Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Middle-earth/archive11

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Tolkien articles by quality statistics (worklist) :
Tolkien articles by quality and importance
Quality Importance
Top High Mid Low NA Total
FA 1 1 2 4
FL 1 1
GA 9 50 99 63 221
B 8 29 46 83
C 1 23 67 91
Start 3 143 146
Stub 3 1 4
List 2 6 10 1 19
Category 171 171
Disambig 33 33
File 17 20 17 17 19 90
Project 3 3
Redirect 2 6 569 577
Template 40 40
Other 1 2 3
Assessed 27 82 182 358 837 1,486
Unassessed 1 1
Total 27 82 182 359 837 1,487
WikiWork factors (?) ω = 1,809 Ω = 3.30
Archive
Archives

If anyone wants to pull out or copy a previous discussion, feel free to to do so. —Mirlen 17:13, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Community

Roll call: October - December

Please sign your name below and on the front page. Comments are optional.

  • Hello, I'm new. And it's December now. Isn't that great!? Sageofwisdom (talk) 17:12, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
    • Welcome to you and everyone else who has signed up these last few months. I've changed this roll call period to end in December above! :-) Unless someone wants to archive the page and start a new roll call? Carcharoth (talk) 00:25, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Hi everyone, I'm new! Norran 19:59, 15 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Alive and well - Shanath18 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.102.41.104 (talk) 22:45, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
  • The problem with this roll call is that not everyone who signs up on the main page signs up here. Uthanc 15:08, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
  • Present --Eruhildo 01:17, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
  • Present Carl Sixsmith 08:17, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
  • I'm here -FlamingSilmaril Talk\Contribs 16:15, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
  • Hi --Psyche825 (talk) 18:05, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
  • Maybe we should have a newsletter and send it to everyone? That would be an excuse to trawl through the archives and sort out what has been done and what still needs doing (lots!). Carcharoth 21:40, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
  • In a state of limbo between activity and inactivity... —Mirlen 01:24, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
  • Here >^..^< Nimfaelin 10:45, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
  • Views and conceptions still changing... – Súrendil 19:47, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
  • I'm still lurking, although with less time these days... LotR 19:52, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
  • Hi, I'm new here Thamusemeantfan 05:14, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Probably will have less time these coming days. Uthanc 15:41, 6 November 2007 (UTC)
  • I'm new here as well, and not good at making pages, but good at designing. And im bad at spelling! User:Saivinay_b-ball 22:32, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Here. Likely working on references for a while. --CBD 14:16, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
  • I'm in : tmc (talk) 22:52, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Lacking talent but making up for it with passion:) Mount Doom (talk) 12:32, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Again, here but very busy with non-wiki life. --Merond e 09:06, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Cordial greetings, you may call me Éowyn. (Éowyn's page)
  • New here, and around in between evil 3rd year uni work. Faerie Queene (talk) 03:42, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Still here, just busy with job and toddler.Ryecatcher773 (talk) 05:20, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Brainardman —Preceding comment was added at 21:17, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
  • According to the main page, I am a former member listed under Rochelle. I am still here! Sorry I disappeared for a bit...I would still like to help. Rochelle CMN (talk) 22:26, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Superlost 01:19, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Issues

Deletion proposals

Strike out expired proposals with <s></s> and note result. Uthanc 15:08, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
Please also add the links to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Middle-earth/AfD. Thanks. Carcharoth 00:24, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
Images
Articles
Each film article already has a "changes and omissions" section, with filmmakers' excuses (still not convinced). Of course, some changes are more notable than others: for example, "Elves at Helm's Deep" and character changes > "Everard" Proudfoot and the length of Gandalf's beard. If we continue to cover these (and a separate article for RotK is too much, IMO) it should be in the main film trilogy article and/or in the individual films, and/or characters. Also, more evaluation from Tolkien scholars like Tom Shippey would be nice. Right now, the only such one mentioned in the trilogy article is Wayne Hammond, and he's pretty negative. How about a more positive opinion? Uthanc 05:39, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
The prod was removed. Should we go to AfD on this one? Carcharoth (talk) 23:15, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
Really delete.87.102.66.10 (talk) 14:53, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
Uthanc 16:21, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
Redirects
Templates
Categories
Already deleted

Articles newly made/found

Please ensure these are all added to Portal:Middle-earth/Pages. This is a list of all the pages related to the project, to allow related changes for that page to be used to watch changes to all the pages - please add template, categories and similar pages to that list as well. Though there should be periodic attempts to redo the list in a comprehensive fashion, keeping it up-to-date manually will be a great help. If you are uncertain about whether a page belongs there, list it at Portal talk:Middle-earth/Pages. Please also ensure that {{ME-project}} is added on the talk page of new articles, try to give them an initial assessment, and place them in the correct categories. The top level categories are Category:Tolkien and Category:Middle-earth. Carcharoth 16:11, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Probably some others as well. Carcharoth (talk) 00:29, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Move/merge proposals

Hi! I'm here too (currently). Done the suggested merge - article still needs work. Also pictures in article are 'not the best' - if anyone has any better.. See the talk page for anything else.. ?87.102.0.6 12:59, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
Question - article uses the term "The Valian Years" - is this in common use - seems to be about the first age??87.102.0.6 13:02, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Redirects reorganised

Have a look at Category:Middle-earth redirects! Some great work has been done there by Súrendil, showing how our redirects should be organised, and the advantages of such organisation, showing how redirects to lists and sections can really help organise merged lists and avoid having hundreds of short stubs. This also reduces the amount of material that needs assessing as well, once the "merge era" is finished. Carcharoth 11:36, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Inspired by that, I created and have started to populate Category:Middle-earth redirects with possibilities. Carcharoth 15:55, 19 July 2007 (UTC)
Could I suggest making additions to the redirect page, rather than creating new articles - I'm sure 'spiders of mirkwood' would make a fine addition to the article mirkwood, but might not stand as well on it's own..87.102.0.6 13:06, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Best articles

Currently we have 15 articles that are considered examples of the best articles we have. I am going to list them below so that people can enjoy reading them, help improve them, and have a model for articles they work on. These are from Category:FA-Class Tolkien articles (WP:FAC is a separate peer reviewed process); Category:A-Class Tolkien articles (examples of the best articles we have - effectively an internal wikiproject assessment); Category:GA-Class Tolkien articles (the WP:GA process is a separate review process). I haven't included any of the 85 current B-class articles at Category:B-Class Tolkien articles, but if any of those are especially good in your opinion, please re-assess, or list or discuss below. Also, please raise any concerns you have with these articles below, though remember to take extensive discussions to the article talk pages. It would be nice to update this every couple of months to see what progress is being made. Carcharoth 12:31, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

FA, A, and GA articles:

Discussion

  • What do people think of putting Faramir up for GA? —Mirlen 01:21, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

Models for merges

There are some articles that I think are good models for how to merge material from stubs and reference it (well, at least in some cases). If you see any articles that you like the look of, please add them below. Carcharoth 22:16, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

See also Category:Middle-earth lists. Anyone have any thoughts about the advantages and disadvantages of these different styles? Carcharoth 22:16, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Another assessment/merging drive?

