Talk:Marcus Calpurnius Bibulus

As you prepare for the GAN process

Was hooked from the first paragraph, @Gog the Mild:. The only things that really jumped out for me (and apologies if you've already caught and corrected these) were:

• The need to correct the spellings of "Ceasar" to "Caesar" and "Rebublic" in par. 1 of "Early years" (didn't notice it anywhere else, but you might want to do another spell check on the full article just to be on the safe side); and
• The absence of citations in the lead/lede. (The article is so well cited that, IMHO, it shouldn't be a problem, but I mention it because I suspect someone will point it out. Would it be possible to add a citation to each of the first two paragraphs or at least the first to head off potential "needs a citation" comments?)

Otherwise, nicely done. 47thPennVols (talk) 22:05, 20 July 2018 (UTC)

@47thPennVols: Thanks for that. My spelling has always been weak, but "Ceaser"? Gah! I like the idea of a rebublic.

• No worries. (I blame my ALL of my spelling and punctuation errors on my progressive lenses.) As for my thoughts on "rebublic," see your talk page.

Lead. See MOS:CITELEAD. Outside of BLPs you will find a lot of articles with no cites in their leads. (All bar 2 of my 20 GAs for example.) Usually, not always, the lead summarises material given in greater detail in the main article. Certainly that is what I aim for. So it is duplication to also put them in the lead. And it would clutter the lead horribly - their are 47 cites in the article, to fully reference the lead would take at least 15. Have a look at some of my GAs and you will see what I mean. A wide cross section of GAN assessors have picked up on all sorts of things, but not that. Even the quotes in the lead of Constantine VIII are not referenced and Auntieruth was happy. Or just look at a random samples up for B class assessment. Gog the Mild (talk) 22:35, 20 July 2018 (UTC)

• Makes perfect sense, and I agree. Thanks for the explanation. Will upgrade you to B-Class in a second. 47thPennVols (talk) 23:06, 20 July 2018 (UTC)

Caesar vs. Bibulus in 59

I've studied this particular consular election, and I've not found any source that supports:

• The crowd broke Bibulus' fasces or dumped feces on him.
• The pun referenced

Also, it is not true that Bibulus' watching for omens technically invalidated the year's legislation. At very least, it's POV (there's a debate about it); at worst, it's blatantly wrong (the debate seems to lean toward the latter, especially in light of the fact that the legislation was eventually approved by the senate -- who wrote this anyway?). The declaration regarding watching for omens had to be made in person in the forum, and another notice, one that declared adverse omens had been seen, needed to be made as well. On this question, see J. Linderski, "Constitutional aspects of the consular elections in 59 B.C." Historia 14 (1965) 423-442. --rmagill 17:20, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

These are both well reported events. For the pun, see Suetonius, Life of Julius Caesar, 20:2

As for the breaking of the fasces and the dumping of faeces on the head of Bibulus, see Plutarch, Life of Cato the Younger, 32:2 and Life of Pompey, 48:1.

Finally, the article says that the watching of the omens was "an act that purported to technically invalidate all legislation passed that year." It was Bibulus's hope that it would, but obviously the Senate didn't agree. I don't see a problem here. Oatley2112 (talk) 12:11, 10 February 2012 (UTC)

Lead Question

I was struck (in a good way) by the LEAD. Two small questions. First is there evidence that RS have described him as an unimaginative conservative? I didn't see this phrase used elsewhere in the article. Also can you conceive an enmity? Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 17:51, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

@Barkeep49: Thank you. Well, there is plenty of evidence in the main article that he is conservative. I have just picked up one RS; when first introduced he is described as "earnest and somewhat plodding". I don't feel that it is a stretch to paraphrase that as "unimaginative". I had felt that the article had covered his lack of imagination (eg, being by passed in the Adriatic not once, but twice, etc) but I take your point. I dislike putting references in the lead, but do you think that I should in this case?

I can conceive of one. As one meaning of conceive is to develop or originate it seems a fair enough usage to me. Gog the Mild (talk) 18:16, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

@Gog the Mild: Yes I was more focused on unimaginative than conservative. I went ahead and changed it to plodding to reflect the mention in the article (but don't think a cite is needed in this circumstance). I hadn't heard that formulation for conceive before which is why I was asking. Congrats on the recent GA pass. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 18:33, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

@Barkeep49: It's a good change. Thank you. Truer to the source and less cliched. Actually a Google only throws up one other use of "conceive an enmity", but enough other conceive'ing of things, most commonly ideas, for me to feel comfortable with it.

Thank you. You can imagine which incident I felt 'hookiest' for DYK. We shall see how WP:CENSORED they are feeling. Gog the Mild (talk) 18:41, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

It's a fun one alright. Hopefully it gets through. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 18:44, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

I'll be honest, plodding still sounds too vague and value-laden to me for WP style? AllenY99 (talk) 14:33, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

Tom Holland as a Secondary Source?

The use of Tom Holland's book "Rubicon: The Triumph and Tragedy of the Roman Republic" in the article is questionable as a secondary source. Not because its a popular history, but that Holland's book does NOT cite for his own claims. Citation no. 34 being one such case. Tatum's "Patrician Tribune" could serve as a substitute for some of these claims. To be candid, I think Holland needs to be removed from this article. 2603:6080:8B0D:3E80:B178:EF9E:220C:B838 (talk) 19:07, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

I would firmly agree with this. Ifly6 (talk) 01:04, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

I agree. There are also many references to Holmes and Smith, whose books are now quite dated. Citation style is inconsistent too. T8612 (talk) 10:19, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

I actually started to take a look at this article and I am somewhat shocked by how error-prone it is. Evidently nobody caught the misspelling of curule, the prose fails to call the Catilinarian conspiracy by its proper name, and this whole section is nonsense:

Bibulus was firmly in the camp of the self-described boni (good men). The boni were the traditionalist senatorial majority of the Roman Republic, politicians who believed that the role of the Senate was being usurped by the legislative people's assemblies for the benefit of a few power hungry individuals. The boni were against anyone who attempted to use these legislative assemblies to reform the state; which was a major policy of the populist Julius Caesar. Caesar nominated himself to stand for the consular elections of 59 BC, with the support of his powerful allies Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus and Marcus Licinius Crassus...

Gruen 1995 show that the "First triumvirate" was founded after Caesar won election; the elections of 59 BC occurred in 60 BC; this whole framing around boni is just the optimates and populares myth repeated under a different label. This whole sector is unsourced and it cannot have come from Gruen or Holland who are both careful enough historians and authors not to have included it. Ifly6 (talk) 05:36, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

This line is incorrect. The Boni, led by Cato, walked out of the Senate en masse to prevent it being heard. Caesar took the bill to the Centuriate Assembly, largely made up of ex-soldiers. The following paragraphs minimises how unpopular the First triumvirate was for their heavy-handed norms-breaking tactics in 59 BC, as is clearly shown in Gruen 1995 and also in Morstein-Marx 2021. It then gives a hugely tendentious summary of the Vettius affair, something which modern historians are very hesitant to make conclusions on, doesn't seem to understand that consular going-away speeches are in contione and not apud senatum, and inverts the timeline associated with the lex Vatinia while also not engaging with the possibility that the the consuls of 59 were assigned to defend Italy (see Morstein-Marx 2021 and Rafferty 2017). The discussion on 52 BC fails to engage with Ramsey 2016, which (I think) is the most convincing reconstruction and inverts the timeline associated with Bibulus' delay in assuming a proconsulship (he could have found one in 58). I would support delisting this as a good article. Ifly6 (talk) 05:46, 21 January 2024 (UTC)