Talk:Ormulum

message: Order of C17th ownership: currently the article states "it was purchased first by Franz Junius and then Jan van Vliet, both Dutch antiquarians. It came to the Bodleian library as part of the Junius donation". I don't have anything that discusses the MS history ATM, but that looks odd to me. IIRC Junius acquired it from van Vliet's library after the latter's death - had he owned it previously too? Haeleth 22:06, 19 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Your version makes more sense, but I did get the information from a source (that Medieval Encyclopedia, I believe), and its sentence structure said that Junius and van Vliet owned it successively.  That, of course, is one of those sentences that people write when they don't want to give the specifics, and it's fully possible (likely, even) that the author there got it wrong.  We all know what fudging looks like, but, when I was making my notes, I didn't have reason to look closely.  However, how it came to be the "Junius donation" when it wasn't Junius's has been bothering me some.  We can fudge, too, or just put it right.  Feel free.  (You were also right about the thorn/eth.)  Geogre 22:57, 19 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Queries

message: It looks ready to me.  Barring objection, I'll nominate it for FA tomorrow.  Or, if you'd prefer to nominate it, Haeleth, I'll gladly give place.  The point is, this is now a very, very good looking article on a very ugly book.  Geogre 18:57, 22 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: And now it is done.  We wish ourselves good luck, I'm sure, and intelligent readers. Geogre 02:52, 23 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Orm the Ready? 

message: I can't believe this article is featured, as it is almost completely without references to credible sources, therefore I added a reference tag. Also, it has many subjective wording which should be altered. Some examples:
:"While some scholars have held that the likely origin is Elsham Priory in north Lincolnshire, recently it has been widely accepted that Orm wrote in the Arrouaisian Bourne Abbey" - which scholars? widely accepted by whom? sources please!
:"The date of composition is impossible to pinpoint." - again, references to sources please. Is this the author's opinion, or established fact?
:"The parchment used in the manuscript is of the lowest quality, and the text itself is written untidily" - NPOV, anyone?
Also, who is this J.A.W. Bennett guy? He's the mentioned various times as authoritive, but there's no Wikipedia page on him.
Jalwikip 09:21, 25 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's not my ignorance that is astounding: clearly you do not know the rules of Wikipedia. I cited a list of weasel words and NPOV violations present in the article, that are without clear reference. You just dismiss those. And no, I do not want to Google for anything when I'm reading Wikipedia, the knowledge should be right here. And no, I did not study Middle English, Anglo Saxon or whatever, as you clearly did - do you mean to say I should in order to understand the merrits of your prose? This article was at the time I wrote my comment (I haven't checked it since), of very bad quality, using the weasel words and NPOV wording I spelled out, and void of any clear in-line references. If you think otherwise, it's you who is blatently ignorant (not on the subject, no doubt, but of Wikipedia guidelines in general). Jalwikip (talk) 14:19, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

text: Here is some help for the befuddled.  Bennett had a very, very long career of masterful and careful scholarship.  In addition to multiple surveys of ME lit, he put together the standard OUP anthology of Early Middle English Poetry and Prose.  Anyone studying eME, which is what the Ormulum is, has to hit him, if one is studying the general shape of the language and literature.  It would have been mighty nice if, instead of throwing tags around without discussion, one took the time to read carefully and do even perfunctory searches.  As for whether Bennett needs a Wikipedia article or not, I should expect that he was not the sort of man vain enough to wish for nor the kind of lightweight scholar who would need an article on him.  He served nobly in a neglected field.  Geogre 21:03, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: What I said above also stands here: I do not need to do 'perfunctory searches' if reading a Wikipedia article. My ignorance on J.A.W. Benett may be befuddling for those knowing him and having studied him, but I bet that 99.99999% of Wikipedia visitors do not know him. So at the very least, a short introductory remark the first time he is introduced between parentheses would be nice. And of course I did not 'throw around' a tag because if the Benett guy, but because of the many weasel words and lack of in-line references. Jalwikip (talk) 14:19, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

text: Ah, that's why Bentley has an article and Bennett doesn't.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.255.154.111 (talk) 21:58, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

text: In defense of that anyway, one can argue that Bentley was discussed and battled against, so we need an article on him.  Without knowledge of him, a fair number of jokes from 18th c. lit. fall flat, and several publishing trends get harder to understand, and the "Quarrel of the Ancients and the Moderns" has a hole in it.  Because JAW Bennett is not raising ire, gall, or eyebrows, one supposes that there is less need for an article on him.  When he becomes a figure of fun in a Martin Amiss novel, we'll have need.  Geogre 10:19, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's even more mysterious, then.  I wonder if our user up there is doing WP:POINT or just a parody?  Geogre 10:19, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sources 

