Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Middle-earth

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Remux (talk | contribs) at 01:52, 23 December 2014 (→‎Fifth line of Ring-inscription Black Speech?). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Jump to navigation Jump to search

Template:ME-Announce

Template:ME-taskbox

Shortcut
Archive
Archives

Past discussions and issuses can be located by clicking on the archive links.

Roll call

Please sign your name below and on the members page. Comments are optional.

Article alerts

The following list is updated daily by a bot. Please use the "Issues" section below for manual entries. Good article nominees

(6 more...)

Articles to be merged

Issues

Other specific issues regarding Tolkien-related Wikipedia content.

List

Cities
Places and Realms

The below articles in this section are no longer active merger candidates but most are still stubs or have been tagged for notability or in-universe style of writing. De728631 (talk) 12:31, 20 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hills, Mountains, and Passes
Rivers and Bays
People and Houses
Writings
Miscellaneous
Moved to Talk:History of Arda

In History of Arda Why are Finarfin and his children (esp. Finrod) not mentioned in the Years of the Trees, or the First Age? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.155.3.135 (talk) 18:10, 18 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Forgotten mergers

In November 2007 User:YLSS placed a Merge JRRT template on Dor Daedeloth, recommending that it be merged with Beleriand. (That user does not appear to have edited since 2008.) No corresponding merge template was placed on Beleriand, however, and no merger discussion was initiated. I would suggest that either a discussion be initiated at Talk:Dor Daedeloth, or that the template be removed. See Help:Merging for more information on proposing mergers. Cnilep (talk) 15:15, 31 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think we need a discussion for that one but can rather quickly merge it to Angband, which itself could need some fleshing-out. De728631 (talk) 16:37, 31 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Same thing, all marked non-notable and certainly most, merge to:

  1. Ered Mithrin
  2. Ered Wethrin
  3. Eregion
  4. Esgaroth
  5. Ettenmoors
  6. Harad
  7. Hithlum
  8. House of Hador
  9. Lond Daer Enedh
  10. Luthany
  11. Meduseld
  12. Menegroth
  13. Minhiriath
  14. Morgul Pass
  15. Nargothrond
  16. Orocarni
  17. Osgiliath
  18. Ost-in-Edhil
  19. Pelennor Fields
  20. Reunited Kingdom
  21. River Sirion
  22. Torech Ungol
  23. Umbar

Rich Farmbrough, 03:56, 22 April 2010 (UTC).[reply]

User:Arskwad has merged a lot of those today. What still remains is shown in the "Issues" section above. De728631 (talk) 19:22, 22 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I would take a crack at Umbar, which needs a serious rewrite, and merge Corsairs of Umbar (another forgotten merger not listed above) there as well (again with rewriting) -- something on the models of Rhovanion and Rohan as parent articles hosting peoples and realms that occupied the territory. Umbar itself should remain as an independent article; there's really no good merge target. -- Elphion (talk) 15:05, 20 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Disambiguation pages and their categories

I just noticed that there is a hidden talk page template {{ME-disambiguation}} that sorts articles into Category:WikiProject Middle-earth disambiguation pages. At the same time we have Category:Disambig-Class Tolkien articles coming from the rating in the project template on talk pages. In my opinion we should gather them all by tagging with the project template. These project banner rating categories have a built-in navigation box and you can also jump to Category:Disambig-Class Tolkien articles from the quality roster on this page.

In terms of work it would surely be easier to just tag the three pages in Category:Disambig-Class Tolkien articles with the other template but I for one think the categories populated by {{ME-project}} are much more user-friendly. What do you think? De728631 (talk) 20:19, 4 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'm up for it. What do I need to do? What tags need going on which pages? GimliDotNet (talk) 20:21, 4 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Cool. Please check the pages in Category:WikiProject Middle-earth disambiguation pages and replace {{ME-disambiguation}} with {{ME-project|class=disamb}}. De728631 (talk) 21:52, 4 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The Hobbit FA push

In its present state The Hobbit looks ready to me for being lifted to FA class. It is very well-referenced and the plot section is pleasantly short while telling the major events. Then there's a lot of real-world info like concept/creation, reception, adaptations etc. No edit warring either. Should we try and nominate it or did I miss anything that should be fixed beforehand? De728631 (talk) 22:08, 5 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I have just requested WP:Peer review for the article De728631 (talk) 20:38, 7 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The article is now an official featured article candidate at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/The Hobbit/archive2. De728631 (talk) 15:48, 4 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed deletions

