Talk:History of wood carving

This is a typical 1911 treatise
I have tried to provide a few really beautiful examples of human wood figures from the "High Middle Ages" period. Someone who is at a museum curator level may be able to boil this down to half. I know about photographing museum art, but nothing about carving technique. I'll try to get more material. It would be a real challange to save a third or more of this classic "long-long" article.3dnatureguy 04:33, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

Yeah: this sounds so Rudyard Kipling:

"The savage carver shows the same tendency to over-exalt his art by crowding on too much design as the more civilized craftsman..., his work as a rule is good and suitable, but when he takes to figure work his attempts do not usually meet with success"

Regards, Fbs.

I agree, this is inappropriate language to be using today. 58.165.19.137 (talk) 10:59, 29 December 2007 (UTC)Jason King

Non-neutral terms
In response to User:Just plain Bill's query on my talk page about the article's problems, even the most casual glance through the article in its state as of today will reveal problems with the tone and uncited subjective terms. The very first sentence is "From the remotest ages the decoration of wood has been a foremost art." As we go on we find "well-conceived", "magnificent", "The expression of the face and the realism of the carriage have never been surpassed by any Egyptian sculptor of this or any other period". And so on and on. Tameamseo (talk) 23:10, 23 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Fair enough. Mind if I take off the neutrality tag? One is enough, and there isn't a dispute. __ Just plain Bill (talk) 00:39, 24 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Not a problem, I've put the one 1911 tag on. Tameamseo (talk) 17:49, 24 February 2010 (UTC)
 * This an EB 1911 article, which badly needs updating. But tagging for neutrality & "uncited material" is wrong ands pointless. Johnbod (talk) 02:28, 24 February 2010 (UTC)
 * It can't be denied that there are definite problems. I have changed to a different tag. Tameamseo (talk) 17:47, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

This article stinks
I've read some dross on Wikipedia, but nothing as bad as this ... it is just a copy & paste of a badly out of date single source. Shoddy and lazy work. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.8.206.73 (talk) 14:01, 16 April 2012 (UTC)


 * Lol... cope. - Troopersho (talk) 14:52, 16 February 2023 (UTC)
 * ...he said to the IP from 11 years ago while actionably violating various policies and guidelines JM2023 (talk) 14:41, 20 September 2023 (UTC)
 * exactly Troopersho (talk) 22:53, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

Before 1200AD - that is 1200CE
Article quote: "Wood-carving examples of the first eleven centuries of AD are extremely rare." Yes, but then not really. In archaelogy such items are well known and not at all impossible to find examples of. Tip: Scandinavia (typical example the Norwegian Stave Churches) clsc (talk) 15:33, 22 September 2018 (UTC)


 * oh, and please use "CE/BCE" in stead of the Christian "AD/BC" - using the latter is actually discriminating against non-Christian people, and may even be considered offfensive. clsc (talk) 15:38, 22 September 2018 (UTC)
 * ___ :( ___ Troopersho (talk) 14:55, 16 February 2023 (UTC)
 * No don't use CE - see WP:ERA. They are in fact fairly rare in most places - eg South Asia. Are the Norwegian Stave Churches actually that old? Most seem to be 12th-century, like Borgund Stave Church). Perhaps why the cut-off date was chosen. Johnbod (talk) 17:42, 16 February 2023 (UTC)
 * our global calendar is based on christianity, the same way time zones are based on greenwich (discriminates against non-greenwichers?), the same way months are named after roman emperors (discriminates against non-romans?), the same way our script is latin (discriminates against non-latins?), the same way we say "goodbye" which means "god be with you", the same way our numerals are arabic. better yet, our days are named after NORSE gods, and our planets are named after GREEK and ROMAN gods. and changing the letters doesn't change anything but the superficial appearance. JM2023 (talk) 14:39, 20 September 2023 (UTC)
 * exactly. Troopersho (talk) 22:53, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

The Overall Tone of the Article, Particularly the Far East Section
Many parts of this article, especially the east Asian section, uses rather poetic, subjective tone and language, rather than objective technical descriptions of the art. Should this be revised, or is it acceptable the way it is? Personally, I find it acceptable because the article's subject is art, rather than something that would require a neutral stance on. Troopersho (talk) 14:51, 16 February 2023 (UTC)


 * encyclopedic tone needs to be used across the entire encyclopedia. neutral POV needs to be used across the entire encyclopedia. exceptions are not made for "art". JM2023 (talk) 14:35, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

How did this Article Become B-class?
Granted, this article is very objectively well-detailed, however, the entire article, as the template states "is too reliant on one source." Now, as stated, this article is well-detailed and assuredly falls under notability, but it appears to contain WP:PUFFERY. (I am aware the rating system is unimportant, however I want to use it as a point to state that this article is being reviewed improperly and needs consideration from this prospective. Otherwise, I do appreciate the passion for this article. Cheers! UnexpectedSmoreInquisition (talk) 12:28, 20 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Most assessments are made pretty much solely on length. The whole thing is EB1911, which nobody has changed much. Johnbod (talk) 12:52, 20 September 2023 (UTC)
 * That's fair, I was just curious. UnexpectedSmoreInquisition (talk) 12:57, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

article has been in a bad state since at least 2006
as others have said: EB 1911, unencyclopedic tone, neutrality issues, lack of sourcing, outdated. good lord JM2023 (talk) 14:44, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

Concrete suggestions about how to improve this article
There seem to be long-standing concerns that this article is bad. Partly the problem is that most of it is lifted verbatim from Encyclopaedia Britannica from 1911. There are suggestions at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Encyclopaedia Britannica on how to handle this, but frankly, modernising old material will still leave it old and potentially biased.

At the moment the pattern seems to be that people drop by, see it's bad, note it's bad, and move on. Does anyone have concrete suggestions what to do?

For example, since a currently-running AfD seems to be heading towards keeping the article, while several experienced editors have suggested it needs a complete re-write, would it be worth trimming out everything that's been lifted from 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica so as to leave a bare-bones article on which anyone with enthusiasm can build? Is there a consensus behind this trimming? At the moment, I'm worried that if I just go ahead, to a recent-changes reviewer it's going to look like a bold-but-dangerous deletion of sourced material, and they'll just revert the clean-up. Elemimele (talk) 14:18, 2 December 2023 (UTC)
 * Don't agree with this - there would be no bare bones article in fact - all "of it was lifted verbatim from Encyclopaedia Britannica" originally, there have been relatively few changes. There's nothing worth doing before the AFD is over. Johnbod (talk) 02:36, 3 December 2023 (UTC)