Jump to content

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Aineta aryballos/archive1

Add links
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Aineta aryballos

[edit]

Aineta aryballos (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

As of 24 December 2024, 01:35 (UTC), this page is active and open for discussion. An FAC coordinator will be responsible for closing the nomination.
Toolbox
Nominator(s): UndercoverClassicist T·C 22:06, 28 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This article is about one of my favourite objects, in one of my favourite rooms, in the British Museum. Gallery 69 is a bit of an oddball, collecting classical artefacts and grouping them by theme rather than by time, place or culture: this little pot sits unassumingly in the case on "writing", alongside an Athenian voting token and a piece of bone inscribed with lines from the Iliad. Almost nobody gives it a second thought, which is sad, given that is both a fascinating archaeological find and a memento of a particularly vicious archaeological quarrel. It was (probably) originally owned by a high-class prostitute, (probably) called Aineta, (probably) depicted on its handle, though scholars disagree about just about everything it is possible to dispute about it. It was also the subject of one of the first major Greek trials for antiquities crime, and played a major role in the unmasking of Athanasios Rhousopoulos -- then a pillar of the Greek archaeological establishment -- as one of the country's most prolific and shameless patrons of grave-robbers. As ever, all comments and suggestions will be most gratefully received. UndercoverClassicist T·C 22:06, 28 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Image review

Hi Nikki -- done. UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:40, 29 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from Iazyges

[edit]
  • Claiming a spot. Iazyges Consermonor Opus meum 20:06, 30 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Lead: made in Corinth between approximately 625 and 570 BCE you may desire to explain to the reader where Corinth is (as ancient greek objects were not restricted to geographic Greece), perhaps made in Corinth (modern-day Greece) or made in Corinth (ancient Greece), whichever is preferred; since it has already been introduced as an ancient Greek object, the modern-day Greece option may be preferred.
    • Good point. I've clarified this as "southern Greece" (frustratingly, Corinth is right on the borderline between what's generally called "central" and what's generally called "southern" Greece, but it's just about in the Peloponnese and plenty of sources go for "southern". UndercoverClassicist T·C 21:53, 30 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Body: Rudolf Wachter concurs with Rhousopoulos's assessment that the vase was likely a "love-gift", while Matthias Steinhart and Eckhard Wirbelauer wrote in 2000 that it is universally considered to have been a gift of some nature. Highly semantic, but I would re-arrange this. For one, Steinhart and Wirbelauer appear to be offering support to a vaguer statement, rather than harshly disagreeing, and for two, the Wachter source appears to have been published after, so I would flip them. Suggest Matthias Steinhart and Eckhard Wirbelauer wrote in 2000 that it is universally considered to have been a gift of some nature, while Rudolf Wachter concurs with Rhousopoulos's assessment that the vase was likely a "love-gift".
  • A secondary comment, Wachter is introduced by date in the "Decoration" section below; may wish to move the date introduction up here at the first mention, for consistency.
  • often known as "grave-robbers" I would suggest often referred to as "grave-robbers"; the "known as" construct comes off as a little flippant to me, but perhaps that's a peculiarity of American English.
  • their owners secured the judgement of a state committee of three experts that the object was "useless" to Greek museums Since this is further mentioned below, I think a little more specificity on the committee could be helpful (here or in discussing Rhousopoulos's role in it). As it reads now, I think the average reader could draw three possible conclusions: 1) there were three sitting members of the committee (elected, selected, or appointed to terms), 2) many members of experts (and 3 would be randomly assigned to each case, such as judges in some legal systems), 3) or if you could collect any three experts you were good to go. I would presume the first is true, in which case I would add a short bit to explain the terms and system, such as perhaps their owners secured the judgement of a state committee of three experts, [appointed] on a [term] basis, that the object was "useless" to Greek museums, or something similar, swapping out appointed for whatever other method may have been used, and [term] for whatever their term was.
    OK, what I can draw is... not a lot. It sounds like what happened was that, whenever someone wanted to export an ancient object, the state (presumably via the Ministry of Education, which ultimately held the reins on archaeological matters) convened a fairly ad-hoc committee of three experts, who were not always necessarily the same people, and who themselves often called on other experts, to make the judgement. We're probably closer to (2) in your framing than (1), which I think is probably the surface reading of what we've got anyway? It's difficult to be too categoric here, as I can't find a source which really spells it out. UndercoverClassicist T·C 10:05, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    This comment was more aspirational than anything; if there isn't more to say I don't think there is a problem, but it would have been nice; I am all too familiar with sources refusing to be specific. Iazyges Consermonor Opus meum 18:21, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • A neat little article! Thank you for your work. Iazyges Consermonor Opus meum 20:34, 30 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Happy to support the nomination. Iazyges Consermonor Opus meum 18:21, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    Thank you -- and for your helpful comments above. UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:40, 2 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from Choliamb