message: Someone has written, in the section on "Significance," "It also demonstrates what would become Received Standard English two centuries before Chaucer (Burchfield)."  Now, not having access to the Burchfield source, I of course have no idea what he actually said that was referred to here.  However, is it exactly right to specify Received Standard English here?  Orm's English probably didn't take a direct line to Received Standard English -- surely it became other Englishes as well?  Or perhaps it died out completely and RSE is a descendant of another English?  It seems a little beside-the-point to specify Received Standard English in this case, especially when Linguists value all dialects equally, and they're the ones to whom the Ormulum is most valuable as a source of information. Julie90043 (talk) 02:28, 17 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: It's exactly what Burchfield said.  I have doubts as well.  I don't see a direct path, either, and I was stretching slightly for significance to avoid making Ormulum seem purely a philological curio.  However, in Burchfield's defense, since his is also the very penetrating insight that the MSS may be in terrible paper because it was a draft/working copy, I would suppose that the argument is that, in comparison to the dialects we see in Agenbite of Inwitte or Ancrene Wisse, we are seeing the Midlands language that becomes the dominant RC.  I.e., "If you want to see the branch of the tree that became ModE, the step behind Chaucer is this," I guess.  In documentary evidence, he's probably right.  Still, of all the claims in the article, that was the one that I felt least persuaded by myself.  -- The Author (deceased)  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.186.127.134 (talk) 17:34, 17 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Historical Linguistics 

message: The introduction to the article claims that the Ormulum employs a 'phonetic orthography', yet the description of it that comes later makes it sound like it's a (roughly) phonemic orthography. Can anyone clarify which it is? Dougg (talk) 05:42, 17 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Orthography: phonetic or phonemic?

message: This diff  shows two different approaches to the explanation of what Orm's motivation was.   (Really this needs better sourcing as well, but that is a separate issue.)
I think I understand to some extent what is being said, but it needs further clarification.  I don't think the clergy would be unable to *transliterate* Latin to Middle English, as such.  Is *translate* what is meant?
I do wonder if that is also unclear.  Would clergy, even low-ranking clergy, of the period, be unable to either "navigate" or translate (understand) Latin?  Perhaps the meaning is rather that they were not supposed to - or allowed to - translate the Bible directly from Latin into English in this period.  Whichever way it is, it should be made clearer.
It would be great to get this fixed while the article is featured on the front page, as at present this passage is somewhat confusing for the newcomer.  --Demiurge1000 (talk) 08:35, 17 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Perhaps what is meant is this: "The motivation was to provide an accessible English text for the benefit of the less educated Englishmen, which might include some clergy who found it difficult to understand the Latin of the Vulgate Bible, and the parishioners who in most cases would not understand spoken Latin at all. "  Thoughts? --Demiurge1000 (talk) 08:53, 17 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: OK I have gone ahead and put that in place. If that's not really what it means, please tell me.  As apparently completely unsourced speculation about the motivations of someone who died around 800 years ago, it may have to be deleted eventually anyway.  But for now at least, I think it makes better sense. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 12:15, 17 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Content and Style - Orm's motivation - needs clarification 

message: The following caption is awkward, it should be reworded:
The interior of the church of Bourne Abbey, where the Ormulum was composed: the two nave arcades, though now whitewashed, remain from the church Orm would have known.Smallman12q (talk) 11:48, 17 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Caption awkward 

message: Is it me, vandalism, or does the article literally not have a single inline reference as per WP:REF?Smallman12q (talk) 11:51, 17 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Correct, see above for the reasons. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 12:12, 17 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Inline Ref 

message: There are two different sources with "Bennett", cited in the Sources section. Which one is being referred to, when? Years are needed as well, in the in-line citations, please. Thanks. -- Cirt (talk) 23:43, 29 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Please do not remove these tags. There are two sources cited for "Bennett", so years and page numbers need to be given. -- Cirt (talk) 17:12, 3 October 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I was going to make a similar comment last night about this on the FAC but did not get round to it. Keith D (talk) 17:46, 3 October 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: The page-needed tag is invalid because the ref it's applied to already has page numbers. As for the dates - no, there are not two Bennett sources, there is one Bennett and one Bennett & Smithers. These are not the same, and therefore any ref called Bennett can only be the former - thus, dates are not needed for the purposes of identifying the source. Nikkimaria (talk) 17:57, 3 October 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Update: Page numbers appear to only now be needed for one Bennett cite. -- Cirt (talk) 04:14, 4 October 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Which Bennett ??? 

message: Copied from Wikipedia:Featured article review/Ormulum/archive1:
* Holt is available on Google Books. ODNB has an online edition, and the paper version is probably in most academic libraries - there's one in my local library, if we need it. Actually, my library has all of the sources, although a couple are 2-hour reference only - if you let me know exactly what it is that needs to be cited, I can probably manage it sometime in the next couple of days.  Nikkimaria (talk)
Nikkimaria has made a generous offer, and I suggest that we use this section to present text that we believe requires verification. Hopefully, Nikkimaria will be able to find the time to verify it and then note the source & page number on this page. That process should go a long way to ensuring the article meets the requirement for verification of text "which is likely to be challenged". Perhaps consensus then can be achieved on how that verification is integrated into the article (bearing in mind the comments in #Sources above). The aim is to improve the article in a constructive manner, so please try to be reasonable with demands on Nikkimaria's time. --RexxS (talk) 14:10, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Citing challenged text 