I have just prodded three articles, Eothain, Éomund and Lothíriel, all three of which are minor characters from the books and have no real-life notability at all. Frankly I can't even remember these characters having just re-read the books, with two of them mentioned in passing and Eothain only having a couple of lines. I perhaps would of supported redirecting them to a list, but I can't find a relevant list to actually link them too. Anyway I am informing this project for any consideration you may have. QueenCake (talk) 17:17, 14 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the notice. I have deprodded Eothain and turned it into a disambiguation page to distinguish between Tolkien's book character and the original character in the Jackson films. The other two (and also Théodwyn) have been redirected to Éomer where these character are further described in their fictional context as Éomer's family members. De728631 (talk) 18:23, 14 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
That seems like sensible decisions for Éomund and Lothíriel. However I question the necessity of keeping a page for Eothain, we now have the problem of a disambiguation page for two minor characters - neither of which deserve articles for themselves, and hence don't deserve a dab page either. If the page can't be redirected I would suggest sending it to AFD. QueenCake (talk) 19:09, 14 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
On a closer look at WP:DAB it is allowed to list topics that don't have their own articles as long as there is a main article to link to where the disambiguation term is explained. That is the case for List of original characters in The Lord of the Rings film trilogy where Jackson's Éothain is is treated along other original movie characters. However, neither The Lord of the Rings nor Rohan make any mention of Éothain, and rightfully so.
So I think we should redirect the page to the list of original characters and explain that this Éothain is different from the book character. Because of the popularity of the films Éothain is a valid search term that should be covered by Wikipedia and that list seems to be the right place. De728631 (talk) 19:35, 14 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not exactly sure if Éothain is a valid term (he was a kid who appeared for a couple of minutes), but a redirect to that list seems good enough. While you can list topics without their own articles on a Dab page, I don't believe one that solely consists of that is a good enough inclusion. I do recommend redirecting it. QueenCake (talk) 17:52, 15 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Alright, I have now redirected Éothain to the list. De728631 (talk) 19:42, 15 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Why do you wrote that Numenor is a continent?

Hallo, I'm Italian; I write in the name of the Italian Wikiproject called "Progetto Tolkien". We don't know if classify Numenor as a island or as a continent. We know that you have wrote that Numenor could be a continent (in the template on your page). But why? What are sources? (We must be sure it's the right solution). Thank you and I'm sorry for my english. --Innocenti Erleor (talk) 13:11, 31 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The Númenor legend is based on the Atlantis myth, according to J.R.R. Tolkien: Architect of Middle Earth by Daniel Grotta, Tolkien: A Look Behind The Lord Of The Rings by Lin Carter Númenor was an 'island continent' GimliDotNet (talk) 21:44, 31 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you --Innocenti Erleor (talk) 13:49, 1 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Il·lustrations of Tolkien characters

Hi all; GimliDotNet suggested me to write here. In the wikiArS project with Llotja school of art, in witch I'm involved, the illustration student Jessica León had produced free licence images about Tolkien's characters. If someone wants to use them in any article you can found it here or here. --Dvdgmz (talk) 10:05, 18 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Personally I think these are great, I'd rather see these in the infoboxes that screen caps from the Jackson films. Especially as when the Hobbit is release we're going to get a deluge of updates I think as interest is piqued. GimliDotNet (talk) 10:25, 18 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think we should feature any one particular artist's rendition of a character in the infobox. There are no original depictions, and everything that has been done has simply been an artistic interpretation of what is presented in the text. I think what we have at Gandalf, Aragorn, and Frodo Baggins is what should remain: no image in the infobox, and thumbnails of different adaptations (including from Jackson's films) down in the body where the adaptations are discussed. —Akrabbimtalk 14:25, 18 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I don't mind having images in the infoboxes but such images should come from a professional artist and be notable on their own. Pictures like Tttom's Tolkien Calendar images or screenshots from any of the movies will support the articles by adding a significance of the subject beyond the original texts. That said, I would not include artwork from drawing classes or whatever else fan-art can be found in Commons:Category:Middle-earth characters. De728631 (talk) 19:45, 19 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I would rather avoid illustrations in the info box, since with a few exceptions from The Hobbit (whose copyright is jealously guarded by the Tolkien Estate), there are no originals from Tolkien's hand. Images in the info box would acquire something of a "official" character that is really not warranted. I would also continue the long-standing practice of placing film caps under "Adaptations", since the films often depart from the books. -- Elphion (talk) 20:31, 19 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Fan images

Goustien is again pushing to include fan art in the Middle-earth articles. Can we finally come to some consensus as to whether these are suitable for the articles. I for one think they are poor quality and nothing more than an attempt to push a favoured viewpoint. Any other opinions? GimliDotNet (Speak to me,Stuff I've done) 07:22, 19 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'm no great supporter of fan art. I added an image to Battle of Mirkwood only because it was already used in two related articles, but its removal would not diminish the articles. I would prefer to see judicious use of noteworthy art from published sources, and for this reason I inserted Tolkien's own design of the Eye of Sauron instead of the fan art versions in Sauron and Mordor. Where no authoritative artwork is available for certain iconic images such as heraldry, I suggest we accept fan art versions that are clearly based on Tolkien's verbal descriptions (e.g., the White Hand of Isengard). Goustien (talk) 07:59, 19 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Goustien that we should prefer professional artwork which has been published elsewhere. Unfortunately that will require a non-free-use rationale for most images unless the creator published or uploaded them under a free license. See e.g. User:Tttom's images which have been featured in the Tolkien Calendar. But I won't mind using high-quality fan art where there's no alternative. Although these images should have explanatory captions like "drawn after Tolkien's writings" or "An artist's rendition of Dol Guldur" so they won't be mistaken for first-party material. De728631 (talk) 18:43, 21 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Deletion discussion

File:JRR Tolkien signature - from Commons.svg is being discussed for deletion at Wikipedia:Files for deletion/2012 August 4‎. De728631 (talk) 15:56, 4 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Themes of The Lord of the Rings

Does anyone have access to War and the works of J.R.R. Tolkien by Janet Brennan Croft? Following the IP's thoughts about Tolkien and World War II at Talk:Themes of The Lord of the Rings#Second world war it would be interesting to have some thematic analysis for the War of the Ring. De728631 (talk) 12:39, 21 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]


