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Talk:Winifred Lamb

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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 BlueMoonset (talk) 06:02, 2 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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  • ... that archaeologist Winifred Lamb deciphered submarine codes during WW1?

Improved to Good Article status by Eritha (talk). Self-nominated at 22:03, 4 January 2020 (UTC).[reply]

  • Article is in date (actually passed GA status on 3 January, but a day is not much to quibble over. It is long enough, well sourced, meets all policies. No significant copyvio detected, no QPQ needed as you do not have any previous credits. AGF on offline sources. As to the hook, the article states "she probably worked" - not that she definitely did, as the hook states. "Submarine codes" is ambiguous in the context of military operations, why not use what the article uses - "coded messages sent to German submarines"? Similarly it would be better to write 'World War I' or 'First World War' as the article does, rather than WW1. As to being an 'archaeologist', she had studied "Classics with a specialisation in Classical Archaeology", and undertaken some archaeological fieldwork during her studies, but her career as an archaeologist seems to have only begun after the war, she went straight from being a student to war work. P.S. This wasn't picked up at the GA review, and is not neccesary for passing this DYK nom, but the phrasing "leaving after the end of the war in December 1918" would probably be better worded as "leaving after the war, in December 1918." So as not to confuse the subject and imply the war's end was in December, and with "after", "the end" is redundant. Otherwise, the article seems up to scratch, but the hook needs addressing. Spokoyni (talk) 01:59, 5 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, all good points! hook could be changed to "... that archaeologist Winifred Lamb worked as a codebreaker during World War 1?" to avoid the 'probably' issue. I described her as an archaeologist as that's what she's best known for (as well as her museum curatorial work), and she was collecting and carrying out archaeological work (in the British Museum; publishing in JHS) during her war-work as well, but something like "... that archaeologist Winifred Lamb had previously worked as a codebreaker during World War 1?" would make it clearer that the bulk of her archaeological work came afterwards? Eritha (talk) 10:29, 5 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

A lot of these changes look good - I have to say I think the thrust of the hook is excellent, not often you think of someone whose primary interests and career were in archaeology taking a role in cutting edge military cryptography (though Dilly Knox had a similar background). I think the 'previously' addition neatly deals with the issue I raised, 'codebreaker' reads fine to me. It's still the 'probably' that is causing me thought though. We know she worked at Room 40, which was the cryptanalysis section of naval intelligence. But there were other jobs and roles within it besides codebreaking - later in the war direction finding became an important part for example. Do we know for sure that she was doing codebreaking? If we can't be sure, perhaps something like the alts I've drawn up might work? By the way, it is a very interesting article and a great read on a fascinating individual! Spokoyni (talk) 15:54, 5 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • ALT1 ... that archaeologist Winifred Lamb had previously worked as a codebreaker during World War I? - if the codebreaker role is explicitely known and sourced, otherwise perhaps:
  • ALT2 ... that archaeologist Winifred Lamb had previously worked in naval intelligence during World War I?
  • ALT3 ... that archaeologist Winifred Lamb had previously worked in Room 40, the Royal Navy's cryptanalysis section, during World War I?

I have double-checked sources and they don't make it entirely clear, so ALT2 or ALT3 would be best, I am happy with either! and thanks, I'm glad you found it an interesting article :) Eritha (talk) 12:36, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds good! Requesting third party approval of Alts 2 and 3 since I proposed the hooks. Spokoyni (talk) 14:09, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I think this is a great choice for a DYK - I like Alt2 for clarity and concision as a hook.Claire 75 (talk) 15:33, 22 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]


New source

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A forthcoming biography, Winifred Lamb: Aegean Prehistorian and Museum Curator by David W. J. Gill, should be useful for expanding this article. – Joe (talk) 11:58, 27 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

This biography is now available Eritha (talk) 16:30, 21 February 2019 (UTC)Eritha[reply]

GA Review

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This review is transcluded from Talk:Winifred Lamb/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Caeciliusinhorto (talk · contribs) 11:35, 22 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]


I will review this article.

On an initial readthrough, it looks good: some more-or-less picky prose comments.

  • "Honorary Keeper (Curator) of Greek and Roman Antiquities" assuming "curator" is not part of her title, it should not be capitalised
  • "Lamb was also working": simplify to "Lamb also worked"?
  • "In May–June 1921 she joined the Mycenae excavation team and was made responsible for the excavation of the palace as well as for the publication of the frescoes." She only joined the team once, presumably in May &nash; unless we don't know exactly, in which case "in summer 1921"
  • "; she visited the archaeological excavation of Troy..." This seems like it should be a new sentence.
  • "Despite the problems for women working in Turkey at this time": can you expand on these problems?
  • "Vice President" per MOS:JOBTITLES, pretty sure this should be lowercased
  • "World War I" vs. "World War 2": be consistent!

I also made a few minor corrections here.

Further comments anon. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 11:35, 22 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

On a second look, I have a few more stylistic points, but also some issues of substance:

  • 'the Fitzwilliam Museum states that she was a "generous benefactor and raising the profile of the collections through groundbreaking research, acquisitions and publications."' The quotation is accurate, but the grammar is problematic here. It would read better eliding the "and", thus: 'she was a "generous benefactor [...] raising the profile..."'
  • "was the author of numerous books on Greek and Roman antiquities, including the 1929 publication Greek and Roman Bronzes, which was standard reading for studies on the subject, as well as writing numerous reviews for the Journal of Hellenic Studies.": repetition of "numerous".
  • As a general rule, the lead should summarise what is in the article, and with the exception of quotations should not need any citations. From this point of view, the lead is currently quite overcited. (And the "numerous reviews" Lamb wrote for the JHS are not really discussed in the rest of the article.
  • "She was the daughter of Edmund Lamb, a former Member of Parliament": this is a little confusingly worded, as Lamb was an MP from 1906 – i.e. during Winifred's childhood.

With Christmas coming on, I'm not sure how much time I'm going to have to go through the rest of this in the next few days; I will grab time where I get it, but I might not finish my comments until early January...

Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 14:39, 24 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for these - picky comments always welcome! I think I've fixed these all now - re the problems for women in Turkey, as the source was vague I've just rewritten that sentence. Other edits are all as per your comments. Please do let me know if any of these need more work/any other comments! Eritha (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 15:36, 31 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Spotted what I think is one final small thing: Lamb was a founding member of the British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara, whose creation was initiated in 1946 by John Garstang, and served as its honorary secretary from its formal opening in 1948 until 1956 Is this the date that Gill gives in Winifred Lamb? The DNB and Breaking Ground both say 1957.

Once we get this point cleared up, I think this is pretty much ready for promotion to GA. There's probably some more useful stuff in the chapter on her in Breaking Ground if you are interested in further expanding the article – if you don't have access, drop me an email and I'll get you a copy – but I don't think that you need that to bring the article up to GA standard. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 21:51, 1 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm, Gill says that she "felt able to resign as Honorary Secretary of the BIAA at the end of 1956" - so possibly resignation took effect from 1957 onwards and that's why the other two sources give that date? It's not entirely clear. I have a copy of Breaking Ground so will certainly check that for more info later on! Eritha (talk) 10:46, 2 January 2020 (UTC)Eritha[reply]

Just to follow up - I've checked with Gill who has confirmed that her resignation was submitted in late 1956 and took effect in 1957, so the various sources are not actually in disagreement, but 1957 is the more correct date to give as the end of her period as hon. sec. Eritha (talk) 17:32, 3 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Excellent, thanks for confirming this. I'm happy to pass the article now: congratulations! Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 18:46, 3 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks again for all your work on the review! Eritha (talk) 12:11, 4 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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