Well, I say another, though the previous one never really took off... I noticed that some people are busy merging and assessing articles, and as you can see from Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Tolkien articles by quality statistics, the number of assessed articles (534) is close to overtaking the number of unassessed articles (603). So let's aim to cross the halfway stage soon! Remember to consider merging before you assess something, as assessing is pointless if the article is later merged. Any questions, please ask. Carcharoth 21:27, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

New images process

See Wikipedia:WikiProject Middle-earth/Images/Disputed images. Carcharoth 03:38, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Discussion in progress

Carried over from last archive. Uthanc 15:08, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Discussion taking place at Talk:Tolkien's legendarium, in case anyone is interested. Carcharoth 13:27, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

Notability of articles

I have just examined over a dozen articles in Category:Middle-earth locations, and not one of them can anywhere near meeting the notability requirements set out in WP:FICTION. I have tagged the articles accordingly with {{nn}} etc, in the hope that editors may be able to produce references which demonstrate notability. May I remind participants in this project that not every detail of Tolkein's works is notable, and that notability needs to be demonstrated for each article by external sources (i.e. not just by citations from Tolkein's works). It would be a pity to see so much writing being deleted, but that's what's likely to happen unless references are forthcoming.

It maybe better to merge many of these small articles into a limited number of much bigger articles for which suitable secondary references are available. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 02:32, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

  • PS Item 7 of Wikipedia:WikiProject Middle-earth/Standards#References appears to discourage editors from citing secondary sources, and also refers to "valid conclusions drawn based on primary sources" (which conflicts with WP:V and WP:RS). I suggest that the references section should be rewriitten to better reflect wikipedia policies, particularly with regard to the essential requirement of non-trivial coverage in muktiple sources independent of the subject. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 02:40, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Hi BrownHairedGirl. You've made a logical, but incorrect, assumption about the sequence of events. This Wikiproject was not responsible for the creation of the vast number of articles on minor elements of Tolkien lore in Wikipedia. The articles came first, most from the earliest days of Wikipedia, and then the Wikiproject was created to try to bring some sort of order and encyclopedic treatment to the chaos. That which you seek to 'remind' us of is, in fact, a major focus of this project... working on references and merging articles. However, there is ALOT of material to be recast. As to the 'primary sources' issue you cite; The "valid conclusions drawn beased on primary sources" wording you quote is referring to when secondary sources should be used... for interpretations and conclusions. The intent was that when you are citing a reference for simple facts (e.g. the color of Gloin's beard in the stories) it is better to cite the primary source. When you are citing a reference for 'interpretation' (e.g. the 'meaning' of the various different colors of the Dwarves' beards) a secondary source is needed... as they also are to establish notability. This is consistent with Wikipedia's sourcing policies. --CBD 13:09, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
There are a lot of articles which the problematic ones can be merged into, like how Bridge of Khazad-dûm was merged into Moria (Middle-earth) (which sports a notability tag!). We have Minor places in Middle-earth, Minor places in Beleriand, and Minor places in Arda. However, where should we merge these into? For example, Lamedon and Lossarnach are just regions of Gondor, but do they go in Gondor, or Minor places in Middle-earth? Uthanc 17:29, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

{deindent) Thanks for the replies, and sorry if I had misunderstood the history of the articles. Good to know that a cleanup is underway :)

Thanks to CBD for clarifying intent of the guidelines; that make sense, although there is a danger that it could be interpreted as encouraging original research. It might be a good idea to clarify that, and wouldn't it be a good idea to add a section to the referencing guidelines stressing the importance of secondary sources to establish notability?

Good luck with all the mergeing — there is a lot of work to do there, and not just in combing articles. Even the article Minor places in Middle-earth currently has no secondary sources to establish notability, and I do wonder whether deletion may be a better solution in many cases. There has clearly been a lot of work put into creating all this material, but so far it hasn't been shown to meet wikipedia's notability criteria. I haven't scanned all the all the sub-categories, but so far I don't see any articles in Category:Middle-earth locations which pass WP:FICTION. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 19:51, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

I clarified the confusion up in ME:S, taken from the words of CBD - who explains it so much better than I could've. If anyone else wants to expand on the importance of secondary sources to establish notability, feel free to do so. In any case, there are a LOT of articles that need proper referencing and clean up and so on, so progress might be slow - but hopefully, we'll get there. Thanks for your comments, BrownHairedGirl.
As for whether or not to place Lamedon and Lossarnarch in Gondor, or Minor places of Middle-earth - that's a tricky question. Perhaps we could discuss it very briefly in Gondor, and expand on it in Minor places of Middle-earth... Or alternatively, we could just keep it in Gondor and only use Minor places of Middle-earth only when the section describing the various regions of Gondor gets too long. The small but subtle difference between the first option and second one is that while placing the the regions of Gondor in the list is a certainy, it will not always be the case for the secondary option. Based on WP:FICTION, I think the second option follows the guideline more closely. What do the other members think about this? —Mirlen 01:41, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
Mirlen, at the risk of labouring the point, it seems to me that you might be putting the cart before the horse. A decision on whether or not to merge seems to me to be premature if notability has not been established even for the merge target; you may be putting a lot of work into something which will ultimately be deleted.
I have just noticed that some of the {{nn}} and {{primarysources}} tags which I had added to these articles have been removed. I won't edit war, but will nominate at AfD any articles which do n not meet WP:FICTION and for which these tags have been removed. The first is Gondor (see AfD/Gondor), but there are several others to follow. This is a pity, because I would have much preferred to give you good folks plenty more time to find sources, but if the tags are removed, then I have to conclude that editors find the article satisfactory as they are, in which case the AfD process is needed. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 07:30, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
Did you discuss the removal of the tags with the editor who removed them? I will see what I can do for the articles in question after the weekend, but I will note that if the long-term goal is merging, then AfD is disruptive because if I had arrived at the article without an AfD notice I personally might have merged. Now an AfD notice is there, I cannot merge. Actually, none of the articles nominated are merge candidates, but the point still needs to be made. Asking for sources is more than acceptable, and is really helpful, but in future if an editor removes tags that you add, could you discuss it with them before going straight to AfD? Carcharoth 09:29, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
How about doing this the other way around: that instead of leaving it outsiders like me to challenge the lack of evidence of notability, this project starts its own systematic process of tagging articles for which notability has not been clearly established through multiple non-trivial references to sources independent of the subject, and reinstating any such tags which are improperly removed for spurious reasons, such as because the article mentions Tolkiens' son and literary executor? You mentioned at AfD that this is a large and active wikiproject, so I'm sure that it would be easy to ensure that this tagging is maintained.
And I'm sorry, but AfD does not disrupt a possible merger: "merge to X" is perfectly legitimate outcome of an AfD. Personally, I have no axe to grind either way about merger; my sole concern is whether the articles meet the notability guidelines. As stated at AfD, I would be happy to withdraw the nominations if this wikiproject starts the work of ensuring that its articles demonstrate notability, but so far don't see that — all I see is resentment at the notion that notability needs to be demonstrated through references per WP:NOTE and WP:FICTION rather than merely taken as axiomatic. I do hope that we will get to the point where I can withdraw these nominations, but we're not there yet. I hope the gap isn't as big as it currently looks. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 13:31, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
Please read the project talk page archive to see what we have been doing. Not terribly well organised and not immensely productive. But some, slow progress is being made. Also, I did not say "All these articles are supported by a large and active WikiProject" - it was TCC who said that. If you are going to say that I've said something, please attribute correctly. The main focus has been merging, but you are quite right to say that the notability part has been neglected. Would you like to join the WikiProject and help us? Finally, I think merging is sometimes an obvious solution that should come before AfD. But the implication of an AfD is that deletion is "on the table", so merging cannot take place during the AfD, and if deletion takes place, then merging is no longer possible. Getting stuff undeleted at DRV to perform a merger is a pain, but is sometimes the only option if AfD neglect the merge option. I understand that some articles should be deleted instead of merged, but the initial merging decision should be editorial, not a community-driven AfD decision. Carcharoth 13:57, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
Sorry about the misattribution, that was careless of me. But, no I'm, not sufficiently interested in the subject to join the project. I happened to chance upon one nn and unreferenced article, and a quick check found loads more, so I didn't just tag them, I came here to explain why I had done so, which I hoped would be seen as a friendly and helpful thing to do. In the same spirit I have offered to withdraw the AfDs if this project starts its own work of checking notability. Anyway, I expect that's all from me for a few days. Good luck! --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 14:21, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
OK, thanks. That's it from me as well. Carcharoth 14:41, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
At the very least we should be merging articles. Uthanc 16:50, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

