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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by Ucucha 14:52, 15 October 2011 [1].

Stephen, King of England

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Stephen, King of England (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

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Nominator(s): Hchc2009 (talk) 19:31, 20 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I am nominating this for featured article because Stephen is a fascinating subject for an article - a war-time leader, who was at one point captured by the enemy until saved through his wife's successes in battle; a devout father who ended up passing over his own son in the succession - and because the article has been through several review processes, and hopefully should be up to scratch. Hchc2009 (talk) 19:31, 20 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Transcluding as of this timestamp. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:34, 21 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Source review - spotchecks not done. Nikkimaria (talk) 20:29, 21 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  • Ranges should consistently use "pp." and endashes
  • I've caught the pp. and I think I've changed correctly to endashes, but they look pretty much identical on my screen, so it would be worth glancing over them to make sure I haven't done something daft. Hchc2009 (talk) 07:45, 23 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Missing bibliographic info for Dyer, Round 1881
  • Is Stubbs 874 or 1874?
  • Blacburn or Blackburn?
  • States would be more helpful than "US" for US locations
  • Longman or Longmans?
  • I've checked back; the records (OCLC etc.) show the 1884 volume as being published by "Longmans", not the more modern "Longman"; it's cited by Crouch, so I don't have a personal copy, but from what I can see elsewhere on other volumes of the period and their bibliographies, I think "Longmans" is right. Hchc2009 (talk) 07:45, 23 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]


