Talk:Knossos (modern history)

Creation
I just created this article by splitting Knossos. Some tasks remain. First, the material has to be removed from Knossos with the appropriate references to here. Second, this article needs to be individualized so that it is as little as possible a duplicate of material in the other. Third, the references have to be tailored to only this material. Fourth, the article is not yet complete. I will be working on those items.Dave (talk) 15:18, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

The you tube videos
Hello cplakidis. You want to know what good the videos are. I will tell you. WP is multimedia; we are not confined to the written word only. Pictures have their own entire section, commons. If we have pictures, why not videos? They are only streams of pictures. They give us a moving visual representation of the places and events mentioned in the article. The public might like to see that. They are as valid as pictures. Therefore, I oppose the exclusion of videos merely on the grounds that they are videos. WP often uses videos; at least I do. You're the first that has ever objected. Is it the fact that they are youtube to which you object? I'm temporarily putting them back until you can come up with a valid reason. Understand, I'm not being confrontational. They can stay in or out as far as I personally am concerned. I put them in because I think they are an enhancement, which I still do. Why don't you reconsider and then let us know what you think. I think your opinion as an experienced editor is valuable. Remember, WP editors do things for reasons specified by the code. So far I have not seen them. You wanted to know what good they are. I told you. By the way thank you for checking the interlinks. This article began as a copy-over. I did not check the links. Thank you.Dave (talk) 19:58, 30 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Without a doubt, videos are useful. What is not useful is a random (and highly subjective) selection of Youtube links, without any particular rationale. If they were online documentaries about Knossos, hosted by, say, the Greek Ministry of Culture, that would be fine. As it is, they are personal video collections, with no particular claim to being important, representative or authoritative. Just as we don't include links to blogs or forums on any given subject, especially since a simple Google search suffices to find thousands of such links, we don't include just any Youtube video links. I am not reprimanding you or anything, but if we begin by adding a few videos you and I find "nice", then where does it end? For this reason, it is a Wikipedia policy as well: WP:LINKFARM. See also WP:YOUTUBE and WP:LINKSTOAVOID. Cheers, Constantine  ✍  20:13, 30 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Hi Constantine. Undoubtedly what you say about WP is useful, true and according to policy. Thanks for the policy. If only I had had that a year or two ago I could have settled a lot of grievous disputes in my favor. Because I didn't research it I took a beating.


 * That is not what I asked for, however. What I asked for is the reason why you removed THESE videos. I can't really discern it among the entire WP policy. You surely can't mean ALL those reasons apply to these videos?


 * Now, there is an error on your part. I did not put these in because I thought they were "nice." First of all, there is a video of Herakleion, one of the better I thought. This is not random. Herakleion appears in the article as a modern place where much of the political action of the article takes place, and where the archaeologists lived who worked on Knossos. The reader might want to see what it looked like. If there is no substitute for a picture, then there is no substitute for a stream of pictures. Then there are historical pictures of Herakleion. The article covers in part the history of the Herakleion area of which Knossos is a part. Do you deny that Knossos is in and within walking distance of Herakleion? Mino Kalokairinos lived in Herakleion. Knossos is Herakleion. Its fleets sailed from Herakleion's harbor. And, there is a video of Knossos. How is that NOT relevant? People want to see what Knossos looks like, and still pictures included in the article are nice but they do not show the place the way the video does. I included a video of the invasion of Greece. That IS in the article. This background material makes clearer why what was happening at Knossos was happening there. Otherwise we have to say simply that, well, one day the Germans showed up to shoot Pendlebury and live in Villa Ariadne.


 * Now, I have just showed you that these are not random videos and are not irrelevant to the subject. I am not presenting these videos as authoritative, except to the topics they record. Are you saying a film of the west court is not an authoritative view of the west court? You are right about one thing, anyone can shoot videos. Are you saying, we can only accept videos from the Ministry? Are you saying, only material approved by the ministry can be here? A video must be shot by a person, that is true. However, it is not of a personal topic. All the pictures on Commons are from persons. If we would take these personal photos off flikr, why would we not include these videos from youtube? Same type of source! You almost seem to be saying, and I certainly hope you are not, that only material approved by the Hellenic Ministry of Culture can appear on the English WP. We don't have censorship on WP, and if we did, I doubt if these videos would fall under it. If there is something politically you do not like I am afraid I cannot help you there. There are lots of events and views lots of people do not like. For myself, Greek politics is quite remote to me. I study its history without much emotion, except the common commiseration with mankind, on which the Greeks have no monopoly.


 * In summary, please list the videos. One or two words will do. Then provide me specifically with the applicable reason this video is unacceptable to WP.


