Talk:Hilary of Chichester

Good article

This article is well written and well referenced, and a good overview of the topic. I was particularly impressed with the breadth of historical coverage. The article meets all of the GA criteria... Johnfos (talk) 09:26, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Peer review comments

Moving these here for ease of editing...

Ruhrfisch comments: Another interesting and generally well done article on a medieval bishop I am not sure I ever heard of before. Here are my suggestions for improvement, mostly fairly nit-picky:

• Please expand the lead so it is an accessible and inviting overview of the whole article. Nothing important should be in the lead only - since it is a summary, it should all be repeated in the body of the article itself and my rule of thumb is to include every header in the lead in some way. Please see WP:LEAD
• Any chance of an image for the lead (upper right corner?) I see there are several images at Chichester Cathedral, but suspect all of them are too recent to be associated with Hilary.
• First sentence is very short - if you had to say the three most important things about him, what would they be? Can they all fit into a new first sentence?
• Try to provide context for the reader who is not a medieval expert. Here are a bunch of examples:
  • would it make sense to add bishop to ...promoting Hilary to [bishop of] the see of Chichester in 1146? Not everyone knows what a see in this sense is.
  • Provide years (if known) for Hilary served as a clerk for Henry of Blois, Bishop of Winchester as well as Dean of Christchurch ...
  • Why was his nomination for Archbishop unsuccessful? Also should the pope be indentified here Unsuccessfully nominated as a candidate for the archbishopric of York against Henry Murdac in 1146, the pope chose to compensate Hilary by appointing him to Chichester.[5] instead of the next sentence?
  • What was the council or Rheims? Why did the king not want the Archbishop of Canterbury to attend?
  • Probably need to explain that in those days there was a struggle over who decided who was a bishop - the pope, the chapter of the cathedral, the king or some combination.
  • Link Pope Hadrian IV in Battle Abbey section (I think this is the first he shows up)
  • say where this was and was present at the announcement of the canonization in 1161.[1]
  • I don't understand this All the bishops but Hilary swore, with the reservation that the customs were not in conflict with canon law. Hilary, however, added no qualifiers. Did he swear or not - first sentence sounds like he did not, second sounds like he did. I also do not understand how swearing the king's oath is thus refused to support the archbishop's party.[1][12]
• Article needs a copyedit. Here are some rough spots:
  • After unsuccessfully being nominated to become archbishop of York, ... makes it sound like he was not even nominated (when it was the nomination that was unsuccessful, right?)
  • Awkward - isn't Hilary the bishop in Hilary spent many years engaged in a struggle with Battle Abbey over the bishop's attempts to inspect the abbey.
  • parallel construction - perhaps Known for providing for his clergy and [for his skill] as a canon lawyer...
  • two uses of probably in one sentence: Hilary was probably born around 1110, and was probably of low birth, ...
  • Probably best to break this into two sentences He was educated as a canon lawyer, and was an advocate in Rome in 1144,[2] where he served in the papal chancery in 1146,[3] and some of his coworkers were Robert Pullen, John of Salisbury, and Nicholas Breakspear (who later became Pope Adrian IV).[4]
  • Avoid needless repetition: ...the pope chose to compensate Hilary by appointing him to Chichester.[5] His candidacy to York had been supported by ... King Stephen of England.[1] He was nominated to the see of Chichester by Pope Eugenius III in 1146, pope names him to Chichester twice in three sentences as written now
  • Should there be commas here: Robert de Bethune[,] bishop of Hereford[,] and William de Turbeville[,] bishop of Norwich.?
  • Struggle with Battle Abbey is one long paragraph - can it be split into two?

Hope this helps. If my comments are useful, please consider peer reviewing an article, especially one at Wikipedia:Peer review/backlog (which is how I found this article). Yours, Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 21:30, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Comments on context

Some suggestions on providing context:

• "collegiate church of secular clergy": Collegiate church may need a wikilink or an explanation. Secular clergy definitely needs an explanation because it sounds like an oxymoron.
• "its ancient constitution": What was the significance of the consititution?
• "Hilary's appointment to the see of Chichester happened in 1147": Is "happened" the right verb?
• "Hilary was one of the bishops that made peace between Theobald and Stephen after the Council": This came in rather suddenly. How and why were they reconciled?
• "over the exemption that Battle…": Should that be "the abbey"? Using "Battle" to refer to the abbey sounds a little strange.
• "Thomas Becket, then Henry's chancellor": Becket is a fairly major character so some context about him at this early stage might be nice.
• "office of sheriff involved the gathering of the county farm": What does "gathering of the county farm" mean?
• "decrees of the 1143 council": What are these?
• "king's growing quarrel with Becket": In the previous sentences, Becket was the king's choice for Canterbury, but all of a sudden he is having a quarrel. Might need additional context here.
• "actual cure of souls": "cure of souls" might need some context in addition to the wikilink.
• "the anarchy": Should anarchy be capitalised as it is referring to a specific item?

I hope you find these helpful. --RelHistBuff (talk) 09:42, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

I think I got them all. If you can check that the context added actually helps and doesn't make things more confusing, that'd be great. Ealdgyth - Talk 16:00, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Each item appears clearer now. There are some commas sprinkled here and there which appear unnecessary (I am no punctuation expert though), but I guess cleaning that up can wait until you are near the finish. --RelHistBuff (talk) 20:56, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

I leave commas to the experts. I just kinda throw them around and hope they stick in the right spots... Ealdgyth - Talk 21:40, 16 February 2009 (UTC)