Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sulla's civil wars

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was redirect to Sulla's civil war. There is consensus to not keep this, but no consensus whether to merge or delete (and where to merge to). The redirection allows editors to resolve any merger from the history through further discussion. Sandstein 12:22, 9 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Sulla's civil wars[edit]

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Also nominating Sulla's first civil war.

This is all original research, with some content forking. There was only one "Sulla's civil war", the one Wikipedia currently calls Sulla's second civil war, fought in 83 BC. The article Sulla's first civil war covers both Sulla's first march on Rome (88 BC), which was not a civil war, and a civil war in 87 BC, which had nothing to do with Sulla.

Neither of the nominated articles possess any content of value. Sulla's march on Rome is already covered in Sulla's own page, whereas the war of 87 (which Cicero calls the "Bellum Octavianum") should have its own article in the future. Sulla's second civil war should be renamed simply to Sulla's civil war, if that's the best name available. Avilich (talk) 16:32, 16 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of History-related deletion discussions. Avilich (talk) 16:32, 16 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Military-related deletion discussions. Avilich (talk) 16:32, 16 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Keep/merge See When is a Civil War not a Civil War? which explains that "there is no consistent historiographical approach for this period" which various commentators compartmentalise in various ways. Deletion is therefore not appropriate. Andrew🐉(talk) 17:05, 16 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

You can't use a negative to assert a positive, i.e. the legitimacy of the article. This particular compartmentalization is not attested by reliable sources, which is the whole point of the nomination. Note that Pen & Sword often seems to be self-published material which falls short of scholarly standards. Avilich (talk) 17:17, 16 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The primary proposition being asserted here is the nomination's demand that these various articles be deleted completely without retaining any trace of their edit history or content. This nomination presents no evidence in support of its contentions whereas I have provided some evidence in support of my position. That evidence was written by an academic who specialised in ancient history and so seems fine for our purpose. My !vote stands. Andrew🐉(talk) 18:41, 16 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The evidence presented is a lack of evidence in reliable sources and the articles' duplication of content from elsewhere. Your only evdence is a non-academic publication which nevertheless just so happens to support the deletion, since he doesn't say that the current arrangement is valid, and he reinforces my statements about the 'first civil war' article. I'm only expected to search around a bit for reliable sources before a nomination, which I have already done – I've certainly done more than getting the first thing that pops out of the search engine, as you did. It's not up to me to prove that the edit history, of all things, should be preserved. Your logic is spectacularly twisted, the burden of proving the value of these garbage articles is entirely on you. Avilich (talk) 19:49, 16 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

~~Keep~~ – I'm not seeing a terribly convincing case for deleting either of these articles. The "first civil war" phrasing is used occasionally by scholars (e.g. David Armitage notes in this book chapter that "Sulla’s first civil war against Marius in 88–87 BCE led to a second series of contentions between them five years later in 82–81 BCE"), but that's really beside the point. The underlying concepts here are certainly notable, as the nominator appears to concede. And any issues with the titles, overlap, or original research can be dealt with through WP:RM, WP:PAM, or regular editing, respectively. Although these articles certainly need cleanup, AfD isn't the place for it. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 03:41, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

First of all, this is probably a case of wp:citogenesis since the article was created in 2006, whereas your source was published 2017. Second, Armitage is not a classicist. Third, there was no "Sulla's civil war" in 88–87 BC. Sulla left Italy in 88 BC and a civil war began while he was away, but the article is not about that; it's instead a collection of original research claiming that his brief and largely bloodless march on Rome constituted a civil war, which it wasn't. There's only one "Sulla's civil war", the one in 83–82 BC. Last of all, I don't concede that a bogus concept like this meets GNG, and AfD is a perfectly appropriate and straightforward way of dealing with this: both OR and forking are reasons for deletion. PAM implies there's sourced and adequate information worth merging somewhere, which isn't the case here, and DINC is an opinion essay with no applicability here. Avilich (talk) 03:51, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Striking. This is indeed not as simple as I thought. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 00:06, 24 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Keep per above. I don't buy Avilich's reasoning here.★Trekker (talk) 11:11, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep/merge. These are important topics that were split off from Sulla many years ago, and have seen a lot of work put into them since. They might benefit from a restructure, pruning, or merger, but they're clearly real, notable, and don't fit any criteria for deletion. P Aculeius (talk) 13:22, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@P Aculeius: can you please prove there are real? Can you demonstrate I'm wrong? Can you show that there were two Sulla's civil wars as opposed to one? These articles were not split from Sulla. The 'civil wars' one was only created because of someone's terrible misjudgment in naming the other two articles 'first' and 'second civil war'. I'd also like evidence that the 'first civil war' was not simply a copy-paste or made-up original research. Can you see any sort of nuance in my original proposal and consider reaching a compromise? Not one person has done that up til now. Avilich (talk) 13:30, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

