User:Katochis/Evaluate an Article

Which article are you evaluating?
Cynisca

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?
I chose this article because I believe that Cynisca and her achievements are very much underrepresented in Classical history. This is reflected in her wikipage, which is quite limited and does not include much information about her life, aside from her Olympic victory. I think that the page could benefit from additional information and sources.

Evaluate the article
At first glance, there are many few small typos and grammar mistakes throughout the article which need to be corrected and sentences which could use some refinement. Additonally, there are relatively few sources cited in the article and the vast majority of them are primary sources. While primary sources can provide insight into how ancient peoples viewed Cynisca and what they knew about her life, I believe that including modern academic research could vastly improve the quality of the page. At the moment, there is only one scholarly article cited, and the page is mostly just a collection of what ancient authors wrote about Cynisca.

In terms of content, the article is currently very short and lacks depth in many areas. I believe that both the introduction and "early life" section should be expanded since they are both very brief and skip over most of her life up until her participation in the Olympics. While it makes sense for her victory to be the primary subject of the article (since it is what she is best known for) I think that it would be helpful to have more context. Also, in the early life section there is an uncited sentence which speculates about the origin of her name being related to Spartan bloodhounds, which should either be cited or removed. On the other hand, I think that the mention of Cynisca's "hero shrine" and the inclusion of the inscription that was dedicated to her were good to include and need comparatively less revision than the other sections, though the article fails to mention that Cynisca commissioned it for herself. I think that an illustration of the monument and/or inscription (if possible) would be good to include in that section. Lastly, the section on "culture" is also very underdeveloped and only includes a few lines on her impact.

Overall, the article needs more content wherever possible, additional citations of scholarly secondary sources, and a revision of the grammar and syntax.

Instructor Feedback
Great evaluation, User:Katochis! You've really highlighted the areas for improvement for this page, especially the lack of modern scholarly articles (despite the fact that there's a short bibliography, this is represented in the citations). This is a fantastic choice for an article, since it's ranked pretty high in terms of importance for Wiki Projects related to the Olympics and, of course, ancient Greece. I love working on biographies, and the nice thing about Cynisca's page is that there isn't an enormous amount of information about her from the ancient world, so you'll be able to really turn this into a comprehensive article and elevate its status. This week your exercises include 1) copyediting, and 2) adding a new sentence with a citation (perhaps from the chapter you're reviewing this week, if applicable) - both of these can easily be done for this article, which will get you some recorded edits under your belt and help you get used to making changes to Wikipedia pages. It also doesn't seem like this is a particularly active page in terms of edits, so I hope it's not too daunting. Great work so far, let me know if you have any questions! Gardneca (talk) 12:43, 2 February 2021 (UTC)