Talk:Gevninge helmet fragment

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Dexter and right

In his edit comment for this edit, User:Usernameunique calls the right eyepiece the "dexter eyepiece" (with that link). Several problems with this:

• The linked article talks about a technical term of heraldry. "Dexter" would be appropriate when speaking of a coat of arms on a shield, say.

• A heraldic context is similar to the military context of a helmet. In fact, the first sentence of the dexter and sinister article includes the clause "and to the other elements of an achievement"; the achievement article specifically includes helmets.

• Usernameunique A helmet or helm is not an achievement -- the depiction of a helmet in a coat of arms is an achievement, so this is squarely within the 'heraldry' case, not the 'helmet' case.
• Re "military context", I hope you agree that the right and left flank of a formation are unambiguously as seen by the members of the formation facing the enemy. Or will you start editing the military history articles to speak of the dexter flank, a term which is found in heraldry and poetry, but not in military history.

• Our article on relative direction, says "In medicine and science, where precise definitions are crucial, relative directions (left and right) are the sides of the organism, not those of the observer." and mentions "dexter" only as a term in heraldry. Though admittedly it does not explicitly say how to specify relative directions for articles of clothing or armor.

• This article is about neither medicine nor science, and different fields have different conventions. (Aero)nautics use port and starboard, for example, and geology uses sinistral and dextral.

• I was considering archaeology to be a (social) science, but I suppose that's debatable.
• As for geology, dextral is about chirality, not relative direction.

• In ordinary English, "right" when applied to a body part or something worn on the body unambiguously means the wearer's right. The right sleeve, like the right eye, is the one on the right of the wearer. Similarly, the right eyepiece of binoculars or of a stereo microscope clearly corresponds to the user's right eye.

• I don't think this is necessarily true, and in fact, it seems like a fairly common occurrence to confuse whose right and whose left one is talking about with somebody else. Does the following conversation sound familiar? "Hey, you have something on your cheek." "Where?" "Right cheek." "My right?" The last question proves the uncertainly. This is particularly true in a descriptive context, for when the exterior of something that is worn (or in the case of a cheek, part of somebody) is being observed, it is done so from the opposite perspective of how it is worn.

• To my ear, "your right cheek" clearly refers to your right, not my right. A police report about someone being hit on the right cheek is similarly unambiguous. If the attacker used a left hook, presumably the wound would be on the right cheek. Do you have any evidence supporting your interpretation?

• "Right" is clear and simple. "Dexter" is obscure. As the WP:MOS says, "Plain English works best. Avoid ambiguity, jargon, and vague or unnecessarily complex wording."

• "Dexter" may be obscure, but it is not jargon. Once a reader clicks over to the dexter and sinister article (and n.b. each use of "dexter" in this article is linked), there is no room for confusion.

• OED: jargon (meaning 6) "...the terminology of a science or art...", in this case heraldry.

• The Tweddle article does explicitly clarify the meaning. But it is WP:SYNTH to conclude from this that "dexter" is more appropriate from this; indeed, the article does not use the word "dexter".

• The only points I'm deriving from Tweddle are that 1) Using "right" and "left" without explanation leaves ambiguity, and 2) as a result some writers use "right" and "left" with an explanatory aside.

• Yes, some writers explicitly define "right" in this context. Even if they are acknowledging the possible ambiguity of "right", concluding that using "dexter" is better is pure WP:SYNTH, as they do not in fact use it.

• Google Web search only finds "dexter eyepiece" in verbatim copies of the Wikipedia article.
• Google Scholar search finds no cases of "dexter eyepiece", but hundreds of "right eyepiece" (typically of a microscope).

• These two points speak more to there being a tiny number of notable helmet eyepieces (I can't think of others; the Uppåkra and Lokrume fragments are similar, but not eyepieces) than to the use of "dexter." ("Dexter ocular" does get a couple results, by the way.)

• Fine, how about other pieces of armor? Google finds "dexter greave" only in 5 cases where the authors are clearly trying hard to be archaic and poetic, and "sinister greave" in none; whereas "right greave" archaeology finds large number of results (with the same result when restricted to book search).

• Finally, Usernameunique claims that "the relevant literature" uses dexter in this case. Citation, please? I haven't found any such cases.

• Maryon 1947 is the main one I was thinking of, but thanks for finding the other as well. The Gevninge fragment literature is primarily in Danish, so that's not much help here.

• Yes, the Burges article is much older and so even less dispositive as to modern usage.
• See right vs. dexter greave for more evidence.

