Talk:Lochleven Castle/GA1

GA Review

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The review comments (below) should be updated as the article is modified to address each comment. Truthanado (talk) 14:50, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Formatting

For now I am placing the article on hold. While reviewing, I enountered some are minor formatting issues, and I have been able to fix them myself (they shouldn't be an obstacle to becoming a GA, but when taking an article to FAC, it's the kind of thing reviewers pick up on):

• When using page or date ranges (eg: 1342–1370) use – (an ndash) instead of - (a hyphen).
• Choose one style of date range and stick with it, eg: all 1342–1370 or 1342–70.

Content

Content issues are more serious and something I cannot fix as I do not have the sources used in the article available to me. However, the article is in good shape and once the issues I raise are addressed I think the article will be easily up to GA standards.

• The {{fact}} tags of course need to be addressed, but I also think the description section needs some referencing.
  • One tag replaced with reference. Two remain. Truthanado (talk) 14:29, 7 December 2008 (UTC)
  • One reference has been added to the "Description" section. Truthanado (talk) 18:00, 7 December 2008 (UTC)
    • Fact tags addressed. Jonathan Oldenbuck (talk) 16:28, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
• I think that the present state of the castle, ie: protected, needs to be mentioned in the lead which stops at the late-17th century.
  • Done Truthanado (talk) 14:05, 7 December 2008 (UTC)
    • I've mentioned that the castle is open to the public in summer in the lead, if anyone thinks this is inappropriate, feel free to remove it. Nev1 (talk) 18:33, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
• "A castle may have been constructed on the Castle Island by 1257": if Castle Island is the name of the island, "the" can be removed from the sentence (as I think is probably the case), otherwise Castle Island should not be capitalised.
  • Done. 16:28, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
• "It was captured by the Scots before the end of the 13th century, possibly by the forces of William Wallace.": captured from whom?
  • The preceding sentence states, "the invading English army held Loch Leven Castle". Should be clear enough?Jonathan Oldenbuck (talk) 16:28, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
    • Fair enough. Nev1 (talk) 18:33, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
• The opening sentence of the lead mentions that the castle is ruinous, and yet the main body of the artile does not mention when or why this happened (although I imaging that Sir William Bruce simply allowed the castle to decay).
  • text with reference added to "Recent years" section Truthanado (talk) 14:29, 7 December 2008 (UTC)
• Have any archaeological investigations been undertaken at the castle? (It's quite possible there haven't considering its SAM status.)
  • An "Archaelogical findings" section has been added with the results of a 1995 dig. More would be nice. Truthanado (talk) 17:53, 7 December 2008 (UTC)
• What type of castle is Loh Leven? eg: motte-and-bailey, ringwork etc. From the plan it looks like a shell keep.
  • Something of a composite, probably originally a sort of shell keep, which then turned into a tower house with barmkin. Jonathan Oldenbuck (talk) 16:28, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
    • It would be great if a reference to this effect could be added to the article, but it's not hugely important. Nev1 (talk) 18:33, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
• Has the castle always been constructed from stone, or was there an earlier, timber phase? Also, has it always taken on the same general plan?
  • Earlier outer bailey is mentioned in the text, I have not come across reference to an earlier timber construction, but most castles began that way. Jonathan Oldenbuck (talk) 16:28, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
    • Ah well, the sources are probably too limited. Shame. Nev1 (talk) 18:33, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

I understand that there are some constraints on the information available due to the nature of the subject, but hopefully the majority of these issues can be addressed and I'll be checking back in a week. If the work is done by then, feel free to drop me a note on my talk page. I found the article to be well written and interesting, so to all the editors involved: keep up the good work. Nev1 (talk) 17:31, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

A good effort Truthanado and Jonathan Oldenbuck, I'm impressed and happy to promote this article to GA and hope more castles get as far as GAN (I enjoy reviewing them ;-)) Nev1 (talk) 18:33, 9 December 2008 (UTC)