 * As far as reprimanding me is concerned, you are not in a position to do that. You are not an employer, or a relative, or of higher rank in any meaningful way. I am not Greek citizen nor am I in the Greek army. I'm just an editor here as are you. I am a reasonable man. If on each video you can give me a reason why this video is not acceptable to WP, I will remove it myself. I understand you might have personal feelings or be committed to some political view. I assert that those do not count here. There is much material on WP I don't like, but unless I have a good reason I leave it alone. That is the WP way, as I understand it. As an editor with medals surely you should be sympathetic with that. What is troubling you? Why don't you like these videos? Think now, exactly what in the video do you feel is inappropriate? I'd rather see a video of Knossos than a whole portfolio of still photos any day. I'm also working on Knossos pics on Commons and without the videos I would not be able to identify most of the photos.


 * Take your time. The videos can come out or stay in any time.Dave (talk) 21:59, 30 May 2012 (UTC)


 * You didn't understand what I was writing. I don't dispute the value of Youtube video collages as entertainment or as a visual aid. I merely dispute that they are an objective, authoritative and representative visual aid with encyclopedic value. That is what external links should be limited to according to both policy and the spirit of an encyclopedia, and not some random videos on Heraklion or Knossos, of which there are hundreds. The videos are nice, but so they have something special, that actually distinguishes them from similar videos hosted on Youtube? No. A simple search can bring up dozens of similar videos. Are they in some way authoritative and representative? No more than any other such personal collection on Youtube. (And here you completely misunderstood what I said about the ministry, it was an indicative example of an authoritative source which would provide expert-based commentary based on WP:RS guidelines, not an attempt at censorship or limiting our options purely to government-approved material) Were these videos selected on some objective, scholarly basis? No, they are random picks by a random Wikipedia editor based on subjective criteria. In other words, we might as well include only a message at the end saying simply: go to Youtube and see some really nice videos on Heraklion and Knossos. That is precisely what WP:LINKFARM cautions against. Plus there is nothing unique about them. By presenting them and only them here, we are implicitly making a selection among dozens or even hundreds of similar ones, but this selection is purely subjective and hence not encyclopedic. Let the interested reader go for himself and search Youtube, as he most probably will do either way, there is no need to prepare an "approved" or "best of" list for her/him here.
 * Further, WP policy states that "Many videos hosted on YouTube or similar sites do not meet the standards for inclusion in External links sections, and copyright is of particular concern. Many YouTube videos of newscasts, shows or other content of interest to Wikipedia visitors are copyright violations and should not be linked." and "This is particularly relevant when linking to sites such as Scribd or YouTube, where due care should be taken to avoid linking to material that violates copyright." For instance, the WW2 and "The Ancient Island of Crete - Knossos" videos are clearly taken from modern documentaries, and are in violation of the latters' copyright. And as for the other videos, they contain both photos with unverifiable copyright, views of buildings (there is no freedom of panorama in Greece), not to say anything about the possibly copyrighted music they use. You see that this is a potential minefield, which is why the average Youtube video can not be linked to. Whenever such links have appeared in the past, they have been deleted, for these reasons. Constantine   ✍  22:49, 30 May 2012 (UTC)
 * All right, Constantine. I accept your last reason concerning the copyright. Youtube does not worry about copyrights. Some of that material, such as the music, might well be a copyright violation. The person who loads it might well be pirating it. I pay a lot of attention to such violations myself. I like videos though. If you see any that do not appear to be a copyright violation, I would appreciate it if you would throw them in there. Otherwise I think the public will just have to be happy with what is there. In the future, if you begin with very specific reasons I think you will save yourself some time. Not everyone is a beginner around here.Dave (talk) 23:00, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

The last name
Hello Arjayay, I see you've been changing Arthur to Evans. I would like to establish a few things. There is no rule as far as I know on WP that says one has to use the last name. The man had two names. I think both can be used. I am at a loss to explain your stange preoccupation with this ad hoc principle of yours to a couple of paragraphs in this article being written by me. You didn't change all the instances in the article. Moreover, Arthur Evans is the only person to receive such treatment. I do not consider it a more objective approach. After you introduce a person it is acceptable in sem-formal language to use the first name, especially in some of the more personal statements. If you really wanted to be formal you would use Mr. Evans. To use Evans all the time introduces a separation of rank between Arthur and the author. The author has to maintain his semi-formal distace at all times, as though he were a servant or a student or a military subordinate. That practice could end up in a stilted style. First names are acceptable. The first names of dignitaries and high officials appear in prose all the time. Lots of people have changed what I have written, sometimes even as I try to write. My policy is this. If your changes result in writing that is equal to or better than mine, I leave it. If your changes are simply different but are not inferior and do not introduce errors, I leave it. If you have degraded the style or have introduced errors then it has to go. I don't say I will revert it. Chances are, I will rewite it. As far as what you have done, frankly, if I had not seen the comment in the history I never would have noticed. I will leave that. I would not recommend your changing every name or every instance of Arthur. If it puts the wrong tone in, I will not leave it. I would say, just let go of it. There is no reason to adopt such a principle further. Let's not.Dave (talk) 03:20, 31 May 2012 (UTC)
 * You were wrong. It's a issue. We use full names or last names except in occasional situations where there's another person with the same last name being dabbed. —  Llywelyn II   16:01, 26 December 2016 (UTC)

