Talk:Mysteries of Isis/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Caeciliusinhorto (talk · contribs) 22:31, 12 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I'll review this article. Hopefully I'll manage to read through and provide some initial comments by tomorrow evening (GMT). (You've been waiting patiently for three months now; you can hold out another 24 hours!) Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 22:31, 12 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I've given the article a first read through. In general, it looks good. The writing is clear and concise, the article seems to be thorough, it's extensively cited.

I have two minor copyediting comments:

In the first paragraph of the lead, the article has "the mysteries did allude to beliefs from ancient Egyptian religion, in which Isis arose". This reads a little awkwardly to my ear; I would rather say something like "the mysteries did allude to beliefs from ancient Egyptian religion, where the worship of Isis arose".

I changed it to "in which the worship of Isis arose." It doesn't feel entirely natural to use "where" when ancient Egyptian religion isn't a place. A. Parrot (talk) 16:50, 13 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

"in which the worship of Isis arose" is probably better, yes. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 17:08, 13 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

In the section on "Connection with the afterlife", the article refers to "their traditional religion". It sounds to me that this is referring to both Greek and Roman traditional religious practices as a traditional religion; it is my understanding that while the Romans did adopt Greek gods/associate their gods with Greek ones, their religions were actually significantly different. Perhaps writing "in both Greek and Roman traditional religion" would be clearer. This is fairly nitpicky, though...

Done. A. Parrot (talk) 16:50, 13 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

The only other place where the prose is at all unclear is where the article quotes Griffiths' translation of Apuleius on the initiation rituals. Specifically, the sentence which reads "At dead of night I saw the sun flashing with bright effulgence."

Should this be "At the dead of night", or is this correct? I don't have Griffiths' translation to check, but "At the dead of night" seems like it would be more correct English to me.
I don't think I have ever seen the word "efflugence" used in English before, and while its meaning was clear to me from context, it might not be so much so for other readers. Is their a clearer translation that could be used? (For instance, the Kline translation linked in the further reading section renders the same sentence as "I have seen the sun at midnight shining brightly") If Griffiths is the translation to use, though, so be it. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 15:34, 13 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I'd been using Griffiths because it was the only full translation of Book 11 that I had when writing. (I found the Kline webpage pretty late.) The standard academic translation now seems to be J. Arthur Hanson in 1989, which I should be able to obtain soon. Alvar quotes Hanson's rendition of this same passage, and it is easier to read. I've substituted Hanson's version and cited it as "J. Arthur Hanson, quoted in Alvar 2008" until I can obtain Hanson myself. A. Parrot (talk) 16:50, 13 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

That does look like an easier to read translation, yes. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 17:08, 13 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, with that out of the way:

I am now happy with the prose, which is eminently readable.
The article seems to comply with the relevant MOS policies.
The article is thoroughly referenced, and to impeccable sources: I'm certainly not going to argue with Burkert on mystery cults!
There are no obvious gaps in the article, and it remains focused on the subject. Where it talks about the Eleusinian and Dionysian mysteries, the relevance is clear.
There doesn't seem to have been any dispute about the neutrality of the article.
The article is stable.
Images are all public domain, and captions are all fine.

I think this article passes the Good Article criteria with flying colours; the only question in my mind is whether or not you are going to put it up against the scrutiny of the featured article people. Congratulations! Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 17:08, 13 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Caeciliusinhorto: Thank you very much! I now think I'll take it to FAC someday, when I've been able to research a little more in depth and answer some questions I have in my own mind. For the moment, though, I have bigger fish to fry. Thank you again. A. Parrot (talk) 17:14, 13 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]