Reception of J. R. R. Tolkien

I looked at this page specifically for a summation of literary criticism Tolkien's works. The section Reception of J. R. R. Tolkien#Literary_criticism, however, only mentions mainstream criticism in passing and only to dismiss it with a quote that no mainstream critic was qualified to critique Tolkien, which is an odd defense of the work, if that's what that section was meant to be. Yet as Wikipedia strives to be as lacking in bias as possible, a good summary of what mainstream literary critics have to say (and perhaps another line explaining the quote that dismisses them) is called for. Pandarsson (talk) 11:29, 26 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I have now quoted Edmund Wilson on Tolkien so the reader gets an idea what Lobdell refers to. And I agree that we should expand this particular section. De728631 (talk) 13:55, 1 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I came to this section (Reception of J. R. R. Tolkien#Literary_criticism) because I have been working on a revision of a critical essay I wrote many years ago. My essay deals with broad moral issues raised by the work of Tolkien and C. S. Lewis, and compares these to a sci fi novel by the Russian authors Arkady and Boris Strugatsky and its film version by Andrei Tarkovsky. I have been considering an expansion and revision of my text, and went to Wikipedia to find references for further research. However, like user Pandarsson, I found this section to be a disappointment. The reference and link to Edmund Wilson is amusing, but Wilson's text is short and lacks detail. The references to Marxian criticism are also somewhat trite and not very informative: E. P. Thompson can hardly be taken literally when he "blames the cold warrior mentality on "'too much early reading of The Lord of the Rings'". In view of the pages and pages devoted to Tolkien, Tolkien fandom and nearly every aspect of Tolkien's work on Wikipedia and on the net at large, I think there would be no harm in expanding this short critical section substantially. Not being an expert on Tolkien studies, I do not feel competent to undertake such an expansion myself, however I do have a few references that might serve as a starting point (I'll look around to see if I find anything more, and post it here if I do): (1) Raffel, Burton (1969). "The Lord of the Rings as Literature". (In N. D, Isaacs & R. A. Zimbardo: Tolkien and the Critics: Essays on J. R. R. Tolkien's 'The Lord of the Rings', pp. 218-246.) The essay is part of a collection of mostly uncritical work on Tolkien. It argues that LoTR is a well-written (fast-moving, gripping and exciting) story, but as literature (in terms of style, characterization, incident and morality) it fails. Raffel's stylistic argument (with numerous quotations from LoTR contrasted with passages from literary classics) is particularly well elaborated. (2) Yeskov (or Eskov), Kirill (1999). The Last Ringbearer. (Originally published in Russian. Available online at http://ymarkov.livejournal.com/270570.html.) This is not a critical work, but an independent novel, which, however, very forcefully criticizes the political morality of Tolkien's worlds. It portrays the War of the Ring from the point of view of its losers (Mordor and the orcs). Though the book is the subject of a Wikipedia article (The Last Ringbearer), I think it at least deserves mention here. Moreover, the Wikipedia article's description of the novel as "an alternative account of and an informal sequel to" LoTR ignores the fact that it also constitutes a critique of the morality of LoTR - a fact that might be emphasized in the present section. The criticism implied in the novel is: (a) The clear-cut Good-Evil dichotomy of LoTR is an oversimplification that is not applicable to real-world events, (b) The losers of any war or conflict have a legitimate story to tell, which is often obscured by the histories told by the winners, (c) The individual participants in any conflict are real people, not types. (3) Nielsen, F. S. "The Morality of Mythical Worlds: Critical Reflections on Narrative Form". I hesitate to recommend my own essay (see above for short description), which has not been published, and the quality of which I am myself unable to assess objectively. It is possible that it contains aspects of critique that are not covered elsewhere, but since I am not at all an expert on Tolkien studies, it may well be that the same points are made more cogently elsewhere. Filursiax (talk) 11:22, 30 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Mythopoeic Society

The revision history of this article shows that certain regular and new editors are actually members of this society (cf. [1]). See also the statement at Talk:Mythopoeic Society. While I currently don't see any obvious COI in the article's text we might want to check the content from time to time in terms of NPOV and other guidelines. De728631 (talk) 13:38, 1 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

image:TheHobbitFilm13Dwarves.jpg

File:TheHobbitFilm13Dwarves.jpg has been nominated for deletion -- 76.65.128.252 (talk) 04:14, 6 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Middle-earth redirects

I wonder if we need this category at all. While it was useful back in 2007 when it was established, the current approach of administrative WikiProject categorisation is talk page tagging with a project's assessment template. I have recently added a redirect class to {{WikiProject Middle-earth}} to classify a bunch of articles that had been rated NA-class until then. So instead of having two similar categories Middle-earth redirects and Redirect-class Tolkien categories I think we could have a bot replace the old article side redirect templates with an instance of {{WikiProject Middle-earth}} on the talk page. That way we would have an up to date overview on redirects by taking a look at the assessment template on the project page. De728631 (talk) 18:52, 13 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Infobox images?

