Talk:Battle of Calais/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Eddie891 (talk · contribs) 14:51, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

Good Article review progress box

Criteria: 1a. prose () 1b. MoS () 2a. ref layout () 2b. cites WP:RS () 2c. no WP:OR () 2d. no WP:CV () 3a. broadness () 3b. focus () 4. neutral () 5. stable () 6a. free or tagged images () 6b. pics relevant () Note: this represents where the article stands relative to the Good Article criteria. Criteria marked are unassessed

• Is it usual to say "1349 Battle of Calais" as the lead title, or would it make more sense to say "The Battle of Calais was an incident in 1349 during..."?

Certainly what I had wasn't ideal. I have changed it. See what you think.

• perhaps link Entrepôt for those of us less linguistically inclined.

D'oh! Done.

• Would it make more sense to say "24 December", rather than Christmas Eve?

Probably. (It was originally relevant, but now I have slimmed the irrelevances out it isn't. Done.

• Why is this text centered? : "[[File:The French attempt to recapture Calais from England (1350).jpg|thumb|upright=|alt=a colourful image of mounted knights in close-quarters combat.|<center>The battle of Calais from Froissart's Chronicles]]"

I think that captions display more neatly if centered, and so always center it. The caption of the infobox image is also centered. (I am not sure why/how I missed the third one.) Is it a problem?

• "After fiery, warmongering speeches from members of the King's Council it voted three years of war taxes." I'm somewhat confused by what this sentence means.

You are quite right. I was trying to be too succinct. Rewritten. Any clearer.

• "Clearly he deserved a position of responsibility, equally clearly he was not going to be assigned to any place where its betrayal would be a devastating blow." not sure clearly is the best word to use here...

@Eddie891: Many thanks for picking this up. Responses to your comments above. Ready for the next installment when you are. Gog the Mild (talk) 18:08, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

• The lede sentence might make more sense as "The Battle of Calais in 1349 was an incident during the Hundred Years' War when a French army under Geoffrey de Charny attempted to bribe Amerigo of Pavia, an officer of the garrison of English-occupied Calais to open a gate for them, in the early morning of either 31 December 1349 or 2 January 1350. The English had been forewarned by Amerigo..." as opposed to "was an incident during the Hundred Years' War when a French army under Geoffrey de Charny attempted to bribe an officer of the garrison of English-occupied Calais to open a gate for them, in the early morning of either 31 December 1349 or 2 January 1350. The English had been forewarned by the officer in question, Amerigo of Pavia," Either is fine, but I think introducing Amerigo earlier makes more sense.

That's a D'oh! moment from me. Done. Thank you.

• perhaps rephrase "ransomed himself", because (at least to me), that implied he paid his ransom. Obviously, I don't really understand this time period that well, but neither do our readers. just saying "was ransomed" might make more sense.

Good point. Done.

• I think the size of the english force needs a cite in the infobox, as do french casualties (I'm not seeing them in the article).

Done.

• If the French were captured, how did half of his force flee?

"With a cry of "Betrayed", half of Charny's force fled. He hastily organised the balance into a defensive formation... The French... broke... Thirty French knights were taken prisoner". Does that explain it? Or do you mean the "a small advance party of French knights into the gatehouse"? (I have just added "small" to try and be clearer here.)

• MOS:ELLIPSIS. I edited accordingly, but I found the mos useful.

Well, well. I didn't realise that. Done. And I shall watch out for it in future.

• How was a specific date of the 'end' decided?

I'm not really following you here Eddie. Is this a reference to "the debacle his enterprise had ended in"?

• A fine article. I'll be happy to promote soon. As always, revert/don't do what you don't like and there will be no hard feelings. Eddie891 ^Talk _Work 13:06, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

@Eddie891: Thanks for the copy editing. (Saint-Omer was already linked, under prelude.) Good points above, all addressed bar one which I didn't understand - sorry. Gog the Mild (talk) 15:03, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

• Gog the Mild: I was referring to the end of the battle itself, as in when the end was determined (i.e. whether "Charny's revenge" fits in the topic, but it makes sense to me now... Passing. Eddie891 ^Talk _Work 17:15, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

Non-reviewer comment

@Gog the Mild: I didn't want to stick an oar into the GAR, but I was just wondering about the images. You see what I did here, to balance the page by alternating the images after the infobox. What do you think? ——SerialNumber54129 13:52, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

@Serial Number 54129: Don't worry about sticking an oar in - this is Wikipedia . Good point. I am not sure why I started alternating from the right. Reversed. I would like to keep the image of the battle under the Battle section, and the wounded Charney one under Aftermath where this is discussed. But that leaves the bottom a bit bare. I have added a semi-random image that relates to some of the text. What do you think? Gog the Mild (talk) 15:03, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

Ah, that looks good. Yes, I shouldn't have moved them down sections—I didn't realise that in VE mode, everything looks a lot more squashed than it really is, I don't know why. I think that tower is a reasonable addition though; I had a cursory look for something else—the principals mentioned in that section—but couldn't see anything; and Edward III would be even more naff  :) btw, do you use AmEng, or not? It's looking good though! ——SerialNumber54129 16:00, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

@Serial Number 54129: Cheers. It started out as a bit of fun as a demonstration of knightly hypocrisy, but it seems to have ended up being half way decent. British English. (If you go into edit mode, that is on the article's third line, above the infobox.) Why? Have I goofed? Gog the Mild (talk) 16:10, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

Nothing important, a couple of installments attracted my attention—could've been put in by anyone. ——SerialNumber54129 16:33, 18 November 2018 (UTC)