Template:Did you know nominations/Picturesque Palestine, Sinai, and Egypt


 * The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as |this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Allen3 talk 15:34, 9 November 2015 (UTC)

Picturesque Palestine, Sinai, and Egypt

 * ... that Social Life in Egypt, an 1884 supplement to Picturesque Palestine, argued that poor treatment of women was Egypt's primary stumbling block in modernizing itself?


 * ALT1:... that Sir Charles Wilson (pictured), Royal Engineer and editor of Picturesque Palestine, undertook his studies of Jerusalem and the Levant for British intelligence?
 * ALT2:... that Harry Fenn and J.D. Woodward, the artists for Picturesque Palestine (pictured), earned $10&thinsp;000 a year each in royalties from the phenomenally popular series?
 * ALT3:... that the illustrations for Picturesque Palestine (pictured) were engraved from sketches and watercolors composed on site in the Ottoman Empire and Khedivate of Egypt in the late 1870s?
 * ALT4:... that Harry Fenn and J.D. Woodward, the artists for Picturesque Palestine, received special permission to sketch within and beneath (pictured) the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem?


 * Reviewed: Professor X
 * Notes: Pic for OP: Social Life in Egypt.jpg. Pic for ALT1: Charles William Wilson.jpg. Pic for ALT2 & ALT3: Picturesque Palestine, Division I.jpg

Created by LlywelynII (talk). Self-nominated at 14:21, 3 October 2015 (UTC).


 * Symbol confirmed.svg Created on September 26 and nominated on October 3rd, at the cusp of the 7th day window, but usually acceptable. 6068 char but 960 are text directly quoted from the article John Douglas Woodward. Still leaves 5108 char. Long enough. (Note, would appear subject article came first and text was added later to Woodward article on 27 Sept, but fact remains is duplicated text and doesn't effect outcome). From what I can check appears to be no copyvio, but many of the book pages am unable to access and must AGF there is none. In line citations. Neutral. QPQ done. All photographs per commons are in PD. Hook #1 has 167 char, under maximum. Verified with citation, though citation should show pp 132-134 rather than just p 132. ALT1 153 chars, under maximum. I don't think this hook is acceptable. He was a Royal Engineer, but the source says his work in Jerusalem was volunteer and he was not paid for it. Thus, any work he did, he did for himself and could give it to whomever he wanted. ALT2 151 char, under maximum. Verified with citation. ALT3 173 char, under maximum. Think the hook is problematic. Source states sketches were "started, if not finished" on site. Further, the only places specifically mentioned, other than in the broad terms of "in the Holy Land" or "Palestine" are "in the streets of Jaffa ...a house where St. Peter had a vision, the stone to which Andromeda had been chained,…and the Dome of the Rock.” Nothing about Egypt or Turkey on the page. ALT4 165 char, under maximum and is verified in source cited. GTG with Original Hook or ALT 2 or ALT 4 SusunW (talk) 20:50, 3 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Symbol question.svg Hi, I came by to promote this but found some issues with the hooks that approved. ALT0 does not correspond to the article or the source. The hook connects treatment of women to self-modernization, while the article links it to prosperity and the source derides its effect on society/social life. The source for ALT2 only surmises that Woodward earned that amount; it is not certain. ALT4 is very good, but it needs an inline cite right after the hook fact, per Did you know (3. Cited hook). I added the correct article link to the hooks. Yoninah (talk) 00:02, 4 November 2015 (UTC)
 * My first reading of the original hook (okay, actually, I read it several times) was that the social system was bound up in modernization. But I can see where you would find that problematic, so we can strike it as well. I didn't see a problem with the ALT2 as it says he earned at least 10K if not more, thus no matter what he earned 10K. If you have a problem with it, it can be struck as well. The 4th alt, we both agree is fine. SusunW (talk) 01:48, 4 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Yes, ALT4 is fine, but it needs an inline cite. Yoninah (talk) 22:32, 4 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Ok. Sorry for the delay. W/r/t User:Yoninah's objections

OH: Susun was right on her first go-round and the objection seems starkly overstated. In the context of 19th-century Egypt and especially in the context of late 19th-century commentary, modernization was synonymous with prosperity: it's overly cractic to think that they're meaningfully different here and bad to think that either is unsupported by the text. The source's chapter divisions for the epilogue read "General Considerations.—The Prime Mistake in the Present System to be found in the Condition of the Women.—Disastrous Results of the Vicious Training of Women.—Relations of Men and Women degraded by Early Inculcation of Vicious Views of each other's Requirements.—The Lack of the Influence of a Lady.—Slight Prospect of Improvement, so long as Islâm is the Religion of Egypt.—Education of the Women must be the First Step." The effects on social life are—just like the hook and article read—precisely germane because of its impact on prosperity/modernization/"civilisation". "As long as the Mohammadan religion exists, the social life with which it has unfortunately become associated will also survive; and so long as the latter prevails in Egypt we cannot expect the higher results of civilisation." Using the author's phrase "... in civilizing itself ..." is what would be policy-violating in this context; prosperity and modernization are the neutral phrasings for what he's describing.

ALT1: The volunteer nature of the work has no bearing whatsoever on its use and the Moscrop citations in the article thoroughly document that it was in large part on behalf of the intelligence services Wilson was already working for. It would be bad form to call him a spy (the source and article pointedly explain that), but the hook wasn't improperly overstating the case.

ALT2, as noted by Susun, has sourcing stating he earned at least that much. No, it is not from the IRS or his accountant; it nonetheless is still a positive statement by a. We are not allowed to synthesize sources ourselves; but our sources can do comparisons and synthesis on their own just fine. That said, we could add an "estimated" or similar caveat to be perfectly clear.

ALT3: "Started" includes the composition. Egypt at the time was the Khedivate and Palestine was Ottoman during the era. The appropriate articles are already linked and an article on a 19th-century book shouldn't need citations to period atlases to mention geographical facts. You may not be familiar with this area during this era but you can't really believe hooks need devoted sources to mention ideas like Oxford being in Britain or Denver in Colorado. (See also .)

ALT4 is fixed, which is all anyone needed. — Llywelyn II   09:21, 9 November 2015 (UTC)
 * All of the hooks should be fine, but will go through and address concerns in next day or three. — Llywelyn II   11:21, 6 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Please ping me when you have tweaked them and I'll be happy to take another look. SusunW (talk) 15:28, 6 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Hey. Thanks for your work. ALT4 is taken care of, which is all you really needed. Also note, though, that I appreciate your diligence but you don't really need to go through all the ALT hooks in something like this. You can just verify the one you like the most... or in any case the one you like the most that's already fully within policy. — Llywelyn II   09:27, 9 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Symbol confirmed.svg Let's just keep it simple and go with one we know the promoters will pass. GTG on ALT4. Thanks ;) SusunW (talk) 14:13, 9 November 2015 (UTC)