Talk:Hipparchus

Scientific consensus

This page is littered with references to Dennis Rawlins and his work, or that of his friends and collaborators. DR is known for his fringe claims and his work has not passed the peer review of other astronomers, historians of astronomy, and historians of science in general.

I don’t have the time or knowledge to verify all the claims attached to his name on this page. I’m hoping someone will do it sooner than later.

CielProfond (talk) 00:32, 15 June 2022 (UTC)

Still waiting for a cleanup… I’ll start one myself… It’s sad that this page doesn’t attract real historians of astronomy… CielProfond (talk) 20:10, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for that CielProfond. I wonder if any experts can be found to check up on what is here or suggest additions/changes. –jacobolus (t) 23:23, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

It would be nice indeed… as long as they’re not self-appointed “experts” like one in particular that I have named above and of whose material I have mostly removed.

CielProfond (talk) 01:02, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

Discovery of ancient star map

An ancient star map being credited to Hipparchus was discovered as a document in a palimpsest, meaning that it had been scraped off & the parchment reused for a a religious codex. Having recognized it as a palimpsest, researchers looking for earlier texts viewed it through multispectral imaging & found the astronomical work.

• Turner, Ben (2022-10-21). "World's oldest complete star map, lost for millennia, found inside medieval manuscript". livescience.com. Retrieved 2022-10-21.
• Gysembergh, Victor; J. Williams, Peter; Zingg, Emanuel (2022-10-18). "New evidence for Hipparchus' Star Catalogue revealed by multispectral imaging". Journal for the History of Astronomy. 53 (4). SAGE Publications: 383–393. doi:10.1177/00218286221128289. ISSN 0021-8286.

Peaceray (talk) 21:55, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

Opinions on images

Does anyone have any opinions on whether an imaginary representation of Hipparchus should be used, or should it just be left without any image in the infobox? SaturatedFatts (talk) 05:56, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I disagree with @David Eppstein that the portraits should all be removed or relegated to the bottom sections of the page. This change doesn't seem to me to reflect prevailing practice on other articles (as one example Euclid has a 17th century portrait at the top), or Wikipedia consensus, and in my opinion it does a disservice to readers.

Even if these are fictional interpretations, readers enjoy seeing how historical figures have been imagined, and articles are in my opinion significantly improved by the inclusion of some images sprinkled about, which attract attention and liven up our otherwise stodgy presentation. In my opinion whatever freely available portraits we can find of Hipparchus should be included, even if they were made by artists centuries after his death, and a few should be included nearish to the top of the page. –jacobolus (t) 05:58, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Fictional interpretations may be and often are seriously misleading. They say more about the beliefs of 19th-century engravers about the ancient Greeks than they do about the subjects themselves. That is why they should only be presented with sourced commentary in the body of an article, not as a lead image, presented in Wikipedia's voice as "that is what the person really looked like". If there is something sourceable to say about these random engravings, we can do that.

Also, it's not just my personal opinion. See WP:PORTRAIT. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:01, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

What you are linking to in your misleading appeal to authority is an essay which reflects the (controversial) opinion of a few Wikipedians, not representative of any site-wide consensus. –jacobolus (t) 06:04, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

But we are meant to ignore all rules if we feel like ignoring them makes an article better. If some sort of consensus comes into existence here, I think we should reinstate an image, but I won’t change anything right now. SaturatedFatts (talk) 06:06, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

It's an essay which represents the opinions of multiple Wikipedians. Exactly as I says when I wrote "not just my personal opinions".

At least, this time, it's not an illustration taken from an American children's historical fantasy with made-up motivational quotes attributing American sensibilities to the subject. But it still provides absolutely no reliable information about Hipparchus to readers. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:10, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

We may also want to include this 19th century print which was described as a representation of Hipparchus in an 1898 book. –jacobolus (t) 06:00, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

What even is he holding and why isn't it an astrolabe? And when is he supposed to have traveled to Giza? See "seriously misleading", above. Do we have scholarly commentary on this image, or just the book it was taken from? —David Eppstein (talk) 06:04, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

We don't actually have any strong evidence that Hipparchus ever made a planar astrolabe. All we have is not particularly creditworthy attribution given 500 years later. There's unfortunately a fair bit of dubious textual information in this article, which does not stick closely to the consensus claims of modern expert historians. –jacobolus (t) 06:12, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

