Talk:St Mary-le-Bow/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Amitchell125 (talk · contribs) 15:49, 29 December 2022 (UTC)

Happy to review the article.

Review comments

Lead section / infobox

St Mary-le-Bow
Country	England
Denomination	Church of England
History
Dedication	Mary, Mother of Jesus
Architecture
Architect(s)	Sir Christopher Wren Laurence King (to Wren's design)
Specifications
Spire height	221 feet 9 inches (67.6 m)
Administration
Province	Canterbury
Diocese	London
Deanery	The City
Benefice	St Mary-le-Bow

• Unlink Second World War, as this article doesn’t “help someone understand the article you are linking from” (MOS:OL).
• The infobox is unusually extended because of the choice of image and the amount of information in it. I would make the infobox less dominant, as with this (an FA). See the infobox on the right for my idea of what would work better (the map will appear when the infobox is put in the article).
• There are eight citations in the lead which imo are not needed, as none of the information is controversial (see MOS:LEADCITE).
• Today, anyone born within earshot of the bells is considered to be a true Londoner, or Cockney. - I think it should be mentioned that this is now not the case, as the original bells were lost in the air raid that destroyed much of the building, and children are rarely born in what is now a non-residential area.
• I may add more comments about the lead after reviewing the rest of the article.

More comments to follow. Please indicate where you have dealt with an issue, I will then cross out text where it looks sorted, or add a small red cross (N) if I can see the issue still needs to be looked at. Regards, Amitchell125 (talk) 12:14, 1 January 2023 (UTC)

Have had a go at implementing these on the lead section + infobox JRennocks (talk) 16:16, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

1.1 Foundation

• Link archaeological; Saxon building (Anglo-Saxon architecture); Cheapside; Lanfranc, Archbishop of Canterbury; St Mary; undercroft.
• See WP:CITETRIM for the tendency in this article to be cited excessively. One or two citations are fine when citing most text. More than this is usually considered excessive, and these should be reduced in number.
• the early church here needs copy editing (to ‘St Mary-le-Bow').
• Sancta Maria de Arcubus – the first letter is not in capitals. Use Sancta Maria de Arcubus for this text.
• St Mary of the Arches – the citation needs to be outside the brackets.
• Bow being an old name – bow should be in italics and not capitalized (see MOS:WAW).

More comments to follow. AM

5 References

Please check you have read and understood Wikipedia:Reliable sources, which discusses a key aspect of a GA, reliability. The following references are of concern to me because they lack reliability. Many are used in multiple citations, and removing these won't be a problem, but with others you will need to look for alternative sources.

• Ref 1 (The Worshipful Company of Parish Clerks) is not a reliable source to use, as it is self-published
• Ref 2 (St Mary-le-Bow Church) provides information about a book—this self-published website is not a reliable source and this page is a commercial one.
• Ref 4 (The History of London) is self published.
• Ref 5 (English Church Architecture) is self published.
• Ref 6 (David Ross) is self published.
• Refs 7, 11, 19, 24 and 37 (https://www.stmarylebow.org.uk/) come from a website that is self-published.
• Ref 17 (Emporis) looks unreliable.
• Refs 21 (Lavender Audio) and 25 (Tickell) do not cite their information and cannot be said to be reliable sources.
• Ref 27 (“Rings of Twelve encyclopedia”) is not a reliable source.

1.2 11th and 12th centuries

• Link rafter; lanterns (presumably Roof lantern).
• only their tips remained visible - Ref 4 (The History of London, not a source I would use) gives a different date and description of what happened to the rafters, e.g. it doesn’t refer to ‘tips’.
• Integers >9 are inconsistently formatted, being in both numerals and in words, I would make them numerals (e.g. hundred → 100) throughout.
• Ref 9 (Keane et al) doesn’t work.

1.3 Late medieval period

• It became home to the Court of Arches, to which the church gave its name - see here for what seems to be a fuller explanation for the church's unusual name.
• The second paragraph has a missing citation.
• A similar design was constructed on the tower of St Giles' Cathedral in Edinburgh - I’m unclear why this is mentioned.

1.3.1 Great Fire of London

• to the southeast - ‘to the southeast of St Mary-le-Bow’,
• The church was nearly completely destroyed - ‘The church was nearly completely destroyed during the Great Fire of London’. Everything before this is not needed. I would put the text with the text of the Wren rebuilding section, retitling it as ‘Destruction during the Great Fire of London (1666)’.

1.4 Wren rebuilding

• Link and introduce Christopher Wren.
• Link mason (presumably Stonemasonry; crypt.
• Unlink Rome (MOS:OL).
• finally completed in 1680 – ‘being finally completed in 1680’ sounds better imo.
• became such a landmark that it became – improve the prose by changing to ‘became such a landmark that it was’.
• the original – this doesn’t make sense within the sentence.

