User:Cullenwaller/sandbox

First draft
Here are some guidelines on how to write a good article on monarchs and important historical figures:

These articles tend to be somewhat long: articles about historical figures should range from ~5000-7000 words, William the Conqueror has ~10000 words but Tiberius contains only ~5000 words so length may vary depending on how important the person was and what they did.

While it might be tempting to use lots of information from primary sources, especially for older people like in Tiberius, it's better to stick to mostly secondary sources as pointed out in Wikipedia's NOR policy.

You'll want to use several historical academic publishings as your sources, preferably from credible historians. Sometimes primary sources can be useful, but you'll want to be careful not to make it your own amateur research.

These articles tend to have a few pictures of helpful maps or maybe artifacts or artwork relevant to the person of interest. William the Conqueror contains 17 pictures and Tiberius has 15 so it seems about 15 pictures should be enough depending on what is relevant.

They should be organized chronologically, in order of events that happened. Usually these articles will have a section on the person of interest's early life and some background information on who they are and where they came from. There should be a section dedicated to major events or parts of their lives such as William the Conqueror has a section on his time as Duke of Normandy, one during the Norman Conquest of England, one on his consolidation of power, and two on his time as King of England and the troubles he faced.

Final draft
Here are some guidelines on how to write a good article on monarchs and important historical figures:


 * These articles tend to be somewhat long. Articles about historical figures should range from ~5000-7000 words, William the Conqueror has ~10000 words but Tiberius contains only ~5000 words so length may vary depending on how important the person was and what they did.
 * You'll want to use several historical academic publishings as your sources, preferably from credible historians. Sometimes primary sources can be useful, but you'll want to be careful not to make it your own amateur research. William the Conqueror uses about 35 sources but really only uses William the Conqueror, by David Bates; William the Conqueror, by David C. Douglas; and The Norman Conquest, by Richard Huscroft for the most part. Similarly, Tiberius mainly uses Annals, by Tacitus and The Lives of Twelve Caesars, by Suetonius with a little bit of Roman History Books 57-58, by Cassius Dio. The only issue here is that the article is written almost entirely from primary sources. While it might be tempting to use lots of information from primary sources, especially for older people like in Tiberius, it's better to stick to mostly secondary sources as pointed out in Wikipedia's NOR policy.
 * These articles tend to have a few pictures of helpful maps or maybe artifacts or artwork relevant to the person of interest. William the Conqueror contains 17 pictures and Tiberius has 15 pictures. Aim for around 10-20 pictures depending on the length of the article and the availability of relevant pictures.
 * They should be organized chronologically, in order of events that happened. Usually these articles will have a section on the person of interest's early life and some background information on who they are and where they came from. There should be a section dedicated to major events or parts of their lives such as William the Conqueror has a section on his time as Duke of Normandy, one during the Norman Conquest of England, one on his consolidation of power, and two on his time as King of England and the troubles he faced.


 * In general, the article should follow the guidelines on content and structure listed on Wikipedia's Featured article criteria