[edit]

A few minor points:

Text

  • The vase body, the neck and the handle were made separately and joined using a lathe. For "lathe" read "potter's wheel". (Tornio, the word used by Rhousopoulos's translator, is the normal term for this in Italian: see here, for example.) But even apart from that, the phrasing is a little odd. The pieces were not really "joined using a potter's wheel", which makes it sound as if the wheel was the tool with which the join was made; instead, the globular body and the disk-shaped mouth were each made separately on the potter's wheel and then the two pieces were joined together, presumably while still on the wheel, but not necessarily so. (The handle, of course, was also added separately, but it was just a strap of clay, not turned on the wheel.) What Rhousopoulos actually says is even less than this: he writes only that the body, the handle, and the neck with its disk were all made separately and then joined, and that traces of the wheel could be detected on the disk (sopra il quale si rintracciano vestigi del tornio, where the antecendent of il quale is disco).
  • Nine men are named, each on an individual line.. "Each on an individual line" is a very generous way of describing the meandering layout of the four names on the right side of the handle.
  • Is there some reason why the names of the men are not listed here? Yes, there's a drawing of the inscription, but even readers who know some Greek are likely to be baffled by the Archaic Corinthian alphabet, so providing the names (either transcriptions or transliterations) would be helpful.
    • I've stuck them in a footnote: none of the names other than Aineta and Menneas, as far as I can tell, have had more than a trivial discussion as to who these people might have been. There's also the question of the double consonants: see below. UndercoverClassicist T·C 09:55, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • including a musician named Menneas. Just flagging this to be sure that Gallavotti really spells the name with two N's, since there's only one nu on the vase. (If he does, it's presumably because the form Μεννέας is well attested elsewhere: ca. 300 examples in the LGPN, vs. only 8 for Μενέας.)
    • I only have the citation at second hand (via Wachter), who writes it as "Men(n)eas", with a slightly opaque (to me) explanation: (or, again, 'expressive' Μεν(ν)εας: Bechtel, p. 312). Bechtel appears to be one of three 1920s German volumes about Greek dialects. He's earlier used this to argue that the name Dexilios could be Dexillios, so I assume his/Gallavotti's point is that there's a particular dialectical feature by which double consonants become/are written as single ones in particular contexts? From what I remember from a different source (Guarducci, possibly?), the argument is that Menneas (double n) is named as a musician on a different vase, and therefore that it might be the same guy. UndercoverClassicist T·C 09:55, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      • @Choliamb: Did you see this bit -- have I got the right end of the stick here with the bracketed double consonants? UndercoverClassicist T·C 20:56, 3 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
        • As I understand it (not really my field), the term "expressive" is used by linguists to describe certain morphological features, especially the doubling of consonants or entire syllables, that supposedly reflect the emotional state of the speaker. This is particularly common in nicknames (which linguists call hypocoristic names, because it sounds more fancy), and the idea is that they express affection or some other kind of intensification, rather than simply being the product of the regular processes of linguistic change. If you search for the phrase "expressive gemination" in Google Books, you'll find a lot of examples of doubled consonants explained in this way. The "expressive" explanation is not universally accepted; hence the scare quotes used by Wachter. The reference to Bechtel is not to Die griechischen Dialekte but to Die historischen Personennamen des Griechischen bis zur Kaiserzeit, which lists a bunch of names derived from the root μεν-, including both Μενέας and Μεννέας; it has nothing specific to say about expressive gemination. If you want my opinion, I don't think you need to mention the alternative forms with doubled consonants in the footnote at all, in parentheses or otherwise: just report the names as they are spelled on the vase. You don't need a source for this: simple transliteration is not OR, and your other Greek articles are full of transliterated words, phrases, and journal titles for which you cite no sources, which is perfectly fine. The fact that the spelling Menneas is generally more common across the Greek world than the spelling Meneas is irrelevant to this particular vase, as is the fact that the names on the vase have Doric spellings (to be expected in Corinth) rather than the more familiar Attic-Ionic spellings (e.g., Lysandridas and Kariklidas vs. Lysandrides and Kariklides). The only thing we know for sure is that these particular names with these particular spellings were expected to be intelligible to Corinthians of the late 7th–early 6th century BC, so in my opinion it's best to stick with what the vase-painter actually wrote rather than inserting hypothetical forms, however they might be explained. (But note that some of the transliterations currently in the footnote need to be corrected: for Eudokios read Eudikos, for Lysandrias read Lysandridas, and for Dexilios read Dexilos.) Choliamb (talk) 15:50, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
          Thanks, Choliamb. I've corrected those translations and removed Dexillos. I'll try and dig into the sources (possibly via an RX request for the original Gallavotti article): if he emphatically thinks the dancer was Menneas, then I think we do need to keep the doubled n as a possibility (otherwise, we're implicitly dismissing his argument, since Meneas is not Menneas); if he writes "Men(n)eas" or similar, we can content ourselves with a single nu. UndercoverClassicist T·C 15:57, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • contrasted the vase with another excavated in Corinth in 1872, which showed three female names that she suggested were those of hetairai This is the pyxis 74.51.364 from the Cesnola collection, now in the Metropolitan Museum in New York. But do we know that it was "excavated in Corinth in 1872"? I don't think we do, and Milne herself does not make this claim. "Excavated" is a euphemism for "looted from a tomb", since there were no controlled excavations in Corinth at this date, and the pencilled notation "Corinth 1872" on the vase itself could mean no more than that it was acquired by Cesnola or an intermediary in Corinth in that year. Antiquities from throughout the Corinthia passed through Corinth (in part because it was easy to sell to foreign collectors on ships that stopped briefly at the Isthmus), and I don't think there's any way to know that this particular pyxis came from a tomb at Corinth itself rather than one of the other settlements nearby, or precisely when it was discovered.

