Talk:Battle of Salt River

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Yoninah (talk) 21:30, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

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Portuguese sailors erecting a cross on Almeida's grave in Salt River two years after the battle in 1512.

• ... that the !Uriǁ’aekua used their cattle to decisively defeat the Portuguese Empire in the Battle of Salt River? When the !Uriǁ’aekua weapons proved ineffective against the Portuguese they used their "cattle as moving shields, hiding behind them, and accurately throwing assegais and stones at the Portuguese."
  • ALT1:... that the !Uriǁ’aekua used their cattle to decisively defeat the Portuguese Empire in the Battle of Salt River resulting in the death of Francisco de Almeida? Source: "You are strongly encouraged to quote the source text supporting each hook" (and [link] the source, or cite it briefly without using citation templates)

Created/expanded by Discott (talk). Self-nominated at 21:53, 10 November 2020 (UTC).

• Hi Discott, review follows: article created 10 November; article exceeds minimum length; I can't access all the sources but I found no problems with overly close paraphrasing from the ones I could access; hooks are interesting; I can't access the source that verifies the hooks but happy to AGF that it does so; I think you only have three past DYKL credits so are exempt from the QPQ requirement. Just one query I have: could you point me in the right direction to verify that Nicolaas Vergunst's blog is a reliable source? Has he published works on South African history, for example? - Dumelow (talk) 07:16, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

Hi Dumelow, thanks for the feedback. You rise a good question and one that I was thinking about myself as I was writing the article. Being in Cape Town and so being a bit more directly exposed to the whole debate and scholarship around this event I am both well placed to find such verification and to know that Vergunst is taken seriously on this issue. However I have also been having trouble finding such a verification as the event has been neglected for a long time in South Africa and partially because of the general lack of scholarship in the area. I am, however, getting addtional sources still to improve and expand the article. I feel that this is a reflection of the general lack of depth of scholarly work on South African subjects. Anyway, I would have quoted Vergunst's book on the subject (Knot of Stone: The Day that Changed South Africa's History) instead of his blog but I dont have a copy. It also seems wasteful when all the information is on his website already. As for verification again, I am waiting to receive my copy of Patric Tariq Mellet's book The Lie of 1652 which seems to be reasonably highly regarded to see what Mellet has to say about Vergunst. I know that Vergunst and Mullet have worked together/collaborated to some degree on researching the Battle of Salt River. Vergunst even interviewed Mullet which can be seen on his website. I see that the Wikipedia article for Knot of Stone also has some helpful sources to help with reliability of Vergunst as a source generally (but not his website specifically). Additionally I see that Vergunst is quoted in a number of Cape Town history related sources such as by the Cape Town museum. I hope that is helpful even if it is a 'bit all over the place'? --Discott (talk)

P.S... Sci-Hub... just leaving that here. ;-)

Hi Discott thanks for your reply and additional information. I see Vergunst has a number of mentions online that seem to relate to this area, published a book and am happy that you have done due diligence in this regard. Also, the image is fine, being from 1707 and out of copyright, though perhaps not great at small scale - Dumelow (talk) 10:32, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

Hi Dumelow, thank you. Good point about the image. Perhaps the other image of the Portugues rising a cross over Almeida's grave site might work better? --Discott (talk) 11:05, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

Also fine from a copyright perspective. Whether to use the image or not is up to the person who places this into the DYK queue - Dumelow (talk) 11:08, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

Dumelow, thanks for the heads up. I have now replaced the chosen featured image. --Discott (talk) 17:51, 13 November 2020 (UTC)