Update

See here, here and here for the latest. The short story is that a large spate (around 150) of non-notability tags were placed by BrownHairedGirl, followed by mass reversions by IronGargoyle, followed by mass reversions by BrownHairedGirl of the reversions. A similar incident took place back in August (see here for details). We probably need to emphasise what should and shouldn't be done if this happens again in future. I suggest something like the following:

  • (1) Do not edit war over the tags. Discuss here or on other talk pages.
  • (2) If you can provide sources and notability, please do so. References to Christopher Tolkien's works are sufficient, but it is probably best to add at least one other non-Tolkien reference if possible.
  • (3) Mass tagging of articles is almost certainly disruptive. There is only a limited amount of work we can do, and we are already aware of the problems. Possibly we can tag the articles ourselves in a less intrusive way, but what we can't do is ignore the problems and hope they go away. The important thing is to set up a system that ensures that work is done on a regular basis (in other words, we need to be more organised). Once we have a steady flow of work being done, it will be easier to ask mass taggers to stop overwhelming us with work and to let us work slowly but surely through the whole set of articles (in this scheme, the unobtrusive tags, such as Category:Wikiproject Middle-earth to be merged should work well).

If you didn't understand any of that, please ask! :-) Carcharoth 00:22, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Can BrownHairedGirl be banned please? I find such conduct unacceptable. This person is trying to force his/her own private assessment on the entire community of Tolkien fans who use Wikipedia to gain knowledge of Tolkien's work. I have not witnessed such hostility towards Tolkien's work in those past 20 years that I am aware of it. Cush 00:44, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
In response to Cush, please stop making personal attacks. The issue is not "my private assessment": the issue is that the articles do not meet wikipedia's guidelines. Read the guidelins, and improve the articles if you want to, but don't shoot the messenger.
In response to Carcharoth, I'm really not sure what your objection is. Is it that the tags are intrusive? If so, then you are right: they are designed to be like that, to invite editors to improve articles with a fundamental deficiency. (And in fact they have recently been redesigned to be more prominent).
I'm also, frankly, astounded that you continue to claim that "references to Christopher Tolkien's works are sufficient". We had this discussion at AfD: do you really claim that JRR Tolkein's son, editor and literary executor is a "source independent of the subject"?
I'm well aware that it will take a long time to clean up this huge collection of non-notable articles. But that it is no reason to object to the deficiencies being flagged up and articles being tagged.
At this point, I think I have done all I can reasonably do to point editors towards the existing guidelines and policies. If tags continue to be removed, I will have to consider seeking admin intervention. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 00:58, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
Just to make one thing clear. I've only removed tags with edit summaries explaining why I was removing it and/or adding a source. You implicitly recognised this by not replacing the tag (primary), but using a different tag (refimprove) instead. This is a step in the right direction, and is not the same as removal of tags. Again, would you consider recognising this and working with me to improve those articles, instead of using tags to communicate what needs to be done? Wikipedia works best when people work together and discuss things (as I've been trying to do with you), instead of people impersonally telling each other what needs doing. I'm going to drop a note of at WP:AN anyway, as I am worried that this situation may escalate in my absence. Carcharoth 01:22, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
I hope that I made clear my recognition of the value of the sources, by using edit summaries which stressed the need for multiple sources. If it has just been sources added, I'd have been delighted to just say "good work", but I remain very disappointed that you assumed that a single source established notability. As I have said before, I lack the expertise to improve the articles; all I can do is to flag up the deficiencies, and all I have objected to is people denying that those deficiencies exist or claiming that pointing then out is inconvenient. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 02:04, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
To be honest, you are the first person I've run into who is so, shall we say, assiduous, in your use of tags like this. Most people fall over themselves in surprise when even one source is added. I'll be happy to add more sources when i get back. Have a nice weekend. Carcharoth 02:28, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
I just thought I'd pop in after finally reading all the discussions, unfortunately I don't have much to add, I agree with everything Carcharoth has mentioned. Yes there is a lot of work to be done, we just need more time. The important thing to note is these minor articles are not being created anymore, so it's just a matter of assessing the current articles and fixing them which takes a while with so few people. While I wish this whole debate could have been a bit shorter and less obtrusive, in the end BrownHairedGirl is just trying to help improve WP. (P.S. It's Tolkien not Tolkein) :) --Hyarion 04:32, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
How can the removal of articles and thus valuable information possibly be considered an improvement? Cush 07:56, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
I don't condone simply deleting articles like Gondor, and the merging of articles should preferably not remove any information. However as much as you and I would both love to see Wikipedia contain any and all information relating to Tolkien, this is best left to the specific wikis as Wookieepedia and Memory-Alpha have shown, Wikipedia should be for the more notable things. --Hyarion 21:40, 29 October 2007 (UTC)
Cush, thanks for your comments, but BrownHairedGirl is right to ask you to not say things like asking for her to be banned. Please don't do that again. If we all stay calm, things will work out OK. Carcharoth 01:22, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
Then stop her from pressuring editors and threatening us with the deletion of articles. I don't see how that would motivate anyone to extend the articles at issue. Cush 01:38, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
Sorry Cush, but the issue is not expanding the articles. I have been repeatedly told that one of the major focuses of his project's work is merging the less notable articles; and you really really really ought to read the notability guidelines. Some subjects don't merit articles, and while Tolkein's works are highly notable, that doesn't mean that every minor detail of them deserves an article on wikipedia, let alone that those article should be expanded. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 01:58, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
You obviously know nothing about Tolkien's work. If you think that articles on Beleriand or Valinor are unnecessary then there is no point in discussing this with you. You just hide behind some arbitrary guidelines but you forget those who come to Wikipedia without any knowledge of such guidelines. You know, those folks you are supposed to serve. But anyways, you win. Tolkien on Wikipedia has died for me now. I've tagged my few maps for deletion. Cush 02:35, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
This page is getting a bit crowded, so I have replied on Cush's talk page. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 09:29, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

A list of potential sources?

Hi. I'd like to help out a bit with Middle-earth-related articles. What sources are available? I am familiar with The History of Middle-earth, by Christopher Tolkien, The Atlas of Middle-earth, by Karen Wynn Fonstad, and I know there are a number of other scholarly works (some are categorized at Category:Tolkien studies) including Tolkien Studies: An Annual Scholary Review. Could there be a list (at Wikipedia:WikiProject Middle-earth/Sources, or somewhere similar) of what works are available and also what works are relevant to which aspects of Middle-earth? Thanks, --Iamunknown 00:56, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

