Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2021 January 2

= January 2 =

After article or article detail from NY Times Machine -- who has access?
I am looking for someone with access to New York Times TimesMachine to grab the detail of what I believe will be an obituary or a news report of death.


 * ELISABETH THOMAS, AUTHOR AND PAINTER > June 29, 1955, Page 29

I'm pretty certain that this person is s:Author:Elizabeth Rebecca Finley / who I can trace to NYC in 1953. Someone can either add the information to the enWS author talk page, or contact me by whatever means is more suitable. Thanks to anyone who can help, or point me to someone with access. — billinghurst  sDrewth  01:41, 2 January 2021 (UTC)
 * Ask at WP:RX to see if any editors have access to that resource. RudolfRed (talk) 02:35, 2 January 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes, I have access. The obit makes mention of "The Paris We Remember," so this is the same person. What information are you looking to add? I can add it, I am just unsure what is valuable to you. Urve (talk) 21:53, 2 January 2021 (UTC) (typo) Urve (talk) 21:54, 2 January 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the offer Urve, when I went to the directed page they told me that I already could access the article through the Wikipedia Library Card, which I did. The person is probably in need of a WP article, though that isn't my priority at this point. — billinghurst  sDrewth  22:26, 2 January 2021 (UTC)

✅ — billinghurst  sDrewth  22:27, 2 January 2021 (UTC)

What made the Byzantine Empire much weaker in the 14th century in comparison to the 13th century?
What made the Byzantine Empire much weaker in the 14th century in comparison to the 13th century? Even after the 1204 Sack of Constantinople during the Fourth Crusade, the various fragments of the Byzantine Empire managed to survive relatively well over the next several decades, even managing to reconquer Constantinople in 1261. However, after the 1280s or so, things really did begin to seriously go downhill for the Byzantine Empire in spite of the fact that this empire was (much?) more united during this time than it was in the several decades after 1204. Why exactly was this the case? Futurist110 (talk) 03:01, 2 January 2021 (UTC)
 * See Byzantine Empire under the Palaiologos dynasty. I assume you mean after the reign of Michael VIII Palaiologos. The Byzantine lost Anatolia to different Turkish states and later the Ottomans during his successors reigns and they fought numerous civil wars with each other and the Kantakouzenos. They also had to fight with the Serbians and the Crusader states in the Balkans. Michael VIII didn't have a very secure empire either and had to rely on diplomacy to keep things together. KAVEBEAR (talk) 07:41, 2 January 2021 (UTC)


 * Futurist110 -- In a longer-term perspective it was pretty much a long downhill slide (with temporary fluctuations, of course) after the Battle of Manzikert, which the Byzantine Empire never fully recovered from... AnonMoos (talk) 14:20, 2 January 2021 (UTC)


 * The problem was that the Orthodox Church antagonised the other denominations so much that when the Turks mounted their attack on Constantinople they appealed for aid and received none. 95.145.229.36 (talk) 15:25, 2 January 2021 (UTC)


 * You seem to be jumping ahead from 1071 to 1453. AnonMoos (talk) 16:05, 2 January 2021 (UTC)


 * The effects of Manzikert are a bit overstated probably...Myriokephalon 100 years later in 1176 was probably more immediately disastrous. Increased contact with western Europe during the crusades and afterwards didn't help either. I'm not sure how the Greek church was "antagonizing other denominations" but the Latin church was certainly doing everything it could to humiliate the Greeks, knowing full well they'd never actually be able to send any help from the west. Anyway, events in Anatolia are way more important than anything happening in Europe. The Mongols invaded and destroyed the Seljuks, a ton of little "beyliks" sprung up, the Ottomans eventually defeated them all, and the Timurids too. See Rise of the Ottoman Empire. Adam Bishop (talk) 21:08, 2 January 2021 (UTC)


 * There was a confluence of factors that led to this. Michael VIII Palaiologos left a relatively strong state, but internally that state was riddled with divisions, from his religious policy (Unionists vs anti-Unionists) to separatist/regionalist/anti-dynastic sentiments (e.g. the pro-Laskarid stance of the Anatolian populations), and was left still facing a multitude of threats. All of this was not insurmountable, but Michael VIII's success depended largely on him being at the helm, constantly manoeuvring between rival powers. His successor, Andronikos II, was much less capable. He allowed the comparative advantages gained with so much difficulty to slip (to the point of disbanding the rebuilt Byzantine fleet), and neglected the Turkish (and especially Ottoman) advance in Anatolia until it was too late to do anything. His one major countermeasure, hiring the Catalan Company, backfired spectacularly. Without him, Byzantium might well have been able to continue its revival, possibly even reaching late Komnenian-era borders by the mid-14th century, including in Anatolia. After Andronikos II, the best that could be hoped for was to be the strongest Balkan state. Andronikos III made a good attempt at it, but that hope in turn was dashed in the civil war of 1341-47: after that, the remaining 'Empire' was too small, too poor, to discontiguous, and the ruling dynasty too fractious for any real chance at a revival. There are a few other factors, of course, such as the Genoese colony at Galata, which siphoned away enormous sums in lost tax revenue from commerce, the constant meddling and attacks of Latin powers (e.g. the Hospitaller conquest of Rhodes), the attacks by the Bulgarians and Serbs, etc. But all of these were more symptoms of the Byzantine decline than causes of it; a strong ruler in command of an empire like that in 1282 could have dealt with them. Constantine  ✍  22:05, 2 January 2021 (UTC)

Baike Baidu
Is baike baidu licensed under "Creative Commons"? Can it be freely copied and distributed? If not, what are the terms of the Baidu copyright? 14.169.211.192 (talk) 06:24, 2 January 2021 (UTC)
 * According to clause 2.2 of the Baidu Baike User Agreement, the copyright of all content published by Baidu Baike users belongs to the original author. So unless the content creator has specified otherwise, it is not free, except for the usual fair use exceptions in jurisdictions where they apply. --Lambiam 09:45, 2 January 2021 (UTC)
 * The copyright of nearly all content on Wikipedia also belongs with the original author, so that's not particularly germane. AFAICT, this includes most of your work, if you intended to give up your copyright (e.g. release it into the public domain) or assign it to someone else, you probably should make a clear statement on your user page. I'll give you though that they Baike Baidu don't seem to require that the copyright holder/author licence their copyrighted worked under any sort of free licence, which is a separate issue but seems to be what the author is interested in rather than copyright assignment or release. See also Mirrors and forks/Baidu Baike and our article. Nil Einne (talk) 01:25, 3 January 2021 (UTC) 04:13, 3 January 2021 (UTC)

"Nordic race"
Regarding the above lemma, I am kindly asking for quick backing here. To be quite honest, my hair really stands on end right now …--Hildeoc (talk) 23:12, 2 January 2021 (UTC)
 * To save time, this appears to be a request for intervention in a dispute about whether the navigation template Germanic peoples belongs in the article Nordic race. 69.174.144.79 (talk) 00:37, 3 January 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes, exactly. Thanks for that service!--Hildeoc (talk) 02:09, 3 January 2021 (UTC)