Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Sieges of Berwick (1355 and 1356)/archive1

Sieges of Berwick (1355 and 1356)

Featured article candidates/Sieges of Berwick (1355 and 1356)/archive1

Nominator(s): Gog the Mild (talk) 15:22, 20 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This article went through GAN in September 2021 and ACR in June 2022. Then it stalled. With access to several additional sources I have been able to expand and tweak it sufficiently that I now consider it may be worthy of FA status. A typical Medieval tale of cunning French, perfidious Scots, and an English army which bounces from northern England to France to Berwick, Lothian and then Carlisle over seven months, ending with little change in the situation apart from the expenditure of gold and blood. Also the Auld Alliance in action: the French distracting the English from Scotland, then the Scots returning the favour. This episode also marked the end of the Second War of Scottish Independence. No battles, no great drama, but - I think - a taste of a typical Medieval campaign. See what you think. Gog the Mild (talk) 15:22, 20 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from mujinga

I'll get the ball rolling for a prose review. My level of expertise is shown by not knowing Berwick was so important back then.

One has to be a bit of an aficionado to be aware of that sort of thing.

"The disastrous English campaign of Stanhope Park brought" - my first thought here was that Stanhope Park was a general, is Battle of Stanhope Park acceptable?

I am so close I would never have thought of that. This is where your not knowing the topic is an advantage. Changed to "The disastrous English Weardale campaign ..."

"Edward never accepted the validity of the treaty[2] and by 1333 England and Scotland were at war again when Edward besieged Berwick, starting the Second War of Scottish Independence." - second Edward could be a "he"?

Fair enough. Done.

"with Edward's son about to lead an attack in south-west France" - maybe name him as the Black Prince?

I wondered about that. Ok, done.

"A force under Walter Mauny went ahead, escorting 120 miners." - why miners? *reads on* ah i see!

:-)

"Edward moved his army up the River Tweed to Roxburgh.." in this paragraph i was slightly surprised by the contemporary chronicler coming after the modern historians and i also wondered if it is worth adding a sentence saying something along the lines of "modern historians see the campaign as a success for Edward" or whatever, so that then the names which come after are clearly all historians .. on present reading it wasn't immediately clear to me Jonathan Sumption was a historian

Rephrased, is this clearer? Modern historians see the campaign as varying degrees of unsuccessful for Edward. Do I need to make that clearer?

that's great now! i was just giving an exmaple of a gloss sentence

i think dependent not dependant?

Oh dear.

is Moffett Moffat?

Good grief!

it's Walter Manny in the infobox but Walter Mauny in the text

Like many people, Sir Walter was inconsistent in the spelling of his name. (Did you know that six signatures of Shakespeare survive, and he spells his surname differently each time? And none of them are "Shakespeare".) Wikipedia is a notoriously unreliable source, and my sources lean heavily to Mauny.

Argh! I misread your comment, sorry. Standardised as "Mauny".

that's it, thanks for an interesting read! Mujinga (talk) 16:31, 20 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

All addressed Mujinga, and thanks for boldly stepping up and being the first to tackle this. Gog the Mild (talk) 17:20, 20 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

happy to support Mujinga (talk) 08:49, 21 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Comments Support from Tim riley

"had been underway for over 22 years" – the OED makes "under way" two words.

Done.

"He was only prevented from worse depredations by his seaborne supplies not arriving due to bad weather" – two quibbles here. First the gerunds are back: it isn't "them not arriving" but "their not arriving" and as "seaborne supplies' not arriving" looks odd I suggest a simple "because". And we must have been through "due to" before: in AmE "due to" is accepted as a compound preposition on a par with "owing to", but in BrE it is not universally so regarded. "Owing to" or, better, "because of" is safer. But as we don't want two becauses in one sentence, may I suggest something like "He was only prevented from worse depredations because bad weather prevented his seaborne supplies from arriving"?

You certainly may. Thank you.

"The castle was overtopped in places" – overtopped is a word I don't know. Perhaps a blue link or something?

Wiktionary link added. ("To be higher than; to rise over the top of".)

"the Auld Alliance, which stipulated that if either country were attacked by England, the other country would invade English territory" – was there any formal agreement to that effect or was it merely an understanding?

I am unsure that an understanding counts as an alliance. It was signed in 1295, renewed in 1326 and while never formally terminated has been a dead letter since 1560.

"Norham Castle, a significant English border fortification" – and what did it signify? I think you mean major or important.

I do indeed.

"he led a chevauchée" – excellent! I'd been waiting for one of those.

:-)

"according to a contemporary 'by reason of the discord of the magnates'" – could do with a citation.

It has one. Number 23. Nicholson page 160. (From memory the last line. Want a photo?)

"devastation was a improvised campaign by Edward" – needs "an" rather than "a"

!

"A winter storm then scattered the fleet, so Edward cut short the campaign and withdraw" – two things here. First, you know my fusty old views on press-ganging "so" into use as a conjunction in formal prose, and secondly "withdraw" should be "withdrew"

Tweaking the first obviated the need to do anything about the second.

"a ceremony known as candlemas" – looks a bit odd without a capital C" – like writing "christmas".

Quite right.

That's my lot for now. Tim riley talk 18:06, 20 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Excellent stuff Tim. I think I managed a full bingo card of my usual errors, but you picked them all up. All fixed. Gog the Mild (talk) 18:45, 20 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Happy to support. Highly readable, clear even to a layman like me, nicely illustrated, evidently balanced and neutral, and well and widely referenced. Meets all the FA criteria in my view. I hope there will be more to come in the same series. Tim riley talk 19:53, 20 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Image review

Suggest adding alt text. Nikkimaria (talk) 06:05, 21 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by Borsoka

Just a first question: why are the two sieges presented in the same article? Does encyclopedias customarily adopt this approach? Borsoka (talk) 10:00, 22 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Frequently. My recently promoted Siege of Breteuil actually dealt with two sieges with a relief in the middle. Sieges of Vannes (1342), not an article I have contributed to, involves four separate sieges in one year. This is just the cases I have come across in the past week. There are numerous similar examples, in Wikipedia and other encyclopedias. In this case the two sieges form a single seamless event. (IMO) If you would prefer a different article name, feel free to suggest one, I am as ever entirely relaxed about such things. Gog the Mild (talk) 13:52, 22 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Source review

I will conduct a source review soon. Hog Farm _Talk 22:06, 22 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]