Talk:Taiping Heavenly Kingdom/Archive 1

Archive 1

Names given to rebels

太平军因拒绝此俗，亦被清廷称作「长毛」、「长毛賊」、「髮賊」、「髮逆」；因為太平軍起自广西，以两广人为主，故清廷称其为「粵匪」（如《欽定剿平粵匪方略》）。 -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 03:59, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

囯

The Taipings did not use the characters 國 or 国; instead the used 囯, which is an uncommon variant which subtly omits a dot stroke from the variant 国. The actual name is (太平天囯. 其中「天」字的两横上长下短；「囯」字内為「王」字) -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 03:16, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

• This picture show what he said.http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Coin_of_Heavenly_Kingdom_of_Great_Peace.JPG --风之清扬 (talk) 06:26, 6 October 2010 (UTC)

Repairing Vandalism introduced in revision of 08:09, 31 May 2013 by 115.184.221.77

While you are repairing vandalism, you may wish to revert several other changes introduced in the revision of 08:09, 31 May 2013 by 115.184.221.77. Since it is too late to use the magic wiki revert, you who have worked so diligently on this article will need to find these changes in the current version and revert them manually in a new edit. Howard McCay (talk) 02:52, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

I checked the changes after revision of 08:09, 31 May 2013 by 115.184.221.77. Apologies if I messed up, but I don't see any changes that need to be reverted. I checked the Spence reference and didn't see anything about God's wife, but I did quickly correct the text based on Spence. ch (talk) 22:42, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

Question: Bibliography, references, etc.

Glad to see that LlywelynII has begun what I hope will be further revisions and expansion. For my part, I started to expand from the bottom but now see that there is a potential conflict with the section at Taiping Rebellion. Should we have duplicate sections? Sections that overlap but have specific coverage tailored to each article? Put the extensive section in one of the articles add a "See main article" link to the other?.

I was indecisive on the names of the sections, and would defer to LlywelynII in setting them-- Bibliography/ References/ Notes whatnot. ch (talk) 16:14, 26 July 2016 (UTC)

Well, I fixed the formatting on the bottom of the page but I was just here to add some more detail about the contact with the Protestant missionaries. I might come back later but mostly swamped now with other things.

As far as the direction the page should go, I think SCOPE covers it. This page should have some small mention of the military history but leave most of those details to the Taiping Rebellion article. The Taiping Rebellion article should have some mention of the state and its operation but leave most of those details here. Of course the brief overviews (#History here and #Taiping Heavenly Kingdom or #Administration or etc. there) should have hatnotes pointing to the main article. — LlywelynII 05:38, 28 July 2016 (UTC)

Sources for future article expansion

Further reading sections are almost always a bad idea on Wiki, since no one curates them and we end up with random detritus, ads, and bloat. Kindly restore these sources (if useful) once they are being used to verify parts of the article:

• Platt, Stephen R. (2012). Autumn in the Heavenly Kingdom: China, the West, and the Epic Story of the Taiping Civil War. New York: Knopf. ISBN 9780307271730. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |1= (help) Narrative history, with emphasis on the military aspects.
• Kuhn, Philip A. (1970), "The Taiping Rebellion", in Fairbank, John K., ed. (ed.), Cambridge History of China, Cambridge: Cambridge Univ Press, pp. 264–350 {{citation}}: |editor-last= has generic name (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: editors list (link).
• Thomas H. Reilly, The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom: Rebellion and the Blasphemy of Empire (2004) ISBN 0-295-98430-9. Explores the religious basis of the rebellion.
• Joanna Waley-Cohen. The Culture of War in China: Empire and the Military under the Qing Dynasty. (London: I.B. Tauris, International Library of War Studies, 2006). ISBN 1845111591. Includes analysis of the impact of the rebellion on Qing statecraft.
• Hsiu-ch°êng Li, translator, The Autobiography of the Chung-Wang (Confession of the Loyal Prince) (reprinted 1970) ISBN 978-0-275-02723-0
• Lindley, Augustus, Ti-ping Tien-Kwoh: The History of the Ti-Ping Revolution (1866, reprinted 1970) OCLC 3467844 Google books access

 — LlywelynII 05:38, 28 July 2016 (UTC)

We have usually done well by following LlywelynII’s advice. In this case I think that his instincts are right – don’t add things that make a messy page and open the door to more messiness – but I respectfully disagree. This article needs work that neither of us or other editors seem to have time to accomplish, so it seems even more useful to give readers a sense of “further reading” they should know about.