That is a good idea. I once put a load of book references into the Middle-earth article in preparation for trying to regain featured article status, but never got very far (see Middle-earth#References). There is a mixture of primary and secondary texts at Template:ME-ref. To those I would add the following (some of which you've mentioned):
Also, see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Middle-earth/Standards#References. The point is that there are lots of secondary texts - some of which are rubbish, but they still help establish notability. I'm only mentioning the ones I think are good. Others can use the other ones (within reason), but I'll stick to the ones I think are good. There is also an online list somewhere published by Michael Drout. Ah, yes, here we go: A Bibliography of Scholarly Studies of J. R. R. Tolkien and His Works. That says "through 2000". I suspect that material after this is covered in the "annual review" sections and lists published in Tolkien Studies. Carcharoth 07:42, 28 October 2007 (UTC)
Unfortunately, I do have not read too many independent third-party sources discussing Tolkien - aside from discussions online - a lot of information regarding Tolkien's legendarium comes from the books and HoME, but I want to take a look at independent sources that discuss Beleriand and the Noldor, including the Sons of Feanor... which reminds me, I've read few of Michael Martinez's essays that were floating around — where do we stand with his works? —Mirlen 14:59, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
You can cite Martinez's works, sure. Others will disagree, I know, and some may question some of what he says, but some of what he says is perfectly valid. They may even remove the links, but you could probably make a case for citing some material to his essays. You have to be careful, because some of his stuff (I'm not 100% sure) verges on self-publication. He has edited Wikipedia, was blocked for 3RR in February 2006, and has been editing recently. Have a look at the contribs for more: User:Michael Martinez. Carcharoth 21:18, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
Michael's first book ('Visualizing Middle-earth') and the e-book ('Parma Endorion') were self-published, but 'Understanding Middle-earth' was put out by a small SciFi publishing house. Some of his essays were self-published while others were sorta like writing a 'blog' for Suite 101 and others still articles for a small magazine.
That info given, this is a tricky subject for me. I know alot of people in this area, including Michael, to varying degrees and I try to stay away from questions of whose work should/should not be included. We need some texts like these for 'secondary source interpretation'... anyone can go to the etymologies and work out the probable meaning of a Sindarin name Tolkien didn't attest, but that's 'original research' unless it can be cited to a reasonably 'mainstream' source. About the least 'notable' / 'independently validated' I'll go is Vinyar Tengwar (I've only talked to Carl infrequently) and 'Gateway to Sindarin' (I know David fairly well, but that was a university publication so it has a degree of 'independent gravitas')... anything beyond that I try to let others decide without my input. --CBD 15:00, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
There's a nice essay on the Noldor and Finweans he has that I want to reference back to, although I'm not sure to what extent would be considered "original research." —Mirlen 00:58, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

Merging

I agree that stubs like Folde ought to be merged, but into Minor places in Middle-earth or Rohan? Mirlen has opined that merging into the "parent" country would be better (in the case of Lamedon/Lossarnach and Gondor). Above our anonymous contributor suggested to merge Durin's Tower and Chamber of Mazarbul into Moria (Middle-earth), as was Bridge of Khazad-dum, but Durin's Tower is already in "Minor places". Uthanc 21:29, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

Hm, good question. I would second merging the article into the parent region, (e.g. Folde to Rohan) and then adding links from Minor places in Middle-earth to the sections. Then we could move Durin's Tower to Moria (Middle-earth) and link to it from Minor places. --Hyarion 21:35, 29 October 2007 (UTC)
I tend to agree. Quite possibly all the "minor places" could be merged to articles about the wider location. Minor places in Beleriand could end up in Beleriand, for example. Redirects don't have to point to sections with the same name as the object - they can point to a general section, or indeed to an invisible "tag" that marks a non-section header. The important thing is to make sure that merging does improve the article. It is characters and objects that, realistically, have to end up in a list. Locations can be upmerged to the wider location. I think I merged Henneth Annûn and Emyn Arnen to Ithilien, while the redirects remain in Category:Middle-earth hills and Category:Middle-earth locations. On the other hand, the minor places lists sometimes work well. If you find it difficult to integrate a location article into a wider location, merging to a list should be OK. Carcharoth 00:26, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
Have a look at my sandbox for a "Geography of Rohan" section with other articles merged into it (feedback here). Needs rewriting or even trimming and the articles may get too long, but it's better than deletion. Merging is a pain. The Sea Belegaer is on AfD now. How about a "bodies of water" list, excluding the existing lists of rivers? I plan to work on List of Middle-earth Elves next, at least judging notability there is easier. Uthanc 07:07, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
Some work done on List of Middle-earth Elves, as of now unfinished. Whew. Uthanc 09:06, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
Now all names in the list have some text no matter how small. Redirects aren't done. I have to do something else, so others are free to continue (redirecting, etc.) These at least must be merged/redirected IMO:
Just check if I missed anyone by search.. sorry. Uthanc 10:30, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
I've added div id tags to each entry in the list, and will now begin redirecting. – Psyche825 (talk) 01:00, 31 October 2007 (UTC)
I've struck off the ones I've redirected. For the ones I redirected, I wasn't sure if the previously existing categories ought to stay, but I left them. Also, the following links redirected to some of the articles I redirected, and I think they may warrant another category, such as MER from alternative spellings, but I wasn't sure which: Amdîr, Amdir, Aikanáro, Aikanár, Míriel Serindë, Aulëndur. I'll finish redirecting later, unless someone else does so first. – Psyche825 (talk) 02:50, 31 October 2007 (UTC)
See the list for an update. Only those with separate articles or are mentioned elsewhere are still linked. Perhaps the sons of Feanor should be merged into Sons of Feanor. At least Amrod and Amras into Amrod and Amras. I feel some others should probably be merged - opinions?. But the list is pretty huge, and it's still bare-bones in places. Uthanc 18:19, 31 October 2007 (UTC)
May I safely assume that we should merge minor realms of Beleriand into the parent article? I agree that we should merge Amrod and Amras into the Sons of Feanor — the others, I'm not so sure, as some of their articles could be expanded... In any case, for the longer articles, we should provide a brief excerpt in Sons of Feanor and then link to the main article under its subheading. —Mirlen 14:57, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
I'm not so sure about merging into regions, now. I think that small places, or places that will never have much written about them, should be merged to the "minor places" lists. Stuff that is very relevant to the region with the article, should be merged there, but if it is just a few sentences, the "minor places" list is probably better. It's difficult to lay down hard-and-fast rules. Have a look at User:Carcharoth/Notes, and note the need to fix the double redirects left behind after merging. I've also found that Minor places in Beleriand is best for places in Beleriand (obviously), but that other First Age stuff, even if technically in Middle-earth, should be put in Minor places in Arda - stuff like Utumno, Cuiviénen and Sea of Helkar. They fit there much better than in Minor places in Middle-earth (Almaren, for example, is in the Arda list). The Minor places in Middle-earth is more for stuff mentioned in LotR - mainly Second and Third Age stuff. As for Numenor, all the minor Numenor stuff should be merged to Numenor. As for characters, I'm even more uncertain as to how to handle that, so I'm concentrating on geographical stuff instead. They are the ones that have been tagged at the moment, anyway, though we should start tagging the minor characters ourselves. The rule of thumb should always be: will there be enough in the books and in secondary literature to justify a reasonably sized article with interesting, notable content. If not, merge and let the multiple references in secondary literature aggregate at the merge destination to allow a better judgment there. I'll have a look at the minor realms of Beleriand, and add some notes on the talk page at Talk:Beleriand. Carcharoth 21:26, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
Significant regions of Beleriand should be mentioned in the main parent article though. But I do think we should probably make use of the "minor places" list, so articles that will never have much written about them, as you say, should be merged into there. What Noldorin realms of Beleriand shall we expand and which shall we merge? But perhaps it's better if we take this discussion to Talk:Beleriand - this page is getting long. —Mirlen 01:02, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

Merging guidelines

Since a lot of merging is going on at the moment, I should repost the guidelines. See here, which links to here. Don't worry too much if any of the steps have been left out, but please do try and follow them. Once you've done a few, it is fairly easy to remember. The checklist needs to be updated with a link to Category:Middle-earth redirects, and the bit about talk page and removing the assessment tags. Carcharoth 17:52, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

New guidelines, and addition of the need to check for redirects and correct them:
  • Open edit window at stub (PAGENAME A)
  • Cut text from stub, leaving categories and inter-wikis behind
  • Open edit window at merge location (PAGENAME B)
  • Paste text into correct position at merge location
  • Add div-id tags or section header at merge location and format layout
  • Save with edit summary "merge from [[PAGENAME A]]"
  • Go back to stub and put "#REDIRECT [[PAGENAME B#PAGENAME A]]"
  • Add the right 'Middle-earth redirects' category (see Category:Middle-earth redirects)
  • Save with edit summary "merge to [[PAGENAME B]]"
  • Click the redirect link to make sure it works
  • If present, remove {{ME-project}} from the redirect talk page
  • Consider archiving talk page discussions to a more visible location
  • Check for redirects pointing at the new redirect, and fix these double redirects if any
Hope that's all clear. Carcharoth 11:55, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Retagging?

