# Talk:PY Ta 641

This review is transcluded from Talk:PY Ta 641/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.
Reviewer: Ealdgyth (talk · contribs) 15:40, 24 February 2024 (UTC)
I'll get to this in the next few days. Ealdgyth (talk) 15:40, 24 February 2024 (UTC)

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)
It is reasonably well written.
a (prose, spelling, and grammar):  b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists): 

It is factually accurate and verifiable.
a (reference section):  b (inline citations to reliable sources):  c (OR):  d (copyvio and plagiarism): 

It is broad in its coverage.
a (major aspects):  b (focused): 

It follows the neutral point of view policy.
Fair representation without bias: 

It is stable.
No edit wars, etc.: 

It is illustrated by images and other media, where possible and appropriate.
a (images are tagged and non-free content have non-free use rationales):  b (appropriate use with suitable captions): 

Overall:
Pass/Fail: 

I randomly googled three phrases and only turned up Wikipedia mirrors. Earwig's tool shows no sign of copyright violation.
Spotchecks:
"The tablet was found in what Blegen called the "chasm", an area at the edge of the Archives Complex filled with loose earth and stones which he considered had once been a wall, dismantled at some point between the medieval and modern period." is sourced to this source p. 63 which supports the information
"Dimitri Nakassis has suggested that this may have been a feast to celebrate or commemorate Augēwās's appointment" is sourced to this source p. 17 which supports the information
"Ventris' announcement was largely met with scepticism from the scholarly community" is sourced to this source p. 1 which supports the information.
Images:
File:Palace of Nestor reconstruction.jpg - I have some concerns about this image. In some countries - 3D works that are still copyrighted cannot have photographs of them that are copyright free - do we know the status of the item being photographed here?
I think you're right: Greece doesn't have Freedom of Panorama. I'm going to try and make my own plan of the Palace of Nestor: I'm just discussing this with another editor who knows a lot more than I do about copyright. I've commented the image out for now, as I'll probably reuse most of the caption and its references when I put in the new version.  UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:25, 4 March 2024 (UTC)
General:
Per MOS:DOUBLE I believe uses of things like "known to scholarship as 'Hand 2' and" should be "known to scholarship as "Hand 2" and". I fixed the first one but the others should probably be fixed before going to FAC for sure (and just fixed because if you care about not making the MOS-geeks freak out)
I think these are all sorted now.  UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:36, 4 March 2024 (UTC)
Lead:
"such as paper, parchment or" ... parchment was developed around the second-century BCE, and paper wasn't developed until around 100 CE... so I don't think they transferred things to either of those.
Done.  UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:38, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
Not required for GA, but suggest rewording "accidentally fired when the Palace of Nestor was destroyed by fire " to eliminate the "fired...fire" repetition
Fixed.  UndercoverClassicist T·C 13:37, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
Production:
"It is unclear how far the writers of Linear B tablets made the tablets themselves" perhaps "It is unclear how involved the writers of Linear B tablets were in making the tablets themselves"
I've gone for something slightly different (I'm not sure how you can be partially involved in making a tablet): It is unclear whether the writers of Linear B tablets made the tablets themselves. I think that leaves open the possibility that some did and some didn't.
"smaller, wider palm-leaf tablets" suggest "and palm-leaf tablets, which are shaped much like the long leaves of palm trees" because "smaller, wider" is not how I would describe the shape of this tablet judging from the infobox picture - I'd describe it as long and narrow, actually.
A matter of perspective, perhaps: the key thing is that page-shaped tablets have more lines, vertically, whereas palm-leaf tablets have much less text overall, much fewer lines and somewhat longer lines. To me, "long" in relation to a page or document is measured from top to bottom: happy to keep working on this one but I think describing the palm-leaf ones as "long" is going to create confusion.  UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:38, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
"It has been suggested that their contents were, in normal circumstances, transferred to other materials such as papyrus or parchment for long-term storage." is sourced to Judson 2020 p. 14, which is here at Internet Archive but ... I cannot find any discussion of this on p. 14. And there is no mention of parchment or papyrus in the entire dissertation. Likewise, "Those Linear B tablets which survive today were accidentally burned during the destruction of the palace in which they happened to be:" is sourced to the same page, but the pdf I get through Internet Archive isn't supporting this information. And this problem also shows up with the citations to Judson 2020 p. 13. Pages 13 and 14 of the pdf I accessed are discussing the minutiae of word signs, nothing about Pylos or the actual tablets. I also checked "These were the first Linear B tablets discovered on the mainland of Greece; all previous finds had taken place on Crete" which is sourced to Judson 2020 pp. 6-7 which also does not support it - at least if I'm accessing the correct dissertation? From this site on Cambridge it appears that the dissertation was published ... later? And that the archived link in the bibliography here is wrong? Ah, yes - I see that the Wayback archive link is to the dissertation that the actual published book was likely based on but is not the same. So I see that they do say "parchment" in the actual book but ... again, I've always heard (and our own wiki article backs this up) that parchment did not get developed as a specific process until the Hellenistic age. I suspect that here the source is really meaning "animal skins" ... I suggest that we do not here (or above) get specific about anything other than papyrus - "to other objects such as papyrus or similar perishable writing materials for long-term storage"