We should use "right", not "dexter". --Macrakis (talk) 21:31, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

I have found cases in the older archaeological literature where "dexter" is used for the right side of a helmet:

• Herbert Maryon's 1947 article "The Sutton Hoo Helmet" (Antiquity 21:137).
• W. Burges' 1879 article "The Tomb and Helm of Thomas La Warre..." (The Archaeological Journal 36:78)

So my claim about the "relevant literature" is weakened. But it does seem to be an old-fashioned usage. --Macrakis (talk) 21:54, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for taking to time to type this out, Macrakis. I'll try to respond tonight. --Usernameunique (talk) 23:39, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

Macrakis, I don't think the idea that just using "right" and "left" leaves no ambiguity is correct. If this were true, the literature on helmets would do so. It does not. There is room for confusion, because in describing the appearance of a helmet our orientation tends to be opposite that of the wearer's, and thus our right is the wearer's left. The literature responds to this ambiguity either by placing an aside somewhere to explain that in the text at hand, "right" means "wearer's right," and "left" means "wearer's left" (e.g., Tweddle 1992 p. 59 of the pdf; Meadows 2004, p. 9: "In the following description the use of left and right will be from the wearer[']s perspective not the observer[']s."), or by employing the terms "dexter" and "sinister" (e.g., Maryon 1947). The question therefore is not whether just using "right" and "left" leaves ambiguity (it does), but what method should be used to resolve that ambiguity. We have two such methods. I think using "dexter" and "sinister" is the appropriate method for the below reasons; I've also responded above to your reasons to not use these terms.

• "Dexter" and "sinister" are defined terms. Once you know what they mean (and they're helpfully linked), there is no ambiguity.
• An explanatory footnote in an article may be missed, especially if a reader is only looking at a particular section. It's better for a reader to see an unfamiliar term and recognize that it is unfamiliar, than it is for a reader to see a familiar term and mistake its meaning.
• Using "right" and "left" requires having to define a specific use for those terms within the article, which is sloppy and prone to change. There's no guarantee, for example, that a subsequent editor will have "wearer's right" and "wearer's left" in mind when using "right" and "left."
• "Dexter" and "sinister" are both specific and accurate. Like camail, also used in the article, they are obscure words, but like camail they have an unmistakable meaning. "Right" and "left" are only accurate half the time.

• They are not only obscure, but out of place, as technical terms of heraldry.

• A substantial number of related articles use this convention: see Benty Grange helmet, Coppergate helmet, Pioneer helmet, Shorwell helmet, Sutton Hoo helmet, Nijmegen helmet, and Emesa helmet.

• Um, there is exactly one editor who has been using this convention (as shown by WikiBlame), and that editor is you, making this a rather weak argument, don't you think? It would have been a courtesy to mention that it was you who has been introducing this terminology in all those articles, rather than letting the user imagine that there are seven independent pieces of evidence.

If navigating helmet articles, it's easier to click the link to dexter and sinister once than, with each new article, to search around to see if there's a footnote somewhere defining which convention of "left" and "right" the individual article adopts.

That's it for now. Nothing like filling up the talk page with the big and controversial issues! I wonder what they talk about on Talk:Donald Trump? --Usernameunique (talk) 04:30, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

As you say, eyepieces are rare; greaves less so. The evidence from greaves is clear that "right" is used, not "dexter". --Macrakis (talk) 22:24, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

Usernameunique, I trust that you find that the greave example decides the issue, and that we're not going to have to update the boxing pages (dexter hook?), the military pages (dexter flank?), and the vector geometry pages (dexter-hand rule?). --Macrakis (talk) 23:07, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Macrakis, terminology with regards to greaves doesn't strike me as particularly relevant. There are already two conventions used for helmets, and, on first impression, dexter and sinister differentiate between sides of a singular object, whereas "right greave" and "left greave" differentiate between separate objects altogether. Not to mention that if it is synthesis to adopt the terminology used in some academic articles about helmets in an article about a helmet fragment, as you claim, then it is definitely synthesis to apply the terminology used for greaves to helmets. (Speaking of contradictions, another is your use of the 6th definition of a word in the OED in pursuit of your claim that we should use commonly understood terms that don't require looking up.) "Dexter hook" is pretty funny, but if we follow your logic, we should edit the nautical and aeronautical articles to replace port and starboard with right and left (you didn't respond to this point above, and though you say "As for geology, dextral is about chirality, not relative direction," the sinistral and dextral article states otherwise: "In geology the terms sinistral and dextral refer to the horizontal component of movement of blocks ... These are terms of relative direction.")