I've been away for some time, and it's a real pity that I was unable to participate in the discussions. I generally agree with BrownHairedGirl's points, but still feel uneasy in this respect: how should the references to tertiary sources be introduced? Common facts should only be referenced to JRRT and CJRT's books, or to some Vinyar Tengwar for texts not published otherwise. If some third-party source does make a guess on Tolkien's work, we have an anchor; but what if it only recounts the history of the conception which has also been traced by CJRT in History? Carcharoth has added several references to J.R.R. Tolkien Encyclopedia just as a 'source' at the foot of a page, though nothing particular seems to be derived from it. Is that a possible solution?

Turning to BrownHairedGirl's request that "this project [should] start its own work of checking notability", I suppose it is appropriate that we should have our own notability tag instead of the general Template:Nn (WikiProject Chemistry has one). Since I'm unable to provide references other than to HoMe now but hope to get a chance in future, I've created Template:ME-importance. It is based more on Template:Importance that on T:Nn, as the former's doc page states "use this template when the subject probably is notable enough, but the article fails to establish notability" - and I intend T:Me-importance only to be used for cases where notability is obvious - Gondor, Belegaer etc. As the wording of T:ME-importance shows, it directly asks for tertiary sources, so it can as well replace Template:primarysources; and it also adds articles to Category:Tolkien articles of unclear notability to keep track of them. If nobody opposes, I'm planning to replace BrownHairedGirl's tags with either this template, or Template:Merge JRRT (unless I merge article myself). Súrendil 19:55, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

If you replace BHG's tags, best to drop her a courtesy note explaining why you have replaced the tags. I'm not convinced of the importance of Belegaer myself. Even though it is a large region, it isn't mentioned that often in the texts, as far as I am aware, at least not by that name. As a merge destination for other articles, it has potential, though lots of them will have their own articles, so it could end up as a list of the places in the sea. Plus some stuff about Middle-earth cosmology. Carcharoth 01:43, 31 October 2007 (UTC)
(Many thanks to YLSS/Súrendil for the pointer to this discussion). It's great to see this work underway, and I have no great objection in principle to the replacement of those tags, thiugh I do wonder whether it is a god idea in the ling run for every wikiproject to have its on cistomise versions of these widely-used tags ... but that aside, it seems OK provided that any tags which replace them are of at least equal prominence, assert the same deficiencies and include the article in the same categories. In other words, it seems to me to be fine to use a custom tag to add info but not to remove the notification of problems identified by the general tags.
I can also see a real advantage in doing so, in that it can add the articles to a project-specific maintenance category, which strikes me as being a very good idea to help track changes.
The proposed template {{ME-importance}} goes some way in that direction, but it has some serious flaws. It's certainly prominent enough, which is great; but thereafter I'm afraid that I start finding a few problems:
  1. There are some ME articles tagged wih {{notability}} which probably could meet notability standards, but there are many others which seem to me highly unlikely ever to come anywhere near it. I welcome YLSS/Súrendil's intention only to use this for articles where "notability is obvious", but the difficulty so far is that I'm afraid that I don't think others in this project are familiar enough with notability to give me as much confidence as I would like in how those judgements would be made. I would be much happier if the project's own tag was based on {{notability}}, so that it could safely be used on all the project's articles where notability is in doubt.
  2. If the proposed template is going to going to replace {{refimprove}}, then it should retain that template's request for sources for verification, a word which is missing from {{ME-importance}}.
  3. I'm also unhappy about the link to Wikipedia:WikiProject Middle-earth/Standards#References. It's a great idea in principle to draw editors attention to guidance on how to apply the referencing guidelines to this project, but unfortunately those guidelines currently disparage secondary refs instead of encouraging them to establish notability. I know that discussions were underway on improving the ME-project's referencing guidelines, but until that process has led to suitably corrected guidelines, it doesn't help to direct editors to them.
Similarly, {{Merge JRRT}} looks like a good idea, but it's no substitute for {{unreferenced}} or {{notability}}; unless and until the notability and {{unreferenced}} problems are resolved, those tags should remain.
One final thought. As above, I think that these tags may have a place ... but I'm a little worried that the attention seems to be focused on not having the standard tags on the articles rather than on fixing the project guidelines on hunting down more unreferenced articles. re you sure hat's the right way to order the priorities?
Hope this helps! And sorry that it isn't an unreservedly positive response.--BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 00:07, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
For what it is worth, the initial assessment drive I did was effectively a notability thing if you look at the "importance" values assigned. See here. Others have added their "importance" assessments to a few other articles, but I still generally agree with the spread across the categories [top (21), high (135), mid (325), low (171)]. There are 425 articles without importance assessments - these are mostly articles waiting to be merged. The top and high importance categories are what I would say are the major topics on which lots of verifiable, independent, material can be written, with references to the secondary literature. Obviously this is only a provisional sorting of the articles, and notability still needs to be made clear in the individual articles, but just thought I'd fill you in on some of the work that has been done before, to make clear that this is ongoing work and not just starting now. I thought the table at the top of this talk page made this clear, but maybe that table needs to go on the front page as well? Carcharoth 10:39, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
I just jumped into the mid-importance list, and found Ithilien, and so far I can see nothing in that article which addresses the issues raised in WP:PLOT. I haven't done any further analysis of that category, but I do question how many of the 325 mid-importance articles are similarly focused on recounting plots, and whether more than a small minority of them could ever really become articles with real-world significance. The assessment drove is indeed a good start, but I think that the importance issue needs revisiting: it seems to me that the low-importance articles are nearly all candidates for merger or deletion, and that many of the mid-importance articles are probably in a collapse-and-merge class. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 13:09, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
I think Ithilien is comparable to Gondor. I agree that the plot elements need to be reduced, but there are plenty of references to this location in secondary literature, and not just passing references as well. The ultimate aim, from my point of view, is to bring some of the articles in top and high importance up to the level of the articles listed at Wikipedia:Manual of Style (writing about fiction)#List of exemplary articles. Some will not be enough for their own articles, but will end up merged. The question is where to start and how to deal with people querying one article while we are working on another one? By the way, I must apologise for saying I would do extensive work on this on Monday - I should have realised that a weekday was never going to be ideal. This weekend I really will have some time to devote to at least one article as an example of what can be done. Carcharoth 13:20, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for the thoughts on the template. 1: I've edited the template to resemble {{notability}} more, while retaining specific request. 2: No, it should only replace {{primarysources}}. As often noted previously, lack of (primary) sources is a common problem with M-e articles, and can be treated on a different plane. A separate project template would be an overkill, but we can manually add [[Category:Tolkien articles with unsourced statements]] to these. 3: Originally, I planned to create a separate page for sources, as proposed by Iamunknown above, but felt that I am no authority in this. For now, I've added links to talk pages, maybe this will speed the discussion; once the standards are settled, the link would be easy to change. If anybody has any other concerns, just edit the template.
By the way, about the detached references/sources. Maybe it would be better to rename the section from "Works cited" to "Further reading"? Súrendil 16:19, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
Further reading sounds good. No need to leave things to others though. That way nothing gets done! :-) Jump straight in and trust others to improve in our wake. Carcharoth 07:09, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
May I suggest at en route the diving board, it'd be a good idea to check Wikipedia:Guide to layout#Standard_appendices_and_descriptions? What's proposed doesn't sound to me quite like what's set out there, though I haven't checked fully. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 13:25, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Premature and inappropriate use of Template:ME-importance

I'm generally in favour of WP:BOLD, but I have just spotted a series of edit by YLSS/Surendil which seem to run counter to what was discussed above, In these edits ( [1], [2], [3], [4]), an {{unreferenced}} tag had been removed even though the articles remain unreferenced. I have not checked all the uses of {{ME-importance}}, but so far I have found only one instance of {{ME-importance}} being used without the removal of an {{unreferenced}} tag.