There's a Citation Bot problem here: it keeps adding the free link to the dissertation. I'll raise a query with its operators. Still to do on acting on that. Done on the papyrus and parchment, which I think is the key thing for this article. UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:25, 4 March 2024 (UTC)
Interpretation:
"as a provincial governor (Linear B da-mo-ko-ro, Ancient Greek: δαμοκόρος, romanized: damokoros)." do we really need the Linear B/Ancient Greek/Romanized) bit here? I get it for the name but... it seems not needed here, especially as we don't do it for the wanax/king bit above.
I've bumped them into footnotes here. There is a good reason to have the steps in the reasoning for some of these terms (that the jump between syllabograms and actual pronunciation requires a bit of reconstruction work, which isn't always universally agreed upon), but it doesn't have to clog up the main text.  UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:36, 4 March 2024 (UTC)
"in other Pylian Linear B tablets" are there other types of writing tablets at Pylos? If not, I suggest dropping "Linear B" here in the interest of concision
Done.  UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:38, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
"The record of tablets of "Cretan workmanship" indicates" ... the translation says the Cretan workmanship items were tripods - did you get your brain stuck on "tablets" and just keep typing it? (I say that because .. .I've never ever ever done anything similar, no no, not me....)
Almost certainly: fixed.  UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:25, 4 March 2024 (UTC)
Discovery:
"Bill McDonald, who was supervising the digging, spent several days along with Blegen excavating them by hand, receiving his director's tribute in the excavation write-up for his "circumspection, perseverance and long-suffering in spending so many days on his hands and knees in positions of extreme discomfort."" While I'm sure it was good that McDonald received praise for this - since it isn't really connected to the discovery of this tablet - this seems like a digression that could be cut rather than distract the reader from the subject of the article.
I've cut from receiving
"Upon discovery, it was coated in lime, stored in a locked box and transported in late July to Athens." THe "upon discovery, it was coated in lime" confused me in connection with the rest of the sentence, since I read it as "the tablet was discovered covered in lime". Suggest "After discovery, as part of the conservation process the table was covered in lime and later moved to Athens." as I'm not sure what the bit about being stored in a locked box tells us
I've gone with After being excavated, it was coated in lime, stored in a locked box...: the locked box is important because it's vitally important later on that Ventris could not have seen the tablet before publishing his decipherment, although people like Beattie claimed that he had.  UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:38, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
Role in the decipherment of Linear B
The first two sections are WAY too detailed for an article on a specific tablet. Ideally, you'd have one or two sentences ... something like "Linear B was first identified as a writing system by Arthur Evans, who found the first Linear B tablets in 1900 at Knossos. He found further tablets and in 1935 published a selection of the tablets which allowed serious decipherment efforts to begin." and then add first two sentences of the last paragraph of "Decipherment"  as well the last two sentences of that paragraph.
Still to do.  UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:38, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
And done.  UndercoverClassicist T·C 13:48, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
Sorry for the delay - unexpectedly the husband came home last week and ... well, he gets pissy if I bury my head in wiki stuff while he's home (He's an over-the-road trucker, so he's out on the road for some weeks, then home usually for 3-7 days... when he's home, I tend to focus on him and house/farm tasks)
I've put the article on hold for seven days to allow folks to address the issues I've brought up. Feel free to contact me on my talk page, or here with any concerns, and let me know one of those places when the issues have been addressed. If I may suggest that you strike out, check mark, or otherwise mark the items I've detailed, that will make it possible for me to see what's been addressed, and you can keep track of what's been done and what still needs to be worked on. Ealdgyth (talk) 20:09, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
This all looks very wise: thank you for your time and comments. I'll probably get to them piecemeal over the next few days.  UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:25, 4 March 2024 (UTC)
@Ealdgyth: I think everything that specifically refers to this article is done: I still need to raise the error report with Citation Bot, but that's a slightly separate matter.  UndercoverClassicist T·C 13:51, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
I'm just getting up ... will check this over after I eat breakfast. (Ah, the joys of working for yourself... you eat breakfast and no commute .. off to your desk you go in ten steps or less...) Ealdgyth (talk) 13:56, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
these look good, passing this now. Ealdgyth (talk) 15:02, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
Thank you for your time and comments -- a pleasure working with you.  UndercoverClassicist T·C 19:00, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

The article uses this phrase a couple of times. Should it be tripod cauldrons?©Geni (talk) 11:52, 26 March 2024 (UTC)

The text of the tablet reads "tripods" (lit: "things with three legs"): it's generally understood to be vessels like the one in the image, and indeed the ideograms show something with a bowl/cauldron as well as legs. It should be said that WP:HQRS overwhelmingly use "tripod" here: I haven't seen any use "tripod cauldrons". UndercoverClassicist T·C 12:32, 26 March 2024 (UTC)