Your general claim seems to be that we shouldn't use dexter and sinister, not that right and left are better terms; it is thus worth pointing out that you have not responded to most of the reasons I made above for favoring dexter and sinister. Orientation is important in these articles—compare the subtle differences between the eyebrows of the Sutton Hoo helmet—and so is having the terminology to precisely convey meaning. If "right" and "left" instills one with confidence, it is false confidence. Either explanatory footnotes are needed, or better yet, words that can mean only one thing. --Usernameunique (talk) 20:39, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Usernameunique Dominic Tweddle is a leading academic expert in this field and chooses to use 'right' in 2015, where the most recent use of 'dexter' we have found is from 1947. Yet you argue against his actual choice, based on the fact that he gives an explicit definition of what he means by 'right'. That is a rather extreme version of WP:SYNTH: "do not combine different parts of one source to reach or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by the source", where you argue against a certain author's choice of terms simply because he bothers to give a definition.

You argue that eyepieces cannot be compared to greaves, because in one case they are parts of a single object (the helmet), and in the other they are separate objects. But in both cases they are handed, and worn on the body. But let's try another example which is part of a single object, indeed, of a helmet, namely, the cheek guard. These sources use 'right' and 'left':

• Travis, Roman Helmets, 2014 [1]
• Robinson, The Armour of Imperial Rome, 1975 [2]
• Jackson, "An early Corinthian helmet in the Manchester Museum", 2013 [3]
• Gonzales, "The Shrine of Asprachoma near Mycenae and its Dedications from the Persian Wars", 2013 [4]
• Ajootian, "A Roman Athena from the Pnyx and the Agora in Athens", 2009, note 28 [5]
• Kavur, "Illyrian helmets from Montenegro", 2017, [6]
• Ebbinghaus, "Ancient Bronzes Through a Modern Lens", 2014, p. 68 [7]

and I haven't been able to find a single case using 'dexter' or 'sinister'. Moreover, these articles don't bother to explicitly say what they mean by 'left' and 'right', so apparently Tweddle is exceptionally cautious....

I certainly agree that orientation matters. I simply disagree that "right" is ambiguous and that "dexter" is better.

At this point, I don't think there's much point for you or me to continue arguing. I think we've made our points, and if I haven't persuaded you, we need to bring in some external eyes. --Macrakis (talk) 22:26, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

PS Yes, I was wrong about the geology usage. Sorry.

PS Re jargon, the OED is a historical dictionary, so the numbering of the definitions is chronological. You can always consult the Merriam-Webster if you prefer, where "the technical terminology or characteristic idiom of a special activity or group" is the first definition.

Does anyone, seriously, feel that "right eyepiece" migth refer to the an eyepiece that would go in front of someone's left eye? Or that the rigth sleave of a shirt would go on the left arm? I would find that totally unambiguous. And that would go much further than apparel; the rigth headlight of a car coming towards me would be the one to the left from my point of view.--Nø (talk) 22:29, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Agreed, but Usernameunique apparently has different intuitions about this. At this point, though, given the overwhelming evidence from the scholarly literature (above) that the sides of helmets in archaeology are called left and right and not sinister and dexter, I will go ahead and make the edits. --Macrakis (talk) 14:57, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

Usernameunique The above discussion has been up for over a week without rebuttal, and yet Usernameunique has reverted my edits.

My latest post demonstrates that right/left is the overwhelming usage in talking about the sides of helmets in the modern scholarly literature. In fact, neither Usernameunique nor I has found a single example of dexter/sinister being used since 1947, and even before that, we have found only one other case. On the other hand, scholarly literature since then has unanimously used right/left. Usernameunique's arguments about the preferability of "dexter/sinister" are original research contradicted by the literature. WP policy is clear: we go with the literature, not the taste of individual editors. --Macrakis (talk) 17:19, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

Macrakis, had you read past the second paragraph of Jackson 2013, which you cite above, you would have seen that it contradicts your argument ("these articles don't bother to explicitly say what they mean by 'left' and 'right'"); moreover, I would hardly term a search through snippet view, as you do with Robinson 1975, a survey of the relevant literature. The articles you cite constitute an effort to find examples supporting your view, without an effort to actually find how the literature deals with the tension between dexter/sinister and right/left. The literature is most likely to have this tension when discussing individual historical helmets, because those articles tend to go into detail on the specific parts of a helmet—hence why Jackson 2013 clarifies in the third paragraph that "'Right' (R) and 'Left' (L) mean the right and left sides from the wearer's point of view." (Incidentally, this is another reason to use dexter/sinister instead of an explanatory footnote—as your oversight demonstrates, not everyone will see the footnote.) Works on general types of helmets, such as Robinson 1975, have less need for such precision because they are from a more general point of view that is less concerned with specifics of particular helmets. It's anyone's guess, meanwhile, why articles such as The Shrine of Asprachoma near Mycenae and its Dedications from the Persian Wars, meanwhile, should bear any consideration on a review of the literature on helmets. There are plenty of works that deal with helmets in an individual context; some are mentioned above, many others are in the articles that you recently edited. These are much more prone to either use dexter/sinister, or introduce an aside explaining how "right" and "left" are used, than is the largely irrelevant list of seven works referred to above. --Usernameunique (talk) 17:36, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

