Talk:Trojan War/Archive 4

message: By now the text should be complete as of mythology. I haven't added all references yet, but I will perhaps tommorow. I have not been able to find original references for some thing I wrote that I discovered on secoundary sources. I will add a subsection here pointing which lines they are.
I'd love to add a section on the Trojan War according to some writers of the imperial era in which the Trojans won. When I discover this text I will. I intend to add 2 or 3 more paragraphs on the historicity section, one on the political situation according to Hittite sources and one on tactics. Then I'll put this up for peer review so that we can have more people coomenting, and just us three...Ikokki 12:46, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  References and form 

message: One would think that after 200+ references the whole work would be complete. It is not. Generally I used the resources at Perseus, at theoi.com and at OMACL for referencing, which is why most are to Apollodorus or Proclus. I am aware that they are very repetitive and inconsistent at times, Proclus' work is described at Chrestomathy, Chrestomatheia or Chrestomathia and since it is on paragraph 2 that most of the Epic Cycle is summarized there is conflicting referencing there. I chose Greek and early references rather than Roman and late but I was not able to find references for these:
* Eris attended invisibly the marriage of Peleus. All 15 or so original sources at theoi.com have her stopped at the door. However I've seen this in secondary sources
* Helen chose her suitor. For Apollodorus it was her father. Most secondary sources (say Shakespeare) have Helen in order to make it more dramatic.
* Achilles was destined to either die young and far in a battlefield or insignificantly and old home. Theoi.com even has a a quote from the Iliad without saying book,line
* Aias the Great campaigns. The reference that I put was from a classical dictionarry
More may come laterIkokki 10:54, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: References

message: I think this article will remain one of the biggest in Wikipedia despite removing the suitors' list to the Helen article, reducing fall of Troy quotation and removing Agamemnon. BTW I have yet to read a Greek writer that accepts a Proto-Indo-European interpretation for the origin of Greek myths (and thus the Trojan War). On the other hand I have read several certifiable nuts that believe in a pre-Columbian America connection to the Greek myths and interpret them that way, for example the Wandering Rocks of the Argonauts being Fulton Bay. Most modern Greek writers interpret myths like Kakridis, which I must say is not a naive theory. If naivette is to be attributed here attribute it to me, for naively writting here his arguementsIkokki 16:32, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Now it is 73kbs

message: Proclus' work is usually referred to as the Chrestomathy in English. However, when works of scholarship refer to Proclus' summary of the epic Cycle, they don't follow the format currently used here (Proclus, Chrestomathy 1). Instead, they refer to fragments as published by a particular editor, e.g. Kypria fr. 4 (Bernabé). This works reasonably well for specialist works, but doesn't seem appropriate for WP. So, I propose that we preface the summary of the myths by saying something like "The following summary follows the order of events given in Proclus' summary of the epic cycle, supplemented with details drawn from other authors." Since we make it clear at the beginning that Proclus is our main source, we won't need to refer to him in footnotes, which will shorten the notes section quite a bit and eliminate some of the superscripts that are peppering the main text. --Akhilleus (talk) 06:27, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Being on vacation I have been unable to work on this though I intended to do this yesterday. In the Wikipedia language if you wish to reference constantly at one source you use:  reference here   and then just using the name you get everywhere the same number. I've already done it here with Karykas who, if you notice at the bottom, always gets the same number no matter what everybody else gets. I'll do the same with Proclus as soon as I can. And BTW I am somewhat aware of Homeric scholarship since this was part of the school curiculum. I cannot claim though to be fully aware.Ikokki 11:15, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  References again 

message: I changed it to this:
:The war sprang from a quarrel between the goddesses Athena, Hera and Aphrodite, after the goddess Eris gave them a golden apple with the inscription "to the fairest." The goddesses went to Paris, who judged that Aphrodite, as the "fairest", should receive the apple. In exchange, Aphrodite made Helen, the most beautiful of all women, fall in love with Paris, who took her to Troy.
It seems good to include the golden apple, since it's well-known. I also didn't like the old wording, since Paris wasn't exactly "forced" to judge between the three goddesses--in fact, in some versions, he is the judge because he is famed for making good judgments. (Obviously that all goes downhill once he chooses Aphrodite). I would welcome a rewrite, though, since I think the lead section is still short of what it should be. --Akhilleus (talk) 07:17, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  2nd para of lead section 

message: Please be careful when using the "" syntax, Since leaving off the ending "/" will cause the remaining text to be "swallowed" utill a following "</ref>" is found. For example the following text:
:Some preceeding text. PC1 Among the loot from these cities was Briseis who was awarded to him and Chryseis who was awarded to Agamemnon. Achilles captured Lycaon, son of Priam<ref>Apollodorus, Library 3.12.5 while he was cutting branches in his father's orchards. Patroclus sold him a slave in Lemnos  where he was bought by Eetion of Imbros and brought back to Troy. Only 12 days later Achilles slew him again (after the death of Patroclus).<ref> Iliad Φ 35-155
produces:
:Some preceeding text. PC1 Among the loot from these cities was Briseis who was awarded to him and Chryseis who was awarded to Agamemnon. Achilles captured Lycaon, son of Priam<ref>Apollodorus, Library 3.12.5 while he was cutting branches in his father's orchards. Patroclus sold him a slave in Lemnos  where he was bought by Eetion of Imbros and brought back to Troy. Only 12 days later Achilles slew him again (after the death of Patroclus).<ref> Iliad Φ 35-155
S
uch an error can be very difficult to spot. I've come across this error three times now, in this article.
Paul August ☎ 18:40, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Be careful with <nowiki>"<ref name=xxx/>"</nowiki> syntax

