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Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Seri Rambai/archive1

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by Ian Rose via FACBot (talk) 23:11, 30 November 2016 [1].

Seri Rambai

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Nominator(s): Singora (talk) 12:31, 4 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

This article is about the Seri Rambai, a historic cannon displayed at Fort Cornwallis, George Town, Penang. In 2013 the Sunday Times began a feature about Penang with the comment "Cannons don’t often have names, but the Seri Rambai, on the walls of Fort Cornwallis, is something rather special". Singora (talk) 12:31, 4 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment I was confused by the suggestion that the gun was made of brass. A little digging suggests that "brass" is a naval term for bronze, a different alloy. (Brass is copper and zinc, bronze is copper and tin. Neither has a fixed recipe.). Could this be clarified one way or the other for us simple folk unfamiliar with seventeenth century ordnance? Mr Stephen (talk) 21:50, 6 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Reply Ha! I understand your confusion.The deal here is that bronze cannon (and I believe bronze ordnance in general) were always referred to as brass cannon or brass guns. A couple of years back I wrote a Featured Article about an obscure sultanate in the deep south of Thailand. The sultan's cannon made a long journey from Singora to Ayuthaya to Mandalay, and is now displayed next to the flagpole in the grounds of London's Royal Chelsea Hospital. In an article published in the Journal of the Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, the cannon is described as "brass". In an another article published in the same journal the author somewhat pedantically points out that the gun is in fact made of bronze.
No particular preference on my part, just a clarifying footnote saying pretty much what you have written above. Thanks for the info & pic. Mr Stephen (talk) 21:21, 7 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Noted added: The seri Rambai is actually made of bronze, an alloy of copper and tin, but like most bronze artillery pieces is commonly referred to as a brass cannon or brass gun. A cannon displayed next to the flagpole at the Royal Hospital Chelsea shows how this differing terminology can lead to confusion: while the gun is labelled "Brass Cannon (Siamese)", an article published in the Journal of the Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society points out that it is in fact made of bronze. Singora (talk) 03:45, 8 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Image review

The last sentence of para 1 in lead could be classed as a tad informal, but I do think it livens up the text and makes it more engaging (and made me chuckle) so I think it is a significant net positive.
....and left for several years before being coaxed ashore by a Selangor nobleman. - what they had to ask the cannon nicely to come in from the sea...?
I'll go over what the sources say.
1. Journal of the Malayan Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (JMBRAS), 1948: "Here we must follow the Selangor tale. The gun was thrown overboard opposite the esplanade, and lay in the water until about 1880, when it was hauled up and mounted on a carriage. The account is embroidered by a report that it refused to come out of the water until Tunku Kudin, who had retired from his appointment as Viceroy of Selangor, came to their assistance. He tied a piece of thread to the cannon, which at once floated in obedience to the orders of the Selangor chief."
2. JMBRAS, 1952: "According to a Selangor legend recounted by Douglas, the gun was thrown overboard on the Pluto's arrival in Penang, and left in the water for about ten years. Then it was hauled up and mounted on a carriage, as it stands to this day. The first attempts to raise it from the water are said to have been unsuccessful, and help was sought from Tengku Kudin, who had by then retired from Selangor and taken up residence in Penang. He tied a length of cotton thread to the gun, which thereupon floated in obedience to the orders of the Selangor chief." Singora (talk) 04:11, 9 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
ok I'll pay that. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 09:44, 9 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Until the 1950s the cannon was exhibited on Penang's Esplanade - wondering why Esplanade is italicised here.
I think this might be a mistake. I'll change it. Singora (talk) 04:11, 9 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Reads well overall and strikes me as having the right amount of background for context. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:51, 8 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Dank