References

  • The way the five short articles published by Galanakis in 2012 are arranged here disgruntles me, for two reasons:
(1) They are referred to as Galanakis 2012a, 2012b, etc. in the notes, but in the bibliography they appear as Galanakis (17 October 2012), Galanakis (31 December 2012), etc. This seems needlessly confusing. You may reply that readers can always click on the link to discover that Galanakis 2012d in the note = Galanakis (30 November 2012) in the bibl, but that argument doesn't move the needle for me, and it's obviously irrelevant for anyone who makes the mistake of printing out the article to read later. In the author-year system of referencing, if something is cited as Galanakis 2012d in the notes, there should be a corresponding publication listed as Galanakis 2012d in the bibliography. I'm not saying the precise date should be removed, only that it should be placed later in the listing, not at the beginning.
I see the problem: the issue here is how the citation template works. "2012d" (for example) is listed in the citation, but the |year= parameter is overwritten by the template if the |date= parameter is also filled, and therefore not displayed. See reply on (2) below. UndercoverClassicist T·C 09:55, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
(2) I understand that these five articles have been arranged alphabetically by title, but the result makes me seasick: the list starts in October, then jumps ahead to December, then back to November, and then back to October again. I'm willing to bet that most readers will not detect an alphabetized list here; they're just going to wonder why the principle of listing a given author's works by date of publication has been suddenly and conspicuously abandoned. Alphabetical order is conventional in such cases, but it did not come down the mountain with Moses: it's an arbitrary rule used when no other more rational sequence presents itself, and with a series of successive articles on related topics published by the same author in the same periodical in the same year, the most rational sequence is surely the order of publication. If you insist on alphabetical order no matter what, sooner or later you will end up with a situation in which Part Two of a two-part article is listed first while Part One of the same article, published six months earlier in the same journal, is listed second, simply because the titles of the two parts happen to be slightly different. That serves nobody's interest.
This actually becomes much easier if we implement the change I suggest above: rearranging which citation is 2012a, 2012b etc is a pain in the neck, but assigning them each to a specific date makes it a lot easier. I've gone and done that. UndercoverClassicist T·C 09:55, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • It looks as if you have cited Lorber only at second hand, via Wachter. But Lorber's book is available at the Internet Archive and his discussion, although brief, is worth reading and citing independently, especially for his comments about the letter forms and date. Although it's true that he places this vase in his group of Early Corinthian inscriptions, most of the comparanda he cites, both for the letter forms and for other vases with women's heads on the handles and inscriptions of the names of presumed hetairai, are Middle Corinthian. The distance between Lorber and Amyx is less than the distance between either of them and Payne, and I would like to see Lorber get a little more credit for laying out some of the reasons why the date of ca. 625 proposed by both Payne and Jeffery is almost certainly too high. But you can read what he has to say and make up your own mind.
    • I've added something here. I'm a bit confused, reading Lorber: Wachter says he calls it EC, but I can only actually see in Lorber that he says that Payne went too early and the letter-forms look sixth-century to him: in other words, there's no necessary conflict with what Lorber says and Amyx/Wachter's MC date, though Wachter implies that there is. Between Wachter and me, one of us is missing something -- there's a clear balance of probability here, but any help in seeing it greatly appreciated. UndercoverClassicist T·C 09:55, 1 December 2024 (UTC) It was me -- a wood/trees confusion: I had failed to see that the whole section was "transitional" (therefore could be no later than EC). UndercoverClassicist T·C 10:02, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • For Rhousopoulos's article in the AdI it would be much more convenient to point readers to the Hathi Trust or the Internet Archive, where the article can be linked directly and read page by page, rather than forcing them to download a giant ZIP file containing an equally giant PDF file and then dig through it to find the right page themselves.