message: Is Joan Turville-Petre's "Studies on the Ormulum MS." Journal of English and German Philology 46(1) (January 1947), 1-27 worth a mention in the references/further reading section? 81.156.175.248 (talk) 09:25, 7 October 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd say use your judgement and be bold. If you know the article and found it useful, other readers may do also. I'd suggest adding a Further reading section between References and External links and placing it there (you can add a very short summary of it to the same line, if you wish). --RexxS (talk) 19:06, 7 October 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  References 

message: The caption for the image of the church interior says: "although now whitewashed, remain from the church Orm would have known". Is that a fact, that churches weren't whitewashed back then? Sculpted celtic crosses, like Muiredach's High Cross, are thought to have been painted, the Parthenon was painted. Were the interiors of churches just left plain in the time of Orm?--Brianann MacAmhlaidh (talk) 11:25, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: It's a slightly odd wording, but I think what it means is that the nave pillars are the same as the ones Orm would have been familiar with, albeit now whitewashed. One usually finds that the medieval pillars survive intact, but the rest of a church is extensively restored during the 19th century. Nearly all churches in England were whitewashed at the Reformation to cover over the "superstitous" coloured decoration/frescoes. It was about this time that the rood screens and so forth were destroyed during the reign of Edward VI. Further destruction of images, altar steps, stained glass, etc, was perpetrated during the protectorate. Rob (talk) 13:27, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Walls were usually plastered and painted, but I think columns could be either painted decoratively or left as plain stone. Johnbod (talk) 13:56, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Whitewash 

message: Does the figure of 19,000 lines refer to the whole work as planned (and maybe executed or maybe not), or does it refer to the surviving portion of the manuscript? The article doesn't really make this clear. -- 92.226.25.150 (talk) 09:42, 17 February 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  19000 lines in total, or preserved? 

message: The characters mentioned in Orthography were added in Unicode 14.0 in the Latin Extended-D block. These are upper and lowercase closed insular g (Ꟑ, ꟑ), lowercase double thorn (ꟓ), and lowercase double wynn (ꟕ). The latter two are used to indicate vowel length while the former represents the voiced velar plosive. Given this, I am of the opinion that they should be inserted into the Orthography section.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Count Cherokee (talk • contribs) 01:27, 5 June 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Orthography: Presence of characters in Unicode 

message: ꟕ redirects to Ormulum#Orthograpy, but there is no information about the letter in the orthography section of the article. ꟓ also until recently redirected the same way, but I edited it to redirect to Thorn (letter) as that page mentions both the double thorn, and that it is used in the Ormulum (while the page for wynn does not mention anything about double wynn except for its existence). I would recommend either more information about these letters to be added, or that they redirect elsewhere. Syollandre (talk) 10:52, 5 October 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: I think redirecting elsewhere would make more sense - did you have a particular target in mind? Nikkimaria (talk) 04:36, 6 October 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: Probably just redirect double-bowled wynn to Wynn, since i believe it is already listed on there as a variant of wynn Syollandre (talk) 06:49, 6 October 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Orthography: Lack of information about double thorn and double wynn 

message: This article uses a manual system of citations which (as discussed over a decade ago, above) predate the modern Wikipedia templates. They do not work well on mobile devices or with the visual editor, and a few of them are broken due to the manual coding. I would like to update the article with more modern and specific scholarship, as it is unnecessarily reliant on anthologies and encyclopedias, but it is unnecessarily laborious to adapt these to the article. Hence I would like first to update all the citations to the modern Wikipedia citation templates: please let me know if you have any objections. AndrewNJ (talk) 22:20, 20 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: Can you clarify what you see as being broken or not working well on mobile? I've checked both mobile and desktop and they seem to be working as expected. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:42, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: Because all the links are manual, a few of the links lead to the wrong citation in the references. On mobile for me, the footnotes are completely broken: one only sees the short reference, then if one clicks on the link to see the full version, the reader loses their place in the article. Neither of these behaviours happen with the standard Wikipedia citation templates. AndrewNJ (talk) 14:55, 25 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks - fixed the linking errors. I can't replicate the mobile behaviour however. Nikkimaria (talk) 02:18, 26 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you; I take it that you have no other concerns about changing the references to use citation templates? AndrewNJ (talk) 13:35, 28 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: On the contrary, with the errors fixed and without being able to replicate other concerns, I'm not seeing a reason to change the existing format. Changing what sources are used does not require changing how they are cited. Nikkimaria (talk) 13:59, 28 April 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: Could you please explain why you would like to keep the references in a format that is incompatible with the visual editor, and thus very difficult for editor to update or enhance? AndrewNJ (talk) 16:18, 17 May 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: I've checked the page in Visual Editor, and was able to successfully add a reference in the current format. Could you elaborate on what difficulties you're having with it? Nikkimaria (talk) 01:01, 18 May 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Fixing broken citations