A word of advice
The article seems to be based mostly on Sir Arthur Evans' biography, since it goes into exhausting detail on what Evans did. Similarly, being based on a book on Evans, it includes a huge amount of related developments in the international scene whose exposition is necessary for the readers of a book (who are probably unfamiliar with the area and it shistory), but completely redundant for the readers of an internet-based encyclopedia where there is no need to include such amount of detail in every article due to the presence of hyperlinks (see WP:SUMMARY). In short, the article often it misses the point of focusing on Knossos itself. I strongly recommend that it be submitted to WP:PR and WP:GOCE for a thorough copyediting and pruning. Constantine  ✍  11:37, 31 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Your advice is noted by me. What I also note is, that, for the first time in this area, someone, namely you, is taking a stong interest in writing this article. Actually, my response is somewhat different from what you appear to have expected. I'm trying to get a continuous article here. The Knossos article has lain fallow for a long time. Actually I would like to get on to other things. I welcome the collaboration of another writer. That appears to be you. My previous objections were mainly to nit-picking my style without any significant contributions to the article. Any disgruntled editor can do that. But, helping to write, that is a different story.
 * Instead of recommending that this be submitted to peer review, why don't you submit it? Do I have to do all the work around here? There is a way to go on the article, however. I'm aiming at a continuous story from Kalokairinos to the present. You can see that there are gaps.
 * I see that you perceived the two main content problems. First, how much goes under Arthur Evans, and how much under Knossos? If you think I had settled that question in my mind you are mistaken. I'm trying to do both articles at the sme time, to jump from one to the other and back. Thus, anything I wrote I regarded as tentatively placed. Second, how much of the general situation is necessary to make Knossos understandable? That was by no means settled in my mind either. I don't know what you might have expected as a reaction from me. I would say, go ahead, write, condense anything you like. I will review what you do as well as expecting you to review me. This is going to be give and take for a while.
 * If you are going to remove material on Evans, I will probably want to place it in the Arthur Evans article. Moreover, you should keep in mind, Knossos had no life apart from Arthur Evans. He guided the entire restoration right from the beginning. Knossos was his. So, we can't develop an article on Knossos and leave Arthur out. Second, I had not yet got to Operation Mercury, the invasion of Crete. While Operation Marita is interesting and something should be said, it is the invasion of Crete that must be covered. I'm not going to desert this thing now. In the past when I've done that the critics just dropped the article and it stayed the way it was. Apparently they were only interested in me, not the article. I hope that is not the case with you and that you will go through a complete article on this. If you appear to be taking, or want to take, a lead role, fine. I will get back to the Knossos and Arthur Evansa articles. It's up to you. Lead or not, write or not, just as you please. Well, I go tthings to do. I'll keep you posted on what I am doing.
 * Incidentally I've been asked to get back to an article after a peer review a nmuber of times. Peer reviews are pretty useful. I think we need, however to finish the article, don't you agree? You can't change something that is not there. Regards,Dave (talk) 13:06, 31 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Ahem. First, don't take input or criticism so personally. Most people here are busy over several articles and projects of their own, and when they see someone actively engaged with an article, they may hesitate to edit themselves before the other editor has produced a finished work (I know I do so). Believe me I've been too often frustrated by no input or interest at all in some crucial articles, so learn to appreciate even "drive-by" edits or comments. The reason I stepped in in this one was to save you the trouble of writing an extensive summary of the book on Evans, and then see it get hacked down, because that is what would eventually happen. Yes, Knossos and Evans are bound together, but there is a difference between Evans' archaeological work and his other life. The former belongs here, the latter at the article on Evans. Be concise and focus on the subject at hand. Huge articles, no mater how well written, are usually read by no one. Constantine  ✍  14:09, 31 May 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm not taking anything personally. Why would you think that I was? I hope you did not mean it personally, but no matter. If someone did not hack this article down I would have myself. This article only exists to avoid having a huge article at Knossos and Arthur Evans. WP articles are not like regular articles. Other articles are written to last and are protected. These are the ice sculptures of the scholarly world. I would never expect any article that I did not to change. Frankly, I'm glad you jumped in on it. The article will be better for a collaboration. So many people do resent it. Then they attack articles you did on a fly-by basis, using the sme language that you used in THEIR article. You spend all your time hassling with these idiots. Sometimes I just walk away from it. Then months later I get a request from someone, will you please come back and take care of this. While I resist the fly-by vindicative attack, most commonly practiced by administrators (since they hace the power to do it), I welcome the honest critique. Welcome to the article. Incidentally some of your philosophy I disagree with. Long articles DO have a place on WP. There are lots and lots of them. However, it should not be long unless the topic requires it. As to what the public reads, well, we are not a funny book. If you are looking for a quick gratification, don't use an encyclopedia. If you look something up presumably you want to know some detail. I will vigorously resist any effort to strip all the detail out of this or any article. But of course as you say, it needs to relevant detail. What I am aiming at is a continuous article that will summarize the modern history of Knossos. That is the meaning of the title. That includes background material and it includes some of the lives of Evans and the other archaeoligists. Nominal articles don't interest me much. If I have to go to the trouble of reading an article I want to get a return on my effort. We are not per se trying to build a readership here, like the yellow journals, but are trying to offer something to people that would not otherwise have it.Dave (talk) 15:08, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Crete changes hands
You requested a condensation but you left it up to me, so I did one, commenting out the material for now until we agree on a version. This is a tentative condensation. If it needs more, let me know. Or, if you want to do it, I will check that. I would say, we need enough information to correctly state the govermental milieu in which the excavators had to function. A raw account of only some excavation details is not satisfactory for an article on the modern history of Knossos. If we were going to do that, then we should have left it in Knossos, reducing it to a few paragraphs. I think the conditions under which they made their decisions should be included. I can only do this intermittently but I will be back before too long. We need to complete a continuous story here. I'm all for a peer review when the story is complete. Until then we can work together on this.Dave (talk) 14:04, 31 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Well, go ahead with what you planned to do (just don't include every single tangential development that doesn't actually concern Knossos). I'll help, as far as I am able to. Constantine  ✍  14:10, 31 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Great, Constantine. I regard your opinions as quite valuable, by the way. You can't expect total agreement. No one gets that.Dave (talk) 15:21, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Knossos in World War II
Too summary. Needs some expansion, now. We need to cover the partisans, the shooting of the archaeologists, the occupation of Villa Ariadne, the rule from the villa, the attack on some of the antquities, the kidnapping of the famous general. The condensation is good because it clears the way for these things, but, a little expansion seems warranted. I got ahead of myself in that section. We are not done with Knossos in World War I, the turning over of the property to the British School, the investigations after Evans, the use of Knossos archaeologists such as Pendlebury by the British version of the OSS. I'm going to go in order now so it will be a few days. I can take your advice on the tangential developments. I probably would have seen these things before the end of the article, but maybe not. If you would like to be a watchdog be my guest. At the end of this effort I would expect at least a good article rating.Dave (talk) 15:21, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Stored section
Constantine took most of this out. I won;t be putting it back but I will be selecting some detail, so it is more convenient for it to be here where I can easily get at it. We need to tell just a bit more story to avoid a fragmented article. Blue links are good, but an article should not be just or mainly blue links. However, I won't be doing my selection until I get to WWII in chronologic order.Dave (talk)