Regards, Choliamb (talk) 22:43, 30 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for all these, Choliamb: sharp and well-taken as ever. I'm having a bit of difficulty reconciling Lorber with Wachter's citation of him: would you be able to throw me a rope on that one? The rest straightforwardly done. UndercoverClassicist T·C 09:55, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, it is genuinely confusing. The main reason Wachter says that Lorber assigns an EC date is because Lorber discusses this aryballos in the EC section of his book. (The heading for the section is on p. 18: "Die frühkorinthischen Vasen und Pinakes (Kat. Nr. 17–33)"; this includes Aineta, which is no. 28.) But since L. was chiefly concerned with pulling the date down from where Payne and Jeffery placed it, most of the parallels he cites, both epigraphical and iconographical, look ahead to the 6th century, and if you just read his discussion of the vase in isolation, with no knowledge of where in the book it appeared, you would naturally conclude that he considers it MC, not EC. The division between late EC and early MC is a judgment call, and while I don't have Amyx to hand, I doubt that he and Lorber would disagree very strenuously over where to place this vase stylistically. This is why I said that the distance between Payne and Lorber is more important than the distance between Lorber and Amyx. Putting the latter two into different periods and adding the corresponding date ranges (in Amyx's chronology) exaggerates a relatively small difference and makes it seem larger than it is.
I look forward to the next installment in your series on notable Corinthian aryballoi. The MacMillan has already been done, but the Pyrrias dance aryballos is still waiting for an article. It's a marvelous little vase, just as interesting as Aineta, and the inscription has generated a longer bibliography. Cheers, Choliamb (talk) 13:35, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks: I've adjusted the language a bit to soften that distinction. UndercoverClassicist T·C 14:10, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Support — Choliamb (talk) 13:07, 3 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Support from Tim riley

[edit]

Not much from me. A few minor points on the prose:

  • "and exposed the latter's widespread involvement in antiquities crime" – not sure why "the latter" as there isn't a former: wouldn't plain "his" do?
  • "a relatively rare successful use" – relative to what?
  • "deposited as a grave good in her tomb" – I am, as ever, open to correction but I don't think there is a singular of "grave goods" (or any other kind of goods any more than you can have a trouser or a mump) and more to the point neither does the OED, which dates the term to 1883 and says: plural: valuables deposited with a corpse in the grave. Chambers likewise offers only the plural form.
    • It's used in archaeological HQRS: see here, here, here and here, for instance. The plural ("it was deposited as grave goods") feels very wrong indeed, and we can't say something like "it was deposited among the grave goods" because we have no idea what, if anything, was deposited alongside it. UndercoverClassicist T·C 13:25, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • "the vase was likely a "love-gift" – unexpected Americanism: see current Fowler, p. 482, and these are the wise words of The Guardian style guide: In the UK, if not the US, using likely in such contexts as “they will likely win the game” sounds unnatural at best; there is no good reason to use it instead of probably. If you really must do so, however, just put very, quite or most in front of it and all will, very likely, be well.
  • "sold the aryballos to the British Museum for 1,000 drachmae" – giving a present-day equivalent of the sum would be helpful here, if possible.
    • Straight inflation calculations don't help very much from this period, given the change in the cost of living. There's an EFN immediately afterwards which contextualises this as three times an upper-middle-class salary (at least, that of a university professor), which is my go-to when ballparking smallish drachma amounts in this period. It's particularly relevant here, given that Rhousopoulos was the one being paid (and, later, paying) that amount. The elephant in the room is that his academic salary was trivial next to his ill-gotten gains from antiquities dealing, but that's somewhat beside the point here. UndercoverClassicist T·C 13:25, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Efstratiadis had assumed the office in 1864, following the death of Kyriakos Pittakis" – "assumed" seems an odd word, suggesting some sort of coup. Presumably he was appointed to the office?
    • Perhaps: changed to "been appointed", though that calls for the question of "by whom", to which the answer is a definitive "dunno" (it would have been some mix of the King, the Prime Minister and the Minister for Education, but as far as I know the history of that decision is not recorded). UndercoverClassicist T·C 13:25, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

