Talk:Robert Alexander Neil/GA1

GA Review
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Nominator: 10:22, 1 April 2024 (UTC)

Reviewer: Kusma (talk · contribs) 10:09, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

Will review this one soon. —Kusma (talk) 10:09, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

Content and prose review
Lead: Early life and education Academic career: Assessment, honours and legacy:
 * "graduated with the university's second-highest mark" is probably clear, but I worry it might be misunderstood for a 2:1 degree (the second highest outcome achievable)
 * Yes, I can see the ambiguity (is this the second-best A or a B, in other terms?). Rephrased slightly to He graduated with a First, scoring the university's second-highest mark in tripos, in 1876.
 * "Pembroke's Senior Tutor" what kind of position is that? (really a question for the body).
 * See below. UndercoverClassicist T·C 16:11, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * How common were thirteen-year old boys at the University of Aberdeen back in the day?
 * Less unusual than you'd think, I believe: remembering that we're in a time before the National Curriculum or widespread access to "good" schools. Our article Scottish education in the nineteenth century has At the beginning of the nineteenth century, Scotland's five university colleges had about 3,000 students between them. They had no entrance exam, students typically entered at ages of 15 or 16, attended for as little as two years, chose which lectures to attend and left without qualifications. It goes on to say that this system was reformed in the 1890s, but it sounds as if Neil would have been unusually young if not shockingly so. None of his biographers saw fit to draw any real attention to it, which suggests that he wasn't considered a prodigy simply for going to university at that age. UndercoverClassicist T·C 16:11, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * "graduated from Aberdeen with a First in 1870" best to gloss First for the benefit of non-Brits, and to explain that it doesn't necessarily mean he was the number one best student.
 * Absolutely; done. UndercoverClassicist T·C 16:11, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Do we know anything about the various scholarships he was awarded? It sounds like they were awarded on academic merit?
 * Usually, these things are simply for the highest examination mark in the subject in question: there are others (the Porson Prize at Cambridge, for instance) where you sit an additional examination or competition (such as Latin verse composition) and then the highest mark in that examination gets the prize. I can't find any specifics about these ones but I don't think there's any reason to think that they were/are anything remarkably different from those norms. There's a newspaper article here from 1882 which makes clear that they had similar prizes in most of the "prestigious" subjects (ie, Classics, Mathematics, Natural Sciences, Medicine and possibly some others). UndercoverClassicist T·C 16:11, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * I was surprised to see the Numismatic Chronicle cited; the reason they write about him seems to be that RA Neil was elected a member of the Numismatic Society in 1892. Also, if I read the source correctly, Society president John Evans states Neil was a close friend.
 * Added both to the article; I think Evans is a big enough name that it's worth listing their friendship. UndercoverClassicist T·C 16:11, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * "students [...] had to sit a Sanskrit paper in order to achieve a First" I assume that sitting the exam was a necessary but not sufficient condition?
 * Correct: you still had to score the necessary marks, but would only be given a Second if you hadn't offered the Sanskrit paper. I don't think you had to score a particular mark in that paper, as long as your overall mark was high enough. UndercoverClassicist T·C 16:11, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * The Senior Tutor seems to have become a full time admin position, but only recently? (I am curious because I have served in a position called "Senior Tutor", but not at a collegiate university).
 * Administration, particularly at the colleges, was pretty skeletal until fairly recently. Senior Tutor at Cambridge isn't a non-teaching post, or full-time at all: it's a post that a fellow of the college would hold, with additional responsibilities for (basically) keeping the undergraduates in line. In the late C20th, it was a fairly "big deal" job which involved a lot of things like discipline, dealing with academic or personal misconduct, setting the rules for college parties, and so on, but I suspect it was seen in Neil's day as one of those embuggerances that someone from the SCR had to shoulder from time to time. UndercoverClassicist T·C 16:11, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Engagement with Harrison: not something you need to do for GA, but there seem to be a lot more sources about Harrison (like those cited here) that could be considered.
 * Oh yes, a lot has been written on Harrison. Did you find anything in there that was particularly relevant to Harrison and Neil, though? Mary Beard's biography of Harrison only mentions him very briefly, though I've added her as a source in relation to the engagement. UndercoverClassicist T·C 16:11, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * I have reduced the precision of the inflation value to two significant digits, feel free to revert.
 * Absolutely the right call; thank you. <b style="color:#7F007F">UndercoverClassicist</b> T·C 16:11, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

