User:Mattlimoli/Evaluate an Article

Which article are you evaluating?
Twelve Tables

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?
I chose this article because I feel like it is important to the course and details the general foundation of Roman law. They give the rights of the Roman citizen and are important to showing treatment of women in this time.

Evaluate the article
Overall, this article gives details needed to identify the laws expected of Roman citizens during this time. In particular, tables V, VI, and X are laws particular to women. Table V shows how, even in majority age, women are still expected to remain under guardianship. This table alone shows how little rights Roman women had at this point, having to constantly be under watch by men. Table VI brings a contradicting law when compared to table V. If a women is to live with a man she is not married to for a year, she will be considered his wife. A women must be under constant guardianship by a man, so this makes it very simple for a man to keep a women in his home for a year. Lastly, table X brings to light the way that women were viewed during this time. It presents women as obnoxious and uneducated, stating that, at a funeral, no women should "lacerate their faces" "tear their cheeks with their nails" or "utter loud cries bewailing the dead." This makes the assumption that most women would do these types of things at funerals and places all women into this group. This article contains many of the common laws followed during this time, but the laws restricting women seem to show much about their treatment at this time. All of the content in this article seems to be up to date. Also, the article gets straight to the point and makes it simple for the reader to get the basic details of the Twelve Tables and allows a person to quickly understand the topic of the article. The article does not reference as many sources as expected for this type of topic, but the sources referenced still give the main idea of the article and allow people to understand the information given. There definitely could be more images in the article but the two images that are present help tie to the article as a whole. The article's talk section mainly discusses possible improvements to the article and doesn't seem to be used too often. ~