  • Support - the last little bits I trust to be taken care of, or are not important enough to worry about. Ealdgyth - Talk 13:01, 10 October 2011 (UTC)Comments - of necessity, this review will be in parts from me... since it overlaps greatly with my main area of editing, it'll be pretty in depth.[reply]
  • Sourcing:
    • I would strongly like to see Chibnall's Empress Matilda used, if only for a "balancing" account of the "other side". Another possible work is Matthew's King Stephen. A good account of the relations with the Church would be Barlow's English Church 1066-1154 - I have all of these if you want me to work them in. I'll need to read the article to see if there are more journal articles you'll want to include.
  • Childhood:
    • You've not linked Pope in "Pope Eugene" in the lead (Matilda's a special case) but you link "Duke" in "Duke William".. you need to be consistent in your linkage throughout the article.
  • White Ship:
    • I don't think historians have decided that there was partiable inheritance in Normandy/England at this time. There are a number of articles discussing this issue, I'd need to review, but baldly stating that "In other parts of Europe, including Normandy and England, the tradition was for lands to be divided up, with the eldest son taking patrimonial lands – usually considered to be the most valuable – and younger sons being given smaller, or more recently acquired, partitions or estates." while sourcing this to Barlow's Feudal England is a bit of a stretch. Let me dig into this a bit, but I suspect the historiography is a bit less clear than Barlow (who always loves to declaim some rule when not all historians agree with him) would make it appear. Feudal England is meant to be a entry level college textbook, so it'll tend to gloss over some contested aspects of things.
  • Thanks. I was having trouble finding a historian who stated the broad picture here that wasn't then "dumbing down" the presentation slightly. The paragraph needs to explain roughly how the system worked for a reader that doesn't know anything of the period, while still being rigorously accurate - any help gratefully received. Hchc2009 (talk) 05:21, 22 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'll continue with this later. Ealdgyth - Talk 22:36, 21 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Initial years:
    • Might I suggest getting a hold of Green's Government of England under Henry I for another view on Henry's government. Clanchy's England and its Rulers 1066-1307 is also useful for another viewpoint.
    • I have a concern with "A wide range of nobles gathered at Westminster for the event, including the Anglo-Norman barons and the higher officials of the church." which is sourced to King, pp. 57-58. Those pages of King are mainly concerned with pointing out that all of the archbishops and bishops of both England and Normandy attended... there is nothing to back up the "including the Anglo-Norman barons" ... also that last phrase implies that ALL of the barons attended, which was probably not the case.
  • Agree, it over states it. Davis notes that he had the "atendence or service of almost all of the bishops and England and Normandy, and almost all the nobles" (p.22)- King lists the nobles on 59-60 I think. I'll tweak and see what you think.Hchc2009 (talk) 18:11, 25 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Defending the kingdom:
    • The classic study of the "arrest of the bishops" is Yoshitake, Kenji (1988). "The Arrest of the Bishops in 1139 and its Consequences". Journal of Medieval History. 14: 97–114. doi:10.1016/0304-4181(88)90022-X.. If you can't get access to it, drop me an email. There are some other articles with a bearing on this, but you've simplified it a bit too much. Stephen actually beseiged Nigel in one of his castles - check out Nigel's article for the full scoop on this. Nigel probably rebelled in early 1140 as a result of his uncle's death from the effects of his arrest. ALso, the council didn't quite "back down", it decided to appeal to Rome, it's just that it appears that that appeal went nowhere.
More to follow. (Yes, Sandy/Karan/etc, I'll move all the resolved issues to the talk page when they are resolved.) Ealdgyth - Talk 15:20, 22 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Initial phase:
    • See above comments about Nigel - he probably rebelled at least partly because of the death of his uncle in December.
  • Second phase:
    • "Worcestershire" or "Worcester" ... you use them interchangably.
  • Treaties:
    • I know I've read that William (Stephen's second son) was dealt with during Stephen's reign also - yes, I see that King (pp. 282-283) discusses this. Suggest adding a sentence about this to the end of the last paragraph.
  • I strongly strongly suggest a good audit of the article for linking. You've got multiple links to the same person, and while this article is long, often times you aren't that far from previous links. Another thing I strongly suggest is deciding on a "house" style for things and sticking with it. In my own articles, I stick to one way to refer to various people (Robert Curthose over Robert of Normandy, Henry of Blois over Henry of Winchester, I don't use numbers in referring to various earls/counts/etc., and so forth). Doing this will make your articles much easier to write, as you will write a lot of this consistently. That final layer of consistency and polish is what you need to do before things come to FAC... in that, Brianboulton is correct, and you need to concentrate on learning to do this yourself before bringing these wonderful articles to FAC. Ealdgyth - Talk 15:55, 25 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm very close to supporting, by the way. Ealdgyth - Talk 14:22, 5 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comments. As always, feel free to revert my copyediting. Please check the edit summaries. - Dank (push to talk) 21:32, 22 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  • I've just been through the diff of the first half (down to Road to civil war (1139)) since my last edit at the A-class review ... outstanding job by Ealdgyth. Starting from there:
  • What's up with all the spaced em-dashes? See WP:EMDASH. - Dank (push to talk) 23:09, 22 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Stephen also took steps": "also" meaning what? That is, in addition to what?
It's redundant I think, so I've removed it.Hchc2009 (talk) 17:38, 24 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "These bishops were powerful temporal as well as ecclesiastical rulers,": most readers won't understand the word "temporal" here.
  • "suspect that they might be about to defect": In AmEng, "suspect that they were about to defect" works (the "might" is implied by the "suspect"); I can't swear that that works in BritEng.
  • "both with the senior clergy more generally, and in particular with his brother Henry": That could lose a few words without a shift in meaning; I don't have a preference which ones.
  • "to give up a castle as ransom in this way.": I don't follow "in this way" here.
  • "like his decision to release Matilda from Arundel Castle, his reasons for doing so are unclear.": The reasons you list are different than before, so it's not clear in what way(s) his decision was like the previous decision. One option would be to add "Surprisingly," to the front of the sentence and then delete this part I've quoted.
  • The paragraph that starts "The young Henry Fitzempress" seems to cover too much ground, and I can't tell what the paragraph is about. Also, a little explanation of how the attack "disintegrated" would be helpful. - Dank (push to talk) 16:31, 23 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "one of a potential number of their Blois family relatives": I don't follow. "any of a number of their ...", maybe? (It may be perfectly good BritEng, I just don't recognize it.)
  • "Bernard's diplomacy resulted in this appointment not being confirmed by Rome": I think I prefer: "Bernard was able to get the appointment rejected by Rome"

Support on prose per standard disclaimer, although I'm not considering the issues that Ealdgyth has already raised. - Dank (push to talk) 16:47, 25 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment, On ref 212, you have "pp.278–8". Should this just be "p.278", or should that last 8 be a 9? Also, the pp. ranges are somewhat inconsistent in how they're truncated. You'll have "pp.140–1" in one footnote, and "pp.280–283" in another. I can't find a specific policy regarding this type of abbreviation, but there should be a uniform structure. My preference is to write out the full page numbers to remove ambiguity. --Gyrobo (talk) 13:14, 24 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Changed as per your suggestion. Hchc2009 (talk) 17:32, 24 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Support. I was waiting for the other editors to finish their reviews so that I could be sure that I was going to bet in the right horse. Writing an entire article by yourself is very hard, even more when you have as goal to place it among the FAs. You did a great job, Hchc2009. --Lecen (talk) 18:39, 27 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Spotchecks: I checked the sources for reference footnotes 39, 47, 153b, 172, 178, 224, 239b, and 242. In each case, the article's claims were backed up in the material cited, and I found no problems with verbatim copying or close paraphrasing. However, I also found the following issues:

  • Reference 39 would, in my opinion, be better sourced to pp. 279-281, rather than simply 279.
  • Browne & Lawrence is listed in the Bibliography, but does not seem to be references anywhere in the sources.
  • It was an edited volume, and there's one of the chapters referenced. This goes back to an earlier point by Ealdgyth, though, that a number of editors would prefer the name of the edited volume to follow the chapter reference; I've changed the formatting accordingly. See what you think.Hchc2009 (talk) 07:12, 8 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Your links to book covers (e.g. Dalton & Graeme) do not seem useful to me.
  • Your reference links within notes look very odd, displaying as, for instance, "UNIQ4a60e99374aaacb4-nowiki-0000020B-QINU?116?UNIQ4" instead of 116.

Thanks, – Quadell (talk) 20:22, 7 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  • The reference links within the notes seems to be a very recent problem with the template - I'm not sure what's causing it (it seems to be impacting on some articles and not others). I'll look into this tomorrow, but I'm a bit puzzled. Hchc2009 (talk) 21:05, 7 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support I was going to say the article measures up to what I'd expect about the subject (even down to mentioning that the term "the Anarchy" has been critiqued) but after Ealdgyth's in-depth review anything I had to say on content seems redundant. As an aside, Sarah Speight's "Castle Warfare in the Gesta Stephani" Château-Gaillard may be of interest if you haven't seen it; it's probably more relevant to the article on the Anarchy itself though rather than Stephen. I found the article easy to read and the references representative of the major sources. Nev1 (talk) 13:31, 10 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Images Most seem to be in the public domain, however some tweaking is needed.
Can you make the ones with the 12th and 13th century images link to a page with describes them, rather than just reproduces them with no text?
More a question of changing the URLs. It is customary here that even though an image is not technically within the four walls of the article, so to speak, that reviewers are within their rights to ask for improvements to ensure the article is verifiable. Right now, I'm getting links to pages that tell me nothing about the origins of the items. The nominator is expected to, assuming the info is online, to set things up so that there is easy verifiability. I should not have to poke around web sites looking for a suitable page, that click should take me directly to the info I need to confirm the stated source and age of the image. For all I know, it was made by an artist in 2007 in Diss.--Wehwalt (talk) 13:12, 13 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
So, for the lead picture, "Stepan Blois". The source link shouldn't be changed as far as I understand, because that is showing where the original uploader actually originally got the image from. Would it be sufficient to add [this additional url|http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/onlineex/illmanus/cottmanucoll/w/011cotclad00006u00009000.html] to the description page, for example? (NB: implying that the original uploader had taken it from the British Library could have legal consequences for them!) Hchc2009 (talk) 16:04, 13 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Did Sandy Berger move to England? Seriously, that is fine. Drop a note on my talk page when you are done and I'll look it over and post accordingly. With luck, we can get you promoted today.--Wehwalt (talk) 16:22, 13 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I don't see that as a problem. I am old enough to remember paper books. Give me five minutes--Wehwalt (talk) 17:25, 13 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I remember them from uni - they're like an iPad, only a little more flexible and water resistant! :) Hchc2009 (talk) 17:27, 13 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I am not convinced that this image is PD as a coin is a 3D object and its photographer has copyright rights. The other coin use looks OK, but there needs to be a license for the image and a license for the coin.
This has a deadlink for source.
This needs straighening out to specify that Geogre's role was taking a photograph or scan of the manuscript.
Nothing major, I think?--Wehwalt (talk) 15:14, 12 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Image check. All images are in the public domain (the old ones) or are appropriately licensed (the modern ones). The ones that are in the public domain are all non-United States images and each appropriately has two copyright tags, one showing it to be copyright-free in the country of origin (a nation of the EU in each case) and another showing it to be out of copyright in the United States. I'll tell Karanacs.--Wehwalt (talk) 17:50, 13 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Will someone please ping me if the images are ironed out on Thursday? Karanacs (talk) 01:29, 13 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Certainly. I should be on and off all day.--Wehwalt (talk) 01:32, 13 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]


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