That is a very bad excuse for putting even more dubious information in an image in the lead of an article without even any explanatory text explaining why it is so dubious. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:15, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I didn't say this particular print should be put into the lead. I would recommend restoring the wood block which was there for a long time previously. –jacobolus (t) 06:17, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

What information does it provide to readers? How much of that information can be relied on? —David Eppstein (talk) 06:23, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

The purpose of Wikipedia is not only to inject factual trivia directly into readers' memories while bypassing their emotions and senses, but also to draw them in, excite them, keep their attention, and leave them feeling satisfied. Adding images, even mediocre images, makes articles dramatically more appealing and engaging. (Notice, for example, that all of the social media websites have switched to the long-parade-of-images format, and that magazines sell far more copies than scholarly monographs.)

We should always try to scatter images throughout our presentation, not to the point of cluttering the page up, but enough to break up an intimidating wall of text. An article that does not have sufficient images is frankly always deficient, even if sometimes these inappropriately get a "GA" badge slapped on them. When possible, these images should be e.g. direct photographs of the subject, scans of their manuscripts, or the like. But when such material is not available, an artists' depiction with a caption explaining its source is dramatically better for the project than nothing at all. –jacobolus (t) 06:35, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Exactly. Putting an image like that into the lead injects factual trivia directly into readers' memories, bypassing their critical faculties. They may well see only that lead image and remember only that from the article. So it is crucial that what we present as the lead image have some basis in fact. Instead, you want to present to them something that is entirely fiction. That is a wholly unencyclopedic thing to do. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:38, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

In other words, you think readers are too stupid to read and understand captions, but you expect them to patiently sit through a giant wall of text. –jacobolus (t) 06:47, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I think that the information we present to readers as trustworthy should in fact be trustworthy. That way we don't have to have high or low expectations of them, only of ourselves. If we don't present them an inaccurate image, we don't have to worry about whether some of them see through the inaccuracies and others don't. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:50, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

It simply allows the reader to see how people have imagined the historical figure in other historical periods. It’s obviously far worse than a source from antiquity or something, but as a reader more than an editor I quite like having an image at the top of articles. SaturatedFatts (talk) 06:36, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

An image with sourced commentary in a section about later perceptions of Hipparchus would perform what you say. I would have no objection to other images there, with proper commentary, even the one with the telescope in ancient Alexandria (if commentary on that can be sourced). That is not the function of the lead image, though. It is to give readers who don't read the whole article an accurate impression of the subject. We can't do that by presenting some random engraver's imagination of the subject. We can't expect readers to understand that this image was drawn from imagination 2000 years later rather than engraved from life in the time of Hipparchus, with the limited space we have to explain such things in an infobox. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:40, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Also, I was going to say that it doesn't even have any provenance, but that appears to be untrue: it is essentially the same as an image from a Greek postage stamp on Hipparchus from 1965, commemorating the opening of the Eugenides Planetarium. That stamp is still under copyright. So either it's a copyvio, or both it and the stamp come from a common earlier source which is unknown to us. Any idea which? —David Eppstein (talk) 06:34, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Greek postage stamps before 1970 are arguably in the public domain as works of the Greek government. Seems like there's some controversy and it hasn't been tested? –jacobolus (t) 06:43, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

It's apparently under debate. Commons:Category:Stamps of Greece says not to upload them to commons unless/until this is resolved or they fall out of the stricter life+70 copyright window. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:48, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

The postage stamp was apparently modeled on https://books.google.com/books?id=CoE-AAAAYAAJ&pg=PA161 of which I'll try to find a better scan. –jacobolus (t) 06:53, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Nice find. If you could upload a better scan of that, I think that would make for a good opening image SaturatedFatts (talk) 06:56, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

In what sense is it any better? It is still a random 19th-century engraving, in a hagiography of a purported plagiarist. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:58, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Because it claims to be based on an ancient artifact. But if that man is known to be a less than reliable source, then maybe it isn’t. SaturatedFatts (talk) 07:03, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

The postage stamp image and the image we were using have the same lines; your book image does not. On the other hand, our image has lost the star at his chin, used in both the postage stamp and the book image. In any case, copyright is the least of the problems here. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:56, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

