Talk:Abbey of Santa Maria delle Macchie, San Ginesio

This abbey's name
In my view there has been no standard in nomenclature for naming abbeys or monastery. When in doubt, see what is customary: In reviewing Category:Benedictine monasteries:

the German category (137 pages) and the American site (39 pages) follow the sequence of (Name) abbey or Abbey. The French category (115 pages) uses both the sequence above or Abbey (Name). No consistency. The Spanish category favors monastery (since abbey has no direct translation in Spanish) and Monastery of (Name), which mirrors Spanish language grammar.

In looking at the choices, I prefer the German and American naming system, it seems the most consistent, and gives the primary name primacy, always helpful.

Rococo1700 (talk) 03:52, 14 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Neither your personal preference nor what is done in other projects has any bearing whatsoever on how we name this page; nor is move-warring likely to lead to any useful result. What's needed is to establish what name is most commonly used for this structure in reliable English-language sources. To achieve that we'd probably need to identify some sources that actually discuss it. That I've not been able to do – how certain are you that (1) it is usually known by this name and (2) that it is notable? Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 16:16, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

I live in a part of the world where a building that is over one hundred years old is notable. 1.2 millennia is a long time to be around. Classic notability comes from being extant a long time. This building has, therefore in my eyes, whether that is not your personal preference, is notable merely for that reason. I have re-read Notability and find that the article has two verifiable annotations by tourism offices linked to either commune or province that make note of the site. The other question is whether it meets the criteria alone based on the fact that Notable topics have attracted attention over a sufficiently significant period of time.

My interest specifically has been to document an area: art, history, and architecture of churches in Italy since it provides a dense nucleation for many other topics. Recently, I have explored the density that this would provide for a small region, but I think Wikipedia will provide value in this fashion too. I view Wikipedia as creating a library of discriminate information. In the case of this abbey, I do not think it is a question, because the contents of the article might be of interest to someone thinking about Benedictines, or Romanesque architecture, or the power of Territorial Abbeys, or how did the suppression of orders take place in the 19th century, or what was the use of spolia like in rural versus urban settings, or to what saints where Benedictine abbeys dedicated etc.

Now to your main point: nomenclature. This can be a tricky business, and I am hoping Wikipedia can often come to help nomenclature along. I have an interest in Italian painters, often they have names spelled in various fashions over the centuries, or they are referred to by nicknames. Sometimes a Google search or a search in academic journals is not the best answer to the question, what is the best name, although it does help to look. I am not a fan of controversial names, but Santa Maria delle Macchie is not controversial, but Our Lady of the Stain or Spot would be. Finally the question is whether to put the term of Abbey in front or behind the name. In Italian, the term is best set in the front, but in English, this is not so. I agree that what we need to establish is what name is most commonly used for this structure? Again, you appear to want to make it an issue of this one abbey; but then are we going to say that "Farfa Abbey" is more commonly used that "Abbey of Farfa", but in this abbey, for which there is not much English language use, we are going to make an exception. I think we should stick to a nomenclature that helps classification best, unless there is an imperative deriving from common or academic usage that alters naming. It is somewhat bold to ask Wikipedia to set a standard convention. But Wikipedia does so all the time in situations like this: we talk about arranging adjectives of a noun in time, place and manner not because of common usage, but because of accepted convention. I think in language, specially the English Language, it is most proper to say what you mean up front, specially in titles , that is, rather than titling an article: "His most gracious and benevolent majesty, King of Castille, Leon, and Asturias, King of Navarre, Lord of Aragon, Conquerer of Andalucía, and Ultramar, etc,etc,etc, King Charles I of Spain", better off saying "Charles I, King of Spain" ("period"). Initially I was not sure what the nomenclature would be for Wikipedia, and so I looked up how it is done for other Benedictine Abbeys. As I stated, the general convention, is name + abbey. It seems more proper, useful, and befitting of Occam's razor. I do not think this should be a controversial point, but if you wish we can bring it up for review.Rococo1700 (talk) 18:27, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

Also I see this change was done by WP:RM/TR:. I strongly reject the statement you made that this was: undiscussed move, for the second time, to a malformed page-name with no evidence of use in English; of course I've no objection to a move discussion once this has been...