A fine biography of a scholar. There is only very little on his personal life, but I assume not much else is known? Do you know what Wace thought of his tutor? —Kusma (talk) 14:26, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't think Wace ever really wrote about him: he never produced a memoir, as far as I know, and doesn't seem to have written any obituaries for him -- he wouldn't have been old or established enough to have done so, really. Thank you as ever for these comments: replies above. <b style="color:#7F007F">UndercoverClassicist</b> T·C 16:11, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

Source spotchecks
Numbering from special:permanentlink/1229385303 No major concerns. —Kusma (talk) 15:08, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * 6: ok
 * 11b: first Wikisource link is broken. Content OK.
 * See below. Problem was that the software automatically appends the content of chapter to the content of wslink, creating a broken link if you give the full link as the latter. <b style="color:#7F007F">UndercoverClassicist</b> T·C 16:31, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * 11d: new Oxford DNB has "Bridge of Gairn", which looks more likely.
 * Good eye; fixed on both mentions. It's almost certainly Gairnshiel Bridge, but I can't find a source which definitively says so. <b style="color:#7F007F">UndercoverClassicist</b> T·C 16:31, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * I think it is a different bridge, next to the cemetery here: . —Kusma (talk) 19:49, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * 14: again, first Wikisource link is broken. Content fine
 * Fixed both of these. <b style="color:#7F007F">UndercoverClassicist</b> T·C 16:31, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * 17: strictly speaking, I can't see that Neil Kensington Adam was "named after" Robert Alexander Neil, but it does look likely.
 * It's in Oakley, cited: [Adam] formed a close friendship with the classical scholar and orientalist, Robert Alexander Neil ... after whom he would name his first son. <b style="color:#7F007F">UndercoverClassicist</b> T·C 16:31, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Perfect then. —Kusma (talk) 19:49, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * 19: looks ok
 * 28: ok
 * I think all of these are fixed or otherwise sorted above. <b style="color:#7F007F">UndercoverClassicist</b> T·C 16:31, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

General comments and GA criteria
Done reviewing. Good work, not very much to do here. —Kusma (talk) 15:18, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Prose is fine, minor comments above.
 * No major MoS issues.
 * Ref layout fine (but try to figure out what is wrong with the Wikisource links).
 * Sources are fine given the topic and era.
 * Only OR question is "named his son after him"; if you can't source this, just use "called his first son 'Neil'"?
 * Other than the Numismatic Society I found, no broadness issues. More about his works would be nice, but there is some content about them, so I can't complain too much.
 * Images look fine in sourcing, captions, ALT text.
 * Is there really no image of RA Neil? Pembroke College might have something??
 * Wouldn't be a huge surprise for a scholar of his era: you can usually get one for C19th Oxbridge academics, but it does vary, and it helps if they had an illustrious enough position to get an official portrait taken (and Neil didn't). However, nothing ventured, nothing gained -- I've sent an email to the college to ask if they have anything we could use in their archives. <b style="color:#7F007F">UndercoverClassicist</b> T·C 16:40, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Kusma: replies above. <b style="color:#7F007F">UndercoverClassicist</b> T·C 16:40, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * All good. I did find another source whil trying to figure out the Gairn Bridge and Glengairn etc.: William Robertson Nicoll remembering his childhood friend. Good for a few anecdotes I think, especially for early years. —Kusma (talk) 19:49, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * An earlier British publication of the same text is here: . —Kusma (talk) 19:55, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Anyway, I think this is a pass. @UndercoverClassicist, just pinging you here to notify you of my comment above before I fill the paperwork. —Kusma (talk) 19:58, 16 June 2024 (UTC)