Template:Did you know nominations/Demolition of al-Baqi

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by — Maile (talk) 22:03, 4 November 2016 (UTC)

Demolition of al-Baqi

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Mausoleum of four Shia Imams

~~... that al-Baqi cemetery (pictured), the oldest and historically most important Islamic graveyard, was leveled to the ground by Wahhabis in 1806 and 1925 (or 1926)?~~

Reviewed: Geography of Somerset

Created by Mhhossein (talk). Self-nominated at 11:20, 9 September 2016 (UTC).

Pending review. "It has been suggested that this article be merged into Al-Baqi'. (Discuss) Proposed since September 2016." SL93 (talk) 21:40, 11 September 2016 (UTC)

New enough and long enough, inline citations and references checks, factual and interesting hooks, close paraphrasing and neutrality is checked as well and approved. Good work, well done! This one is good to go. The merge discussion should be closed as Keep per discussion held at merge discussion. BabbaQ (talk) 07:07, 8 October 2016 (UTC)

I have pulled this hook following problems mentioned at WT:DYK with sourcing and factual accuracy. Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 10:36, 12 October 2016 (UTC)

Ritchie333: How are the things now? Mhhossein ^talk 10:14, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

I can see the source for 1925; have to AGF for the 1926 dates (unless I'm just not looking in the right place). Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 10:17, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

Ritchie333: Thanks for assuming my good faith. Those Brill entries require subscription. Mhhossein ^talk 12:23, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

@Ritchie333: Are you happy that this is now ready for promotion? If so, could you give it a formal tick. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 05:33, 17 October 2016 (UTC)

Yes, put this on the queue. Ritchie333 ^(talk) ^(cont) 12:19, 18 October 2016 (UTC)

Hi, I came by to promote this, but I have some questions. In the article lead, the expression "the oldest and historically most important Islamic graveyard" is quoted directly from the source, but is not in quotes in the hook. Personally, I am not a fan of quoting long phrases like this in the hook. It may be better to use a different hook, like:
ALT2: ... that al-Baqi cemetery, site of the mausoleum of four Shi'a Imams (pictured), was leveled to the ground by Wahhabis in 1806 and 1925 (or 1926)?
Additionally, the second paragraph and blockquote under Motivations lacks any cite, per Rule D2.
Looking at the hook again, what do you think about eliminating the vagaries of the year and write:
ALT2a: ... that al-Baqi cemetery, site of the mausoleum of four Shi'a Imams (pictured), was leveled to the ground by Wahhabis in both the early 19th and early 20th centuries? Yoninah (talk) 22:03, 18 October 2016 (UTC)

@Yoninah: Thanks for the review. I added the citations, the most important issue you had raised. However, both of your suggestions are vague in my opinion; Baqi is not home only to the bodies of the four Shia Imams while your hook gives us such a wrong impression and I don't know why we'd better use vague century instead of using accurate years. --Mhhossein ^talk 05:50, 19 October 2016 (UTC)

@Mhhossein: thank you for adding the cites. Regarding the two points about the hook:

Your original hook seems to indicate that the pictured mausoleum is the cemetery. The article lead, though, describes a graveyard that is far bigger. That's why I suggested "site of the mausoleum" – that doesn't mean the mausoleum is the only thing there, but that it's one of the things there. Though if the whole place was demolished, maybe it should be written "former site of the mausoleum".
A hook should be crisp, not vague. We also round off numbers (a 4.2-mile-long stretch might be called "4 mile-long", and a child of 2 1/2 was recently called a "2-year-old"). I agree that the actual years sound better, but maybe we could drop the parenthetical year?

Yoninah (talk) 15:34, 19 October 2016 (UTC)

@Yoninah: You're welcome. "site of the mausoleum" was a good point and you're right about that; that does not mean "the mausoleum is the only thing there." The whole place were demolished. I have no prblem with removing the year in parenthesis. So the following should be OK:

ALT2b: ... that al-Baqi cemetery, former site of the mausoleum of four Shi'a Imams (pictured), was leveled to the ground by Wahhabis in 1806 and 1925 (or 1926)?

--Mhhossein ^talk 19:11, 19 October 2016 (UTC)

@Mhhossein: thanks for understanding. Did you mean:
ALT2c: ... that al-Baqi cemetery, former site of the mausoleum of four Shi'a Imams (pictured), was leveled to the ground by Wahhabis in 1806 and 1925? Yoninah (talk) 21:41, 19 October 2016 (UTC)

Yoninah: Exactly! Sorry I forgot to remove the parenthesis. --Mhhossein ^talk 05:30, 20 October 2016 (UTC)

@Yoninah and Mhhossein: I can hardly believe that you are both happy with the ALT2c hook after the discussion of this nomination on the DYK discussion page. The 1925 date for the second demolition is unclear and the article still states that it took place in 1926. I've already been as good as accused of lying over this issue. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 05:46, 20 October 2016 (UTC)

It was a bad faith toward you, I think. However, I thought it could be just visually nicer to remove that parenthesis. --Mhhossein ^talk 06:05, 20 October 2016 (UTC)

@Cwmhiraeth:, @Mhhossein: what do you think about rounding off just the second date?
ALT2d: ... that al-Baqi cemetery, former site of the mausoleum of four Shi'a Imams (pictured), was leveled to the ground by Wahhabis in 1806 and in the mid-1920s? Yoninah (talk) 09:51, 20 October 2016 (UTC)

@Yoninah: To be honest, I enjoyed the suggestion. Thanks. --Mhhossein ^talk 10:32, 20 October 2016 (UTC)

Approving ALT2d and striking all the other hooks. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 11:17, 20 October 2016 (UTC)