Since I did discuss why I made the change. Specially since the first name was made by myself, something you failed to bring up in your comment. I provided evidence for the use of the name in English. You just ignored it. I have objected to your process. You need to start a discussion. Rococo1700 (talk) 18:34, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

Requested move 14 December 2016

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: not moved. Consensus appears to be against moving the page. JudgeRM  (talk to me)  02:50, 22 December 2016 (UTC)

Abbey of Santa Maria delle Macchie, San Ginesio → Santa Maria delle Macchie Abbey, San Ginesio –
 * Queried move request via my user talk page. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 23:38, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

I pick this one move as an example, since I originally gave the page a name. I recommend that all the Benedictine abbeys called Abbey of such and such or Abbazia of such and such be renamed Such and Such Abbey. If the abbey is known well enough without using the term abbey, such as Monte Cassino, then we can leave it alone. The reason is that it makes better listing in categories, and establishes or follows a convention. For example, the category of Benedictine monasteries in Germany, which has the largest number of entries and the category for similar place in the US, follow this convention. The Category for France, like the one for Italy, has no such convention. I also hope that it helps forward this encyclopedia to be thrifty of language, at least in titles, although this may not be true in debates about minutiae, where editors, including me, are too verbose.Rococo1700 (talk) 13:52, 15 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Oppose - I understand and largely sympathise with the nominator's desire for greater standardisation in this area but don't think we've reached a point where all monastery articles, or just Benedictine monasteries, across all European countries can be given standardised titles, for a number of reasons too complicated to go into here. I don't think the above brief analysis is particularly accurate.


 * Looking solely at this article, from the viewpoint of WP:ENGLISH and WP:COMMONNAME, which is where we need to start from, the English standard form for monastery names is [Place] Abbey (Priory, Friary etc), which here would give Macchie Abbey; but where the name is longer than a straightforward placename, as here, the form as used in the present title is also a possibility. I think however that the "San Ginesio" is probably unnecessary, as there is no disambiguation issue, so the second option = Abbey of Santa Maria delle Macchie. I support that. To the extent to which the place crops up in an unscientific internet search, that is by far the commonest form, and far commoner than either Macchie Abbey above or the proposed name here, which is unidiomatic and uneuphonic, and apparently doesn't occur anywhere outside this discussion on Wikipedia.


 * Some editors insist on using monastery and church names in their original languages: I see no case for using the Italian name here - Abbazia di Santa Maria etc - as English has perfectly good ways of referring to abbeys and so forth, and there is no reason not to do so here, so there I agree with the nominator. Eustachiusz (talk) 02:02, 16 December 2016 (UTC)

I do not buy the too complicated answer. That is too simplistic an answer. I object to Macchie abbey because Italians would fall to the ground and laugh. I prefer to give churches a place, specially if there is redundancy. There may or may not be other Santa Maria delle Macchie churches, but not likely abbeys. I completely disagree with Abbey of Santa Maria delle Macchie (my original title) for all the reasons I cited previously. Again The unscientific internet search mentioned above, derives from an n = 1, and that one may derive from a machine translation of Abbazia di Santa Maria delle Macchie by a regional tourism office. Not quite meeting any standards. The only other use was by me, and I don't agree with it anymore. Also by the way, I rap Santa Maria delle Macchie Abbey and it comes off my tongue completely idiomatic and music to my ears. As to making this a convention, we can battle it out one by one, if we want to waste our time. I would suggest asking the opinion of the editors of the abbeys in Germany or US how they came about their convention.Rococo1700 (talk) 05:50, 16 December 2016 (UTC)
 * The abbey is apparently in a place called "Macchie" - doubtless that is hugely amusing to Italians too, but entirely irrelevant - as Macchie Abbey it wd take its name from where it is, not from the dedication (which may well be based on a pun on Macchie).
 * As for the German Benedictine abbeys, there are perhaps half a dozen in the form (e.g.) Berg im Donaugau Abbey, which is not comparable because the first element as in "B im D" is a complex but single placeneme, and c a dozen in the form (e.g.) St George's Abbey in the Black Forest, where the placename element and dedication together are too lengthy to fit comfortably at the front, so are separated. Although there are several more which include dedications either with or without placenames, there are none as you want here, with a complex dedication all in front. I used to edit as User:Staffelde and User:Heartofadog and under those names created most if not all many of the earlier articles on German monasteries so am familiar with the Eng lang issues. (Similar issues to those here arose with some of the French ones I wrote using at first the same form you want here, which I later renamed as I have changed my mind since then: I would not use that formula now, as I don't think it is good English).Eustachiusz (talk) 17:18, 16 December 2016 (UTC)


