Talk:Vasco Núñez de Balboa

Date of death revisited
I raised the issue of his precise date of death back in July 2008 (now archived), but no discussion ever ensued.

Various dates appear in sources: 12 January, 15 January, 21 January being the main contenders. Back in 2008, we were showing the date as 15 January 1519, but it's since been changed to 12 January. But the text currently says the trial at which he was condemned took place on the "fifteenth of January", so if that's correct, he couldn't have died 3 days earlier.

Since it's so unclear when he actually died, I am going to change the date to simply "January 1519" with a footnote explaining the uncertainty, until we can find an authoritative source. --  Jack of Oz   [your turn]  21:21, 8 September 2011 (UTC)


 * just a guess, but maybe the varying dates have to do with the adoption of the Gregorian calender and the 10-day adjustment? Wayne61 (talk) 14:20, 25 September 2011 (UTC).


 * Thanks, but that's unlikely imo. The new calendar was introduced in 1582, and did not have any retrospective effect.  There was confusion during the period when the non-Catholic countries were resisting a change promulgated by a Catholic pope, and if Balboa had died post-1582, that could well explain things.  But he died 63 years before then, when the whole western world was using the same calendar (Julian).  --   Jack of Oz   [your turn]  20:20, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

Quotes around the word "discovery"
The article is peppered with the word "discovery" in quotes, I'm assuming this is done because he wasn't the first human to know about the Pacific Ocean of course, but from a European perspective he's attributed with this discovery.

Either way, the use of the word discovery this way is inconsistent in the article. When it comes to the Pacific Ocean it's in quotes, but when it comes to other islands and regions it is not.

I'm wondering if there are some better guidelines to represent this in this type of article (maybe a look at how it's handles in the Christopher Columbus one?). ElCapitanAmerica (talk) 03:35, 16 January 2012 (UTC)


 * The whole thing about Europeans "discovering" anything in the New World can be contentious. (I particularly like William Keegan's title for his book about the indigenous people of the Bahamas, The People Who Discovered Columbus.) I would prefer to see something like, "Balboa was the first European to see the Pacific Ocean from the Americas." -- Donald Albury 16:27, 16 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Which is a bit of a cumbersome phrasing (hi) to use for the regular users of the article. How about something like this: 1. In the lead: "Balbao was the first European to see the Pacific Ocean from the Americas, and as a result is commonly credited with the discovery of the Pacific." (if we have an article on the european discovery vs natives controversy, this sentence should include a link there) 2. In the title of the section: "European discovery of the Pacific." For the text of the section, either use European discovery or discover as seem most appropriate given the sentence.
 * All this assuming there is no wiki standard on this I don't know about. --Guillaume Hébert-Jodoin (talk) 20:01, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 20 December 2017
balboa was known as one of the greatest explorers of his time. He lived from 1512-15774. His wife was Maria and he had no children... 2601:182:4300:993B:D898:AD2E:76DA:A096 (talk) 23:53, 20 December 2017 (UTC)
 * ❌. All of this information is already in the article. What improvements do you think it needs?  City O f  Silver  01:14, 21 December 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 13 January 2018
In the first paragraph, I think that it has the dates wrong. 2601:241:8800:B10A:4964:8A08:884B:E654 (talk) 17:16, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate.  JTP (talk • contribs) 17:21, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 30 May 2018
the http://www.win.tue.nl/~engels/discovery/balboa.html reference is a dead link, replace with https://web.archive.org/web/20110806113241/http://www.win.tue.nl/~engels/discovery/balboa.html Arminkaric (talk) 16:12, 30 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes check.svg Done clpo13(talk) 16:36, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 28 January 2021
I would like to add an inline citation:

Behind "He is best known for having crossed the Isthmus of Panama to the Pacific Ocean in 1513,"

please add " ".

Thank you. Margo92 (talk) 13:52, 28 January 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes check.svg Done Dr. Swag Lord (talk) 04:28, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

Sorry for being fussy, but I thought I'd rather ask now than later: The source only contains the information in the first part of the sentence. That's why I wanted to place the tags directly behind "1513,". Is it customary in Wikipedia to place ref tags always behind the end of a sentence? (Even if the source cited only contains the information in the first part of the sentence?) Thanks again for your help. Margo92 (talk) 11:07, 31 January 2021 (UTC)


 * Yes check.svg Done. The Spanish source does indeed provide the date of the crossing. I had a look at the Smithsonian source and it includes both the date and the second half of that sentence, so I've used that as a citation for the rest of it, but it does mean that the Spanish source probably isn't needed for this line. Since the article is lacking citations anyway I'll leave it in at this point as it's probably a good source for someone else to have a look at and use to add inline citations to this article, but I don't speak spanish so I'll just leave it there. Don't worry about coming across as fussy :) Volteer1 (talk) 12:36, 31 January 2021 (UTC)


 * To answer your question about placement of citations, the MOS guideline is at MOS:CITEPUNCT, although it has not always been strictly followed in articles. - Donald Albury 14:27, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

Muchas gracias to both of you. --Margo92 (talk) 17:26, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

Slaver
Shouldn't the word slaver be somewhere in the lead paragraph, or is it assumed since he was a conquistador? Awhit003 (talk) 00:47, 13 November 2023 (UTC)


 * Sort of the latter. Trying not to be too crass about it, but taking slaves was very common in that era, and not something that distinguished Balboa from other conquistadors, or other military leaders in most of the world. Donald Albury 01:27, 13 November 2023 (UTC)