"Knossos in World War II Through a remarkable series of coincidences after the death of Evans in 1941, Knossos became once again the capital of an eastern Mediterranean power. After the outbreak of war through the German invasion of Poland in September, 1939, Greece resolved at first to declare neutrality. This resolution was eminently satisfactory to the 3rd Reich, which now did not find it necessary to defend the oil fields in Romania against attack from British bases in Greece, and to the British Empire, which did not have to defend Greece. The conflict instead focused on North Africa.

Loss of Greek neutrality Neither side were prepared to deal with the impetuous actions of the flamboyant Benito Mussolini, fascist dictator of Italy. In April, 1939, he had occupied Albania, which was astounded, since it was already an axis power closely supportive of fascist Italy. He was perhaps influenced by der Führer's occupation of Czechoslovakia. The German leader did not inform his fellow dictator of his impending actions beforehand. Despite their alliance, the two men were almost never in agreement either philosophically or politically. Il Duce, as he was called informally, therefore adopted the practice of taking unilateral actions without informing his allies.

Britain and France responded by putting in place mutual defense agreements that would shortly trigger world conflagration. They undertook to guarantee the sovereignity of Poland and Greece, which meant war if either were invaded. In May, 1939, Il Duce concluded the Pact of Steel with der Führer. In September the invasion of Poland triggered war. The next year was consumed by the Phony War, the Battle of France and the Battle of Britain. At the end of that time France was out of the war, and could no longer join the British in guaranteeing Greek sovereignity. In September, 1940, one year after the invasion of Poland, Rodolfo Graziani opened the Italian front on behalf of Il Duce with a full-force attack on British-held Egypt. Despite superior numbers they were stopped apparently without undue difficulty at Sidi Barrani. Military prudence would seem to have required a regrouping and reinforcement of his North African troops. Instead, against all expectation, Il Duce launched an attack on Greece through Albania on October 28, 1940, breaking the neutrality, infuriating OKW Wehrmacht, which was trying to plan the invasion of Russia, and triggering the defensive agreement between Greece and Britain at a time when the British were least prepared to enforce it.

