Talk:Gunpowder empires

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Zbklein, Lcat29.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 22:02, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 24 June 2019 and 31 July 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Kamigonn, Jiawei Zou.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 22:02, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

A possible tautology
"an artillery corp of 12,000 and 500 cannons as well as 12,000 musketeers" Is this intended? For the time being, I'm removing "12,000 and".--Adûnâi (talk) 22:45, 31 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Why don't you look up the citation before you change an attributed factual statement you are unsure of? AnthroMimus (talk) 15:27, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

A word choice
"Rallying under Tahmasp's personal leadership, the infantry of the center engaged" Should it be "rallying" or "rallied"? The meaning is basically the same, but the alternative variant would emphasise Tahmasp's role.--Adûnâi (talk) 22:47, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

Article name?
The current name of this article, Period of Gunpowder Empires, makes no sense to me, and will likely confuse readers.

First, why is it capitalized? Is it supposed to be a proper noun? Even early modern warfare, which this subject is a part of, isn't treated as a proper noun; its just a description of a period, even if a unique one. Isn't that the same here? Do the majority of sources treat it as a proper noun? If not, WP cannot do so.

Second, shouldn't the local be part of the subject name somehow? Several empires in Europe at that time also based their military on gunpowder, but I don't think this subject is supposed to include them.

In short, wouldn't something like Islamic gunpowder empires be far better? ("Period of" could be appended before, or "period" appended after, but I think "period" sufficiently redundant as both the "gunpowder" and "empire" terms already denote a restricted period in history, just as we don't say Early modern warfare period.) --A&#8239;D&#8239;Monroe&#8239;III(talk)  18:02, 27 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Well, it just got randomly moved by a (now banned) user without any form of discussion. --HistoryofIran (talk) 18:04, 27 August 2019 (UTC)


 * So we should discuss now, right? We shouldn't just leave it as-is, for multiple reasons, including WP:BMB.
 * It was named Gunpowder Empires for quite a while before this. Should we just go back to that?  Per the article lede, it isn't about any and all empires that focused on gunpowder, so seems insufficiently distinct, and, again, should not be capitalized as if it were a proper noun, as that's not supported by sources.
 * I still lean towards Islamic gunpowder empires. Any objections?  Speak now, please.  --A&#8239;D&#8239;Monroe&#8239;III(talk)  15:28, 28 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Sigh. Looking over the history, it appears the focus of this article was about only the Islamic gunpowder empires, but, likely because of the indistinct name it was given, sections have been added covering non-Islamic empires.  So, as it was being edited per its name rather than its lede, I guess Gunpowder empires (not capitalized) is a better name for the article's current (inconsistent) state.  I'll move it to that unless someone stops me.


 * Pinging recent editors of this article:, , , , , , , , , , . --A&#8239;D&#8239;Monroe&#8239;III(talk)  15:51, 28 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Yes sure, but I did try to move it earlier to its original spelling before the disruptive move occurred but it said I needed a admin to do that. --HistoryofIran (talk) 23:16, 28 August 2019 (UTC)


 * I prefer Gunpowder empires with the appropriate redirects. The article can provide the necessary details. Bradeos Graphon Βραδέως Γράφων (talk) 02:05, 29 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Agree with what you see re Gunpowder empires v. Islamic gunpowder empires. The second would have been the more relevant title but the parts on Korea and Japan, in particular, preclude this possibility. Support renaming to "Gunpowder empires". Lansonyte (talk) 08:39, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

Moving to Gunpowder empires per above, requires admin since it's over an existing redirect, requested here. Thanks all. --A&#8239;D&#8239;Monroe&#8239;III(talk) 21:59, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

Done. --A&#8239;D&#8239;Monroe&#8239;III(talk) 23:35, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

Islamic or any empires?
Per the above, the disruptive moves by banned/blocked users are fixed, and this article's name is in sync with its contents, and properly lower case. That's much better.

I now want to move onto the more nuanced question I brought up above: should this article cover the Islamic empires, as stated in the lede and infobox, or should it cover any empires (and non-empires?) that used gunpowder, in keeping with the article's current contents?

I think the original intent of this article was as stated in the lede and infobox. Those empires share notable aspects involving their use of gunpowder, and share a time, place, fate, and religion. These together indeed seems worthy of an article. But the article was titled Gunpowder Empires, as if that was a proper noun that applied (apparently) only to these empires. This isn't correct; there's no majority of sources using this term specifically for these three empires, and none as a proper noun.

It seems to me that later editors found this article, and based on the name, added sections attempting to widen the scope of the article to fit the over-general name. But, I think the name is too vague to ever be a coherent subject.

I propose we reduce the scope of the article to fit the lede/infobox, even though this means removing most of this added content. Included with that proposal is to again rename this article, this time to Islamic gunpowder empires, or something similar.

