Template:Did you know nominations/Bamburgh Sword

Bamburgh Sword

 * ... that the Anglo-Saxon Bamburgh Sword is thought to be unique due to the number of strands of iron used to create the blade?
 * Reviewed: Soviet Strike
 * Comment: Increased from 416 characters to 2416, but has a larger uncited version in the history which was subsequently deleted, and so will throw off the DYK checker.

Created/expanded by Miyagawa (talk). Self nom at 22:20, 22 September 2012 (UTC)


 * Symbol confirmed.svg This article passes the DYK criteria of epansion, newness and length. The hook is sourced. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 08:56, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Symbol delete vote.svg article created in 2006. Not close. Secretlondon (talk) 21:11, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Symbol redirect vote4.png 416 characters before Miyagawa's edit on Sept. 22nd, 21:57 (UTC), 2417 characters after  Miyagawa's edit on Sept. 22nd, 22:18 (UTC). (Counting per DYK check.) 2417/416=5.8. Am I missing something? --PFHLai (talk) 02:42, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
 * DYK check says " 5x now, expansion began 32 edits ago on October 17, 2007" Secretlondon (talk) 07:00, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
 * User:Shubinator/DYKcheck says "the tool can get confused. If it does get confused, it will err against the nominator ... reviewers should always check expansion manually if DYKcheck says the article hasn't been expanded 5x." --PFHLai (talk) 07:51, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
 * I think the question is how much of the material that was stripped out because it was uncited should count. Rule A4 on WP:DYKSG says: "Fivefold expansion is calculated from the previously existing article, no matter how bad it was (copyvios are an exception), no matter whether you kept any of it and no matter if it was up for deletion." Indeed, the hook fact, referring to the number of strands, is part of the deleted, uncited material, which disappeared on November 22, 2011. The total peaked at 986 characters the day before (you have to ignore the 1210 entry, because it includes inappropriate boilerplate that shouldn't be counted), though an argument could be made that since the article's originator removed the extra 21 characters under 12 hours after their addition, they shouldn't be counted. I think the baseline is 965 characters, which was the article's length for over 17 months starting in June 2010. That would require 4825 prose characters in the current article, which is currently only half that length. Any chance of further expansion? BlueMoonset (talk) 19:32, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
 * I always thought that "the previously existing article" in A4 refers to the stable version immediately prior to the expander's edits. No? That's how I counted 416 characters of prose as the baseline. Not sure how to interpret the rules now..... --PFHLai (talk) 23:47, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
 * I see rule A4 as something that often requires a judgment call. This one requires some judgment. I lean toward judging this one to be a 5x expansion. My reasoning: The 416-character version had existed for 10 months before the recent expansion began (a long time), the longer version that existed at an earlier time was unsourced and looked like original research, and the current article is substantially longer (about 2.5x) than that earlier unsourced 986-character version. However, the article content and sourcing still seem kind of thin. I would expect to find some citations to scholarly papers -- don't any such exist? Also, as a reader I'd like to see more detailed discussion (in this article) of pattern welding and the significance of this sword. --Orlady (talk) 03:34, 28 September 2012 (UTC)


 * Pictogram voting keep.svg Agree with above comments by Orlady, PFHlai, and Cwmhiraeth: new enough, long enough, etc. I have no issues with judging from the stable revision so long as the expander is not the stubbifyier, and the article beforehand was poorly referenced. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 10:29, 28 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Sounds reasonable to me. I'll keep that in mind in future. BlueMoonset (talk) 22:45, 28 September 2012 (UTC)