On October 29, 1940, the British landed all the troops they could spare: two battalions of regular army and elements of the Mobile Naval Base Defense Organization, at Chania and Suda Bay, the old centers of allied occupation priot to World War I. A new naval base and an airfield were opened, shortly occupied by the British fleet and three squadrons of the RAF. More troops were sent to assist the Greek army. In November and December at the insistence of the Greek government. Britain assumed the defense of Crete, landing another 1000 men, releasing the Cretan 5th Division for duty on the Albanian front. The short-lived invasion of Greece was soon converted to an Italian defence of Albania. The Greek army appeared to be about to reverse the invasion. The Italian campaign in North Africa fared no better. On December 9, the British army drove Graziani from Sidi Barrani across North Africa to El Agheila, where, by February 9, 1941, 130,000 men had surrendered. There was a danger that, left to himself, Mussolini would be removed and Italy would revert to its former alliance with Britain, a disaster for the 3rd Reich. The Germans saw immediately that Il Duce must be kept in power with the assistance of the Wehrmacht. He would become, in essence, a puppet dictator.

Operation Marita Führer Directive Number 20, December 13, 1940, defined Operation Marita as the invasion of Greece. Walther von Brauchitsch, Chief of Staff, OKW, was instructed to prepare ten divisions for the occupation of the Balkans and the coast of the Aegean Sea. The Luftwaffe was to seize key islands from the air. These actions were to precede Operation Barbarossa, defined shortly in the 21st directive as the invasion of Russia. The Wehrmacht was impatient to "mop up" Greece so that it could get on to Russia, committing the very strategic error against which Hitler had railed so often in his rise to power, the opening of a second front. With the loss of the Battle of Britain and the cancellation of Operation Sea Lion, the invasion of Britain, military prudence would seem to have required consolidation of Fortress Europa. Hitler's decisions, however, are often no more rationally explicable than Mussolini's. Crete, therefore, placed in the center between Europe, Asia and Africa, suddenly became the strategic center of the malestrom.

The Germans planned interventions in North Africa and the Balkans for early 1941, but the pro-British stance of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, which Arthur Evans had helped to form, was a threat to the rear of Operation Marita, which could not be neglected. The cooperation of Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria had been secured by the Tripartite Pact of September, 1940, which included the Balkan states in the alliance of Germany, Italy and Japan, the Axis powers. Prince Paul of Yugoslavia became signatory under pressure in March, 1941. He was promptly overthrown in favor of Peter II of Yugoslavia, a 17-year-old boy.

Meanwhile in February Irwin Rommel, General, had led the Afrika Korps to the assistance of the remaining Italians in Libya. By April the British were in full retreat across the desert sands to Egypt. The substantial Italian fleet was ordered to sweep British supply lines from the sea. They went so far as to steam into Suda Bay, which Churchill had wanted to turn into another Scapa Flow, sinking a number of British ships there. Fortuitously the British had applied the secret weapon that won the Battle of Britain, radar, to its fleet in the Mediterranean. The Italians knew little or nothing of it. They had no defense. The British hunted them by night. By March, a series of surprise attacks coordinated with air attacks, and one big air attack on Taranto, had removed the Italian fleet from the scene. The garrison of Crete was increased to 6100 men. It was indispensable as a central base.

The Germans attacked Yugoslavia and Greece simultaneously by Blitzkrieg on April 6, 1941. Fifteen divisions of the German 12th Army under Wilhelm List, Field Marshall, struck into Greece and Yugoslavia in a two-promged attack. The Yugoslavs surrendered on April 17; however, resistance through the war by irregular partisans continued against a German military regime in Serbia and a nazi puppet state, the Independent State of Croatia, which was made to include Bosnia-Herzegovina. The Serbs would be hunted, persecuted, and massacred as an inferior race in favor of the pure muslim Bosniaks and Catholic Croats.

On April 9 the Germans took Thessaloniki, outflanking the Metaxas Line, a fixed defense paralleling the Bulgarian border, where the Germans might have been expected to come through. The Greek army there, outnumbered, outclassed, and outflanked, surrendered on the same day, except for isolated renegade forts, which had to be reduced by artillery. The German army pushed New Zealand and Greek troops to the south through numerous classical battlefields. Thermopylae was refought and rebetrayed. On April 13 the army of Epirus began to withdraw, but too late. An SS division coming up behind them plugged the gap. On April 18 they contacted the SS to make a gentleman's agreement. They would surrender, but the Italians were not to be informed, as they had not earned surrender through victory. The SS, suitably impressed by these terms of military honor, let the Greeks go home and allowed officers to retain sidearms.