1.5 18th - 20th centuries

• Link Diocese of London; vestry.
• Unlink New York (MOS:OL).

1.5.1 Second World War

• This section is not well written. It needs to copy edited to improve the prose, remove contradictions, and edit out redundant text.
• Link Blitz.
• A gallery of images such as the one that follows the text of this section is usually to be avoided (see WP:IG). The images should be moved to where they illustrate the relevant text in the article, or not used. They can be found easily enough in Wikicommons as the article is correctly linked to them.

More comments to follow. Amitchell125 (talk) 19:01, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

2.1 Plan

• Link chancel; nave; aisle.
• The note requires a citation.
• In the caption I would give the name of the book the image of the plan comes from, and add the date.

2.2 Exterior

• Move the link for spire to where it first occurs (Wren rebuilding).
• Check for any examples where the information is duplicated (e.g. the information given about the building materials), and edit these.
• imposing; substantial are subjective descriptions, and should be avoided.
• is the parapet. The parapet – needs to be amended to improve the prose.
• These twelve columns – ‘These’ (to avoid unnecessary repetition).
• The above comment about the gallery of images applies here as well.

2.3 Interior

• Introduce John Hayward.
• Hayward's dates should be removed, as their appearance here is inconsistent with the rest of the article.
• Only three bays – why only?
• I would add a comma after blue and white.
• They, along with the other furniture, vestments, etc., is too vague.
• All three of the - ‘The three’.
• I would omit The crypt is now in use as the "Cafe Below" as being irrelevant to the subject of the interior architecture, and information that is likely to become dated.
• The above comment about the gallery of images applies here as well.

3.1 Organ

• Link pedalboard (Pedal keyboard); sanctuary (Sanctuary#Sanctuary_as_area_around_the_altar).
• The caption is missing a full stop.
• Add commas after dates to 1802; pre-war condition.
• additional; Following the restoration of the church from 1956 are redundant.
• £255 needs to be converted to a modern value.
• Introduce Thomas Trotter.
• The second paragraph needs to be copy edited to improve the English.
• by many – who are we talking about here? The members of the church? Experts? Musicians?
• which reuses the old case is redundant.
• plus is imo poor English.
• According to MOS:SPELL09, numbers from 1 to 9 are written as words.

3.2 Bells

• There are 65 citations in this section, some of which I have identified as being unreliable, so I cannot verify the text. I will return to this section when the multiple citations issue is addressed. Amitchell125 (talk) 12:54, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

3.3 History

• This section title seems to be redundant.

More comments to follow. AM

Further comments

• 3.3.1 Early bells - Link peal; Common Council (presumably Court of Common Council). Link and introduce Richard Whittington.
• 3.3.2 18th and 19th centuries - Court of Arches is a duplicate link and needs to be unlinked.
• 3.3.3 Selfridge's ring - Province of Canterbury is a duplicate link and needs to be unlinked. Link ecclesiastical court; incendiary bomb (Incendiary device. There is no link for grillage, but I think a brief explanation is required.
• 3.3.5 Specification - I would argue that the table listing each bell should not be included, as only the most recent bells are listed in it,
• 3.3.6 In popular culture - Hackney Marshes is a duplicate link and needs to be unlinked. Link City of London.
• 6 Further reading - Why is Colvin listed here?

On hold

I'm putting the article on hold for a week until 12 January to allow time for the issues raised to be addressed. There may be other comments made about the Bells section once you have addressed the comments listed. Regards, Amitchell125 (talk) 13:06, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

Within earshot

Amitchell125's comment above:

Today, anyone born within earshot of the bells is considered to be a true Londoner, or Cockney. - I think it should be mentioned that this is now not the case, as the original bells were lost in the air raid that destroyed much of the building, and children are rarely born in what is now a non-residential area.

However, "Anyone who meets condition X is considered to be Y" doesn't entail "Anyone who doesn't meet condition X is not considered to be Y".

The sentence cites two sources. This one: "The most famous tradition linked to St Mary-le-Bow is that only someone born within the sound of Bow bells can be considered a true Cockney." Note the "only", which makes it much stronger; but the description of the notion as a mere "tradition", which weakens it. This source: "to be born within the sound of Bow bells was the sign of a true Londoner or Cockney": "was", but when within "hundreds of years"?

If the originality of the bells is an issue, the original bells were lost centuries before the second world war.

How about simply directing readers interested in the Cockney/Bow relationship to Cockney#Bow_Bells'_audible_range? The treatment there seems much better. -- Hoary (talk) 04:19, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

Britain Express

The website tells us at the foot of each page:

"Britain Express is a labour of love by David Ross, an avid historian, photographer, and 'Britain-ophile'. Connect with us on Facebook."

(More details here.) But can it really be classed as an RS? -- Hoary (talk) 04:19, 5 January 2023 (UTC)