Talk:Via Giulia/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Kingsif (talk · contribs) 00:13, 4 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi, I'm Kingsif, and I'll be doing this review. This is an automated message that helps keep the bot updating the nominated article's talkpage working and allows me to say hi. Feel free to reach out and, if you think the review has gone well, I have some open GA nominations that you could (but are under no obligation to) look at. Kingsif (talk) 00:13, 4 May 2020 (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

• Copyvio check looks clear
• Images all seem appropriate, perhaps work on layout - a gallery might be more functional for the individual landmarks

The problem with the gallery is the bidirectional navigation. There is a way to achieve it?

 Done.

• The list layout in prose format of the landmarks should be converted to either a list or entirely standard prose

Actually in the two articles which I wrote before this one (Borgo Nuovo (Rome) and Borgo Vecchio (Rome)), I did as you suggest, but I was not satisfied, since I was missing a structure in the landmark section. This article was born as a translation of the German one, and there I found this kind of structure, and I liked it. The problem is that if we convert it to a list, I am afraid that there is too much text, and in plain prose, as I wrote, we lose the structure.

• Coverage of location and denominations is bare - location also needs some ref(s)

 Done.

• Quite a few of the sources aren't accessible, so AGF, but I do question the use of inscriptions or Dante's Inferno as reliable sources. Surely there's at least one academic who at least commented on these things?

I moved Dante's Inferno citation where it belongs and I substituted it with a RS (not difficult, since it is one of the most famous informations about 1300 Rome). About the inscriptions, I have still to check, but consider that some of them are just reported here, they are not meant to be refs. I moved all of them in the footnotes section (another advantage of the template you suggested).

• There are a few parts missing refs

I know. As I said, the Germans used as reference an Italian web site which is fully unsourced, :-( so the first thing that I had to do was to find RS for the text. In doing that, I found a lot of mistakes, so basically I rewrote a good deal of the history part. See my comment below about sources.

• Ref formatting can be improved - I suggest using Template:Sfn. It's the same style as used now, but actually links the refs to the source. This will also make identifying ref errors easier. (At the moment, everything is highlighted as a ref error using the script I do.)

 Done. Changed to sfn.

• Actually, is it possible to split the landmarks out into their own List of landmarks on Via Giulia article?

Of course it is possible: but for which reason? Do you think that as it is now the article is too long?

• The landmark sections are all consistently low on refs

See above. I will do my best to fill them. The problem is that until now here the libraries are closed due to COVID, and a lot of my books are in Rome, also unreachable (borders with Italy are still sealed). :-(

• 'Trivia' is not a standard section. What is the trivia about and where does it belong. Also, is its inclusion DUE? I think that Zola's description of the road probably deserves coverage itself, not just a trivial mention that it exists.

 Done. I removed it.

• More comments to come, but some work on this, and discussion on some points, should happen first.

Overall

•  On hold This requires quite a bit of work, but I think it has GA potential. Kingsif (talk) 19:57, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Hallo Kingsif, and thanks for your comments! Today I started to do some work here. Unfortunately since a couple of weeks I have a health problem related to my two months of home office with PC, so my efficiency is low. However, I will try to do my best. Bye, Alex2006 (talk) 15:22, 15 May 2020 (UTC)

Thanks, I appreciate the difficulty in using sources at the moment, and look forward to seeing your work. I suggested the split, not because it's too long, but because I think there's a lot of coverage of the important history of the road and the landmarks separately, and each is a notable subject. I'm not sure what you mean by "bidirectional navigation", could this be clarified? Thanks, Kingsif (talk) 16:10, 15 May 2020 (UTC)

I understand. From one GA, two GA then? ;-) About bidirectional navigation, I will explain it with an example: now, if I am reading something about a landmark, I have its picture to the right, more or less in correspondence with the text: if we put all the pictures at the bottom of the article, the reader has to scroll a lot, search for the right image, and maybe go back to the text. I think that this is very inefficient, unless we find a way to navigate back and forth between text and image. Cheers, Alex2006 (talk) 16:57, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

If you want ;) My concern is that to make the images fit inline, they have to be quite small, whereas they serve the purpose of illustrating the landmarks better if they are larger. Each individual section could have a gallery, where there are multiple images (see what I did here for what I mean); where there is only one image, it could be made larger and a {{clear}} template used to stop it from overlapping the section below. (An alternative would be a large gallery/table at the bottom with links between this and each section). Kingsif (talk) 18:43, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

