Talk:Château Gaillard/GA1

GA Review
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Reviewer: MinisterForBadTimes (talk) 09:16, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

OK, this article basically conforms to the GA criteria, so there won't be any major problems passing it. I've done some of the work myself, tidying things up a little, correcting some typos etc. I've also restructured some sentences to reduce redundancy in the text.

There are only a few issues that I would like to see addressed.


 * Background - I have made a new sub-section in "History", which I think should contain the back-story of Richard and Philips conflict. This contextual information is very important here, because, as the article says, the castle was built as a direct result of the conflict; it was not a "traditional" location for fortifications. By back-story, I mean things like; why Richard was Duke of Normandy, his fedual relationship as Duke of Normandy with the king of France, exactly why he was at war with Philip in the first place (especially since Philip was his seigneur'for Normandy).
 * So you want a couple more sentences on Richard's conflict with Philip and how Richard came to be Duke of Normandy? Nev1 (talk) 13:58, 24 February 2010 (UTC)
 * That would more-or-less do it. Obviously, how Richard came to be Duke of Normandy is fairly straightforward in many ways, but the point links nicely to the sentence later on about how, after Philip's conquest, the Duchy was in French hands again.


 * "The French gained access to the outermost ward on the line of approach by undermining the tower" - I didn't really understand what this sentence meant.
 * I think the problem lay with "on the line of approach", which unnecessarily complicated the sentence. Is it now clearer that I've removed that bit? Nev1 (talk) 13:58, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

For the next two points, I have placed a double asterisk at the appropriate point in the text.


 * Castle Saucy - whilst true, this lacks any kind of context. Why was it called that? If this isn't clear, I would suggest just deleting the sentence.
 * I agree, it is a bit non-sequitor. Unfortunately, that's also how it's presented in the sources. I think it's fair enough to remove it as it doesn't really fit in, although I'll leave a note on the talk page. Nev1 (talk) 13:58, 24 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Philip's campaign after Richard's death - this needs to be dated more clearly in the text.
 * I intend to get round to this later today. Nev1 (talk) 13:58, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

And that's it I think. If these issues are addressed, I'll pass the article. Regards, MinisterForBadTimes (talk) 12:33, 19 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the review and the note on my talk page, it's possible I may have missed this otherwise as I've been around intermittently. Just a note that the article use ndashes before (ie: – ); that's fine and they're a valid alternative to mdashes per MOS:DASH, so it was not necessary to change them. Nev1 (talk) 13:58, 24 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Well I never. I'm sure someone once made me change all my dashes to m-dashes in a review. Although maybe they were hyphens... It's very confusing! MinisterForBadTimes (talk) 14:59, 24 February 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm sure someone did, a couple of times well intentioned people have insisted that mdashes should be used instead of ndashes because someone told them too but usually haven't checked for themselves. Of course it's a stylistic thing so doesn't really matter, and it's almost impossible to be familiar with every aspect os the manual of style. Anyway, I think I've addressed most of your point, how do the changes look in your opinion? Nev1 (talk) 18:26, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Everything looks great now, at least as far as this review is concerned! I've now passed the article. M.F.B.T.  Yes, Minister? 19:27, 3 March 2010 (UTC)