Talk:William de Vere

Latest comment: 15 years ago by Ealdgyth in topic Predecessor and Successor

Predecessor and Successor edit

Hm.. The Handbook of British Chronology 2nd ed. (1961) is showing the predecessor as Robert Foliot and the sucessor as Giles de Braose. Some newer source show something different? Ealdgyth | Talk 03:38, 6 September 2007 (UTC)Reply

Is there such a thing as too much citation? This article is littered with notes and yet more are called for to back up not only sentences but even phrases. And the references employ the awkward 1. ab... format. The Barrow article on William provides plenty of these references as it is the most complete study of the bishop's life and career to date, and there is no need to overload the entry with references. DeAragon 10:22, 16 February 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dearagon (talkcontribs)

Unfortunately, Wikipedia calls for citations pretty much for everything, even things that most scholars would not think need citation. It's not an encyclopedia just for scholars, but also for anyone reading, and so has different citation standards than other scholarly encyclopedias. Ealdgyth - Talk 14:12, 16 February 2009 (UTC)Reply

I haven't notice superscript numbers cluttering up most other articles on medieval subjects. If people know anything about citation, it is that, if an entire paragraph has only one citation--at the end--that citation covers the entire paragraph. Citing lots of sources contained in a later publication that is considered the most authoritative is something of a waste of time and effort. Just as here, someone substituted references to Barrow's article on Bishop William in Viator (1980s) with her entry on the bishop in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, so Barrow supersedes many earlier references.

If we were really going whole hog on the citations, we'd be citing manuscript and other archival materials, etc. Yet we're specifically told NOT to cite such materials. DeAragon 22:02, 17 February 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dearagon (talkcontribs)