The book image is a 19th century sketch of an ancient metal image, and it was clearly the inspiration for the stamp. (I agree the stamp image per se plausibly has some copyright concern.) I'll try to find the sources discussing its discovery. Here is a better scan: https://archive.org/details/briefbiographypo00webbrich/page/n326/mode/1up –jacobolus (t) 06:58, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Apparently there are actually Roman coins from Nicaea from only several hundred years after the time of Hipparchus, depicting him [1] [2]. That is still too recent to be an accurate image but at least it tells a story that we could include as text in the article, if we could find a usable image of such a coin. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:04, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

The existence of these coins is briefly mentioned in doi:10.1016/0315-0860(79)90030-2, which points out "none of these depictions are contemporary, all being of Imperial times when the cities issuing the coins were recalling past glories." —David Eppstein (talk) 07:25, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Oh I missed these comments until just now. Those might be a better lead image. –jacobolus (t) 08:32, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Though it's a bit hard to make out details from https://rpc.ashmus.ox.ac.uk/rev/180336/high –jacobolus (t) 08:34, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

@David Eppstein here is a coin with a clearer picture of seated Hipparchus on the back. –jacobolus (t) 14:59, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

That looks good, I think that should also be added to the article somewhere. SaturatedFatts (talk) 17:31, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

My only question is whether we can get an image with a clear open license (or with a clear provenance as being photographed in a country where accurate and non-artistic photographic representation of non-copyrighted objects like ancient coins has been clearly determined to be non-copyrightable). There's a discussion on this at [3] and Commons:Commons:Reuse of PD-Art photographs. If we can find a photo of one of these coins, taken face-on like the ones you link, that is clearly taken in the US, I think we're ok to upload it and use it per the precedent of Bridgeman vs Corel. If it was taken in a different country (like the one in your link, from the UK), that might not be true. —David Eppstein (talk) 17:55, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

It sounds like the UK doesn't have entirely settled case law, but the clearest precedent applies a test of whether the photograph is "the author’s own intellectual creation", which I think would be hard to argue for a straight-on photograph of a coin with no other framing, arrangement, or context. There's really only so much you can do with lighting such a photograph, and calling it creative is a pretty big stretch. So I'd be inclined to just go for it on UK photographs of coins (and if someone sends a takedown we can honor the request), but I imagine there are some Wikipedians who are more conservative. –jacobolus (t) 02:44, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

Okay, I see, both the sketch and the stamp were depictions of the same ancient metal coin. Here's from Chambers: https://archive.org/details/handbookofdescri03chamuoft/page/n7/ –jacobolus (t) 07:03, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I don't think that's the right link. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:04, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Scroll down one page SaturatedFatts (talk) 07:07, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

"Coin": not found in that book. It has the same depiction, but I don't see a description of its provenance. At least a scan from that would resolve the copyright and quality issues, but we can and should do better. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:11, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

You’re right, I think the one here https://archive.org/details/briefbiographypo00webbrich/page/n326/mode/1up is better. At least it actually claims to be a drawing of a depiction from antiquity. SaturatedFatts (talk) 07:14, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

It clearly states that it's redrawn from someone else's drawing in Chambers' book, with additions from said plagiarist. As such it's not an improvement. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:16, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Yes, but what we can get from the caption in that source is that both drawings (and later the stamp) depict an ancient metal "cameo" found by Admiral Smyth in the Mediterranean c. 1813. Since this has been widely used as a depiction of Hipparchus, including e.g. by the Greek government in the form of a stamp, some form of this image clearly has encyclopedic value. But we should replace the image currently on Commons with the best scan we can find and then clearly document the source. –jacobolus (t) 07:25, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