I asked about this at Talk:Gandalf but was directed here. I was wondering why the none of the infoboxes in articles about LOTR characters have images, although this is done for most other literary characters. A few examples are Sherlock Holmes, James Bond, or any of the characters in the Harry Potter universe. I understand there's a preference against using images from Peter Jackson's movies, but there are plenty of well-known illustrations of these characters we could use that aren't from the movies. Zeromus1 (talk) 06:54, 16 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hello again :). Some of the characters do have images, Fëanor for instances has an (in my opinion a rather crappy) illustration. The avoidance of Jackson images in the infoboxes is two fold, one is they are just one interpretation of the character and two the fair use policy is rather strict - we are discussing literary characters, not film characters. They do however get fair-use in the adaptation sections where the film portrayal is discussed. This is a general guide, I don't know how pages like Harry Potter (character) get away with it, possibly because the Tolkien focused editors here are rather more stuffy than the potter fan boys ;) GimliDotNet (Speak to me,Stuff I've done) 07:04, 16 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Turgon has an even worse one IMHO. Double sharp (talk) 12:06, 24 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I notice it was suggested in a discussion above to use images from the Tolkien calendars. I would support that idea. But do the same issues apply to those as well? Zeromus1 (talk) 07:10, 16 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Personally I would prefer in this order Tolkien's images -> Illustrated book versions -> Illustrated artists version (inc. calendars). I think the issue is always copyright though. I will leave it to others with more experience to discuss those issues though. GimliDotNet (Speak to me,Stuff I've done) 07:15, 16 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The main issue here is in fact copyright. I.e. most previously published artwork is non-free and would have to be commented on in the articles instead of merely serving as a decoration. One requirement for non-free content is that it "is used only if its presence would significantly increase readers' understanding of the topic, and its omission would be detrimental to that understanding." But I think many Tolkien articles would benefit from an illustration to help the general reader understand the concept and context. And especially for the lesser known topics we could use professional images to point out popular impact. De728631 (talk) 16:51, 16 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

OK, so how do we decide which images to use? Zeromus1 (talk) 06:43, 18 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I think De's post makes the answer fairly clear. Most freely usable artwork is not of sufficient quality, and the copyrighted art should be used only within the body of the article where that art is specifically addressed. Therefore, in general, neither will be appropriate for an info box. For art within the article body, I would suggest floating possibilities on the talk page before incorporating it into the article, simply because people have strong opinions about this. -- Elphion (talk) 12:45, 18 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Actually I don't mind putting non-free images into the infobox when there's a commentary in the text part of the article. We should however credit the artist in the caption and possibly point out any special circumstances. E.g. book illustrations, art that has been exhibited somewhere, etc. De728631 (talk) 12:54, 18 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I've never understood why people want to add non-definitive images to the info box. I have no problem adding them to the article, as long as they are properly credited (which should make clear that they are not "official"). -- Elphion (talk) 12:58, 18 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
What is "non-definitive"? Even if we used images drawn by Tolkien himself (J. R. R. Tolkien: Artist and Illustrator) they would still be his personal interpretation of the matter. So in lieu of them we may as well use interpretations by professional artists. It works well for other articles, e.g. Tin Woodman, Robinson Crusoe or Sherlock Holmes. De728631 (talk) 13:32, 18 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I've gone ahead and added an image to the infobox in the Smaug article. I hope that isn't too forward of me. This illustration was painted by Tolkien himself, so it's as definitive an image as could exist. Zeromus1 (talk) 04:41, 20 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

New stub templates

For those who do stub tagging at existing or new pages, Fortdj33 has created two new stub templates: {{MiddleEarth-stub}} and {{MiddleEarth-char-stub}}. These are more specific than the old {{Tolkien-stub}} which refers to the legendarium in general. De728631 (talk) 17:29, 19 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Deprecated template and category

The old talk page template {{ME-disambiguation}} has been superseeded by {{ME-project|class=dab}} since I have replaced all instances of the former. Consequently Category:WikiProject Middle-earth disambiguation pages is now unpopulated. I propose therefore that both the template {{ME-disambiguation}} and its automated category be deleted. If noone objects I'm going to list them at Tfd and Cfd. De728631 (talk) 18:47, 19 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, I've now nominated the template at Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2012 September 21. De728631 (talk) 17:02, 21 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Nomination of The Hobbit (1985 film) for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether the article The Hobbit (1985 film) is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Hobbit (1985 film) until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion template from the top of the article..

This film is the Soviet ballet-style adaptation. MatthewVanitas (talk) 22:29, 24 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/The Hobbit Original Complete Soundtrack needs help getting approved

Greetings, we have a draft article Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/The Hobbit Original Complete Soundtrack where the author isn't yet prepared with proper Sources, etc. If anyone else thinks this is worth having, some quick mentorship would be appreciated. Thanks! MatthewVanitas (talk) 05:18, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

This is already present in the article on the 2003 video game; apart from that that raw title is very disambiguous. I've left a note at the creator's talk page where I suggested a redirect to the game article. De728631 (talk) 15:25, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

New sister project proposal

Hi, you may want to see this proposal for new project based on fiction. --213.155.255.148 (talk) 19:51, 2 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Four days later that page "Wikicanon" was "deleted per author request". I have no idea what it was about. --P64 (talk) 20:27, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Oxford spelling

See my note on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Middle-earth/Standards. -- Elphion (talk) 19:56, 31 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

