Template:Did you know nominations/Roman Theatre at Palmyra

The following discussion 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 Allen3 ^talk 18:43, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

Roman Theatre at Palmyra

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... that the Roman Theatre at Palmyra (pictured) in Syria, was left unfinished with only the ima cavea?

Reviewed: Nahrawan Canal (Using the second article of a double-article hook)

Created/expanded by Zozo2kx (talk). Self nom at 18:13, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

The article is new enough. The hook is not to long (98 characters). The article is long enough (1,649 characters). Nominator has reviewed another nomination. The image is free, used in article and show up well at small size. I am afraid there is similar problem with this hook as with hook nominator reviewed. The problem is that hook is not explicitly stated and referenced. The article says that cavea was unfinished, not the whole theatre, like hooks says. --Antidiskriminator (talk) 20:30, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

I've added a citation to the sentence in the lead where it explicitly says that the "theatre was unfinished." For the record though, it is the cavea that was left unfinished, but because it is an integral part of a Roman theatre (structure), the sources refer to the whole theatre as unfinished. Thanks for your review. Yazan (talk) 03:28, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for writing this article (and many other articles about Syria) and adding the reference. Since it was only cavea which was left unfinished (the picture clearly shows that the other structures of the theatre were also built), wouldn't it be better to change hook to:
ALT1... that cavea of the Roman Theatre at Palmyra (pictured) in Syria was left unfinished?--Antidiskriminator (talk) 09:48, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for your kind words Antidiskriminator, and your always thorough reviews. Although I think it's unnecessarily detailed, I'll oblige with your suggestion. However, I tweaked it a bit to that the cavea was left unfinished (the ima cavea, which is the lowest part of the cavea was actually finished). Thanks again!
Let me comment on the hook. Cavea - i.e. the stands - were obviously an important part of a theatre, so leaving them unfinished would indeed make the theater substantially incomplete. That's why I think both hooks are fine, the question is just which one sounds better, as I believe the point of the hook is something being unfinished (the original hook), not what exactly was unfinished (ALT1). However, one way or the other, the problem for an average reader here is a lack of understanding of what ima cavea exactly is: Cavea does not help much here. I couldn't figure out this myself, but e.g. this source explains it well, and there is also a nice illustration at it:Cavea, so it would be nice to add a couple of sentences to Cavea, enumerating the areas by their name. (Of course, this is not a DYK requirement, just a useful enhancement.) GregorB (talk) 12:10, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

Thank you GregorB for your comment. Since I made mistake when I thought that original hook was not fine I don't think it should be changed.--Antidiskriminator (talk) 12:16, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

The article is within policy. AGF for offline sources. Good to go.--Antidiskriminator (talk) 12:33, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

Thank you both for the comments. I'll add a few explanatory sentences to the Cavea article. I also struck ALT1 per Antidiskriminator's agreeing to the original hook, and GregorB's comment. Yazan (talk) 12:39, 11 November 2012 (UTC)