Furthermore, the template still includes a link to Wikipedia:WikiProject Middle-earth/Standards#References, which still specifically says "Try not to cite secondary sources or tertiary sources". As above, this actively undermines the notability guidelines.

Please reinstate the tags which were previously on those articles, and please do not use the {{ME-importance}} tag until the project standards to which it links have been corrected. (it is curently attached to over 20 articles, from which it should be removed and the previous tags reinstated. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 10:16, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Have you seen my response above? If not, please have a look, I've presented there my view on links to discussions. About removal of 'unreferenced 'template: I just generally assumed that these articles are due to be merged, and that this template would in any case be placed on the destination page. (And I usually do add references when merging.) In several cases I've added the articles to Category:Tolkien articles with unsourced statements. In summary, and as I've already said, if you have any objections, just edit the template itself, I completely rely on your experience and authority. (PS I will be unable to contribute in this weekend, so go ahead.) Súrendil 10:48, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
I think BHG is right to point out that the ME-importance template (nice job, there!) doesn't address referencing, and shouldn't be used to replace "unreferenced". Súrendil, one thing I noticed - the merge template is designed to go at the bottom of the articles. It doesn't conform to the normal design of "top of article" templates. I suspect it was designed from a stub template. Merge notices should go on top, but they shouldn't look like that. Carcharoth 11:27, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

I've rewritten Wikipedia:WikiProject Middle-earth/Standards#References. Hopefully that is OK. Carcharoth 11:41, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

It's much better, but I don't think it's quite there yet :) I have take the liberty of copying your version to Wikipedia:WikiProject Middle-earth/Standards/References, where I have created an expanded and restructured redraft, and I'd value your thoughts on it. It may need some trimming, but I also wanted to suggest that once it's completed, it probably ought to be right at the top of Wikipedia:WikiProject Middle-earth/Standards, rather than hidden in the midst of a long document. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 13:19, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
OK. I've made some changes and am happy with it. We should wait a day or two to let others say what they think, and I agree, move that section up to the top of the page. One little thing might need to be discussed. What do you see as "non-trivial coverage"? Carcharoth 13:36, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
All your changes are great, and since this fixes the prob with {{ME-importance}} you ere quite right to include it. Good idea, though, to see what others think. (Actually, just thught of one minor tweak: it might be easier to make the sub-headings currently implemented with a leading ";" into proper headings using ==== Fo ====. That way they appear in the ToC and can be linked to directly if anyone wants to).
Unfortunately, I'm not aware of any guidance on "non-trivial", but I also rather wonder if trying to pin it down might not be excessive instruction creep. WT:NOTE might be a good place to look for guidance. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 14:22, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Why does a template need notability?? And what about at all the guidelines and templates and tagging discussion? Isn't Wikipedia about the people anymore? About those searching for information? Is it all about nitpicking on aspects of guidelines and "notability" now? It seems to me that the message that Wikipedia has for the people now is "make your contributions and then fuck off, and if it ain't good enough we'll delete it" BHG's crusade of recent weeks has demonstrated that pretty clearly Cush 12:10, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
It is not the template that needs notability established. It is the topic of the article that needs to be shown to be notable. The template is to request that notability be established. General discussion of notability and whether the concept should apply in Wikipedia, should be at Wikipedia talk:Notability. Please don't attack BHG. She is raising some valid points, and we need to work with her, not against her. Carcharoth 12:13, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Cush, there is nothing at all new in any of this, except perhaps that some people maybe hadn't paid these issues quite enough attention before, which is why we are all doing a bit of catch-up exercise. As Carcharoth rightly says, Wikipedia talk:Notability is the place to discuss any concerns you have about the notability guidelines. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 13:19, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
I apologize for my absence - I was caught up with entrance exams this weekend, and though I'm not sure how active I will be in the following weeks, I did take a quick look over the revised guidelines for references, and it looks good to me. Once we decide on a proper system (i.e. CBD's proposal), we should add it into the guideline. Will take a look over {{ME-importance}}. —Mirlen 14:47, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
Updated referencing guielines

There has been no comment for 8 days on the draft Wikipedia:WikiProject Middle-earth/Standards/References, so may I propose that it now be copied to Wikipedia:WikiProject Middle-earth/Standards#References? --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 14:40, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Done. Carcharoth 15:12, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
Thanks. I suggest that the draft page be deleted, unless you want to keep it as a doodle pad for any future tweaks.
BTW, may I just say how pleased I am that after a difficult start we have reached a consensus? I think it's a well-done-everybody situation. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:40, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
I'll blank the draft page down to a note. Still lots of work to do on articles, so forgive me if I don't celebrate just yet. Carcharoth 16:03, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Requesting opinions

Anyone want to take a look at the exchange under "Incorrect passage" at the bottom of Talk:On Fairy-Stories and weigh in with an opinion before I attempt to perform major surgery on the article? Deor 01:57, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

Reference templates

I made some adjustments to {{ME-ref}} and created a new {{ME-cite}} template. The complete spectrum of these templates can be seen here and instructions are displayed on the template page(s). The general idea is that you can do {{subst:ME-cite|RotK|Appendix A}} to create a reference link like --> [1]. That then shows up in a <references/> section as;

  1. ^ (Return of the King 1955, Appendix A)

. If you then put {{ME-ref|Rotk}} in another section you can click the 'Return of the King 1955' link in the reference above to jump to and highlight the full description --> Tolkien, J. R. R. (1955). The Return of the King. The Lord of the Rings. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. OCLC 519647821.. Thus, the full publication details for the book only go on the page once, but all the individual citations are linked to it. The ME-ref template can still be used exactly as it was before, but I think there will be alot of advantages to using ME-cite for the inline citations (with sections and/or page numbers) and then ME-ref for the full reference details. --CBD 00:09, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

I made updates to Lothlórien as an example of using these templates as described above. --CBD 00:28, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
That looks great! The cite template will be really useful. One thing, I think the section with the inline cites should still be called "References", but and what you've called 'References' should be "Works cited". See, for example, James I of England, though I now see that that article has "Notes" for the inline cites and "References" for the list of works consulted. Hmm. Carcharoth 00:40, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Guide to layout#Standard appendices and descriptions says it is "Notes" and "References". Carcharoth 00:47, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Irmo

Someone needs to disambiguate Irmo from the Tolkein character. The town in South Carolina is much more relevant to the wikipedia searcher than the character. I will try to do it but may error, so I'd like some assurances I did it correctly. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kylelbishop (talk • contribs) 15:56, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

I made Irmo itself a disambiguation between the character, the town, and the school. I'd say that the character probably IS the most searched for of the three, but likely not so overwhelmingly that it should be the default search result. --CBD 17:19, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Awakening of the Elves

(Time to brush up my nerd cred, I guess.) We've had an article Awakening of the Elves since 2004. It's full of statements which in a factual-history article would require specific hard cites. It has a general "Reference" (The War of the Jewels), but it does not have such specific cites. Is this article okay? Is it plagiarism of some sort? It it adequately cited? Is it accurate? -- Writtenonsand 16:19, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