Comments? There's no need to rush on this one. --A&#8239;D&#8239;Monroe&#8239;III(talk) 00:06, 30 August 2019 (UTC)

Stubify original research and synthesis article
I am picking up the suggestion of the admin in the closing comment of the AfD and stubify the article in its present form WP:boldly. I repost my reasons here:

On the surface the article may look neat: it has a longer introduction, two sections that define the subject and then follows with historical examples. However, a closer look reveals it is a big mishmash of WP:SYNTH and WP:OR.

The scholarly definition of a gunpowder empire is an empire that was built or maintained by the use of gunpowder weapons by the central state, usually headed by an autocratic ruler. As such the term is typically employed to describe the rise of the early modern, territorial, centralized state against both internal, factionalist enemies and foreign rivals that could not afford the same level of armament. The term "gunpowder empire" thus refers to a relation between use of weaponry and state power. Thus, the article should be concerned mainly if not exclusively with scholarly literature that focuses on this relation.

What the current article does, however, is citing a few such texts as a rough outline of the subject, but then it goes on to ignore what they say and fills the article space instead with unrelated literature on the development of weapons technology. This is synthesis. The subject of the article is not another history of gunpowder warfare, but about the impact these weapons had on state formation. In other words: The article should evolve primarily around military and political history, with a stress on administrative matters, but in its current form it is more a fleshed out timeline of the history of (weapons) technology.

In more detail, some of the bigger problems with the current version are: The sections on the other empires are, as been said, more accounts of the history of the spread of cannon and handguns than on the subject. Since the subject is notable but so thoroughly missed that the article is beyond repair, the article should be stubified and reworked. Gun Powder Ma (talk) 08:34, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
 * The central role of Western Europe is largely ignored: The weapon technology, and the related organizational changes in warfare, that made gunpowder empires possible was developed and exported from Western Europe. Yet, no empire rose in Western Europe as the military and political rivalry was too intense for one power to gain the upper hand. The cited William H. McNeill 1993 devotes almost half of his space to this special path of Western Europe (pp. 103-117). In the section on Europe, however, this development is not even addressed, even though it provides the necessary comparative background for Asia. Instead, all that is offered is a brief outline of the history of the gunpowder formula in Europe that is irrelevant here.
 * The current article entirely omits those European gunpowder empires that did exist. McNeill, for one, treats Muscovy and the European overseas colonial empires such as Spain as the first gunpowder empires (pp. 121-125).
 * The current article overplays the importance of Muslim empires. It even goes so far to misrepresent in the lead and the info box the entire phenomenon as being synonymous with "Islamic Gunpowder Empires". This is WP:OR. In truth, McNeill covers them after the European ones and concludes that at least one of the three, the Safavid empire, "ought not, perhaps, to be counted as a gunpowder empire at all" (p. 131). As it is, the section on the Safavids does not contain a single reference to a work that is primarily concerned with gunpowder empires.
 * Same is true for Korea that is simply listed as one, although McNeill does not refer to it at all, but explicitly writes that the described empire formation process only occurred in the Far East in "China and Japan" (p. 103).
 * The period of Gunpowder empires is very well-known in scholarly studies of Muslim history. Most books on the history of Islam give a chapter or more to it. Perhaps one of your concerns will be better addressed by creating a new article called Muslim Gunpowder Empires or Gunpowder empires (Muslim history)? That way we won't have any concerns of WP:SYNTH. The concept of Gunpowder empires in Islamic history is notable and covered by several sources (Islamic Gunpowder Empires: Ottomans, Safavids, and Mughals, The Venture of Islam, Volume 3: The Gunpower Empires and Modern Times, The Oxford History of Islam, chapter 8).VR talk 04:09, 30 August 2020 (UTC)
 * I see that also made this proposal above.VR talk 15:06, 30 August 2020 (UTC)

New article on the Age of the Islamic Gunpowders
Pinging, , , , , , , , , , , , : a new "Islamic Gunpowder Empires" article has been created by using content from this article on 26 April and then moved to Age of the Islamic Gunpowders. Please can you have a look at the new article as it may have inherited some WP:SYNTH and WP:OR problems from this one. TSventon (talk) 05:50, 28 April 2020 (UTC)

Start and end date in infobox
The 1453 to 1736 range should be portrayed as more approximate, probably, as the gunpowder empires era, could be seen as starting earlier (with Ottoman cannons) or starting later (with Safavid and Mughal establishment); or ending earlier (based on Safavid fall) or ending later (based on Mughal or Ottoman fall).

Can we find some sources to give more exact start and end dates, or change it to approximate centuries? -- Rauisuchian (talk) 05:23, 25 January 2022 (UTC)