WP policy certainly allows such a list: WP:FURTHER is a section in the MOS guideline Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Layout that says a Further Reading section is an “optional bulleted list, usually alphabetized, of a reasonable number of publications that would help interested readers learn more about the article subject. Editors may include brief annotations.” Wikipedia:Further reading is an advice essay, but is pretty sensible. I think that this list follows both guidelines.

With these reasons in mind, I'm restoring the list. In order to meet LlywelynII's reasonable concerns, however, we should be on the lookout and remove any objectionable additions either here or in other parts of the article. Cheers! ch (talk) 16:37, 28 October 2016 (UTC)

Historical fiction not a reliable source

Hi Polyenetian --

First, thanks for all your good work on this article! I hope that you will keep it up.

Sorry that I did not make my point more clear here that Chang's historical novel is not a Reliable source; I could have removed the material entirely, but I thought that the content was OK, so I just marked it "unsourced" in order that another editor could supply a good source.

Your comment here does not address the problem that the "source" is not a source.

Another problem was & is that notes #6 & #7 are not in acceptable form: a bare url cannot be a footnote: Wikipedia:Citing sources or WP:CITEHOW will explain. You can also see Help:Referencing for beginners/sandbox.

As an aside, you might also glance through Wikipedia:Etiquette, Wikipedia:No personal attacks, and Assume Good Faith before you post comments such as those here

All the best. ch (talk) 03:02, 29 October 2016 (UTC)

Again, sorry that a Edit SUmmary is too short to explain. I removed the reference to the historical fiction, which is not a Reliable Source, then edited the material from the Reilly book, with a full note. The way to give a full note is to use this form (I've put a "No Wiki" mark around the text, which leaves it in an unformatted text): For the note, you would type

{{sfnb|Reilly|2004| p= [https://books.google.com.sg/books?id=wm4CuSvIYiEC&pg=PA139&lpg=PA139&dq=Kill+the+demons+manchus&source=bl&ots=DTNA4_c1Vm&sig=qXEFebuaiwYrVurWrC6WlV2E9Lc&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjkw6Ws0PXPAhWLQ48KHcs4CgcQ6AEIHDAB#v=onepage&q=Kill%20the%20demons%20manchus&f=false 139]}}

which produces this:

Then you would add the item in the Reference section:

{{cite book |last = Reilly |first = Thomas H.|year = 2004 |title = The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom: Rebellion and the Blasphemy of Empire |url = https://books.google.com.sg/books?id=wm4CuSvIYiEC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false |publisher = University of Washington Press| location = Seattle |isbn = 0295984309|ref = harv}}

which produces this:

Reilly, Thomas H. (2004). The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom: Rebellion and the Blasphemy of Empire. Seattle: University of Washington Press. ISBN 0295984309. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)

The Notes would look like this:

References

Hope this helps! ch (talk) 22:36, 29 October 2016 (UTC)

Polyenetian Just a few words on the reason I reverted your most recent edits. As I said in the edit summary, as explained above, a bare reference is not an acceptable footnote; "bare reference" is when you just put a url address with no information as to the author, title, etc. Second, the reference A Geek in China: Discovering the Land of Alibaba, Bullet Trains and Dim Sum By Matthew B. Christensen is not a WP:Reliable source. It appears to be charming but not reliable in the Wikipedia sense. Third, the text was awkward and had repetitions and mistakes.

If you disagree, please discuss here.ch (talk) 21:55, 30 October 2016 (UTC)

Polyenetian instead of answering here, replied on his/her TalkPage, which I copy here for reference:

Reponse: The only thing which needs to be done is that you need to see the new credible source I provided which clearly states the massacre of 40,000 manchus by the taiping rebels in nanjing, but you keep stubbornly insisting on writing it your way and completely ignoring the source provided instead of easily figuring out yourself, I am begining to think that you don't want people to know that 40,000 manchus were killed in Nanjing by the taiping for some strange reason.