 * Oppose Our policy on article titling is quite specific: "Do not ... use obscure or made-up names". The proposed name certainly comes into that category. What's needed here is to establish what this place (which appears to be the crypt of the church of Santa Maria Assunta?) is called in reliable sources in English. If that can't be done – improbable though that seems, but I've drawn a total blank – then we fall back on our policy for that situation: "If there are too few reliable English-language sources to constitute an established usage, follow the conventions of the language appropriate to the subject (German for German politicians, Portuguese for Brazilian towns, and so on)". The name "Abbazia di Santa Maria delle Macchie" seems well established in Italian. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 12:07, 16 December 2016 (UTC)
 * There are 750+ google hits for "Abbey of Santa Maria delle Macchie", 4 for "Macchie Abbey" and 4 (all from Wikipedia itself) for Santa Maria delle Macchie Abbey. But in any case surely sensible translations are permitted? Eustachiusz (talk) 17:18, 16 December 2016 (UTC)


 * you are selectively quoting from theWP:AT, other sections of that document should apply: for example: The official name of Rhode Island, used in various state publications, is State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. Both titles are precise and unambiguous, but Rhode Island is the most concise title to fully identify the subject. In our case we could state: ... in various state publications, the title is "Abbazia di Santa Maria delle Macchie", but "Santa Maria delle Macchie abbey" is the most concise title to fully identify the subject. or we could refer that in the English Wikipedia, article titles are written using the English language. That is assuming there is no convention, and again, I urge you since the titles in Italian are randomly assigned, why not look at the more tidy entries in the English language categories for US and German abbeys, which are larger or about the same size and follow a convention. Unless however, you want to apply the google or JSTOR search criteria for each abbey individually. Regardless of whether you did or did not, as you yourself have stated, it does not easily apply in this circumstance. I agree that we should have criteria and policies, I just think you are misusing them, and that common sense should still prevail. Rococo1700 (talk) 15:12, 16 December 2016 (UTC)


 * Eustachiusz, I also did a google search using quotation marks around the titles "abbey of SM delle Macchie" and "SM delle Macchie abbey" and the difference when analyzed is far less. The former gave 12 most relevant results, of which about 3-4 were due to Wikipedia, 4 were due to the same Macerata tourism office, one to Macerata tourism office, and other tourism sites, all of which may have the same origin, which may have been a quick machine translation of Abbazia di SM delle Macchie". There is one use of this in the "Novana, its territory and the Pisa South Picenum Survey Project", an academic work, but it uses "Benedictine abbey of SM delle M". Ultimately I am unconvinced that this changes my mind. I disagree with Justlettersandnumbers that this is an "obscure or made up" name, any more than the hundreds of other "such and such abbeys" found in non-English speaking entries in Wikipedia. I can agree with dropping "San Ginesio" and just making the entries "such and such abbey" as long as this is a unique identifier (ie not Santa Maria Abbey). Anyway, even for me, this is too much debate for word order. I said my peace. If no one moves, then these titles stay this way until someone else notices the lack of clarity or convention. Rococo1700 (talk) 21:12, 17 December 2016 (UTC)

I am closing the discussion. I was in favor of change. Two were opposed. While not a democracy, I acknowledge change requires more momentum than stasis.
 * don't close pages that you have participated it (or at least attempt to, since your "close" wasn't done properly). I will assess the move when the seven days are up (which is likely in a few hours or so), and then close it myself. JudgeRM   (talk to me)  22:44, 21 December 2016 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.