I agree that a snippet view is incompete, and I'm happy to see more complete evidence. Can you provide it? You say that many other articles "are prone to use...dexter/sinister". As for me, I could find no scholarly literature since 1947 that uses the terms dexter and sinister for parts of helmets. If you have examples, let's see the citations! And I don't understand why the citations above are "largely irrelevant"; they are scholarly articles in archaeology on ancient helmets. As for explanatory asides or footnotes, they are not relevant here. Clearly the article writers have chosen to use left/right rather than sinister/dexter in the main body of their article. As I've said before, it is beyond WP:SYNTH to take the fact of an explanatory aside or footnote to conclude that it's better to use terminology that the authors themselves have chosen not to use! --Macrakis (talk) 19:13, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

• Usernameunique Macrakis - As this lengthy discussion has now spilled over into other pages, e.g. recent edits to Coppergate Helmet I'd recommend you both cease and desist any further edits on mainspace articles on the minutiae of Left/Right vs. Sinister/Dexter for the immediate future else this'll spiral. Take a breather eh? At least until some level of consensus is apparent. Anyone invited additional parties to the discussion yet? Plenty of WikiProjects connected to this and the Coppergate Helmet page who might weigh in. Zakhx150 (talk) 08:47, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

Thank you Zakhx150 for your sensible words. I've been invited here by Macrakis as I commented on the issue during the FAC. My concern at the time was that dexter and sinister are niche terms, and right and left would be more straightforward. The response was that right and left give no indication as to whether it's the wearer's or the viewer's right or left, but this is solved by sinister and dexter. That seems broadly reasonable to me, and falls well within stylistic choice. As far as I see it, it's not the role of a reviewer to impose their personal taste on an article.

Neither are wrong, and while I think right and left are clear enough a wikilink means that dexter and sinister can be easily explained. Although the relevance of heraldry won't be immediately clear to readers so does add an extra unnecessary complexity. However, I think there are two main problems. Firstly, by introducing obscure vocabulary when everyday terms would convey a very similar meaning we run the risk of putting off the reader. Secondly, those who aren't put off but are unfamiliar with the term are being invited to leave the article in the very first sentence. We have no analytics beyond how many people read this page, so it's difficult to judge how it's performing but I would expect that the dexter/sinister will mean fewer people read on compared to if we used right/left.

I think that right and left are clear enough, and if there is the risk of ambiguity a footnote could be added. If we talk about the right sleeve of a jacket I would expect that most people most of the time would understand that to mean the wearer's right. The shared point of reference may slip when talking about an item most people will only encounter in museums, but I think confusion would be minimal compared to the number of people who are confused by dexter and sinister.

Wikipedia is an educational tool, and this is indeed an opportunity for people to learn about dexter and sinister. It's easy to pick up, and I imagine some people will really enjoy that. Wikipedia is at its most fun when you're finding out new things you didn't expect, and there are going to be some people who haven't seen the term applied in this context but will understand from other contexts and will really enjoy that.

Overall, I would prefer it if the article used right and left but it's worth remembering that while this effects several articles it is quite a small point. This is a fine article and I won't be losing any sleep if the article sticks with dexter and sinister. Richard Nevell (talk) 18:55, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

Well I'd find it hard to disagree with this reasonable approach, thanks for weighing in. I'll be keeping a weather eye on how this ends.Zakhx150 (talk) 19:46, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

Usernameunique, I agree with Richard Nevell that this is otherwise a fine article -- I should have mentioned that at the outset. My only concern is that the term of heraldry "dexter" is inappropriate here, based both on the obscurity of the term for the general readership, and on the absence of the term from the scholarly literature, making it WP:OR to use it. You say "There are plenty of works that deal with helmets in an individual context;... these are much more prone to either use dexter/sinister". If that's true, let's see the citations, and the WP:OR issue is taken care of (though I still think the term "dexter" is unnecessarily obscure). --Macrakis (talk) 15:20, 19 November 2018 (UTC)