Talk:Battle of Mauropotamos/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: ErrantX (talk · contribs) 12:39, 14 June 2012 (UTC) A short but decent article. I enjoyed reading it, and particularly liked how neatly it was tied into the historical context. A few extremely minor issues/clarifications and then I'd be happy to tag it Good Article:

• The Byzantine regent, Theoktistos, headed the Byzantine army that went to meet the Muslim raid, but was heavily defeated, and many Byzantine officers defected to the Arabs.
  • lots of "Byzantine"; Perhaps a reword?
  • "the Muslim raid"; needs context/explanation. Or switch "the" -> "a"
• Possibly include a brief sentence summarising the background as a second sentence in the lead
• This aggresive return; I'm not sure "return" is the right word here, doesn't seem to fit. Just a thought.
• Although the Arab sources do not make explicit mention of this campaign, Alexander Vasiliev identified it with the expedition, led by general Abu Sa'id, that is recorded in the poems of Abu Tammam and Buhturi as taking place during the regency of Theodora.; I'm struggling to parse this sentence well. Suggest splitting it up a bit.
• Theoktistos led the Byzantine army in person against the invaders, but was heavily defeated by them at Mauropotamos ("Black River")
• Despite their success, the Abbasids were unable to exploit it; stodgy. And some of it redundant. Suggest: The Abbasids were unable to exploit their success
• The Abbasids reciprocated with an to Constantinople? Seems to be a missing word or two.
• Just to check; this really is all the material on the battle? I guess it gets only brief mentions in the sources?

I think that mostly covers it. I did some slight copyediting myself. --Errant ^(chat!) 12:39, 14 June 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for taking the time for the review! I've dealt with the issues you raised, I think. To answer your last question, the Byzantine sources are very brief. I could perhaps include the actual translated Arabic poems, but I don't think that is suitable because they are too generically phrased and don't provide very reliable information. Whatever modern scholarship has gleaned from them is in the article. Constantine ✍ 21:22, 14 June 2012 (UTC)

Excellent - that looks fine then. Tagged up :) --Errant ^(chat!) 23:09, 14 June 2012 (UTC)