Talk:Crossing the Rubicon

Very non-standard comma
Julius Caesar's crossing the Rubicon river on 10 January, 49 BC precipitated ...

Maybe because the year is odd (two digits) someone thinks this comma is beneficial, so I've left it alone. But it extremely non-standard, nevertheless. &mdash; MaxEnt 00:27, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

After or before?
It is written in the article "According to some authors, he uttered the phrase alea iacta est ("the die is cast") before crossing." (bold mine). It seems illogical and also not congruent with the statements in the final paragraph of the article. May someone check and correct it? noychoH (talk) 11:52, 26 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Most scholars today take Plut Caes more seriously than Suet Caes in the origin of this specific quote (I think probably because of the attribution to Meander and because apparition in Suet is a nonsense story). In Plut, Caesar says "let the die be cast"; in Suet he says "the die is cast". In both, he says this before or at the start of the crossing of the river. You can confirm this by just going to Suet Caes 32. I think what has happened here is that Caesar was saying civil war = gambling and it was received some 1500 years later as Caesar talking about the result of an already thrown die. Ifly6 (talk) 13:01, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Merge proposal
I propose merging the contents of Rubicon into Crossing the Rubicon, leaving Rubicon to discuss the modern river only, and Crossing the Rubicon to discuss the ancient river only: Thanks! IgnatiusofLondon (talk) 22:17, 30 January 2024 (UTC)
 * The current Rubicon article effectively centres on the ancient Rubicon, not the modern river identified as the Rubicon in 1933, which leaves limited scope to discuss the claims of competing claimants to the ancient river in either article.
 * This difficulty is somewhat expressed by an article I created this afternoon, Ponte di San Vito, where a section is dedicated to the claim of the river (specifically, the Ponte di San Vito, which has been the subject of archaeological interest since the 1933 identification).  The current Further information links to Rubicon, but this feels inappropriate: Crossing the Rubicon would be a more sensible redirect.
 * Both Rubicon and Crossing the Rubicon need considerable work on their citations, and the discussion in Ponte di San Vito suggests it is by no means scholarly consensus that the Rubicon has been correctly identified (as implied by Rubicon), though this might be the contrarianism of Riminese historians.
 * To repeat, the Rubicon article would not become a redirect, but simply discuss the current river (formerly, the Fiumincino), with a Further information template directing to the Crossing the Rubicon article for the history of the ancient Rubicon's identification.
 * This doesn't seem to be a merge proposal - it's simply seeking a new consensus on the scope of these two separate existing articles which will remain as two separate articles. DeCausa (talk) 22:27, 30 January 2024 (UTC)
 * That's an accurate summary! Is there a different process I should follow? My thought was that it is tantamount to a merge, given that little of the Rubicon article discusses the modern river. IgnatiusofLondon (talk) 22:31, 30 January 2024 (UTC)


 * Oppose merging, as the two articles seem to cover different topics: the river itself vs. the event for which it's most famous. Maybe the contents should be adjusted to better separate those topics, but you'd expect the article about the river to have a section devoted to Caesar's crossing of it, and that section should logically be longer and more substantial than the section about the river in the article about Caesar's crossing.  It doesn't seem too bad as it is, but you don't really need consensus to move some material from one article to the other, or prune unnecessary details.  If someone else thinks they're necessary, they can always put them back, or start a talk page discussion about them.  P Aculeius (talk) 00:25, 31 January 2024 (UTC)
 * I also oppose merging. The crossing is a specific event. The river is a place. Ifly6 (talk) 00:37, 31 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Without consulting other sources, from what's discussed in Rubicon, the only notability of the ancient river is the event, and any subsequent history of the ancient river after the event is general to all rivers in the Romagna region (principally, the changing of the river course, which has some bearing on the identification of the ancient river). To that extent, the identification of the ancient river was a search for the site of the event, so I'm not sure the ancient river or its identification are cleanly separable from the event. But the distinction you and P Aculeius draw leads me to wonder whether an entirely new article, Identification of the Rubicon, might be a better way forward. IgnatiusofLondon (talk) 00:49, 31 January 2024 (UTC)
 * The ancient Rubicon's notability emerges from its place in Roman law and the boundaries of Cisalpine Gaul. Caesar's crossing is just the most famous case where it was relevant. Also, you can have a single article on both the ancient Rubicon and the modern Rubicon with identification disputes. Just divide them into two sections: § Ancient and § Modern. Ifly6 (talk) 01:39, 31 January 2024 (UTC)
 * As Ifly6 says, there's more to say about the river, its significance in Roman history and law, and its current state (including disputes about whether the modern Rubicon is the same river) than would conveniently fit in the article about Caesar crossing the Rubicon. Just as there's more detail to be had in that article than fits conveniently in the main articles about Caesar, or the Civil War.  That's why it's a good thing to have a separate article about the river.  There's going to be some overlap with other articles, but that's okay.  Traditional encyclopedias also have article overlap; if there weren't any overlap, it'd be harder to understand how topics relate to one another.  P Aculeius (talk) 02:02, 31 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Oppose merging but some rearrangement between them may be appropriate. Johnbod (talk) 04:17, 31 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Oppose merging. The OP didn't really intend this as merge proposal in the WP sense, since both articles are to remain. There is scope for eliminating some duplicate information. --Heron (talk) 09:38, 31 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Oppose merging Per everything already said.★Trekker (talk) 11:57, 31 January 2024 (UTC)