Then I will try to implement the first option, I think that it is the best one. Regarding the sources, it looks like the Swiss government will reopen the libraries for loans at the middle of June. The problem is that the book which I need (listed under "further reading" in the article) has been loaned in January. Usually loans last one month, but due to COVID all the loans have been extended, and the book will be given back not before August (unless the borrower when will get the notice will bring back the book before). :-((( Alex2006 (talk) 06:50, 22 May 2020 (UTC)

@Alessandro57: That is annoying, I know how useful libraries are - is there no online version to help? Best of luck with the improvements so far, I'll add some prose comments when the formatting has been finished :) Kingsif (talk) 22:51, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

@Kingsif:, unfortunately not, but I hope that the guy who has been keeping the book since January will give it back as soon as I reserve it. :-) Sorry for my slowness in working, but I have some health problem due to two months of homeoffice and the physician told me that I should not spend too much time in front of a computer. Anyway, I changed the location of the pictures in the landmark section. :-) Alex2006 (talk) 07:38, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

@Alessandro57: Have you managed to get your hands on the book? Kingsif (talk) 01:05, 10 August 2020 (UTC)

@Kingsif:, telepathy :-) I wanted to write you today: I will get the book in a week. :-) Alex2006 (talk) 08:45, 10 August 2020 (UTC)

Status query

Alex2006, Kingsif, it's been another five weeks; where does this stand? I've noticed that Alex2006 has been more active at Wikipedia recently; might we hope for a final resolution soon? Thanks to you both. BlueMoonset (talk) 20:18, 16 September 2020 (UTC)

I've been assuming that even after getting the book, Alex has had to spend some time reading it again :) I see you've pinged, so I hope a reply comes through Kingsif (talk) 20:26, 16 September 2020 (UTC)

BlueMoonset, Kingsif, thanks for writing! At the moment I am still in vacation (with the book :-)). Next week I will start to work, I promise! :-) Cheers, Alex2006 (talk) 16:05, 19 September 2020 (UTC)

Alex2006, I've noticed that you're making a lot of edits over a number of weeks. Can you please keep us informed as to your progress? Many thanks. BlueMoonset (talk) 00:21, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

Hello BlueMoonset, Kingsif. After having recovered and read the book (a wonderful large volume almost 500 pages long that I now bought on the antiquarian market :-)) I have almost completed the insertion of the references of the descriptive part, and now I am checking the historical part. I have been stopped for several weeks because unfortunately I had an infection at my left eye. Luckily till the end of 2020 there are only two and a half months left...Cheers, Alex2006 (talk) 16:51, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the update, Alex. If you can ping me/us when you're done with the update, I can review changes. Kingsif (talk) 17:18, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

Alex2006, Kingsif, it's been another two months. How much is left to do, and how much longer do you think it will take to do it? Thanks. BlueMoonset (talk) 06:30, 19 December 2020 (UTC)

BlueMoonset, Kingsif, the next two weeks I will be in vacation. My work will be ready for review by then (4th of January, 2021). Thanks and have a happy and healthy Christmas, Alex2006 (talk) 10:05, 19 December 2020 (UTC)

Kingsif, BlueMoonset, article is ready for review! I am happy to remain at your disposal for comments, reproaches :-) and modifications. Thanks for your patience and have a good year! Cheers, Alex2006 (talk) 19:25, 3 January 2021 (UTC)

Resume review

It's been a while, so I'll just go again.

• Copyvio check seems clear

It is interesting that the program found most similarities with a source (Morelli) which I didn't even read (the reason is that it has no refs or sources). Are we sure that it works correctly?

Of course; it searches the entire internet and anything archived on the internet, not just sources in the article, as intended. Most people obviously don't attribute their copyvio, so it searches everything it can find. This is also why you have to look at the content it flags: most of the similarities are proper nouns of the inscriptions you've quoted, so nothing of concern, and things that are likely published in a lot of places. Kingsif (talk) 12:28, 6 January 2021 (UTC)

You are right (as almost always :-)) @Kingsif:. I checked the source and the largest similarity concerns the quotations from Vasari, which obviously are present in practically all the sources dealing with the street. Thanks! Alex2006 (talk) 13:02, 6 January 2021 (UTC)

• Nearly every citation has a harv error, so it's not clear which reference is sourcing what. You can get one of the user scripts that flags them to help identify which aren't - I'd list but it's really most of them that show errors. If that's too much, a simpler ref format (everything inline) would not produce errors and might be an option

I think that the errors were by the two sources with more than an author. I repaired them now. Hopefully... Done.

• The location and denominations sections aren't big enough to sustain whole sections. Is it possible to combine them if there's nothing more to say? Otherwise, incorporating the facts into the relevant part of the history may help make the section balance more even. This isn't strictly necessary.