That's my lot. Tim riley talk 12:42, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, Tim. Replies above. UndercoverClassicist T·C 13:25, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Fine. I'm not in the least persuaded about "grave good", but I don't press the point, and the article otherwise seems to me to meet all the FA criteria. Happy to support. Tim riley talk 13:32, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, Tim -- very gracious of you. Remind me of this one next time I'm trying to crowbar some postmodern literary criticism into one of your nominations. UndercoverClassicist T·C 14:11, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Support Comments by Pendright

[edit]

Lead

  • The Aineta aryballos is an Ancient Greek aryballos, made between approximately 625 and 570 BCE in the city of Corinth in southern Greece .
Close the space after Greece
Good spot: done. UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:25, 3 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Approximately 6.35 centimetres (2.50 in) in both height and diameter, it was intended to contain perfumed oil or unguent, and is likely to have been owned by a high-class courtesan (hetaira) by the name of Aineta, who may be portrayed in a drawing on its handle.
  • portrayed in a drawing -> or portrayed in the drawing - seems specific enough
"A" is better here: if we say the, we're begging the question, since we haven't introduced to the reader that there is a drawing. UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:25, 3 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
<>Yes, but consider this: The body of the vase, its drawing, and its handle are a unit of one and are not severable. Pendright (talk) 23:34, 3 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I'm afraid I don't see the relevance. In any case, I think what we've got is perfectly grammatical and comprehensible, though of course individual preferences as to language will vary. UndercoverClassicist T·C 06:52, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I concur with UC: the indefinite article is preferable here. Tim riley talk 09:30, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Description

  • The vase body, the neck and the handle were made separately and joined using a lathe.[4]
Add a comma after neck
This article is written in British English, where serial commas are optional and generally discouraged when the items in the list are short (see MOS:COMMA). UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:25, 3 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
<>I'm aware with the British point of view on the use of serial commads. As for the MOS though, it says, in a list of three or more items but its examples favor your point of view. Pendright (talk) 23:43, 3 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
All agreed that no Oxford comma is wanted, then. Tim riley talk 09:30, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Rhousopoulos believed that the vase may have been a gift from her lovers to a high-class courtesan (hetaira) named Aineta, or perhaps deposited as a grave good in her tomb.[a]
  • lovers -> one of her lovers?
  • or perhaps it was deposited?
There were multiple lovers (at least nine, to be exact). I don't see the improvement offered by the second, or the problem it's trying to fix: could you explain a bit more? UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:25, 3 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
<>The first clause, in part, says, Rhousopoulos believed that the vase may have been a gift from her lovers - literally, this says to me, that one gift was gifted by many, which is nether clear or concise - thus my comment. Pendright (talk) 00:03, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
That is absolutely correct: one gift was given by nine, according to Rhousopoulos (and many others). It's not uncommon for people to band together to get someone a present: think of a retirement gift at work, for example. UndercoverClassicist T·C 06:53, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
<>The sentence has two clauses: the first clause is an indepemdemt one but the second one is a dependent clause. -> In British English, a comma is used to join an independent clause and a dependent clause when the dependent clause comes first in the sentence; if the independent clause comes first, a comma is not typically needed - my addition makes it a independemt clause. Pendright (talk) 00:03, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
That may be so, but what we have at the moment is perfectly grammatical: there's no rule that every clause should be an independent clause. Adding "it was" would break the grammar of the sentence and require a rewrite, which doesn't seem to be necessary here. As above, there may be individual preferences at work here. UndercoverClassicist T·C 06:55, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I should be sorry to see the superfluous "it was" added. There is no rule in the King's English that a comma is used to join an independent clause and a dependent clause when the dependent clause comes first (though I notice a couple of minor university sites advocating that American dogma). This spurious "rule" appears nowhere in Fowler (2015) or Gowers (2014).