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  • @Dank. Do you know the term for this point of grammar:
    • "his contributions to British archaeology have been widely acclaimed, with some referring to him as ....."
    • "His arrival at the OS generated some resentment, with co-workers often seeing his post as superfluous"
    • "Previously Crawford had assisted Keiller in campaigning to prevent a radio mast being erected on Windmill Hill, with Keiller later purchasing the hill"
    • "Although designed to have an international scope, Antiquity exhibited a clear bias towards the archaeology of Britain, with its release coinciding with the blossoming of British archaeology"
    • "He refused to publish an advert for Watkins, with Watkins becoming very bitter towards him"
  • These and more examples are taken from the FAC nomination: O.G.S. Crawford. I'm sure the grammar here is wrong. Is it? Singora (talk) 18:50, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Comments (Brianboulton)

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There are several issues:

  • Links: MoS guidelines disapprove linking major geographical entities such as countries, e.g. Malaysia. Also some of the links here may confuse general readers. For example, the link on "Siamese capital" takes us to "Ayutthaya Kingdom", apparently a quite different entity.
    • *@Brianboulton. Sorry it's taken a while to get back to you; I've just finished reviewing CasLIber's article and that piece about the Northampton war memorial. Yes, "Siamese capital" links to Ayutthaya Kingdom rather than Ayuthaya since the latter contains little historical perspective and describes the city simply as the former capital of Ayuthaya province. The situation here is far from ideal as neither article is especially good, but the Ayuthaya Kingdom article does include this (accurate) sentence in its lead "in the sixteenth century, it was described by foreign traders as one of the biggest and wealthiest cities in the East". Singora (talk) 17:30, 2 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Sunday Times comment: Rather trivial and hardly leadworthy. If you do keep it in the lead, the direct quotation needs a citation.
  • "Dr Gibson-Hill": Use his full name, not the academic title, per MOS:CREDENTIAL
  • For clarity I'd use "inches" or "in.", rather than ""
  • "28-pounder": A pipelink thus, 28-pounder might be informative
  • What entity is being described as "Holland"? As far as I know the polity at the start of the 17thC was the Dutch Republic, and "Holland" has never been the country's name (other than during Napoleon's short-lived puppet kingdom).
  • principle" → "principal" I imagine.
  • There's a rather large gap in the narrative, between 1613 and 1795. Maybe nothing noteworthy happened in this time, but a linking sentence of some sort, covering the hiatus, should connect the eras.
  • "Almost thirty years later [i.e. about 1825] a British East India Company official visited Selangor and recounted a bizarre tale about a white snake said to be living inside the gun's barrel". This information seems devoid of context and I'm not sure what to make of it.

Brianboulton (talk) 11:14, 20 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

It's a concern that I missed several of these things. I'll go back through the other articles I copyedited on the same day to see if I was having a bad day. - Dank (push to talk) 17:27, 20 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Fine, but these are mainly not copyediting issues. Brianboulton (talk) 13:12, 21 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
@Brianboulton. Hey Brian -- thanks for the feedback / suggestions. I'll reply in full later this week. Singora (talk) 06:07, 25 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Support subject to sources review. Handle my few outstanding points as you see fit. The article is very nicely presented and illustrated. Brianboulton (talk) 13:42, 4 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

@Brianboulton

Thanks for helping out. I've deleted the Sunday Times quote from the lead and added a linking sentence as per your suggestion. I've asked user WEHWALT to do a source review. I did one for him a while back and will happily do another for his current FAC nomination if/when required. Singora (talk) 13:56, 7 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

PS. I still need to finish my review for the Northampton War Memorial article. I'll try to do that tomorrow. Singora (talk) 13:56, 7 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

PPS. Actually I probably won't finish the review tomorrow as I'll be watching Trump thrash Clinton. Singora (talk) 13:58, 7 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Source review All sources appear to be of encyclopedic quality and are consistently cited. I make the following comments:

@Wehwalt

Thanks. I've edited that Isranews source and added OCLC refs to the three books without ISBNs. Singora (talk) 18:02, 13 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Drive by comment

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  • Under the "Citations" section, the ref for "Replica Cannon Bombed Nine Days after its Installation" is throwing up a cite ref error; it also shows an error beside the listing under "Newspapers / News Agencies". SagaciousPhil - Chat 11:43, 15 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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