Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Biddenden Maids/archive1

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 Laser brain 15:29, 1 December 2010 [1].

Biddenden Maids[edit]

Featured article candidates/Biddenden Maids/archive1

Nominator(s): – iridescent 12:49, 15 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

One of the odder surviving remnants of old English folk tradition. Each year at Easter, the elderly and widows of the small town of Biddenden (and a large crowd of tourists) gather for a free handout of bread, cheese, tea and biscuits imprinted with a picture of conjoined twins, in a ceremony which has gone on for at least 300 and possibly as many as 900 years. There are three competing theories for the origins of this bizarre tradition: that it genuinely commemorates two adult conjoined twins from the year 1100 (which would make them one of the oldest documented cases ever recorded); that the twins existed, but in the 16th century; that the twins are a folk myth based on the unusual cake design, which was actually intended to represent poor widows. I think this article gives equal weight to all three theories (none of which, unless someone digs up a conjoined skeleton one day in Biddenden churchyard, will ever be provable), and neutrally explains the arguments for and against each. – iridescent 12:49, 15 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sources comments: nitpicks only:-

~~Consistency required with "Retrieved" and "retrieved"~~
~~"Bibliography" is a slightly misleading title (it could comprise sources and further reading). Better to call it "Sources", Incidentally, I can't see a citation to the "Sylvanus Urban" source.~~

Otherwise sources and citations look OK. Spotchecks on online sources reveal nothing amiss. Brianboulton (talk) 15:13, 15 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Ref 12 is the citation to Urban (it's cited 5 times, but all to the same page so it only shows up once in the reflist). The Retrieved/retrieved was due to a {{cite web}} sneaking in, now fixed. – iridescent 15:28, 15 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Apologies re Urban - blame age, myopia etc. Brianboulton (talk) 19:00, 15 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hasted: For consistency, shouldn't the Hasted references use the {{sfn}}. Rather than the British History Online websource (verbatim text?), The Weald website has scanned pages of the actual work, and would seem to be a better websource, as no errors from the original can be made. this is the page with the mention of "vulgar tradition". Mjroots (talk) 06:35, 16 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Any citations I add anywhere are to the edition I've used; if it's print, I cite the particular print edition I've used; if it's online, I cite the online source. "Consistency" is a red herring; citation/core outputs results in a standardized form. I don't see any reason to use a particular edition of a source, unless there's a material difference between the editions. I don't think anyone has ever had any concerns about British History Online's web-reprints of historic texts; since they're squarely in Ealdgyth's area of work, one can be pretty certain that if there were any issues with it, they would have been raised long ago. If you're going to oppose over this, so be it; especially in the current climate, I have no intention of lying about sourcing. – iridescent 07:47, 16 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It was just a suggestion. If British History Online is deemed to be very accurate, then I won't oppose it's use. I'd have used The Weald myself, but thats just my preference. Mjroots (talk) 08:32, 16 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

DAB/EL Check - no dabs, no external link problems. Corrected one external redirect (.org to .com). --Pres N 19:47, 19 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Support: the article reads well; no problems there. I could find no instances of close paraphrasing in samples of the passages cited from Bondeson (1992). I was able to find a few sources not cited here. [2] calls the Biddenden Maids the earliest well-documented case of conjoined twins (!). doi:10.1002/ajmg.10070 cites the following sources on the Maids:

Ballantyne JW. 1895. The Biddenden Maids: the medieval pygopagus. Teratologia 2: 268–274.
GouldGM, PyleWL. 1896. Anomalies and curiosities of medicine. New York: Julian Press (1956 reprint).
Guttmacher AF. 1967. Biographical notes on some famous conjoined twins. Birth Defects (OAS) 3: 10–17.

JSTOR 20271788, from the 1902 British Medical Journal, does not seem to provide any more data than are already in the article. This book may have some more material, but Google Books won't let me see the relevant pages. This is another with some possibly good material, and it quotes large pieces of Ballantyne. ISBN 9781566890359 is a novel that mentions the Chulkhurst sisters.

None of these seem likely to have much more relevant information. Ucucha 22:00, 26 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! I don't have access to those three, but as Bondeson's paper and the expanded version in the book (both cited) cite them, I assume they don't have anything substantive to add (it's very much a story full of holes). Calling them "well-documented" is stretching it, since (assuming the story is genuine) the only documentation for the first 600 years is a biscuit design, so I don't really want to include that. They're generally considered the second recorded case in Europe; there's a case from circa 940 AD in Byzantine records. Other cultures, particularly in Latin America, have depictions of conjoined twins going back much further, so I think it ought to be very vague about any "earliest" claim. – iridescent 22:37, 26 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, those people must have an expansive view of the meaning of the word "well-documented". That paper also cites some other early Eurasian cases, by the way, including one in Cappadocia in 970 (perhaps the one you're referring to). It doesn't seem too relevant to this article, although a history of conjoined twins would be interesting. Ucucha 22:43, 26 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There's Conjoined twins#Conjoined twins in history already; that's in such a poor state, I don't think it warrants splitting off. (For obvious reasons, I have no intention of touching any medical article, especially one as potentially contentious as that, with a barge-pole.) – iridescent 23:29, 26 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Support A terrific read, and no real queries, ~~although perhaps you could assure me that "The Two Headed Nightingale" in note 10 lacks the hyphen in your source too.~~ Jimfbleak - talk to me? 16:51, 28 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks... It does lack the hyphen, but I notice that our Millie and Christine McCoy does include it. Bondeson's Swedish and may not be familiar with the quirks of English punctuation—as you may guess, I've no opinions either way on whether or not it's hyphenated. – iridescent 17:16, 28 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Support. This is just about as good an article on a cake as I ever expect to see. Malleus Fatuorum 01:32, 30 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Support - I don't think my minor editing of the article disqualifies me from participation here. I can't see any major problems with the article that prevent it from reaching FA status. Mjroots (talk) 21:38, 30 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.