It's not plaigiarism. More like a copyvio. Needs severe trimming. Carcharoth 17:58, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Target merges

Category:Middle-earth Dragons seems ripe for merging, either into Dragon (Middle-earth) or a list, but there's only four of them. Note that Chrysophylax Dives is part of Farmer Giles of Ham. Of the four, Smaug and Glaurung are the only true "characters" as Scatha and Ancalagon appear to be little more than footnotes/anecdotes, discounting evolution. Uthanc 17:05, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Sounds good. Smaug and Glaurung should keep their own articles, but should also have overview paragraphs in the summary/overview article. Carcharoth 17:47, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
Scatha says that "Glaurung ... was quite small (for a dragon). ... [Scatha] was not the longest or tallest dragon in Middle-earth ... though he was still larger than Glaurung." -- I don't believe that there are any canonical sources for this assertion of Glaurung's small size - rather the contrary. Glaurung says that he was "the largest of dragons, before Ancalagon", which is more in line with my understanding of the matter. -- Writtenonsand 19:26, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

I've now merged all the Kings of Rohan into List of Kings of Rohan. That article still needs tidying up and referencing. Also created Category:Kings of Rohan to subcategorise the redirects. Left three with their own articles: Helm Hammerhand, Théoden and Éomer. Possibly Helm Hammerhand should be merged instead, or Eorl the Young brought out again as its own article. Carcharoth (talk) 16:10, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Rulers of Numenor

Something unrelated brought me to Tar-Telemmaitë an unreferenced stub in Category:Rulers of Númenor, which tagged accordingly. I check two more, then tagged all three for merger, but looking further through that category it seems that there are a few long articles (but some, such asTar-Aldarion are unreferenced), and lots of unreferenced stubs which should be merged. I suggested merging to Númenor, but a better merge get might be List of rulers of Númenor. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 20:48, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Would you believe we know about those articles? :-) I know, kind of difficult to tell isn't it? Thanks for pointing them out though, as it is better they get dealt with sooner rather than later. I think the last time we looked at this there were concerns that an article on these rulers would basically be practically identical to the existing text (mainly the bit in Unfinished Tales). This is not too surprising, as Tolkien often presented his background material as appendicecs or chronicles, as an encyclopedia article on that will look very similar. To avoid charges of in-universe writing and excessive WP:PLOT, we probably have to interleave the information with textual history (ie. when Tolkien was writing this stuff), and material from other sources. That should reduce the reliance on single primary sources, which as you are quick to point out, is a Bad Thing (tm). Carcharoth 23:06, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
That starts to sound to me like a case for deletion, or at least for radical trimming to a bare list of names and dates. Surely it's not the role of Wikipedia to duplicate the appendix to a book, even if leavened with some textual history? --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 18:57, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
Possibly. Have a look at the appendix in The Return of the King and the material in Unfinished Tales yourself and see what you think. Do you have copies of those books? Carcharoth (talk) 23:13, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

The stubs have been merged. The three articles are now List of rulers of Númenor, Kings of Númenor, and Ruling Queens of Númenor. There is also a category, Category:Rulers of Númenor, which includes the redirects as an alternative browsing method. Three articles remain as their own articles: Elros, Tar-Aldarion and Ar-Pharazôn. More work needs doing to address the concerns raised by BrownHairedGirl and me (see above), but this is a start, reducing the clutter of 25+ separate articles to six, and focusing the work needed onto one article. I also created Category:Númenóreans for the non-ruling Númenóreans, about which even less is said compared to the rulers (if that is possible), so that is a set of articles that needs tidying up soon. Carcharoth 14:12, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

Do we really need three lists of Númenóreans rulers? IMHO, it would be far more useful (and easier to handle) if we merge them to List of rulers of Númenor. The only possible advantage of the current disposition is that it lessens somewhat the accusations of plottism and copyvio, but not much. BTW, any thoughts about where to merge all non-royal Númenóreans? Some "Line of Elros" won't serve, as there are also Vëantur, Beregar, Zamîn, Henderch, Lindórië etc et al. Or do we choose "a slippery slope we don't want to go down" ;) to forget them? Súrendil (talk) 19:51, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
My idea was more that the main list was a short summary, while the other lists went into more details of the reigns. My main point here was to reduce the number of small stubs, but still gather the information in one place to help decide what to do with it. I've left them in a very unsatisfactory state, and a lot more work is needed to avoid, as you say, excessive plots, but that is an indication of what I think is needed. Possibly the lists should be converted to a minimal format just to tell people who this fictional character is, and nothing more. The wider notability and mentions in secondary literature (few and far between) could be merged to the Akallabeth or Numenor articles. It is a difficult conundrum to get the balance right. Carcharoth (talk) 11:51, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Assessment update

When the next update occurs, the number of unassessed articles should be below 400. At around this time last year (see here) there were 1368 unassessed articles (including redirects and stubs). At that time (11 December 2006) there were a total of 1399 articles tagged with {{ME-project}}. The current update (30 November 2007) shows a total of 1067 articles, which shows that some progress has been made with merging (though more work needs doing). The short-term aim should be to get the total below 1000. I think, with the right sort of merging, that the total number of articles should number in the hundreds, rather than over 1000. For a full history of the additions and changes, see Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Tolkien articles by quality log. The earlier history has been truncated to keep the page short enough to load - see the page history for that earlier history. Carcharoth 14:04, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

Unassessed is down to 346. Total should be below 1000 at the next update. Carcharoth (talk) 16:04, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Work on specific pages: input and opinions appreciated

I made a few small edits to the Shelob page today, and would really like to get this one out of start class and further up the quality scale. I was thinking of including information such as discrepancies between Tolkien's spider anatomy and actual spider anatomy (ie stinging vs fangs), further expansion of her relationship with various ME characters such as Gollum and Sauron, and expand on her role in the plot. Any opinions on the relevance of these or suggestions for inclusion?

I'd also like to move onto working on the Ungoliant page once I've got to work on Shelob (input appreciated on that also), and was wondering if there's a page anywhere about the Mirkwood Spiders? There doesn't seem to be anything specifically about them which seems odd, and if there isn't a page, I'd be willing to create one, as I think they're notable enough within The Hobbit to merit it. Might as well establish myself as the Weird Spider Geek on here as I have done in the real world... :) Faerie Queene (talk) 04:07, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

Honestly, I don't think there's too much more to say about her role in 'the plot' as she was an unknowing participant in the conspiracy. She's have eaten Gollum if she had caught him. Sauron arrived in Mordor after Shelob was already dwelling in its mountains (see Book IV, chap. 9), and as a descendant of Ungoliant, was not subject to Sauron at all (she ate his orcs, but was tolerated by the Dark Lord because she guarded his realm). So far as the Mirkwood spiders go (I was just on the Mirkwood article cleaning it up a bit), my suggestion would be to include the spiders there as a subsection. They don't really appear outside of the related chapter(s) in The Hobbit, and there isn't much info to be found on them except for speculation that they are likely descended from Shelob, and lurked in Mirkwood after Dol Guldu was built.Ryecatcher773 (talk) 05:36, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
Actually, an article Great spiders of mirkwood existed once, but was turned into a redirect to Mirkwood as non-notable enough to merit a separate page. Carcharoth tagged it as a redirect with possibilities, meaning that it does merit a section within another article, e.g. Mirkwood. Personally, I would prefer to create a "List of Middle-earth animals", paralleling List of Middle-earth plants: this would be a good merge target for such stubs as crebain, kirinki and Kine of Araw. The questions are, where to draw a line between "animals" and "?sapient beings" (e.g. Huan, Eagles, ?Wargs), and how to synchronise this with Bestiary of Middle-earth? Súrendil (talk) 19:43, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
The pre-redirect version of the article is here. I agree that a section in Mirkwood, or a section in a list is best. I think the main link from other articles should go to the list, which should then direct people to the section in the Mirkwood article, or just the Mirkwood article as a whole. I think many of these "minor characters/place/races" lists should be minimally annotated (1 or 2 paragraphs", and act as navigation aids outwards to other articles, or between different articles. A diagram showing the desired linkage pattern might help here. Carcharoth (talk) 11:58, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Fictional content arbitration case