These events clearly happened—whether they're correctly classifying events as a "first" civil war or not. And yes, they were split from Sulla, or at least one of them was; the page history actually says the content was taken from there. And I don't need to prove that something isn't original research, or that something wasn't copied and pasted from another source (and if it were, that wouldn't be a valid reason to delete it). There is no nuance in deletion. Merger is a compromise.

If you don't think material belongs under this title, it's your job to determine what's factual and usable, figure out what articles it could be added to, and incorporate it there—or find someone else to help you do so. If in the process these titles are effectively emptied of non-duplicative content, then they can be changed into redirects to the appropriate articles. This preserves the page history while providing a means for people searching for these terms—which are out there, no matter why you think they are—to find the right topics. Or if the content doesn't clearly belong in an existing article, then change the title of these so it can stay where it is.

The fact that articles overlap with each other doesn't mean we go around blanking the ones we judge to be the least finished or most poorly organized and cited; the fact that an article describes something badly or characterizes it wrongly doesn't justify its deletion. This isn't how collaborative editing works. Fix problems, assume good faith, and in almost all cases assume that there is something worth preserving before moving to the deletion process for articles about substantial topics (it doesn't fail to be a topic because you think it's mischaracterized as A when it's really a part of B) that have been part of Wikipedia for over ten years. P Aculeius (talk) 17:41, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@P Aculeius: I already figured out what's factual, usable (nothing), or disposable (everything), and I wouldn't have started this AfD if I hadn't already done that. Demanding other editors to do "collaborative editing" when they disagree with your preferred course of action, while doing nothing yourself, is a very shitty thing to do. The only thing that matters is reliable sources, which are absent here, and everything you said is time-wasting procedural nonsense based on a perversion of the guidelines and of common sense. But, since you'll never be convinced, lets do some "collaborative editing" ourselves. This will be quick, I promise. The "Sulla's civil wars" is pure OR, it was only created because more than one title exists with that theme. Can we delete that one, "merge" Sulla's first civil war back to Sulla, move Sulla's second civil war to Sulla's civil war, and call it a compromise? This is still a place to discuss this. Avilich (talk) 18:14, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Your argument is basically WP:TNT and an attempt to avoid collaborative editing, which is a core policy of Wikipedia. You cannot get out of it by complaining that somebody else is demanding it of you without giving you something in return. Instead of complaining about policies, follow them or stop demanding that everything that doesn't meet your standards be wiped from existence. P Aculeius (talk) 18:29, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@P Aculeius: I'm not avoiding collaborative editing, I'm arguing that editors' hypothetical collaboration in the future will be put to better use if things are done my way. Nothing I'm proposing contradicts policy; the only policy that's immediately applicable here is that of reliable sources, everything else is just a misguided waste of time on your part. There's nothing inherently wrong with TNT (not what I'm proposing here anyway), it's an essay, and so not explicitly against WP policy. And can you answer my question please? If you're going to disrupt my work as usual, at least give an input, something worth considering, an alternative. Would you consider what I put forward as a compromise, which is more or less similar to T8612's option 1 below? Avilich (talk) 18:42, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I'm really tired of your combative attitude, constant insults, refusal to consider anybody else's point of view, and utter lack of regard for either the work of other editors or basic Wikipedia policies. I've already replied to you three times and you're not listening. I'm not going to keep arguing with somebody who considers everything a waste of his time and everything he doesn't agree with a waste of space. You're absolutely determined to do whatever the heck you want no matter what anybody else says, so why even bother starting a discussion? Don't keep pinging me—I already gave you my answer, and it's not my job to keep refactoring it to suit your demands before you're willing to acknowledge it as anything but a waste, a perversion, or whatever other rubbish you want to call it because it doesn't tell you what you want to hear. P Aculeius (talk) 18:59, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not the one being inflexible here. It's twice already I asked for your own opinion on how to handle this, anything that is not just reactive ("you can't do this b/c reasons!"), and I'm still waiting for an answer. One such input has already been proposed below, and I didn't even need to tell its author how to behave himself and how to convey his message. Avilich (talk) 19:07, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Comment, this series of articles bugged me long ago. The main problem is that there is no real common names for all these events, nor a common chronology. The period from the Social War to Sulla's dictatorship (or even Aemilius Lepidus' attempted coup in 78) was very violent and confused. Sulla's first civil war was hardly a "civil war", as there was only brief fighting, with civilians and freed slaves opposing Sulla's army. It looked more like a coup, because he forced Marius and others to exile, then amended the constitution. *After* Sulla had left to fight Mithridates, there was an actual civil war between the consuls Octavius and Cinna, with pitched battles; currently there is no article covering these events.

