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Wells Cathedral

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This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because extensive work by many editors has brought it up through GA status to its current state where I feel it is nearly ready for a FA nomination. The architecture and history of the building over many centuries is fairly well covered, but is there anything which is missing or any MOS issues still outstanding?

Thanks, — Rod talk 14:24, 10 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from Tim riley

I'll need two goes at this. I've made a few minor amendments, mostly of typos, which please check to see you're happy about. First lot of comments:

  • General
    • Capitalisation – you need to be consistent about capitalising (or not) church job titles, notably bishop and dean. Of course Bishop So-and-So or Dean Such-and-Such need capitals, but "the bishop" or "the dean" should be in lower case.
  • Lead
    • I don't know that I'd include the current bishop and dean in the opening para. With all due respect to the Rt Rev and Very Rev gentlemen they are transient figures in the history of the cathedral, and they're mentioned in the info-box alongside the lead. There is a question of WP:DATED here.
    • "Scheduled monument" – the capital S seems wrong here. I note that the word is not capitalised in the relevant WP article.
  • Seat of the bishop
    • "despite much lobbying of the pope in Rome by Jocelin's representatives" – the thought "where else?" rather comes to mind; perhaps rejig as "despite much lobbying of the pope by Jocelin's representatives in Rome"
    • "like the cathedrals of Chichester…" – you might consider putting blue links here
  • Construction
    • "quire and retroquire" – unusual archaic spelling not used elsewhere in the article
    • "the Retroquire" – capital letter really wanted?
      • I'm hoping that User:Amandajm will comment on this as I have a memory of this previously being discussed.— Rod talk 18:38, 14 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • Done, and removed some capitals from Chapter House etc. Some early books have a convention of always using caps for parts of a cathedral, West Front etc. But it is tidier not to, unless they have names that are specific, as at Lincoln: the Angel Choir, the Dean's Eye etc. The only one that really requires a capital here is Lady chapel, because it refers to "Our Lady". Do we want it to have one capital letter or two? Is it a chapel called the Lady Chapel or is it a generic Lady chapel? Amandajm (talk) 09:43, 15 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Tudors and civil war
    • "From 1508 to 1546, eminent Italian humanist scholar" – the omission of "the" before "eminent" is either tabloid journalese or an Americanism. Either way, it is regrettable in so English an article.
    • "The dean was Dr Walter Raleigh, a nephew of the explorer Sir Walter Raleigh" – seems anomalous to pipe the dean's "Dr" but not his uncle's "Sir". With "Sir"s I find the eye travels more smoothly over the prose if they are piped.
    • [Barrett ran him through – nothing to do with this review, but I'm curious to know what happened to Barrett. Did he get off or was he punished?]
  • 1660–1800
  • Ministry

This is a most enjoyable article, and I'm looking forward to doing part two of this review. More soonest. – Tim riley (talk) 14:18, 14 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

  • Exterior
    • The first para has a lot of statements before we get to the first citation. Are all the statements of the first three sentences covered by ref 76?
  • West front
  • Crossing tower
    • "which was burnt down in 1439" – it may just be me but this phrasing suggests that someone did it deliberately. If, as I assume, it was an accident, I think I'd omit the "was". Ignore this if you think I'm talking nonsense.
  • Cloisters
    • "none, however, are proven – We have an excellent Wiki-colleague User:John who is first among several reviewers (I am another, Johnny-come-lately to the cause) who wages a campaign against "however", and nine times out of ten I think he's right. In my view this is one of the nine, and we could lose the "however". The sentence will be stronger without it, I think. (There is another debate to be had about the merits of "proven"-v-"proved", but that's for another day, perhaps.)
      • My grammar is not strong enough for this debate (either however or "proven"-v-"proved") and I would welcome input/advice from others.— Rod talk 09:12, 16 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • Changed to "Explanations for their construction at these secular cathedrals range from processional to aesthetic" as suggested by User:Eric Corbett
  • Restoration
  • Choir, transept and nave
    • "and are "brutally massive" and intrusive in an otherwise restrained interior" – I think you really need something on the lines of "according to Walter Plinge…" before this ringing statement.
  • Chapter House
  • Lady Chapel and retrochoir
  • Misericords
    • [Particularly fine pictures in this section, if I may say so.]
      • I spent several hours (with permission) crawling around on the floor, lifting seat cushions to find loads of sweet wrappers etc., with and without flash & trying different exposures. They are not easy objects to access for pictures as the position and lighting are a challenge.— Rod talk 10:29, 16 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    • "They may have been carved under the master carpenter John Strode" – this sounds rather painful for the poor man. Perhaps "carved under the direction of …"?
    • "over-riding" – the OED doesn't allow a hyphen and prescribes "overriding", but perhaps other dictionaries disagree.
  • Fittings and monuments
  • Voluntary Choir
  • Library
  • In the arts
    • "Joseph Mallord William Turner" – I'd be inclined to pipe this as J M W Turner, or even just Turner. I think he's eminent enough to be recognisable by surname alone, à la Beethoven or Picasso.

