User:Millsnaps/Seljuk Empire/Autonomous owl ch Peer Review

General info

 * Whose work are you reviewing?

Reviewing Millsnaps's article on the Seljuk Empire. [Excited to review your article, Millsnaps. Hope my feedback is helpful!]


 * Link to draft you're reviewing
 * User:Millsnaps/SeljukEmpire


 * Link to the current version of the article (if it exists)
 * Seljuk Empire

Evaluate the drafted changes
Content

I absolutely loved your entire section on Arts of the Seljuk Empire. Firstly, you are definitely closing a gaping equity hole in the original article. It's saddening to see how the original article only has a small section of Seljuk Arts, which only features a few images with no explanation or elaboration.

I particularly liked your organization of the section. Architecture and ceramics offers a good opening into Seljuk Arts. Architecture is such an important part of Seljuk arts so starting with it seems like a good way to reel the reader in. The architecture and ceramic section offered a vast amount of detail without getting lost in itself. The information isn't too in-depth nor is it too generalizing. Despite being in a book arts class, this section definitely showed you have a good grasp on the basics of architecture and ceramics needed for an overview of Seljuk practices. I enjoyed learning more about the Minai technique and I was not aware that it was pioneered by the Seljuks. I appreciated you going slightly more in-depth on muqarnas and how they were used by the Seljuks, because it is seen in architectural structures so often that I think it definitely deserved some elaboration.

The next section, the Book Arts of the Seljuk Empire, starts off really strong with a general statement about the genres of Seljuk book arts: both secular and non-secular and it ends on a great note as well by talking about occult manuscripts. In the first paragraph, before delving into super specific information about manuscripts, you provide some social context on how Seljuk book arts persisted after their decline and their susceptibility to deterioration, which may be a reason why we don't have access to as many Seljuk book arts.

Once again, you only keep relevant information in your section when talking about Quran manuscripts and secular manuscripts. I liked how you offer some context on prevalence of paper and how it changed some trends in manuscript making. You also go on to talk about scripts in each other Quran manuscripts you mention and how they weren't exclusively limited to one script per manuscript. Quran manuscripts are without figural illustrations, only vegetal decorations sometimes, so you made sure the pivotal aspect of the work was considered as opposed to just talking about the Quran manuscripts and how they were made. When you organize your paragraphs on Quran manuscripts, I really like how you present it as an evolution of the scripts that were used, to highlight the variation of calligraphy scripts scribes worked with. You took a few manuscripts and did a deep dive into their particular aspects to highlight the diversity of production.

Your section on secular manuscripts is also well-crafted. I admire how you paired talking about occult manuscripts and how they were influenced the production of other artifacts and their decoration. That supports your later statement on these occult manuscript/images persisting even after Seljuk decline.

A couple of small suggestions for you to consider that I have in terms of content is in the Book Arts section: the second to last paragraph seems to be slightly disjointed. Perhaps placing it at the end might be more useful for the fluidity of text because then you can talk about occult manuscripts and the Daq'aiq al-Haq'aiq and then move onto the overall influence of these manuscripts on other artworks. One other thing is the reference to Andrew Peacock. For me, the multiple explicit reference to Andrew Peacock in the last paragraph seems to highlight how the information attributed to him might not be the consensus and biased. I think if you take his name out (but definitely cite and refer to him once or twice) you can make a more unbiased statement on Seljuk art, that doesn't seem like it is only the opinion of this one author as opposed a consensus or a fact in the field (assuming his statements are not widely contested in the field).

I would also suggest including some more names of secular or non-secular manuscripts just for context. Not deep-diving into them or talking in detail about them but just mentioning more example of book arts like this, this and this manuscripts etc. So, the reader has more knowledge about other names of Seljuk manuscripts. Basically just listing them and not talking about them in depth.

One thing I was left curious about after reading the article was the making and production of these manuscripts. Who worked on these, where were they made (like workshop etc.), and what was the patron situation like and what kind of illustrators and scribes worked on these? Were they concentrated from one area or brought influences from many geographical locations? I think this is the only part somewhat missing in this section and would definitely give a more 360 degree view of book arts. Not super specific but a general overview of the production process.

Images

Good job on including images. Offers more visual aids to the reader to help them see examples of Seljuk art and solidify their understanding of the written section.The captions draw the reader only to the pertinent information, such as the script or the illustration, as opposed to talking about everything shown in the image which can be overwhelming. I assume these are from wikimedia so not copyrighted.

Tone and Balance

Your tone is stellar! It is unbiased overall and has no partial statements. There don't seem to be any viewpoints that are not mentioned, rather you do consider taking about the arts from multiple viewpoints such as social and calligraphic. The information I gained from this article was pretty general without pushing me towards one school of thought or the other.

Sources and References

Your article is very well researched. I can see you put a lot of time and effort in this to make sure the information was factual and succinctly organized. They are diverse without favoring a particular side. I particularly like how you continuously had in-text links to other wikipedia pages, even with terms such as Arabic, Quran and the author names such Oleg Garbar. For a beginner reader or someone for whom this is a first contact with Islamic arts, there may be an obstacle to understanding, so even the simplest term linked to its page on wikipedia could help them understand it better.

Overall Impressions

Just absolutely brilliant! I am not sure if you are done with this draft but this honestly looks almost good to go. It reads well and I did not find any copy edits, so you clearly spent time proofreading and researching this. It is so well-structured and diverse in information without overwhelming the reader: easy to read as well for a newcomer. It definitely reads like a great wikipedia page. I think you have definitely improved the quality of this article and improved the original article. I have very minor suggestions that I mentioned earlier but otherwise it's wonderful!