'Decoration and date

  • However, he contrasted this with the decoration of the vase body, where, he judged, "we immediately find ourselves in unknown regions of Asia: magnificent, ... but strange and exotic".[11][b]
Why the comma aftet where?
"Where" modifies we immediately find..., not he judged..., so needs a comma to separate it. Compare "Peru is a country where, I believe, bears live in the jungle": I believe that wherever I am, not only in Peru. Compare "Home is a place where I believe I am safe": there, I believe I'm safe specifically when I'm at home. UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:25, 3 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
<>>In British English, a comma precedes the word "where" when it introduces a non-restrictive clause, meaning it provides additional information that isn't essential to the sentence's core meaning. Pendright (talk) 00:23, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Ah, I see. That's not really what's going on here: we simply have indirect/direct speech, where it's completely normal (indeed, required) to bracket off phrases like "he said" with commas when they interrupt the quoted material. UndercoverClassicist T·C 06:56, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
In my view, people who pontificate about commas should refresh their memories of Gowers: The use of commas cannot be learned by rule. Not only does conventional practice vary from period to period, but good writers of the same period differ among themselves. ... The correct use of the comma – if there is such a thing as "correct" use – can only be acquired by common sense, observation and taste. Tim riley talk 09:30, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • In 1979, Fritz Lorber argued that Payne's date was too early: he discussed the vase among those of the Early Corinthian period (620/615–595/590 BCE),[17] and wrote that the letter-forms show features, such as the serpentine form of the letter iota, characteristic of sixth-century inscriptions.[12]
and he wrote that the letter
Not needed; we have a perfectly good grammatical subject ("he") in the previous clause, and I don't see any ambiguity: there's no other person mentioned here that it could have been. UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:25, 3 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
<>Correct, only if you drop the preceding comma— and wrote that the letter-forms show features clause can not stand on its own withou a subject noun or pronoun. Pendright (talk) 01:14, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
There's no need for every clause to be able to stand on its own: some do and some don't. Even then, "wrote" is syntactically part of the main clause: "he discussed the vase ... and wrote [subordinate clause]". That's perfectly standard English. UndercoverClassicist T·C 06:57, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with UC on this, as my immediately preceding comment may illustrate. Tim riley talk 09:30, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Inscription

  • The name Meneas (or Menneas) comes first in the list and is written slightly larger and more boldly than the others, and so seems to have been given particular prominence.[10]
and so it seems to have been given particular prominence.[10]
As with the Lorber comment, I don't see the problem or the improvement here. UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:25, 3 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
<>Similar to the above Pendright (talk) 01:14, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Sale to the British Museum

  • In 1865, Panagiotis Efstratiadis, the Ephor General in charge of the Greek Archaeological Service,[h] wrote in his diary of the size and richness of Rhousopoulos's antiquities collection, marking the first time that Rhousopoulos's activities had come to official attention.
marking it the first time that Rhousopoulos's activities had come to official attention.
That doesn't seem to be grammatical: have you read making where marking is written in the text? UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:25, 3 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
<> I have not, but I do believe I have a grasp of indepedent and dependent clauses whether in British or American English. Similar to the above Pendright (talk) 02:54, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
And see above: but here I don't see that "marking it the first time that..." actually makes sense. I've certainly never seen it or similar in print, whereas "marking the first time that..." is a common phrase. UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:00, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This is it - Pendright (talk) 19:12, 2 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for your time and your comments, Pendright. Replies inline above. UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:25, 3 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@UndercoverClassicist: I trust you'll not dismiss my responses without first consulting the related rules that apply - thank you. Pendright (talk) 03:27, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for your replies. I'm afraid I've generally continued to disagree: in the cases we have left, I think we're dealing with matters of personal preference rather than anything grammatically wrong in a clear-cut way. The article has already been reviewed by Tim riley, who is a skilled and elegant writer of BrE: if you still think there are errors here, he might be a good person to weigh in as a third opinion? UndercoverClassicist T·C 06:58, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
We are indeed dealing with matters of personal preference here. I started to add detailed comments on each of the above points but ran out of steam when I realised that no grammatical rules are at stake. What we have above is our old friend "I'd write it this way and so you must, too". A personal preference for grapes does not entitle one to forbid others to eat plums. I hope these few comments are helpful. Tim riley talk 09:30, 4 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Source review

[edit]

Doesn't seem like there is much to say here. Is "The Colors of Clay: Special Techniques in Athenian Vase Painting" a high-quality reliable source. Is it just the titles of the sources, or do they seem to cover the sale of the artifact much less than the article does? Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 12:31, 6 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Ceoil

[edit]

From the lead,.

