Talk:Saint Basil's Cathedral/Archive 1

This is an archive of past discussions about Saint Basil's Cathedral. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

Page move

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the debate was don't move. —Nightstallion (?) 00:41, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

User:Kuban kazak moved the article to Cathedral of the Intercession, saying the latter name is correct in Russian. While there is no denying this, we should consider which name is correct in English. 2004 Britannica refers to the cathedral as "Cathedral of St. Basil the Blessed (originally Church of the Intercession)". I believe that St Basil's Cathedral is the accepted English name and so it should be kept as it is. Also, "Cathedral of the Intercession" is the title that may be applied to a number of churches (e.g., cathedral of the Marfo-Mariinsky Convent) and hence should be reserved for a dab page. So should we move the article to Cathedral of the Intercession? --Ghirla | talk 15:18, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Add *Support or *Oppose followed by an optional one sentence explanation, then sign your vote with ~~~~

Oppose as nominator. --Ghirla | talk 15:18, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
Oppose. Wikipedia's policy is to use "what the majority of English speakers would most easily recognize" (Wikipedia:Naming conventions (places)) - Mucky Duck 15:40, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
Support Official name, St Basil's is only one of the many churches there. Recentely more and more Russian guides and media begin to refer to the church as one of Intercession. --Kuban kazak 18:11, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
Oppose - keep it at the more widely recognized name. Jonathunder 21:55, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
oppose. mention the other name in the first paragraph of course but keep under the best known name. --Irpen 06:32, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
Oppose per nom abakharev 10:45, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
Oppose as per Irpen. KNewman 15:43, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Ivan the Terrible Legend

The article states that the legend of the architect being blinded by Ivan the Terrible is untrue, but no explanation is given, neither any references. Please, improve it, because just by saying something is untrue isn't very relialable. --Surten (talk) 21:51, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Removal of games

I would like to remove the mention of games from this article. They have no solid connection to the subject matter and I feel it borders on game advertisement. It is non-notable at best. Are there any editors opposed to removing the games? --Orbit One ^[Talk|Babel] 11:53, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, I do not care much about the whole paragraph about multimedia placing the Cathedral incorrectly. But I think the weaseling phrase Some games place the cathedral incorrectly is much inferior than Games XX and YY place cathedral incorrectly. The later is way more informative and verifiable (games themselves allowed to be the sources for the articles, the former is less informative and unverifiable. I do not buy the advertisement argument: firstly, errors in the game reality is hardly a feature to brag about, secondly, who cares even if this will somehow affect the sales of the games - we do not work for them nor for their competitors. abakharev 16:16, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

I think the game references are simply trivial, whether generic or by name - inside/outside is as likely to be an accidental consequence of game design decisions as anything else, and I don't think anybody would take Civ4 as more authoritative than our actual pictures showing relative position. It would be noteworthy if a whole generation of Australians were confused because of a spectacular mistake in a 1950s textbook - we got any examples like that? Stan 21:32, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree. The games are not signifigant in making any mistakes and the information they are attached to would never be able to stand on its own in its own article. --Orbit One ^[Talk|Babel] 04:45, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

Sources

This article really needs some cites. Adam Cuerden ^talk 18:43, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Images

Today someone attempted to swell the gallery by adding inferior images from the Commons, although a link to the appropriate Commons page is here. I raised the issue on Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#How many images does a stubby article need? and, after receiving positive feedback from administrators Geogre and Dbachmann, revert the changes. Let's expand the stub, not just mechanically overload it with Commons pics. --Ghirla ^-трёп- 14:37, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Question

So I'm writing a book pretty much on St. Basil's Cathedral. I was wondering where I could get closer pictures of its towers. I also want to know where I can learn more about its history. If you know anything please put a link on my Talk Page. Thank you!

Reeseswithsalt (talk) 22:55, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

Under Threat

http://www.rferl.org/featuresarticle/2007/05/82C2116A-568F-4413-A9AF-5528525AEE75.html The article here says St. Basil's may be under threat of being destroyed. Any info on this?

Yes also this was the first time I've researched it in quite awhile and was quite shocked at it's "new" appearance...when did a restoration take place? I head something years ago about a rich guy just funding it himself or something.Hanz ofbyotch (talk) 00:34, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Interiror?

Could someone provide interior pictures? They are almost impossible to find on the web. I'm afraid anything I add will be removed for copyright purposes. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.234.185.74 (talk) 04:51, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Domes in Islamic Architecture

This article states: "[...] onion domes already existed in russian architecture in XII century, while in islamic architecture they appeared only in XV century, so in fact there is nothing asian in this cathedral."

