Talk:Umma–Lagash war

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by SL93 (talk) 08:32, 1 September 2022 (UTC)

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• ... that Professor of History Lorenzo Kamel deems Umma–Lagash the first recorded war in human history? Source: https://www.historians.org/publications-and-directories/perspectives-on-history/september-2022/the-anthropocene-history-and-legacy-of-the-colonial-mindset
  • Reviewed: Template:Did you know nominations/Freya (walrus)
  • Comment:

Created by Coin945 (talk). Self-nominated at 05:10, 17 August 2022 (UTC).

General: Article is new enough and long enough
New enough: Long enough:

Policy: Article is sourced, neutral, and free of copyright problems
Adequate sourcing: Neutral: Free of copyright violations, plagiarism, and close paraphrasing:

Hook: Hook has been verified by provided inline citation
Cited: Interesting:

QPQ: Done.

Overall: Alright, some minor issues remain:

• "Sumerian scribes began writing with cuneiform and clay tablets in 3500 BCE. 1000 years later, the war began around 2450 BCE." ... ... This isn't supposed to suggest that the invention of cuneiform prompted the war exactly 1000 years later, is it? XD Because I stumbled over this at first ^^ Maybe rephrase it to highlight the script had been in use some 1000 years before the war started, and this is why there are sources about it.
  • I've clarified this section by explaining that records of this war survive 'because' writing had been developed 1000 years prior.--Coin945 (talk) 19:24, 20 August 2022 (UTC)
• There's a "clarification needed" tag in the Resolution section, and rightly so. Please explain why these names are unclear, and which source says what.
  • I've added a note about the use of two names. I'll link a source or two that refer to each name.--Coin945 (talk) 19:24, 20 August 2022 (UTC)
• Every paragraph needs an inline citation at the end, and currently some are missing one.
  • These should all have an inline source at the end.--Coin945 (talk) 19:24, 20 August 2022 (UTC)

But these should be easy to fix. --LordPeterII (talk) 16:39, 20 August 2022 (UTC)

Addendum: I just realized the part about the Eannatum Boulder confused me: Why it is from 2450, when the war supposedly ended in 2400? That one can't be about the war then, can it? Or is it referring to a decisive event at the very beginning? This would need some clarification. --LordPeterII (talk) 16:44, 20 August 2022 (UTC)

• • This one is a bit confusing to me upon reflection. The war ended in 2400BCE but the Stele commemorating victory was produced in 2450BCE. It's only a difference of 50 years which is nothing for artefacts that old, so I've dismissed the inconsistency and described the Stele as 'contemporary'.--Coin945 (talk) 19:24, 20 August 2022 (UTC)

• Thank you @LordPeterII: for offering to review my article! Please see my replies above! :)--Coin945 (talk) 19:24, 20 August 2022 (UTC)

• @Coin945: Okay almost done, but this "However, Umma began encroaching on Lagash's territory which reignited the dispute and led to a war. The war began around 2450 BCE" is not in the cuneiform source, so please duplicate the actual source on it. Also, please convert the remaining bare urls to proper citations (so they can be archived by our bots, among other things). As for the stele, yeah I think it's okay now. Frankly if you consider that it is also referred to as "wars", maybe the stele was produced before the very end, but after some siege or battle. Or the dating is off for some reason, indeed not unlikely for that far back. It's fine now that it doesn't actively confuse readers. --LordPeterII (talk) 13:26, 21 August 2022 (UTC)

• • Those changes are now complete. You might be right about the exact timeline of the war(s). But we're dealing with very old sources. I agree that it is fine at this stage.--Coin945 (talk) 19:42, 21 August 2022 (UTC)

• @Coin945: Alas you did not cite the sentence "The war began around 2450 BCE" which was also not in the cuneiform source. I tried to quickly find which source actually states the dates, but couldn't find it and found this from the article which mentions both 2470 and 2430 – but not 2450 or 2400. Can you please check where you read these start/end dates as currently in the article, and cite them? Everything else is fine, but we should get the dating right (at least according to the sources; in the end we won't know for sure). --LordPeterII (talk) 23:02, 21 August 2022 (UTC)

• Ahh, I copied in the wrong source. Here's the date listed by Professor of History Lorenzo Kamel: --Coin945 (talk) 01:16, 22 August 2022 (UTC)

• "The first recorded war in human history took place around 2450 BCE between the Lagash and the Umma kingdoms in ancient Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq). It was triggered by competing claims over water sources and the supply of water."

• Thanks, that works for me. I know these dates are only estimates with only so much precision, and a lot of the apparent inconsistencies could be explained if we actually knew to the year when which events happened. But it's likely we'll never know that, and so as Wikipedians must be content with citing our contemporary sources as good as possible. Which you have now done :)

Approving now. --LordPeterII (talk) 09:24, 22 August 2022 (UTC)

References

"Lagash victory"

Considering that Lugal-zage-si later conquered Lagash, shouldn't we say that Umma actually won? 177.86.143.52 (talk) 14:46, 31 July 2024 (UTC)