GA review for Quenya

After a nomination from me in December, Quenya is currently being reviewed for Good Article status. The reviewer has however put the process on hold to allow for improvements. Actually he has left quite a few remarks and as of today we have been given one week to address the concerns. Please see the review page for specific comments. De728631 (talk) 17:40, 3 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'm going to address as many points of the review as possible but help would be appreciated. De728631 (talk) 17:55, 3 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It's been a hard work, but now it is done: we have a new Good Article. De728631 (talk) 15:04, 24 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

On the opposite side: Magic (Middle-earth)

While De pushes for Quenya, on the opposite side we have Magic (Middle-earth) which is an awful article. I've made a start on re-arranging it but it's going to need a hell of a lot of work if anyone has time. GimliDotNet (Speak to me,Stuff I've done) 18:03, 3 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:WikiProject Middle-earth/Assessment

...hasn't been updated since October 2006...six years ago. i.e. it has no discussion of inline referencing nor the introduction of the C-class rating which exists for substantive articles with sections lacking inline referencing. - see Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Assessment FAQ for what the latest global rating scale looks like. Casliber (talk · contribs) 11:32, 29 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

 Done Braincricket (talk) 07:11, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

template:Middle-earth Labelled Map

{{Middle-earth Labelled Map}} has been nominated for deletion -- 65.92.180.137 (talk) 06:09, 9 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Requested move

Just a heads-up to everyone that there is a requested move here. Someone more knowledgeable about Tolkien's works than I should probably chime in. Thanks! Evanh2008 (talk|contribs) 04:04, 26 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Animals and monsters living in Arda

There's a rather complete list of animals and monsters living in Arda in the book Middle-Earth Role Playing game published by ICE. I don't know whether they were (at least partly) based on Tolkien's works (and thus they can be added to the list) or they were fully created by the publisher of the book.--Carnby (talk) 01:13, 18 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Edit war brewing at Uruk-hai

The Uruk-hai article is under a bit of conflict. Anyone fancy heading over there to give a second / third opinion? GimliDotNet (Speak to me,Stuff I've done) 14:06, 22 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Differing versions of the legendarium

We obviously need to present them all in the article. But do we put the version of published Silmarillion first, or the final version? (We are currently somewhat inconsistent, e.g. having Gil-galad son of Orodreth son of Angrod, while sticking to the Silmarillion version of events where both Angrod and Aegnor are on Dorthonion.) Double sharp (talk) 14:11, 22 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Anyone at home?? Double sharp (talk) 13:09, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think there is such a thing as a 'definitive' version, the differing accounts make for interesting topics and are great for adding to the 'character development' setting. GimliDotNet (Speak to me,Stuff I've done) 20:07, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Yes indeed, but the fact is we really need to choose one specific one for the first character biography section, and elaborate on the others in "character development". There's at least two obvious choices: Silm canon or HoME canon. Double sharp (talk) 15:31, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I suggest we use the Silm version for any first description since this was the first published version. HoME should be used for describing the character development. De728631 (talk) 15:40, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Yes I think we should rely on the Silm versions to define topics in the lead section because the Silm represents the "final" form of the stories (and names) which underwent many previous editorial revisions (e.g. the Solosimpi -> Teleri evolution). HoME is a great source for discussing publication history, character development, narrative evolution, etc. Braincricket (talk) 04:53, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
All right, so I'm going to start applying Gil-galad son of Fingon everywhere... :-) Double sharp (talk) 11:15, 5 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]

J. R. R. Tolkien Collection at Marquette U

J. R. R. Tolkien Collection now redirects to section 3.4 of our biography rather than to our Marquette University, whose recent split makes it entirely inappropriate.

See Talk:J. R. R. Tolkien Collection for more information including notes on current mentions of Tolkien in our Marquette pages, one of which our biography should link.

Perhaps manuscripts should be covered in our bibliography. See Talk: J. R. R. Tolkien bibliography#Manuscripts.

--P64 (talk) 23:30, 31 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Music of The Lord of the Rings film series

The album covers depicted there are now subject of a non-free content review. Please feel free to comment. De728631 (talk) 15:11, 7 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Input needed at Talk:List of multimedia franchises#The Hobbit/The Lord of the Rings

Input is needed at Talk:List of multimedia franchises#The Hobbit/The Lord of the Rings, on the question of whether The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit constitute parts of a single multimedia franchise. Cheers! bd2412 T 20:42, 23 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Possible history behind the name Durin

I was wondering if the name Durin could have been chosen by Tolkien with reference to the ancient Celtic tribe inhabiting southern England until about 4 A.D., the Durotriges. A lot of cities in that area have the "Dur" prefix such as Durnovaria (original name of Dorchester), Durweston, and others. My surname, Durborough/Durborow originates from this area. The Durotriges built the earthen mound forts that helped then to temporarily (but unsuccessfully) defend themselves against the invading Romans who conquered them around 4 A.D. 71.228.186.109 (talk) 15:21, 28 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

According to Christopher Tolkien and several scholars almost all dwarf names were inspired the "Catalogue of Dwarves" in the Poetic Edda. And "Durinn" is one of them (see this quote). De728631 (talk) 18:54, 28 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure what the root 'Dur(r)-" means in Old Norse, but with -inn on the ending it could mean "the hard one" is the root means the same...... most of those dwarfnames have real meanings (e.g. Gandalf - "magical elf", "elf of magic"). that being said I'm juxtaposing the French (Frankish maybe?) meaning of "dur"..... "dyr" in modern Norse is "animal" (cf. "deer"). Skookum1 (talk) 08:40, 30 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Employing a lot of OR and these sources [2][3], one could think that Durinn is the past participle of Old Norse (or Icelandic for that matter) dúra [to sleep, nap], i.e. "(one who) slept". Reversely, this would even fit into Tolkien's origin of the dwarves who were laid to sleep under the mountains by Aule until Illúvatar made his own "children". De728631 (talk) 22:32, 3 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Talk:Eye of Sauron#Requested move