This is a fine piece of work and a most enjoyable article. Please let me know when you take it to FAC. – Tim riley (talk) 20:57, 15 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from John

I was too lazy to break down my suggestions as Tim has done, so I made my suggestions in this series of edits. In summary:

  • I dislike "while" as it carries an overtone of simultaneity. Where this is not the case, I prefer to avoid it.
  • shifted -> moved
  • With the Norman conquest -> Following the Norman Conquest
  • I greatly dislike sentences like "Designed in the new style with pointed arches, later to be known as Gothic and introduced at about the same time at Canterbury Cathedral, the church was largely complete at the time of its dedication in 1239." In this case I reordered to a more traditional sentence structure as "The church was designed in the new style with pointed arches, later to be known as Gothic and introduced at about the same time at Canterbury Cathedral. It was largely complete at the time of its dedication in 1239." The information is already complex enough without making the reader work so hard to extract the meaning.
  • "before finally settling at Wells" I prefer to avoid using "finally" as history is still running. It could be that next century they will relocate this to Slough, you never know.
  • lead -> led (past tense)
  • Clarify that Peter Price is retired
  • Remove "a number of" throughout; zero, negative nine, pi and the square root of minus one are all perfectly respectable numbers. It's usually better to say "a few", "several" or similar.
  • "The west front at Wells has paired towers, but these do not indicate the location of the aisles, extending well beyond them. The west front is in fact a screen." -> " The one at Wells is a screen; its paired towers do not indicate the location of the aisles, extending well beyond them." Shorter, clearer, and we lose "in fact". Everything recorded in our articles should be factual.
Response: We have just said there are three forms 1. following the nave and aisles 2. with paired towers, 3 a screen (Exeter for example) The facade at Wells has two towers, BUT screens the actual form of the building. The present edit simply states that it falls into the "screen" category, which is misleading, as it has two towers. Besides which, I have an extraordinarily strong aversion to jamming whole sentences together with semicolons. If used for that purpose, the they must be used for effect. (unless it is a legal document.
  • Two instances of 1300s replaced with 14th century; please clarify whether this is correct. The 1300s could also refer to the decade from 1300-1309, so is best avoided.
  • "the carving of the foliage is notable for its variety and vigour, " -> "the carving of the foliage is varied and vigorous"; of course it is notable else we would not be noting it!
Response The carving of the foliage is notable for the degree of liveliness and vigour. Stiff leaf foliage is usually vigorous, or it isn't stiff leaf. I don't drop in words like "notable" without reason. IN this case, it is more than usually lively and vigorous. They are "noted" or "known for" that characteristic.
  • "The carvings at Wells are not both typical, however, as one has wings and appears to be wearing clothes." -> "One of the carvings at Wells is unusual, as it has wings and appears to be wearing clothes." State a positive if you can rather than a negative, shorter is better and "however" should usually be avoided.
Response The wording is careful. There are people who insist that it is a Sheela na Gig. However It is not simply "unusual"; it is anything but "typical"> (Note punchy use of semicolon to emphasise contrast in two statement....) It probably isn't a Sheela na Gig, but the article is the wrong place to argue that point.
  • "Moreover" is also always worth trying to do without
  • "Many of the subjects are simply depictions of animals" -> "Many of the subjects are depictions of animals". I haven't seen them but I very much doubt they are simple or that it was simple to carve them. This is another word to avoid where possible.
  • We don't need Bishop of Bath and Wells in the See also as it is already mentioned and linked in the article.

Just one remaining issue for me; why are the images formatted in a non-standard way with upright tags? It makes them display awkwardly large at some resolutions.

Response The reason that they are tagged "upright" is that I have been advised that this formatting is preferred for ipads, mobiles etc. It is more effective than sizing them by the number of pixels (250px etc). I have had my son check it out on his mobile, and he can view those images without any problem. Amandajm (talk) 00:31, 19 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Per WP:IMGSIZE it is usually preferable just to leave the images as unforced "thumb"s. This allows logged in users to set their own image preferences. I have looked at this article on three monitor settings and while there is no problem seeing the images on the smallest monitor setting the images definitely overwhelm the text as they are currently formatted. --John (talk) 06:51, 19 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It's a super article, I enjoyed reading it, and I look forward to seeing it at FAC. I might even try to visit it next time I am in Southern England; it sounds fascinating. --John (talk) 21:14, 17 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for all your time and effort. I think the chances of a relocation to Slough are slim to say the least, but otherwise all your comments are valid, and hopefully I will be able to learn from them to improve my editing.— Rod talk 21:44, 17 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
That was intended as a joke, with no disrespect to Slough intended. Thank you for your work in writing such an interesting article. --John (talk) 21:47, 17 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]


Thank you to everyone who has identified issues during this peer review. The comments and responses to them have definately helped to improve the article. Further discussions are continuing on Talk:Wells Cathedral and I am hopeful that everyones contributions will mean we are soon able to nominate the article for FA status.— Rod talk 10:01, 20 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

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