  • What is an Aryballos, and why is it referred to in many paragraphs as "the vase" without specifying which vase... to put it another way, it would be useful to explain early on what Aryballos and their elements are....especially before you detail the various dimensions in the opening praa in the "description" section, which are...a barrage and exhausting without a grounding on the these things structure. When you say vase later, do you mean a part of the object or are you referring shorthand for the object as a whole.
    • This is true: I've added a bit to the body on this. I don't see how "vase" could be anything other than the whole object -- what's your thinking here? When talking about the spherical bit, the word is "[spherical/globular] body" in this article and any other source. UndercoverClassicist T·C 10:55, 8 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • illegal sale in 1865 can we say in lead why the sale was illegal and the grounds for Rhousopoulos prosuceation (rather than "an illegal sale
    • I'm not sure we can (or should), at least here. The reasoning is a bit complicated: it wasn't that selling it was illegal, but that selling it to someone outside Greece was illegal -- but not in itself, only if certain formalities hadn't been followed, and explaining those formalities itself requires us to sketch something of the complexities of C19th Greek archaeological law. What matters here (under WP:SUMMARYSTYLE) is that Rhousopoulos broke the law: interested readers can go to the body to find out precisely how he did that. UndercoverClassicist T·C 10:55, 8 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • fined Rhousopoulos for selling the vase in contravention of Greek law - exporting the vase?
    • I'm not sure he strictly exported it (as in, loaded it on a ship and sent it to London), but he sold it to a buyer outside Greece without following the necessary procedures, and that was the crime. Compare "The singer was booed for singing a song against the audience's taste": we understand that singing that particular song was unwelcome, not that the audience disliked all songs. UndercoverClassicist T·C 10:55, 8 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Who is Yannis Galanakis.
  • The Athenian art dealer and a professor at the University of Athens Athanasios Rhousopoulos,[5] made the first scholarly publication - "professor at the University of Athens" could just be "academic", and are publications "made"?
    • I'm not sure it can: Professor is a senior rank (Athens used a variation on the German system, where most academics were not professors), and it's relevant that Rhousopoulos was a prominent, respected and powerful figure. "Publication" here is a gerund rather than a concrete noun: compare "made the first ascent of Everest". UndercoverClassicist T·C 10:56, 8 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Later,

"provided their owners had secured the judgement of a state committee of three experts that the object was "useless" to Greek museums" - seems glib and a (frankly deliberate) misunderstanding/justification by an earlier British translator; can we give a definition of how "useless" was legally defined by the Greek courts. Ceoil (talk) 00:52, 8 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think it was defined, any more than the conventional meaning of the term. I would be utterly amazed, given the generally ad hoc nature of everything to do with archaeological legislation at the time, if a legal definition existed, and far more so if that definition was actually adhered to in practice. It's not a misunderstanding at all: the word in the Greek law is άχρηστον, which means 'useless' by any definition. The translator here, incidentally, is Greek. UndercoverClassicist T·C 10:55, 8 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Well its pleasingly odd language...adds colour and happy thus to keep. Ceoil (talk) 22:02, 10 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Very interesting indeed, more later. Ceoil (talk) 23:36, 7 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

  • Thank you, Ceoil. I note you've made a few edits, mostly very helpful: I've fiddled around with a few where grammar, EngVar, or sense required. Happy to discuss those if you feel the need. To get one thing in early: it's important to be clear when Rhousopoulos made the claims about the vase's provenance, as these predate his coming to the attention of the authorities as a likely criminal: if we just say "according to Rhousopoulos", we leave it possible that he made these claims after being required to prove that he acquired the thing legally. UndercoverClassicist T·C 10:55, 8 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Satisfied with responses. Support. Very nice work. Ceoil (talk) 22:00, 10 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Drive-by comments