On April 26 the 2nd Parachute Regiment dropped on the Isthmus of Corinth, isolating Athens. The only remaining question, as at the Battle of Dunkirk earlier, was how many troops the British could evacuate before the nazis paraded into Athens.

Evacuation to Crete"


 * Dave, why are you filling the talk page with this? This can be retrieved from the article history as necessary. And I still fail to see what mentions of Operation Barbarossa, the Phony War or the details of the diplomatic and military background to the Battle of Greece have to do with Knossos. Constantine  ✍  18:43, 31 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, I was thinking, if you find it offensive there, I can hide it. But why would you do that? I said why I put it there. I was going to hide it as a comment, but on second thought, I would like others to see it and possibly comment on it. So, the answer is, so that it can be seen and possibly discussed by others. I never heard of anyone yet complaining of the discussion page being cluttered up by material for discussion. When the article is done or near done or has been stable for a while, they archive these discussions. So, it is not a permanent feature.


 * The excavation history of course does not require us to look beyond the mound of Kephala. But, if we want to know why things are being done on the hill and by whom and what the general history of the archaeological efforts is, we have to look beyond the excavation history. The competition for who was going to excavate, what it took to be able to excavate, who the players are, what the results of their efforts were, and what impact this had on European civilization, require more than just the excavation history. We have to know something about the historical circumstances in which they labored. Now, these are mainly covered in other articles. You are right about that. But, you yourself mentioned the part of the policy that says, articles of mainly links are to be avoided. If there is a main article, of course they want us to refer to it. But, they also want some introduction. Moreover, the other articles may not be tailored to the use of that material here. Now, Crete was invaded by the Germans. They took Knossos and shot some of the archaeologists. They destroyed at least one ancient tomb. They used the Villa Ariadne as a headquarters. A German general residing there was kidnapped. Cretans nearby were shot because of it. If we are going to talk about these events, which we should, we need a little background on what the Germans were doing there and why they were doing what they were doing. A good explanation would tell us that Greece was conquered by a surprise attack, that the government evacuated, that a parachute invasion of Crete took place. The British used KNossos archaeologists to organize partisan resistance. Some of these were shot. The site was occupied for three years. This is a minimum.


 * To me, the real question is, and THIS is what I thought you were discussing, how much detail is appropriate to this introduction to the occupation of Knossos. I think maybe you are right about my being too zealous in including detail. But, your introduction leaves everything out. All we see vaguely is that some parachutists landed. Nothing about Pendlebury or Kreipke or any of the other things that make the meat of the section. If your fear is that I want to restore the whole thing, forget it. Your opinion is that it incudes too much, which I do accept. I am going to rewrite that finishing what I started. I think it is fine to mention the name of the invasions, Operation Marita, etc, and have a sentence explaining what the Germans were trying to do by this action. That way, the reader will understand why they were occupying Knossos and what generally the circumstances were. Then if he wants to follow the blue link he can, but if he does not want to bother, at least the intro gives a brief, coherent picture. I'm not sure that you understand that. Underlying this whole discussion is the thought that maybe you do not agree with the topic, which is an article on Knossos in modern history. How can it be in modern history if we do not mention any modern history?


 * What seems appropriate to me is this. If you do not think anything belongs in there but the excavation history, mark this article for quick deletion or for redintegration into Knossos in truncated form and withdraw. Then there will be a vote and you will either win or lose. If you agree with the topic but question the level of detail needed, then perhaps we can work it out. If not then place a tag. If I can't respond to the tag I will leave it, you can request a review, and other editors will make the decisions. And, I would appreciate it if you did not guess what I am about to do. Wait until I do it before you critique it. I think you will find me reasonable.


 * Whew. We are going to be at this for some time, I can see that. Well, sometimes it is necessary. This is a long game of chess. I'm going to split my time with other articles. I know I won't be able to spend all the time I just have. But, when it is my move, I WILL move. It just takes longer. My only other choice is to drop it. No doubt you will drop it also. Then it will sit there for years, not much good to anyone. I think it is better to stick with it.Dave (talk) 00:54, 1 June 2012 (UTC)


 * I've been looking at your user page and some of the material you have written. We're about on the same level, except you like to wear a chest full of medals, but I don't. You have more languages than me, I think. You seem to prefer the Byzantines while I like the very ancient. I've been on since 2005. I think I see what the problem is. You like to write very short articles, only giving a succinct statement or two. I'm the opposite. I feel, unless you give some detail, you aren't really saying anything. I don't see much hope for either of us convincing the other. We're both hardened at what we do. The best we can hope for is a compromise in between. If we can't effect a compromise, it is just going to have to go on with tags all over it. How did you get onto this anyway? It isn't your usual topic.Dave (talk) 01:24, 1 June 2012 (UTC)