I have requested to move the disambiguation page, Eye of Sauron, to a disambiguation title in order to redirect that title to Sauron. Please feel free to weigh in on the discussion. Cheers! bd2412 T 03:11, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Old Forest

In the last week or so I've reviewed the Old Forest article in response to the tag/flag, 'This article may require clean-up. The specific problem is: repetitive." The tag (or whatever it's called) has been there since 2012.

I've hopefully removed the repetitious bits, and I've expanded other information and have added new sections. I'm not sure if the article can be graduated from Start-Class, but it's a lot better than it was.

Can the tag please be removed? (I don't know how to do this.) 203.6.146.5 (talk) 08:29, 7 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for dealing with the repetitions and for your general edits. But I've now changed the tag because the article still needs more mentioning of the Old Forest's coverage by real-life sources. The rather short section on adaptations seems to contain some synthesis or original research, and the "Hobbits vs Old Forest" part appears to be a bit too detailed for encylopedical uses. De728631 (talk) 09:21, 7 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Update needed

Alan Lee (illustrator) has illustrated some Middle-earth books since 1990 and handled concept design for the Peter Jackson films. His biography needs update at least regarding the ongoing Hobbit film series.

So I consulted our The Hobbit (film series) and found that it too needs update. The long sections on The Hobbit under original director del Toro (1.2-1.4 and part of 1.6) should be reduced. Anyway they need careful attention to grammatical tense and temporal standpoint. (The sentences before and after Del Toro meets with Lee and other Lord of the Rings artists --whose contributions may or may not have been dropped by actual director Jackson-- begin "The Elves will also..." and "He has also considered...".) Perhaps the idiom "would have verbed" should be used only where we know that del Toro's film would have been different in some respect because Jackson didn't verb or verbed differently. ("Del Toro would have redesigned the Goblins and Wargs[16] and the Mirkwood spiders would also have looked different from Shelob.[35]")

--P64 (talk) 22:07, 9 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Help needed at Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Jens Hansem (jeweller) (creator of LOTR film ring)

If anyone wants to help support a novice editor on a Tolkien topic, this draft needs some mentoring: Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Jens Hansem (jeweller). MatthewVanitas (talk) 15:24, 10 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Chris Seeman

Draft:Chris Seeman is a draft space page related to this WikiProject. If you have any independent reliable sources to add to this article, we may be able to get it moved into article space.

If you are interested in helping out with more drafts, please see my list of draft space pages, and help me reach my goal of eventually getting them all to article space! BOZ (talk) 00:03, 18 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

AfC submission

Hello fellow Tolkien readers! Could any of you have a look at Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/The Woodland Realm? Thanks, FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 02:15, 5 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Minas Morgul

There is an ongoing discussion at Minas Morgul about the notability of the article. Apparently being referenced in 3rd party works is not good enough to establish notability unless they deal with the work in a real world context. If you have anything to contribute it would be much appreciated. GimliDotNet (Speak to me,Stuff I've done) 17:01, 7 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

This project maintains two lists of pages at Portal:Middle-earth/Pages and Portal:Middle-earth/Related pages. The blurb at the top says that the lists include deliberate links to disambiguation pages. I've noticed that several editors have used disambiguation tools to "fix" the links, despite the instructions at the top.

I *think* that a good way to stop this happening would be to move them to the Wikipedia namespace, to be subpages of the Wikiproject instead of subpages of the Portal. Any comments? If no-one objects I will move them in a few days. -- John of Reading (talk) 16:06, 25 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I've now moved them to Wikipedia:WikiProject Middle-earth/Pages and Wikipedia:WikiProject Middle-earth/Related pages and restored the links to the disambiguation pages. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:18, 2 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

A Walking Song

Because this is probably the best people for alternative viewpoints, I listed A Walking Song at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/A Walking Song. I believe that the song was used in part for the soundtrack but it's not listed nor explained on the soundtrack page and so I can't find anything about it in that way. Thanks. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 23:39, 1 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Leaflet for Wikiproject Middle-earth at Wikimania 2014

Hi all,

My name is Adi Khajuria and I am helping out with Wikimania 2014 in London.

One of our initiatives is to create leaflets to increase the discoverability of various wikimedia projects, and showcase the breadth of activity within wikimedia. Any kind of project can have a physical paper leaflet designed - for free - as a tool to help recruit new contributors. These leaflets will be printed at Wikimania 2014, and the designs can be re-used in the future at other events and locations.

This is particularly aimed at highlighting less discoverable but successful projects, e.g:

• Active Wikiprojects: Wikiproject Medicine, WikiProject Video Games, Wikiproject Film

• Tech projects/Tools, which may be looking for either users or developers.

• Less known major projects: Wikinews, Wikidata, Wikivoyage, etc.