I am glad to hear that you are beginning to think. However, the problem is not my intentions. One of Wikipedia's basic principles is Assume Good Faith. Please click on that link and read the article before we procede.

Good! Now that you are back, I will assure you that I have read that article and also Don't Bite the Newbies.

The article WP:Reliable Source defines "Reliable Source" in a technical WIkipedia way. When you read it, you will see why I keep saying that an historical novel and a travel book are not, in Wikipedia's definition, Reliable Sources. You or any other editor who comes across souirces like these should remove them.ch (talk) 05:44, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

Replacement of Reliable SOurce with Tertiary Source

Polyenetian Two problems with your repeated replacement of good text and good references.

1) Your footnotes which I replaced and now replace again were "bare url." A bare url is against Wikipedia policy, as I explained in the section above. You can see the essay WP:BAREURLS for more.

I fixed the citation with Wikipedia Citation Tool for Google Books, which is at http://reftag.appspot.com/

You just enter the url of the Google Book page, and it generates a full citation.

2) You replaced Reilly's Taiping Heavenly Kingdom with White's 100 Deadliest Atrocities.

WP:SCHOLARSHIP and WP:PSTS explain why Wikipedia prefers Secondary Sources. Reilly worked with the primary sources and read the other work in the field; White simply read works like Reilly's.

In addition, your edits frequently have typos (e.g. "manchu" for "Manchu").

Wikipedia is a great thing, and one of the greatest things about it is that anyone can edit. But this means that everyone has to take the time to understand policies. You edit carefully. Some of these policies are technical, as above, and some are social. These social policies, such as Assume Good Faith mean that we treat each other with respect.

Hope this helps!ch (talk) 18:59, 17 November 2016 (UTC)

Redirect

Shouldn't the official name of this failed country "The Heaven Kingdom of Eternal Peace" be a redirect that leads to this page? (104.33.76.108 (talk) 20:23, 10 January 2018 (UTC))

I've not seen that translation, but if it's used by some sources I don't see why there would be harm in creating a redirect from it. Dbrote (talk) 15:12, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

"A self-proclaimed convert to Christianity"

The article states in it's lead "A self-proclaimed convert to Christianity, Hong Xiuquan led an army that controlled a significant part of southern China during the middle of the 19th century, eventually expanding to a size of nearly 30 million people". What does it mean by self proclaimed? I'd remove it but I think there may be a good reason. Helloimahumanbeing (talk) 01:10, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

You are right to question the phrase. "Self-proclaimed" is a WP:WEASEL because it implies without proof that Hong's Christianity was not authentic. Please go ahead and remove it, perhaps changing to Hong was a "convert to Christianity."ch (talk) 04:13, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

I assume that "self-proclaimed" was used not to imply that the conversion was not authentic, but to imply that he may not have actually converted to Christianity (due to the differences between orthodox Christianity and the Taiping's religion). There's definitely a better way of getting that point across though.Dbrote (talk) 16:06, 30 September 2019 (UTC)

Flag Change

When I Went on this Article Again I Saw That The Flag has Changed and I Don’t Like it So Can You Guys Please Change it to the Original? 155.143.185.99 (talk) 06:00, 13 May 2022 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:

• Hong Xiuquan.jpg

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 21:08, 18 May 2022 (UTC)

flag color

the flag has been rendered as white; the cited photo looks to me more like a faded yellow or perhaps buff.2601:642:C481:4640:0:0:0:FFA4 (talk) 06:00, 9 August 2022 (UTC)

Popular culture

A section on its influence in popular culture like media, tv shows 2601:246:5400:1CE6:C4B3:A7CB:152F:F45D (talk) 21:09, 17 May 2023 (UTC)

Official languages

It says Standard Chinese but then the article about it says it was first developed during the Republican Era (1912-1949). Also it only mentions Hakka Chinese and Gan Chinese. The area the Taiping took suggests to me more variations were spoken. Were these the only two official? Was there even an official language at all? I suggest changing it to "Chinese language (mainly Hakka)". Yakutia2023 (talk) 04:56, 25 May 2023 (UTC)