I have to think how to solve it. Actually this is kind of standard (by me :-)).

Both Location and denomination are now integrated in the lead.  Done.

• Can the first history section be broken up; the single paragraph takes up more than my screen, so to a reader the prospect of the whole article being a wall of text is not good.

 Done.

• What is the intended meaning of "attended" in this was attended above all by pilgrims coming from the north?

Actually I meant "frequented", but I changed it with "used".  Done.

• There's several instances of year spans used (e.g. "(r. 1294-1303)"), but they use a hyphen rather than an en-dash or a span template, could they be fixed?

 Done.

• Do Jubilee and stampede really need wikilinks?

Corrected Jubilee (there is a dedicated article for the Catholic Jubilee), removed Stampede.  Done.

• Why are images wikilinked? I.e. the "(inscription)" in built across the Tiber (inscription) and around the Campo de' Fiori (inscription) leading to images of the afore-described for no discernible reason: if the images are sourcing the statements, it should be in a citation. If it's there for flourish, just add the image.

 Done.

• This long history paragraph is still a bit storytelling, there's narrative flair rather than encyclopedic tone. E.g. In fact, due to the power in the city - language like "in fact" is often narrative and authorial, Sixtus IV took the occasion of the jubilee is unnecessary flair for a simple statement/taking creative liberty (it's treating Sixtus IV as a character and giving him personality/motivation, and should just say "On X, Sixtus did Y")
• noble families of popular extraction what is "popular extraction" supposed to refer to? To me it seems like a poor translation of something about social hierarchy, but it's utterly meaningless

Maybe "folk background" is better... Done.

• Expropriating (who is he, Chávez!?) should probably have a wikilink

Another false friend...I don't know why, but I never liked Chavez: he always looked to me like a wannabe of Che Guevara.  Done.

• to hit the property income of the city nobility - "hit" is both informal and very unclear

"to reduce the property income of the local nobility"  Done.

• In the last sentence of the opening history paragraph, what is the random (Fig.) doing? Is this another inscription thing, and please can there be no more of them?

 Done.

• thus creating the conditions for the opening - vague. What conditions are created and what relevance does this have to a street opening and another street widening?

The widening of the via peregrinorum is part of the road works started by previous popes. The opening of the Porta Settimiana in the Aurelian Walls was the precondition for the construction of Via della Lungara, which would have connected Ponte Sisto (inside the walls) to Borgo and the rebuilt Nero's Bridge, creating with Via Giulia the "circuit" that Julius II had in mind. I know that all this is quite difficult to visualize for those who do not know roman topography, and I'm wondering if a map of the city with the works mentioned in the text would not make sense...

• More specific and less flowery language is needed throughout this part.

About "flowery": when many years ago I went to study in the USA, several professors and colleagues complimented me on my sophisticated language. I was surprised at first, but then I understood why: in the English language there are two words for most concepts, one of Latin origin (usually French) and one of Germanic origin (usually Anglo-Saxon). As an Italian, it was much easier for me to remember and use the words of Latin origin, and here is where the fancy language comes from. To this must be added that many Anglo-Saxon scholars of Italian art and culture (e.g. Richard Krautheimer, American by adoption), spending much of their time in Italy, also tend to use words of Latin origin in their works. But back to the problem: I tried to simplify the English of the article. If this is still not enough, I might ask the kind colleague who did the copyedit to give it another run.

• by his uncle, Pope Sixtus IV (r. 1471-1484) - since ol' Sixtus has already been introduced and discussed, the dup wikilink and repeat of the yearspan are unnecessary. Adding yearspans at every instance of a name is terrible for flow, too.

Removed all multiple wikilinks by popes. Yearspans only at the first occurrence. I found out that there is a nice template for the pope's reign, I used everywhere.  Done.

• The Lungara had the dual aim to relieve the pilgrimage route to Saint Peter[23] and transport goods coming from the Via Aurelia and the via Portuense roads towards the centre of the city. The Pope intended for it to reach Piazza di Santa Maria in Trastevere and the port of Ripa Grande. [24] Moreover, the street, overlooking the river, was going to represent the place of the cultured and refined otia of the Roman upper class, who in fact built some of the most luxurious suburban residences in the city there.[25] - awesome detail on a different road! (Irrelevant, remove)

I don't think that mentioning the Lungara in the article is irrelevant, because its construction is a part-like Via Giulia-of Julius II's Project (which btw gives the name the the section) and is mentioned by all the sources (primarily Tafuri). However, I have shortened the part describing it, and removed the otia from the text.  Done

• There's a lot of instances of spaces, even double spaces, before citations. I've fixed some examples, but can refs be kept tight to the word/punctuation preceding them

All spaces before citations removed.  Done.

