no dialogue is preserved), let alone what Plato Comicus thought.
So I think Wetman was mistaken in this sentence (but Wetman may turn up tomorrow and prove me wrong). Parker on pages 283-286 (+ footnotes) discusses both female attendance and male disapproval, so we could rewrite based on him, perhaps without mentioning either of the Platones. Andrew Dalby 16:06, 14 October 2017 (UTC)
As a footnote, this article: Joseph D. Reed, "The Sexuality of Adonis" in Classical Antiquity vol. 14, No. 2 (Oct., 1995), pp. 317-347, says on page 338: "Recent scholarship on the Adonia seems to be unanimous in holding that Plato, speaking through Socrates, disparages and despises the rite as 'anti-agricultural'." [No mention of "essentially non-Greek and female".] Reed dismisses the view brusquely, mentioning none of its proponents in his text (I think a Wikipedian would have added "Citation needed"). Andrew Dalby 16:22, 14 October 2017 (UTC)
Thanks all, especially Andrew Dalby, for confirming my suspicions. Looks like this is a mistake after all. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 07:37, 15 October 2017 (UTC)

Template:Roman colonies in Europe

Regarding this template, I would like to point out that it seems actually quite incomplete to me (e. g. the whole province of Gallia Belgica and its colonies are missing). Does anybody see why only so few colonies are listed here in fact? I'm not an expert in Roman history, though – otherwise I would probably try to improve this by myself. Best regards--Cleph (talk) 17:27, 16 October 2017 (UTC)

"Carmania"

There's a link in Titus Tatius to Carmania (now tagged {{dn}}), which is a completely irrelevant DAB page. Neither Livy (I:13-14) nor DGRB (under Romulus) say anything about Titus and Romulus' conquests between the unfortunate incident with the Sabine women and Titus' death. The only Carmania in DGRG is the one in Asia. Has anyone got any ideas? I suspect a mistranscription, but can't think of any halfway-plausible emendation. Narky Blert (talk) 13:10, 16 October 2017 (UTC)

Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities II.50, has Romulus and Tatius conquer the Camerini from Cameria (English translation). Could this be it? (It looks like the whole section was written by InformationvsInjustice: can they confirm? Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 17:12, 16 October 2017 (UTC)
Definitely a mistake for Cameria. I think I saw a similar claim in another article, but forget which; possibly Romulus. P Aculeius (talk) 17:55, 16 October 2017 (UTC)
Yet again, this WikiProject turns up trumps on a difficult DAB question! Applause! :-D Narky Blert (talk) 23:09, 16 October 2017 (UTC)
@Narky Blert, Caeciliusinhorto, and P Aculeius: A lesser man might take umbrage at such well-based, true accusations. I, on the other hand, choose to thank you for your edits, and commend you all on making a good catch :-) Informata ob Iniquitatum (talk) 23:13, 16 October 2017 (UTC)

Emptying of Roman walls/limes in Britannia

Hi. Could someone review recent contributions by Rjdeadly who has been emptying and shuffling some of the Roman wall/limes categories in the UK. It's not my subject at all but I know there was some discussion of the subject about a year ago, I thought you might like a heads-up. Cheers. Le Deluge (talk) 11:41, 6 October 2017 (UTC)

I've reverted as many as I could and entered opposition to the speedy deletion of categories. I got most but a few slipped through the net. Laurel Lodged (talk) 10:19, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Walls vs Limes

I've taken the liberty to move this discussion to the talk page of the Limes article. Marcocapelle (talk) 13:31, 21 October 2017 (UTC)

Rfc regarding Limes

I've taken the liberty to move this discussion to the talk page of the Limes article. Marcocapelle (talk) 13:33, 21 October 2017 (UTC)

Cato

OK here's another DAB puzzle, late Latin this time. Virgilius Maro Grammaticus has an ambiguous link to Cato. Can any regular here help solve the problem?

(The name "Sufphonias" in that article looks seriously dodgy; and the links to Aeneas and to Blastus also look wrong in all sorts of ways...) Narky Blert (talk) 23:44, 16 October 2017 (UTC)

Most likely the link should go to Distichs of Cato. Based on my knowledge of the subject of the article -- an eccentric early medieval Latin author not known for his learning -- that would be the Cato this Virgilius would be most familiar with. -- llywrch (talk) 17:21, 17 October 2017 (UTC)
@Llywrch: TY, I'll buy that, it has a feeling of rightness about it. I've added a footnote to the article to explain the uncertainty. (Virgilius' sources were a real grab-bag...) Narky Blert (talk) 18:21, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

Ancient Greek

If anyone here can read ancient Greek, then User:The Blade of the Northern Lights is looking for some help in sorting out the list at User:Anomie/Neelix list/6#Greek. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:00, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Julio-Claudian dynasty

Two things: I'm back from my months long hiatus, and I've "completed" improvements on articles of the would-be successors to emperors of the Julio-Claudian dynasty (except Agrippa). I'd appreciate any feedback regarding further improvements or to see if I've left out any important facts. The articles are, chronologically: M. Claudius Marcellus, G. Caesar, L. Caesar, Agrippa Postumus, Germanicus, Drusus Caesar, Nero Julius Caesar, Tiberius Gemellus, and Britannicus.

Gaius Caesar and Lucius Caesar are up for Good Article nomination and Peer review, respectively. I'm hopping to get all these articles promoted to GA status and if anyone has the time to review the G. and L. Caesar it would be much appreciated. I've been really busy with work out of town, but I have December off giving me time on Wikipedia. SpartaN (talk) 22:48, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

Wikipedia has many thousands of wikilinks which point to disambiguation pages. It would be useful to readers if these links directed them to the specific pages of interest, rather than making them search through a list. Members of WikiProject Disambiguation have been working on this and the total number is now below 20,000 for the first time. Some of these links require specialist knowledge of the topics concerned and therefore it would be great if you could help in your area of expertise.

A list of the relevant links on pages which fall within the remit of this wikiproject can be found at http://69.142.160.183/~dispenser/cgi-bin/topic_points.py?banner=WikiProject_Classical_Greece_and_Rome

Please take a few minutes to help make these more useful to our readers.— Rod talk 14:25, 3 December 2017 (UTC)

Isis (the goddess) has been rewritten

The rewritten version of the article much better reflects the reams of scholarship on the cult of Isis in the Greek and Roman worlds. I expect to take this article to FAC sometime in 2018, so any questions, comments, or suggestions for improvement are welcome. A. Parrot (talk) 21:52, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

Fortifications

The present category structure breaks down Category:Roman fortifications into legionary fortresses, auxiliary forts, vexilation forts. Is this division really necessary? Is it not over-categorisation? For some ruins, who could say definitively where they are legionary, auxiliary or vexilation? Is there enough content for all 3? Could they not be merged to a single Category:Roman fortresses ? Laurel Lodged (talk) 22:30, 17 December 2017 (UTC)

I can only suppose that it would be useful to be able to group fortifications by type, at least if there are ever enough articles about Roman forts to be worth the effort. There aren't a whole lot now, but if an editor interested in the topic decides to take a stab at it, there could eventually be several dozen. I'd guess that this would be a good case where articles could reasonably belong to both a parent category and a subcategory, although I'm not sure how much discretion there is in this particular policy. But the ability to categorize them by type would be just as important if only a small number could be clearly distinguished by type, as there might be no other convenient way to compare forts of a particular type, without visiting every article about a Roman fort to see what kind it is. P Aculeius (talk) 07:54, 23 December 2017 (UTC)
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