 * I am sorry, but what has my userpage got to do with this article, or whether I am qualified to edit here? Do you really suggest you can gauge a person fully from his userpage? As in that I prefer to write very short articles? I am sorry to disappoint, but when last I checked, Byzantine navy was among the 20 longest FAs in WP. When the subject warrants it, the article will get as long as it has to be in order to be comprehensive. But including any amount of extraneous stuff just in order to fill it up, and touching the topic at hand perhaps once in an entire section is simply bad writing, not only per Wikipedia's Manual of Style, but according to what they teach in high school. This is supposed to be an encyclopedia, and encyclopedias provide succinct, comprehensive information, not a full narrative of whatever happened in the world for the 3,500 years Knossos has been in existence. It suffices to say that Greece got involved into World War II and provide some info, the links are there for the rest. Anyhow, I see that I can't convince you. What is more, I believe you are taking this way too personal, and think I am here to boss you around. I am not, but obviously you are not going to take my word for it. I am not prepared to argue with you ad nauseam, so I withdraw myself from this article. Feel free to do whatever you want with it and best of luck. Constantine  ✍  13:34, 10 June 2012 (UTC)

Spelling
Thanks for correcting the spelling. Your explanations are welcome if you want to make them, but it is not necessary. I accept any and all spellings. On my setup, I can't get spellcheck up and running on WP so I have to check everything personally. I suppose I could copy to Word but often I don't have much time. I'm using Mozilla with some WP gadgets. On my keyboard if I build up any rate of speed, the rate of errors increases. I guess it is the spring tension on the keys. Mine is a low-budget operation. I do apologize for the errors. I review often but these things slip by. Thanks.Dave (talk) 08:10, 4 June 2012 (UTC)

Bail out the beleagered
While I appreciate the advice - thank you - and you are right, the article contained far too much detail, as its current length is beginning to reveal, we must be careful not to denude it of so much detail that the statements make no sense or are now wrong. This is a big job and may take more time than some of us are willing to put in, but we must also be careful not to express our frustration with jokes, as "bail out the beleaguered" clearly is. We want good semi-formal writing, not vernacular jokes. I can appreciate the tendency as I had it at first myself, but the editors of the times convinced me to take these articles seriously.

I must say, and I'm sorry, I can't do it in monosyllables, or Laconic style, as you might prefer, the article is long because the topic is huge. We're covering at least a century here. If Evans had died at 40 the topic would be short. I could see this as I worked on Knossos. I was never going to get in even a small introduction of what there was to say in one article. That is why this article exists. I may have to split Knossos, which DOES actually deal only with ancient Knossos, again. Que sera sera. However, you are right, this sort of topic links in to a good many others. We could do more there. Plenty or articles exist that so far as links are concerned are not even suspected. I am looking for those. We want to tie those all in to here if possible. Meanwhile, keeping you advice in mind, I may have expand your overcondensations a little, upgrade your English slightly. I think you have made good contributions to this article. You may go now if you have other things to do.Dave (talk) 12:52, 10 June 2012 (UTC)

The escape of the king
I got this section down to two paras, which I think does not compete with Battle of Crete, which has all the long and tedious details. Unless of course, you are interested in the topic. Editors often are not too interested because they want to get on with it, so they don't see the sense of all the detail. But, the rest of us, who looked it up, were interested in the detail. Anyway I have mentioned the escape of the king. This topic is apparently problematic, no doubt because once upon a time the king's goings and comings were a matter of national security. Now he's just a figure in history, only significant because we say so, because our ancestors said so. But, he had to escape from somewhere. The question is, where? There are differing accounts. Moreover, in this day and age WP editors just wing it. If we are going to wing it we may just as well forget it and not have WP be about much of anything definite. I did find some refs on this. They are pretty creditable. One is a book on foreign policy. Battle of Crete has no ref for this (it is tagged) and moreover their story is quite different. Until such time as someone finds a ref that clears up the mystery, please leave the referenced material here. I will add the refs in just a moment.Dave (talk) 18:58, 11 June 2012 (UTC)