• Wiki Loves Parliaments, Wiki Loves Monuments, Wiki Loves ____

• Wikimedia thematic organisations, Wikiwomen’s Collaborative, The Signpost

The deadline for submissions is 1st July 2014

For more information or to sign up for one for your project, go to:

Project leaflets
Adikhajuria (talk) 11:10, 26 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Talk:The Middle Men

cf. Men of Twilight Cheers. In ictu oculi (talk) 10:21, 5 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comment on the WikiProject X proposal

Hello there! As you may already know, most WikiProjects here on Wikipedia struggle to stay active after they've been founded. I believe there is a lot of potential for WikiProjects to facilitate collaboration across subject areas, so I have submitted a grant proposal with the Wikimedia Foundation for the "WikiProject X" project. WikiProject X will study what makes WikiProjects succeed in retaining editors and then design a prototype WikiProject system that will recruit contributors to WikiProjects and help them run effectively. Please review the proposal here and leave feedback. If you have any questions, you can ask on the proposal page or leave a message on my talk page. Thank you for your time! (Also, sorry about the posting mistake earlier. If someone already moved my message to the talk page, feel free to remove this posting.) Harej (talk) 22:47, 1 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Middle-earth Projects and WP:PLOTPRESENT

Another editor has indicated that "per long standing consensus, Middle-earth projects do not follow WP:PLOTPRESENT". Why is this? Where can this consensus be read? Thanks. Nightscream (talk) 18:49, 2 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

It's been in the MOS[4] for ages. GimliDotNet (Speak to me,Stuff I've done) 21:10, 2 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
[5] Here is a discussion from a few years ago. GimliDotNet (Speak to me,Stuff I've done) 21:19, 2 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, I get it. It's because the plots are part of a larger fictional history. Thanks. :-) Nightscream (talk) 18:22, 5 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Question: Does this include articles on original characters that were created solely for the feature films? Or solely for the literary material? Nightscream (talk) 18:25, 5 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I don't recall that there is an official position of the project on this, but I would say that we should treat original characters like any other film characters, i.e. we use present tense for them and their plot. At least the original characters shouldn't be treated as part of the larger fictional history. De728631 (talk) 20:02, 5 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
whilst I agree with the sentiment, doesn't that open a can of worms re using Oxford English in those articles too? GimliDotNet (Speak to me,Stuff I've done) 22:28, 5 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I dunno. Are there any special requirements for plot summaries when using Oxford English? Or do you mean American/NZ film character concepts vs Oxford English article text? De728631 (talk) 21:59, 11 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The Hobbit (film series) specifies that it should be written in British English for instance, really is there any need to try and enforce this when its an American funded New Zeland production? GimliDotNet (Speak to me,Stuff I've done) 22:11, 11 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Now I see what you mean. If you ask me we should again divide the adaptions from the treatment of the canon material. While it's desirable to have a uniform date format etc. let's not restrict the articles that deal mainly with film content to any specific variety of English. De728631 (talk) 22:23, 11 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Info box images.

a user has added an image to Radagast, citing Albus Dumbledore amongst others as example articles where adaptations of the character are used in the info box see here. Is it time to revist our view on these images as this seems to crop up every few years. GimliDotNet (Speak to me,Stuff I've done) 18:03, 11 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I believe that there is varying inconsistency in the use of the inboxes in Tolkien's legendarium. The characters pages are filled with info-boxes that have inconsistent images. For instance, Treebeard uses an image by an external artists impressions, akin to fan-art. Smaug uses one of Tolkien's illustrations, where as Lonely Mountain has an "artists" interpretation. Other pages, like Gandalf and Arnor have no image, where Gondor uses the shield or crest of the city. This inconsistency is a problem, and guidelines should be established for a constant and visually appealing set of entires. Obviously, the original author's illustration should be the first used image, but info boxes serve an important purpose. --Emnp3 (talk) 20:54, 11 November 2014 (UTC) Tom[reply]


Personally, I can't stand a lot of the crappy fan art and would rather see either, no images or images from Tolkien or the books, I think putting film images in the infoboxes is wrong (I think they would fail fair-use for this as we're using them to pretty up the article rather than to display something specific), we attempt to keep the literature character information separate from the film specifics and having the film image in the info box confuses this. The Harry Potter articles are not good examples to go off, they confuse the books and the films and make it difficult to see what is 'original' and what is 'derivative'. As the images are on the articles, under adaptations section I think that is enough. We've been through this discussion a couple of times over the last 10 years and I think it's about time we agree on a consistent way forward. GimliDotNet (Speak to me,Stuff I've done) 21:03, 11 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that this is an important thing to establish. I mean no offense when I say this, but by perusing the previous discussions that concern this issue, it seems that you, GimliDotNet, have been the main and only (save one case) proponent of removing all images from the info boxes. We will agree to disagree on the appropriateness of Jackson images, but I think this may require several other opinions. Whilst you may have your own opinions of the other Wikipedia communities, it is important to learn from others. Peter Jackson's interpretation of the characters should be presented as any other movie or film director/producer's work should be. --Emnp3 (talk) 21:08, 11 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Gimli is right. We can't use film images for simple purposes of illustration in an infobox because they're all fair use. This would require that the article was about the specific depiction of one character or landscape in the Jackson films, and not about the general Tolkien character, location, item, etc. For the same reason the current usage of non-free art in Gondolin's infobox is against our criteria for non-free media because while Ted Nasmith is a notable Tolkien artist, the image as such is not discussed in the article. As to fan art, I wouldn't use it either because these drawings are mostly bad quality and would belong an adaptations section anyway. The same goes for the illustration in Treebeard: there is no reason whatsover why this one should be prominently displayed in the infobox while other fair use images are shown further down belown in the article. De728631 (talk) 21:14, 11 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]


This has been the defacto standard since before my time Wikipedia:WikiProject_Middle-earth/Standards#Images

if available, place book illustrations first in the article, especially in infoboxes. Screenshots and other images from adaptations properly belong in an Adaptations section.