I see two possible moves:

(1) Rename Sulla's first civil war to Sulla's march on Rome (2) Create a page Bellum Octavianum or War between Octavius and Cinna (3) delete Sulla's second civil war or redirect it to Sulla's civil war (singular) (4) delete Sulla's civil wars.

Wouldn't it need to be "Sulla's first march on Rome", to avoid confusion with the later one? Right now merging the three into "Sulla's civil war", singlular, sounds like the best solution, treating all of them as a larger sequence of events that cannot easily be separated (although there would still be the potential to split off detailed topics, hopefully with better titles). P Aculeius (talk) 18:37, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

There's too big a gap (5 years) between the first march and the war of 83, and the two events are not immediately related, there being a civil war in between. A single Sulla's civil war for the war of 83, and possibly another article for the march of 88, is a better arrangement. There wasn't really a 'second march' in 83, not in the way the 'first' one happened. Avilich (talk) 18:54, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The problem is it leaves out the conflict between Fimbria and Sulla in the East, while it was part of this civil war. It seems that there was a continuous war between 87 and 81—without combat in some years (85 and 84). I prefer explaining the concatenation of these complex events into one main article.

On the subject of "Sulla's march on Rome" [granted, we should add "(88 BC)"], the current article only mentions "After restructuring the city's politics and with the Senate's power strengthened"; in fact Sulla passed a series of important constitutional reforms. I think the current article on Sulla is already too large to deal with these events in detail. T8612 (talk) 21:05, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Another, bolder solution, is to consider all the events of 88-81 BC as a whole by merging everything and calling them First civil war of the Roman Republic (note: it's currently a redirect to Sulla's first civil war). It would echo Last war of the Roman Republic (between Antony and Octavian) and this is what has been done on the Spanish Wikipedia. I favour the second solution, although creating individual articles may still be possible. T8612 (talk) 18:21, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Finally, a worthwhile answer. What I'm suggesting here in this AfD is more or less your option 1. Note that Sulla's civil war already redirects to Sulla's second civil war, so only a simple move here is required. I prefer option 1, since op. 2 is wp:synth, it wasn't all a single civil war, despite the conflicts being obviously related. Brennan's Praetorship in the Roman Republic (p. 963) lists the conflicts separately, and I think Wikipedia should do so too. I don't think Sulla's march on Rome needs an article at all: the event's importance lies in the context of Sulla himself and the history of the Roman Republic, and Wikipedia's articles on both subjects already cover that. But, if we can agree on 1, I think we can call it a day. Avilich (talk) 18:34, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I vote for T8612's bolder soliution.

IMO, if you are going to label something as some particular thing in the title of an article, you are making a claim that this is the consensus opinion as to how it is referred to by the majority of scholars. That better be supportable. In this case it isn't, and reading through this discussion shows that everyone admits that.

An occasional mention is not sufficient to support the kind of claim a title makes. At least not without mentioning in the article that it is only occasionally thought of in the way the article speaks of it - and in this particular case that would just be an internal contradiction that would seem stupid.

If they are dealt with together, as T8612 suggests, both bases are covered. The connection between these events, whether there is any, and whether or not one was actually a civil war, can be discussed in the body of the article, and the categories will get cleaned up as Avilich suggests. The existing titles of Sulla one and two can become redirects.