message: I wrote the reformatting in a hurry a few days ago, and missed a few spots. I intended to do it carefully at the university but work cropped up. If you put up    it has the same effect. Sorry for the sloppiness, alas I've got greater priorities and the political situation does not helpIkokki 13:55, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Notes

message: Be careful to not copy text from sources, without quoting. Recently, in the section "Penthesilea and the death of Achilles", referring to Memnon's arrival at Troy, I came across this bit of text:
:He came not directly from Ethiopia but either from Susa in Persia and from the river Choaspes, having subdued all the peoples that lived between these and Troy, or …
The reference cited was Pausanias 10.31.7. The text above was clearly copied from Jones' translation, given on the Perseus cite as:
:"He came to Troy, however, not from Ethiopia, but from Susa in Persia and from the river Choaspes, having subdued all the peoples that lived between these and Troy." 
If our text was meant to be a quote, then we forgot to add quotes. If rather it was meant to be a paraphrase, then it was still too close to the original. I have now reworded this passage as follows:
:He did not come directly from Ethiopia, but either from Susa in Persia, conquering all the peoples in between, or …
Paul August ☎ 18:03, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Be careful to not copy text from sources, without quoting 

message: As I say above, the footnotes for this article ought to follow the conventions of classical scholarship. I do not think that references of the form "^ IKakridis (1988), Vol. I." are helpful. If I want to verify that Kakridis thinks the Cyclic Epics were composed in the 7th-6th century BC, I don't want to read through all of volume 1, especially since my modern Greek isn't very good. Specific page numbers, please! --Akhilleus (talk) 05:52, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sorry! It's just that I don't have a copy of Kakridis available right now. He says that due to their timing (Kypria ends right before the Iliad and the Aethiopis right after) they were probably written after the Iliad though this is not a very satisfactory supposition. The real gem in volume 1 is that using example from Serb legends about the battle of Kossovo and an Albanian epic poem composed in the 1920's (and recorded by that American which demonstrated that balkan epic singer remembered huge poems) that epic poetry is an unreliable source for historical events. When I get access this book again I'll put up both references with page numbers Ikokki 20:34, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

text: No offence taken. I do try to cite English language sources but alas they only one I own is Graves (which I cite by chapter). Kakridis along with his student Maronitis are the only Φιλόλογοι of the 20th century that managed to gain popular fame in Greece. [Volume 1 for sale at Papasoteriou], if you wish ISBN is 9602131535 but I doubt that you could find it at Amazon.com since amazon does not sell Greek books (search Papasoteriou or Protoporia for them)Ikokki 21:59, 23 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Notes again

message: Compare this passage from the "Prophesies" section:
:After his the death his brothers Helenus and Deiphobus quarrelled as to which of them should marry Helen. Deiphobus was preferred and married her against her will. Helenus left Troy and abode in Mt. Ida. But as Chalcas said that Helenus knew the oracles that protected the city, Odysseus waylaid and captured him and brought him to the camp.
with Frazer's translation of Appollodorus:
:After the death of Alexander, Helenus and Deiphobus quarrelled as to which of them should marry Helen; and as Deiphobus was preferred, Helenus left Troy and abode in Ida. But as Chalcas said that Helenus knew the oracles that protected the city, Ulysses waylaid and captured him and brought him to the camp.
Our passage was obviously copied from the above passage from Frazer. Such copying is not allowed!
Ikokki, I think you added this, I think you also added the text I mentioned above at "Be careful to not copy text from sources, without quoting". I don't think you meant to be deceitful in any way, and I'm assuming this was an accident, or that you are unaware that copying like this is wrong. But you need to understand that such copying is unacceptable. I now think that Ikokki, and the rest of us need to examine all of the text for problems like this.
Paul August ☎ 02:48, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I never intended to be decietfull and tried to change the wording if I was copying from sources. Aparently I was not sucsessfull at time. Ikokki 10:28, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I never though you were ;-) Paul August ☎ 15:14, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

text: I found another three passages that were not sufficiently different from Frazier and changed them. I'll try more later Ikokki 11:21, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks Ikokki, for looking back at some of your additions. As I said above we should probably check the whole article. Also please understand that just changing a few words, or even phrases, to synonyms, is not really the right way to fix things. Rather the correct procedure, is to read the sources, internalize what they have to say, then write in our own words, in our own style. I know this can be very difficult, especially for a non-native reader and writer of English, (which I'm guessing you are). I will have a look at the passages you've identified and see how I might rewrite them. Just to be clear, I think you are making very valuable contributions to this article, so please do continue with your efforts. Paul August ☎ 15:14, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Serious problem: Copying from sources