GimliDotNet (Speak to me,Stuff I've done) 21:18, 11 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Excuse me, but it seems that someone has deleted an entry in this thread that I posted, and replaced it with their own. I believe that we should have a bigger discussion about this issue. just because something is defacto, it doesn't mean that it's correct. Is there a way to have a discussion that includes more contributors here. Just because some contributors have different opinions of other sections of Wikipedia (Harry Potter, etc.) it does not make them the common denominator in decision making, nor the final decision maker. Is that a fair request? --Emnp3 (talk) 21:27, 11 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sorry. I just noticed that somehow I deleted your comment with this edit. That was not intended and I don't know how that entire paragraph of your got overwritten. I do agree though that we could need a fresh discussion with more input. Maybe you could crosspost a notice at WT:WikiProject Books and WT:WikiProject Film. De728631 (talk) 21:48, 11 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I remember that when I opened the edit window I was replying directly below Gimli's post. What might have happened here is that you began writing your reply while I was still typing and somehow the system failed to recognise the upcoming edit conflict. I've never seen this before but I wouldn't clear any valid messages written by other editors. De728631 (talk) 21:54, 11 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Agree with Gimli about most fan art, and the general inappropriateness of (and copyright issues with) film captures outside the adaptations section since it is in general unrepresentative of the books. Quality art (preferably by Tolkien) is useful for the articles; the rest is distraction. I find even the heraldry cruft overdone, as it often doesn't stick to what Tolkien describes or what his sketches indicate he may have had in mind. These articles should be primarily about Tolkien's work; WP is not meant to be a showcase for amateur artists. -- Elphion (talk) 23:09, 11 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Fifth line of Ring-inscription Black Speech?

Reading the article Black Speech, I clicked on the Other Languages:Esperanto link and was shocked to find the Ring-inscription described as comprising five lines, the fifth being a purported Bl.Sp. version of the last line of the full Ring-rhyme, "In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie":

uzg-Mordor-ishi amal fauthut burgûli

I ran a Google search of that text and found just five hits, all in Wikipedia. They're listed below, with the corresponding sentence from each. I'm fluent in Esperanto, and that sentence translates as

The sole example of the "pure" Black Speech to appear in Tolkien's works is the inscription on the "One Ring": The poem of the Rings of Power.

My Spanish is good enough to equate that version to the same translation, and the Catalan and Galician as well; and the Basque looks to be structured the same, including the names.

But that fifth line, the last of the Ring-rhyme, is not part of the Ring-inscription, and the text should not state or imply that it is. And where did the Black Speech version come from?

I can fix this in Esperanto, but not in Spanish or its Ibero-Romance kin, let alone Basque.

  • Spanish
    • El único ejemplo de lengua negra «pura» que aparece en las escrituras de Tolkien es la inscripción del Anillo Único: el poema de los Anillos de Poder.
  • Basque
  • Catalan
    • L'únic exemple de llengua negra "pura" que apareix en les escriptures de Tolkien és la inscripció de l'Anell Únic: el poema dels anells de poder.
  • Galician
    • O único exemplo de lingua negra "pura" que aparece nos escritos de Tolkien é a inscrición do Anel Único: o poema dos Aneis de Poder.
  • Esperanto
    • La nura ekzemplo de la "pura" nigra lingvo kiu aperas en la verkaro de Tolkien estas la enskribo en la "Ununura Ringo": La poemo el la Ringoj de Povo.

If you would like to discuss this with me, please {{Ping}} me. Thnidu (talk) 01:38, 19 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

@Thnidu: I suspect this was reconstructed for the Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor game. At least I have found the full poem in Black Speech (and Sindarin and Quenya) at the Shadow of Mordor Wikia. As to original Black Speech, the inscription on the Ring and some Orkish cursing are the only published corpus which has been listed by Fauskanger. De728631 (talk) 02:55, 19 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
@De728631: Thank you. I will use this ref. --Thnidu (talk) 04:34, 19 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I have fixed this in the Esperanto wiki  – Nigra lingvo (Black Speech) and its Talk page  – but the other four languages' articles must be fixed by those who can. There's a note at the bottom of the Esperanto page that the article uses text translated from the Spanish page. --Thnidu (talk) 04:45, 19 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
@Thnidu: Thanks for fixing the Esperanto article. I have no idea of Hispanic languages let alone Basque, so yes, the people over there need to fix that themselves. De728631 (talk) 16:00, 19 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
@Thnidu: Thanks for your help Thnidu, I fix the articles in the other wikis (I assumed that the people of the Basque and Galician Wikipedias would understand my explanation in Spanish). -- Remux - I will never forget that i fell in love with the more beautiful flower Ĉu mi povas helpi vin je io? 01:51, 23 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Middle-earth&oldid=639269802"