[edit]
  • "Aineta herself". Do we need "herself"? Is she likely to be anyone else?
  • Could Yannis Galanakis be introduced in the lead and at first mention in the main article.
    • See reply to Ceoil further up: I suppose I can see an argument here, since he gets a lot more mentions than any other modern expert (a reflection of the fact that he and I would probably comprise the entire membership in an Aineta-aryballos fan club), but we do have a lot of modern scholars name-dropped (Wachter, Amyx, Steinhart, Wirbelauer, Payne, Skaltsa, Guarducci, Gallavotti...), and I'm reluctant to give them all a variation on "the archaeologist/classicist/art historian" (slippery categories in this area anyway) for the reasons that Caeciliusinhorto so eloquently expressed. UndercoverClassicist T·C 18:47, 19 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Take the lead, the lack of introduction leaves the following subjective judgement near meaningless to a reader. Who is Yannis Galanakis? Someone you met down the pub? A reader might surmise that they are someone whom the author believes is authoritative, but this is an encyclopedia, why should a reader have to surmise? Gog the Mild (talk) 22:56, 19 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
(As it happens, that's not far from the truth...) There's a lot to that, and a big part of me is persuaded, but I am still unconvinced here. After all, just about every other encyclopaedia or scholarly source would simply say "Galanakis writes..." or just cite him. It's also a bit of a slippery one: Galanakis is a Mycenaean archaeologist by trade who, by virtue of a side interest, is also one of the leading experts on nineteenth-century archaeological crime and legislation in Greece. So "the archaeological historian YG" wouldn't quite be accurate, but "the archaeologist YG" wouldn't really establish any authority (a doctor wouldn't necessarily know anything about the history of medicine), and "the scholar YG" just sounds loose and a bit naff.
I do see the argument from both sides: most encyclopaedias and academic sources are writing for an "insider" audience, or at least one familiar with how scholarly works tend to sound, but we're not. I'll note that we (as an FAC community, rather than you and I) did have this debate at Beulé Gate with another case of an academic whose precise disciplinary position was ambiguous: see Choliamb's points in that FAC, which I think apply here as well. UndercoverClassicist T·C 07:41, 20 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, well I am not happy to promote it in its current state, and have arguably lent into this point enough that I should recuse, so I shall pass it by my coordinator colleagues. No doubt one of them will be along shortly. Gog the Mild (talk) 19:21, 22 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, Gog. I’m anticipation that we may end up trying to establish whether this style is in keeping with FAC practice and consensus, I went looking for other FAs that use it — I found, on a fairly cursory scan, Corinna and Brothers Poem in addition to my own Beulé Gate and Anactoria. FAC is not a common-law jurisdiction, of course — it may well be argued that this case is different. UndercoverClassicist T·C 20:59, 22 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Well Wikipedia is not a reliable source or precedent for anything of course. :-) But I am greatly concerned that there are four mentions of Galanakis, each time giving a firm opinion which a reader would take as read, twice being quoted in the article and once in the lead, and we know nothing about them beyond their name. Not even if they were they alive at the time or are these 20th or 21st century opinions. What are we to make of them contradicting themselves? Footnote f. If they are a lawyer or a judge this is one thing, if an academic specialising in 19th century archive interpretation it is another. I just can't reconcile this with "places the subject in context"; even "it neglects no major facts or details" seems a stretch. Gog the Mild (talk) 21:18, 22 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
There might be another solution here — how about “Writing in 2018 on the history of archaeological crime in Greece, Yannis Galanakis called…” or something similar? That would solve the two problems I have — one that it’s hard to find a short, accurate, relevant introduction in this case, for the reasons I set out, and two that I’d rather not have to introduce all the other scholars, who are used much more briefly, because doing so would require either a lot of repetition or misleading variation (e.g. alternating “classicist”, “archaeologist” and “art historian” where there’s no meaningful distinction in practice). UndercoverClassicist T·C 08:17, 23 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • "the same as the price for which he had sold". There may be a touch of duplication between price and for which he had sold; maybe "price" → 'amount'.
    • I'm not sure I see that as a bad duplication: "price" is often used with the verb "sell" (e.g. "I bought the bike at a low price and sold it for a high one"). However, going for "amount" allows the trimming of a few more words, so done and trimmed. UndercoverClassicist T·C 18:47, 19 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
One comeback above. Gog the Mild (talk) 22:56, 19 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Gog the Mild (talk) 16:50, 19 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, Gog. For transparency, as I've now made a following edit, I reverted your cut of "in order to": it's quoted material, so I think it's a lesser evil to have a slightly verbose quote than to adulterate one, and adding "..." to remove two short words doesn't strike me as a good trade. UndercoverClassicist T·C 18:47, 19 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Featured_article_candidates/Aineta_aryballos/archive1&oldid=1264743922"