This is grossly inaccurate, not to mention poorly written. The appearance of domes in Russian architecture and their connection, or lack thereof, to Asia or Islam is certainly worth elaborating upon/discussing on this page; but onion-shaped domes in Islamic architecture, whether they influenced early Russian designers or not, appeared as early as the VII Century among Islam's very first mosques. So, whoever wrote this is eight centuries off!

Also, Islam, while having spread into Asia (among other continents) is not an "Asian" religion, no more than Christianity or Judaism can be labeled "Asian". Equivocating the terms "Islamic" and "Asian" are also egregious inaccuracies. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.158.30.142 (talk) 16:45, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Request for a "History" section

Could some informed editor add a History section to this topic?

Searching Wikipedia for "Kremlin", I learned that St. Basil's Cathedral is often confused with the Moscow Kremlin, because it is located next to it on Red Square. That made me curious: This gigantic church stood next to the ruling palace of Lenin, Stalin, and their successors... but did they allow it to function as a church during their rule? That would look a bit odd, to have totalitarian Stalin ruling right next door to a functioning church, eh? But if it wasn't functioning, was the building used for some other purpose? Alas, the history in this article ends in the year 1588, so I found no answer. — Lawrence King ^(talk) 03:25, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

The name is wrong, there is no cathedral with this name

The "discussion" on top of this page is ridiculous. There is no such "Saint Basil" in Russian orthodox church. Saint Basil (Saint Vassily) is a completely different person, having nothing to do with this cathedral. The "blessed" is not the same as "saint".

The name of the cathedral mentioning "Vassily the blessed" is a vulgar name. It is not used by Russian church. It was encouraged for use during Soviet times when authorities were trying to cover up everything related to Russian church.

The REAL name is Pokrovskiy cathedral. Not only official, but the only correct. It can be translated into English as "Intercession", but only approximately.

Just click on Russian version of the same article and see how it is named there.

If English "sources" such as Britannica etc. call this cathedral a wrong and vulgar name, additionally distorted and translated incorrectly into "St. Basil's" - then the shame should be on those "sources". It is stupid and arrogant to spread this error further just because "the majority of English speakers would most easily recognize" it.

I believe this is not only stupid and arrogant but also abusive to many Russians.

At least, the vulgar English name should be placed into round brackets with a note "also known as". —Preceding unsigned comment added by Alexander0807 (talk • contribs) 20:59, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

It's rather daft to assume that every WP editor is an idiot. Please consult WP:NAME before moving pages. --Ghirla^-трёп- 12:13, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

English sources?

I'm planning a proper rewrite based on academic Russian sources; any ideas on quality English sources (no travel guides please :)) that may back up significant and unconventional research (like the reconstruction of original colour scheme, the fact (?) that it was one of the first, if not the first brick (not stone) building in the city etc...) ? NVO (talk) 10:25, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

I really look forward to reading your rewrite! DVD 20:17, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

Even as a start, material could be drawn from the significantly longer Russian version of the article. I too am very much looking forward to a rewrite of this page. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 10:22, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

In the works. Meanwhile, the quality of online sources in English (apart from the trusted usual suspects in my bibliography) is beyond any comments, I wish I did not venture there at all. The problem with Russian sources is somewhat reversed, there's just too many conflicting academic studies filling the gaps of missing written evidence, too many conjectures made and debated and rejected... NVO (talk) 16:55, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Need to check English edition of The Stalin-Kaganovich correspondence, 1931-1936 - any hope? For a start, does it mention the cathedral in any way? NVO (talk) 12:49, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Copyeditors please! Rewrite needs a thorough cleanup... damn the definite articles! NVO (talk) 18:06, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Simply awesome, awesome work. I've given it a first pass; still a few definite articles to sort out, but those can be cleaned up gradually. Thanks so much! Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 10:20, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

I cleaned up a lot of grammar, punctuation, tried to make it more readable without altering any content. I have removed the edit box because I think it is acceptable now, though of course, it could probably use more work. In particular, one paragraph, which I did not attempt to parse. Maybe too tired. :-) Riverpa (talk) 13:04, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Which one? I'm too familiar with the subject to see evident flaws. Quotation from Bussow is out of place, perhaps it should be removed at all. NVO (talk) 15:01, 21 October 2009 (UTC)