We provide the relevant information and let our readers make up their own minds about things like this. Don't delete, combine and fix accordingly is my vote.Jenhawk777 (talk) 19:47, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I do think that Sulla's civil wars (the plural) should be deleted. Title is an error, and its content is worthless. T8612 (talk) 21:05, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@T8612 and Jenhawk777: The 'bolder' solution is an additional step to the previous option. We don't actually have a Bellum Octavianum article yet, so we're not in a position to merge everything into a single civil war article encompassing everything between 88 and 80 BC. In the shorter term, we don't seem to really disagree that Sulla's civil wars (plural) is useless, and that Sulla's first civil war (if it's to be kept) needs to be at least renamed. A hypothetical grand merge in the future is kind of beyond the scope of this AfD, but could well come after that when the means become available, and in the meantime we can agree on a specific fate for those two articles I nominated. Avilich (talk) 21:48, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I support deleting Sulla's civil wars and renaming Sulla's first civil war to Sulla's march on Rome (88 BC) and Sulla's second civil war to Sulla's civil war. Perhaps you will have to relist these discussions separately. T8612 (talk) 19:00, 18 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

~~Merge~~Delete both Sulla#First_march_on_Rome and Sulla#Second_march_on_Rome adequately cover these, and it's strange to have an additional article summarize the two events when that's what the main Sulla article does. Reywas92^Talk 20:47, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Reywas92: the "second march", which is the only genuine "Sulla's civil war", has enough wp:sigcov to exist as its own standalone article, and is not part of the nomination. I can agree with merging Sulla's first civil war into Sulla#First_march_on_Rome (there's nothing to merge, but whatever). Are you also saying Sulla's civil wars should be deleted, then? Just to know if we're on the same page and can agree on a common course of action. Avilich (talk) 21:48, 17 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, one article for the second march, one on Sulla overall. No separate article on the first march, no separate article summarizing both marches when the main one already does. Reywas92^Talk 05:16, 18 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Merge as appropriate; I would suggest Crisis of the Roman Republic as another option. Bearian (talk) 14:51, 23 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Sandstein 09:25, 24 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. only commenting on the present article and not the related ones. There was only one "Sulla's Civil War", so the title is wrong, while the content is OR, coming from unreliable sources, such as "janusquirinus.org". T8612 (talk) 18:47, 24 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Note to closer/relister This is not, as has been claimed, an issue of notability. Sulla's first civil war is an OR piece claiming there's a civil war where there's none, and Sulla's civil wars (also unreferenced) was only created, to begin with, because the name of the first implies (incorrectly) there's more than one civil war which might be styled as such. The single evidence against this offered til now is a non-specialist reference which uses these very articles as a source, so that shows the harm in leaving these pages just lying around. Merging this is odd since the content by all rights falls within WP:DON'T PRESERVE and WP:DEL-REASON, so that would be de facto redirect, though I don't think any of the titles are appropriate for this either.
If this were to be closed right now, I think there's at least a case for deleting Sulla's civil wars here, which is supported by myself, T8612, and Reywas (despite the latter's call for 'merging' the other one). As Reywas notes, there's no need for a third article (which, again, is completely unsourced and OR) to sum up and repeat the contents of other two; the keep voters, in their general dismissiveness, have neglected to address this. Avilich (talk) 15:31, 26 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: I think we have rough consensus to merge this content somewhere. The "keep" opinions don't refute the argument that this classification into several wars is OR; to do that the "keep" opinions would need to cite sources that make this classification. But we still don't have consensus where to merge this content to.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Sandstein 08:02, 1 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Updated vote to clarify that there doesn't seem to be much content that needs to be merged since the main articles have everything already. This doesn't seem too complicated to consolidate in accordance with the sources without duplication. Reywas92^Talk 03:11, 3 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment One of the merge voters has switched his support for deletion, so I ask that the closer now consider this as a course of action. I still don't see how merging is appropriate, since the subject is already covered elsewhere, wikipedia policy states that OR should not be preserved and is a reason for deletion, and the article titles are worthless as redirects. I've seen no relevant policy or adequate sources from those seeking to keep, only inertia; and the lonely pure merge vote fails to provide a rationale. Avilich (talk) 17:50, 3 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete In my view, there is nothing left to say here. Jenhawk777 (talk) 19:55, 6 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
- Okay, I have contemplated everything everyone has said here, and I realize that I've been a little back and forth on this as each good argument has appeared, but I think all the arguments have been made now, and there seems no doubt the best set of options has been put forth by T8612 which includes delete Sulla's civil wars as supported by Avilich and others. Jenhawk777 (talk) 01:38, 9 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.