Back in a moment
My library books have run out. I'm on Pendlebury, and so great is his fame, his kleos, that nothing exists about him for free on the Internet. He's a rice bowl all by himself. Another trip to the library is warranted. I'm reading things now, strange things - how Hitler used to be found quivering under the bed, staring fixedly at the cabinet, muttering in terror - the eye, the eye, take it away, please take it away. Take it away, please take it away. And they say, those who traverse the Cretan mountain passes at night, that a strange glimmering figure arises before them, wearing an ancient necklace and grimacing horribly at them, and muttering, "I say old chap, have you seen my sword cane? I need a defense against the Germans." Down near Knossos, they say, on a moonlit night, when the summer wind tosses the trees wildly, the bellowing of bulls in heard from the ruins, and a murmering as of a great throng, and a tap-tap, tap-tap, with a quavering voice, "Duncan MacKenzie, Duncan MacKenzie, fetch aft the whiskey, Duncan." These are matters that need careful investigation. I will be back just as soon as I secure decent book or two on Pendlebury and the shenanigans of the paratroopers and freedom fighters, kidnappings and what not. If you want to make an old war buddy the best way to do it is to kidnap him. Meanwhile, don't delete all my material.Dave (talk) 15:42, 12 June 2012 (UTC)
 * I got Dilys Powell's book, so I'll be working on this again. Reading about Pendlebury I confess I had to fight the tears back. But I am sure there are many such stories from those troubled times. One has to try to stay objective. Pendlebury died in battle like all the rest since time began. Requiescat in pacem. If there were a Valhalla ....Dave (talk) 17:23, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Biased and argumentative?
I'm just a lowly wikipedia reader and know very little of the style and guidelines in effect. I like this article and it reminds me of a summer I spent on Crete. However, to me this article reads quite biased and argumentative when compared to other articles which touches on similar ideological conflicts. To me, the article (primarily the excavation description) reads as a defense of Evans and his excavation style, and incorporates rhetoric into what is supposed to be a fact-based text. As an example, the part regarding Émile Victor Gilliéron and their creative restoration. As another, the "high technology milieu" reference used in season five. There are several occurrences of variations on the theme "it had to be done or all archaeology would be lost", which appears without reference or argument (my amateur brain thinks that they would have options on stopping, preserving, and covering up, even back then) All in all, without any major evidence to support my claim, the text leaves that feeling in me. Maybe I'm reading too much between the lines here? There is no section that concretely deals with the criticism of Evans' excavation methods. Instead it's woven into the running text. Adding such a section would be an easy way to improve neutrality, I think. Just my two cents. I have no working knowledge of the issue so I don't feel qualified to contribute myself. But I do hope that the article may continue to be improved. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.131.56.171 (talk) 10:52, 5 April 2013 (UTC)
 * No, you're right. It has issues and should largely be merged back to Knossos with (at most) its excavation history being split off. —  Llywelyn II   16:07, 26 December 2016 (UTC)

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Quick revisit
I was impressed with the article. I think it is one of the better on Wikipedia. It is true, I contributed the better part of it, but not entirely. I would consider the article clean; that is, I did not have to reformat any notes and references. I consider the clean-up more or less done. But of course no article on Wikipedia is ever "done."

The removal of material from the "Knossos" article diminishes that article considerably. It needs a lot of work. Also the 2005-2008 ground artifact survey by the British School changes the big picture considerably, Apparently only the palatial site was excavated, as at Troy. The city in which most of the people lived was quite a lot larger and more continuous - there was no great abandonment of the city. I think that material probably belongs under Knossos. I'm scheduling a rewrite of it.

I notice this article has basically been accepted. There is a comment above about bias. It seems to focus on Evans' restoration. There IS something the public ought to know. There is a field-wide controversy about whether sites ought to be "restored;" that is, whether modern means should be used to preserve the site. The "no" side argues that "restoration" alters the site so that it is not the ancient site anymore. The "yes" side argues that without some means of preservation the forces of nature would soon obliterate the site. Evans went through a period of trying to decide which is best. He could not really excavate very far without the whole site collapsing. In fact his friend Hogarth had branched off to another site, which was washed out totally by torrential rains in a few days. It should be said, the Turkish government has come down on the side of restoration of its sites and has even moved to remove permission to dig from a university that would not cooperate. With all due respect to everyone's experts, the Turkish Republic has experts that are second to none. So you see this is a pretty big topic. It might be worth another article. I will tell you why I did not get into the detail. Reading the accounts of Evans' decisions and the common problem of site wash-out, it seemed to me obvious and common knowledge that Evans would have to shore up the site and do some restoration even to continue. Therefore I did not put a section in on that. There have been a few people that noticed it here and elsewhere. I am going to attempt to remedy that in the Knossos article. Then one might refer to it from this one. Such a section will not be easy to write, as the topic involves national politics and the big money of big archaeology. What shall we do with the sites of our ancestors? Emotional topic.

Now, there is a certain biased criticism of some supposed bias of some of my writing. I think it goes too far. Let me take a hypothetical example. Hypothesis: "the British won the war in Crete." Oh no, you might say, this is too prejudicial and expresses a bias against Germans. Like the British, we read, the Germans never abandoned Crete despite their temporary little set-backs in Crete! All that stuff about their shooting archaeologists and decimating the population of Crete for their vicious non-cooperation, well, that is way too biased for a history such as ours. I'd like to know just what kind of a history THAT would be without any recourse to plain fact. This is not a propaganda war here it is supposed to be encyclopedic. The British and Germans did not sponsor a war in Crete, they waged it with all their strengths and at considerable costs and often without mercy. I don't think WP has any mandate to water the English down to the point where it says nothing recognizable as history. Ciao.Botteville (talk) 12:38, 23 June 2018 (UTC)