• to superimpose a regular road network with the focus given to the Tiber by medieval Rome's disorderly buildings - what? I know what all these words mean, but sadly not in this order

Sentence reordered and corrected.  Done.

• Also the ending of that run-on sentence, the city's maze of alleys, is a bit storytelling.

What do you think about "chaotic web of narrow streets"?

• The center of the city would thus have shifted towards - run-on sentence, it gets hard to follow all the information and the clauses get out of line. Finding meaning in the sentence and how the clauses relate is hard. It could be reworded or broken into multiple sentences.

After long thoughts, I reworded the sentence so, and moved it below: "As a resulting consequence of the project, the area around the Vatican and Trastevere would have been enhanced at the detriment of the Capitoline Hill, symbol of the Roman nobility's power."  Done.

• Following these last few comments: abject confusion then re-reading is necessary for... a lot of this. Which isn't a positive. Given the extra spaces and missing punctuation, I think it might need a copyedit in general: I don't want to fail it on not meeting style criteria after so much work has been put in, but also with so much work put in I'd hoped it would be more readable. If I was just picking this up for the first time, I'd be asking if anyone had prepared it for nomination. Can you turn the prose around in the next week?

Please see my comment about "flowery" above.

• The building was supposed to face - what building? Is any of this paragraph relevant?

The building here is the Palazzo dei Tribunali. Changed.  Done. Is the new Piazza relevant:? Yes, at least for Tafuri, Portoghesi, Frommel, etc.

• At Giorgio Vasari writes:, the ref should come after the comma, before the block quote, not in a paragraph of its own afterwards.

• Also should be "wrote", MOS:TENSE

 Done.

• The word center has been spelled differently in the last two paragraphs; please pick one form and be consistent. British ("centre") is probably the most relevant form.

 Done.

• Julius II, in serious difficulty in his relations with other states, preferred not to force the hand, pretending that the anti-papal pact had been an agreement in his favour - storytelling. It sounds like a great soap opera summary, though

Here I did some rewording, trying to keep the meaning however.  Done.

• Yeah, there's a lot of duplicate wikilinks.

Most of dup wikilinks removed.  Done.

• Comment reminder to self to come back to the prose history.
• Landmarks section looks good!
• @Alessandro57: comments, concern Kingsif (talk) 00:01, 4 January 2021 (UTC)
  • @Kingsif: thanks for your fast review! I will address the different points (although not sequentially) and I will ping you when there will be enough points to be discussed. Thanks again! Alex2006 (talk) 16:04, 4 January 2021 (UTC)
    • @Kingsif: I think that I have solved a great part of the problems you have raised. About the language, please see my comment above about "flowery". Thanks a lot in advance for your review! Alex2006 (talk) 16:12, 24 January 2021 (UTC)
      • @Alessandro57: "Flowery" wasn't about the difference between Latinate and Germanic terms (I also have experienced this, I grew up in a mixed English-Spanish home and while UK universities expect the more sophisticated Latinate words, US universities were impressed). It's about exaggerated elucidation. Having said that, I can see the copyedits throughout and it looks much better! GOCE reviews don't always change words, but it's looking good. The history section all looks great, except the phrasing of Via Giulia too was not spared from the demolitions that disrupted much of the historic centre: significant building demolishments in the central section of the street is still, sorry, too flowery. I also think footnote [a] should be moved to after the ref, since all the other footnotes are like this, but that won't hold it back. Glad to see almost complete refs for the landmarks sections – After a long period of restoration, the church is open to the public again since 1986 is missing a ref and is also poorly phrased; and the refs for the quote block in the 19 Palazzo dei Tribunali section are all over the place. The bold text in the 8 Palazzo Cisterna (Via Giulia 163) and 25 Casa di Raffaello (Via Giulia 85) sections are inappropriate, they should be in quotation marks. That should be all! Kingsif (talk) 17:17, 28 January 2021 (UTC)
        • @Kingsif:, thank you for your explanation: at this point I have no more excuses, it is my style that is flowery... ;-) Maybe it comes from the fact that I attended the classical high school. I have tried to correct the points you have indicated, please check if they are now OK.

Moreover, I wanted to thank you, @BlueMoonset: and @Tenryuu: again for your great patience during this review. However, I now have a much clearer understanding of the process needed to make an article good, next time it will go much faster. One last question: the article, even if it has now been expanded about thirty times, and has reached the "good" status, cannot be submitted for DYK, because it has already been there (although at that time it was little more than a stub), correct? Thanks again, Alex2006 (talk) 08:25, 30 January 2021 (UTC)