There is currently an arbitration case in progress on how to behave in disputes over possibly non-notable fictional articles. See Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Episodes and characters/Workshop. This may be of interest to those working on merges and notability of articles edited by this Wikiproject. Carcharoth (talk) 12:02, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Disambiguation at Elfwine

Could someone deal with this please? I changed Elfwine to redirect to the father of the real-world person. I created Elfwine (Middle-earth), but most of the links are pointing to the wrong place. I'm away for a few days now, so could someone fix those please? Thanks. Carcharoth (talk) 16:12, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Sure, fixed :) --Hyarion (talk) 18:29, 14 December 2007 (UTC)
Thanks! Carcharoth (talk) 05:57, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

Please fix my attempts

I tried to change the article on Durin's Folk to include a link to Gimli, son of Glóin, son of Gróin, but somehow it was messed up. Fix the article, and try to link to Gimli, son of Glóin, son of Gróin. Sorry about this. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.152.239.101 (talk) 23:59, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

I fixed the formatting. Thanks for bringing it up. --FlamingSilmaril 00:20, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Luthien, 43 664 years old?

How can Luthien be 43 664 years when she first met Beren, when Cirdan, who woke up at Cuivenen before Elwë met Melian, is 15 000 (or 36 000) years old at the time of the War of the Ring?? (For the age of Cirdan, see the Wikipedia page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%ADrdan)

marteljeanfrancois@hotmail.com —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.202.165.251 (talk) 01:21, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

First, remember that the earlier years of the First Age (and before then) were given in Valian Years, which are 144 times as long as our Years of the Sun.
The elves (including Círdan were awoken 4550 Valian Years after the origin of Arda. Valian Year measurements continue until 5000, making 450 * 144 = 64800 years of the sun. Then the First Age lasted 590 more years of the sun, the Second Age was 3441, and the War of the Ring started around 3018 TA. This makes 64800 + 590 + 3441 + 3018 = 71849 years of the sun for Círdan's age at the time of the War of the Ring.
Now Lúthien: She was born around 4700 Valian Years (300 * 144 = 43200 Years of the Sun), and met Beren in 464 Years of the Sun in the First Age. This makes 43200 + 464 = 43664 years old. Incidentally, Círdan was 64800 + 464 = 65264 years old at this time. --FlamingSilmaril 01:53, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
Working out ages like this is interesting (sometimes), but not really suitable for Wikipedia articles. Carcharoth (talk) 13:36, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
Agree with Carcharoth. Even speaking not from Wikipedia point of view but as a Tolkien fan, such statements are far from perfect - we just don't know what Tolkien thought on this matter. He wrote all the Annals of Valinor in 1930s and early 1950s, when he clearly intended 1 Valian year to correspond to ca 10 "modern" years - so at that stage Lúthien was imagined to have been around 3500 years. (In this particular case, remember that "it is not known to any" (WJ:9) when she was born precisely, so no 43664 anyway, please!)
What would have happened when Tolkien decided that Elves reckoned in "long" years (=144 sun years), we don't know. Personally, I think that he would have dropped a substantial part of the Annals of Aman if he had ever reconsidered them - they would have been just incompatible with all the stuff he introduced in late 1950s. (Especially in respect of birth dates - Fingolfin being born a year after Finwë's second marriage, preceded by Findis and followed after 50 years by Finrod?)
Of course, all such discussion is only suitable for talk pages, so please abstain from adding any ages (and birthyears) for Elves born before the Rising of the Sun. Rather, present all the relevant material in Wikipedia-friendly out-of-universe perspective, with annotation, citations etc. Súrendil (talk) 16:43, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Caras Galadhon's notability tag

I would like to know if anyone could look at the page for Caras Galadhon so that its notability tag could be removed.

I've worked on the page for a week and I think it's becoming pretty acceptable. Please let me know what you think. I would be very appreciated if you did that, please.

Superlost (talk) 21:36, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

I see the notability tag has already been removed. Nice work on the article. Still a few problems. It is too much "in universe". See WP:WAF (ask here if you have any questions). Also, film screenshots shouldn't be used to illustrate the article. They can be used, if essential, in a section about the adaptation of Caras Galadhon to film, as long as the picture is showing some difference that is commented on by secondary sources. I also note that you use the Encyclopedia of Arda as a reference for some of the language stuff. That should properly be referenced to a primary source such as the Etymologies. I probably haven't explained this very well, so please ask if you have any questions. Carcharoth (talk) 22:04, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for your explanation about the main problems in the article. About the images, do you think it should be better if I put them on a Gallery instead? About the Encyclopedia of Arda, I was thinking of erasing those links and replace them with sources connected to Tolkien's work (mostly his books). I also noticed you wrote the text was "too much in the universe". I wondered if you were saying that because of Sindarin nouns such as Mellyrn or Ered Nimrais I used when writting it. If that's it, he guess we can change them to other with the same meaning, such as "Mallorn trees" or "White Mountains". Obviously, others like Talans cannot be change in the same way, but we can always work things out for the best. Please rewrite anything you deem less understandable or strange to other people. I appreciate your help helping me improve this article! Superlost (talk) 00:55, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
The film stuff tends to get put in a section titled "Adaptations". The only justification for a gallery might be if you had screenshots from different films to show how they depicted Caras Galadhon differently. The real trouble with the screenshots though is that they are what we (Wikipedia) call "non-free". Read our non-free content policy. What this means is that the use of non-free images must be minimised and must only be done with good reason. Finally, when talking about out-of-universe" writing, what that means for Tolkien is not writing from the perspective of an inhabitant of Middle-earth, but from the persepctive of a reader. In practice, articles about fiction are a mixture of both styles. In this example, "the chief city of Lórien and home of Lady Galadriel and Lord Celeborn" is in-universe, while "Caras Galadhon was the name given by the author J. R. R. Tolkien to a place in his fictional work The Lord of the Rings" is out-of-universe. More examples of out-of-universe stuff is talking about the films, role playing, other games, also talking about when the author first wrote about Caras Galadhon, saying that Caras Galadhon is mentioned in the following books (give list), all that is an out-of-universe perspective. Have a look at Lothlórien for more ideas. Generally, the broader the article, the more out-of-universe stuff it will have. Look at Middle-earth for example. Carcharoth (talk) 01:28, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

Disambiguations needed

Can anyone check "what links here" for these lot that I've created after some merges, and fix them?

Thanks. Carcharoth (talk) 18:28, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

I've gone through them and I think gotten all of the ones that needed to be changed. – Psyche825 (talk) 22:17, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
I've had a quick check and it looks like you got them all. Thanks! Carcharoth (talk) 22:18, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Coordinator

Is there a coordinator for this Wikiproject? And should we start a role call for this month? Harland1 (t/c) 12:46, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Not really, though some are more active than others. We've all managed to get along OK without one. But things are a bit disorganised and slow at times. The most pressing administrative tasks that need doing regularly are: (1) Archving the talk page (can be difficult because of the way it is structured - best to copy everything over, and then selectively remove old stuff to make newer stuff get more attention); (2) Starting the new roll calls every two or three months (used to be every month!). Carcharoth (talk) 15:54, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
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