What we get from the source is that See elaborated. I don't think he can be trusted, even regarding the provenance of the image, especially because this information appears nowhere in Chambers. We also have no idea without much better sourcing whether "ancient" means from the ancient world, or carved for the tourist trade in the early 19th century. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:26, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Even if it is a fraud, the Greek government fell for it. That alone, in my opinion, should be enough for it to have encyclopedic value and a higher resolution scan of it would be a good leading image. That’s just what I think. SaturatedFatts (talk) 07:38, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I think David means that he doesn't trust Webb's book about TJJ See in explaining the provenance of this image. That doesn't necessarily reflect on Chambers. –jacobolus (t) 07:40, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Yes, that's what I meant. The stamp is clearly copied from Chambers, not from See's copy of chambers. Chambers says nothing that I can find about the image so there is nothing to impugn. Incidentally, "metal cameo" makes no sense. If it is metal it is not a cameo and if it is a cameo it is not metal. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:46, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

You are right. Sorry for misunderstanding about the material. –jacobolus (t) –jacobolus (t) 08:13, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I haven't been able to track down more yet about Smyth's supposed discovery, but I think I'm going to call it a night. I'll try to put a little bit more time into this tomorrow, but no promises. In any event, if we can't find a better image I think we should find the highest resolution scan we can of Chambers's print, and paste that over the image currently in Commons which has unclear provenance. –jacobolus (t) 07:44, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Okay here's one crumb: "From W. H. Smyth, Chelsea, England, August 20, 1842: Acknowledging bulletin No. 2, and forwarding his privately printed catalogue of Roman brass medals; also, specimens of impressions of the head of Hipparchus, from the Poniatowski-gem, intended as a vignette illustration of his work." https://books.google.com/books?id=cNdRAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA258 –jacobolus (t) 07:54, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

One last note. This impression was used first in Smyth's (1844) book A Cycle of Celestial Objects, on the title page. If the original object was really a Poniatowski gem then that's definitely not "ancient" (I wonder where See/Webb came up with the "fished out of the sea" story), but still kind of interesting. –jacobolus (t) 08:11, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I feel like the image I uploaded is better because it does not include the Egyptian elements common in modern representations of Hipparchus which are completely wrong. SaturatedFatts (talk) 06:07, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

At least it's not the one with the telescope in ancient Egypt. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:36, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I propose restoring the previously established lead image (1), which was used on a Greek stamp (2), and may be based on an ancient cameo (I can't confirm that last point). The other 19th century depictions listed above could of course be added to the "Legacy" section of the article, which needs expanding. 𝕱𝖎𝖈𝖆𝖎𝖆 (talk) 07:35, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I think instead of using that low resolution scan from an unknown source, we should use a higher resolution scan from one of the books linked in this conversation. SaturatedFatts (talk) 07:44, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Here's another depiction of Hipparchus from a 1559 book, http://www.sites.hps.cam.ac.uk/starry/hipparchuslrg.jpg –jacobolus (t) 07:37, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

With what appears to be a quadrant, also ahistorical but better than a telescope. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:48, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Do you have any objection to the representation taken from a Greek stamp? This includes no anachronisms as far as I can see. 𝕱𝖎𝖈𝖆𝖎𝖆 (talk) 07:54, 19 July 2023 (UTC) There is a Renaissance (judging by the style) version of the same or a very similar likeness (3), so it's at least that old. Either way, it seems to me a more neutral representation than the Victorian ones mentioned above. 𝕱𝖎𝖈𝖆𝖎𝖆 (talk) 08:16, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Your "Renaissance" likeness is a 19th century sketch by TJJ See of an impression made by Admiral WH Smyth of some carved stone depiction of Hipparchus, possibly from the early 19th century. See the discussion above. –jacobolus (t) 08:19, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

And regarding its merits as a lead image what is your opinion? 𝕱𝖎𝖈𝖆𝖎𝖆 (talk) 08:21, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I think we should use it as a lead image for now, but we should pull the best scan we can find to overwrite the current commons image which has unknown provenance, either this one or some scan of Chambers's book. The caption should be clear that it's a 19th century conception, and the image description page should explain the details as clearly and accurately as we can make out. –jacobolus (t) 08:28, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I think we should use a scan from https://archive.org/details/cycleofcelestial02smytrich/page/n10/mode/1up or https://archive.org/details/handbookofdescri03chamuoft/page/n7/ instead since See’s version might just be a copy claiming to be based on a cameo. SaturatedFatts (talk) 08:28, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Hipparchus
19th century engraving supposedly based on an antique cameo of Hipparchus
Born	c. 190 BC Nicaea, Kingdom of Bithynia (modern-day İznik, Bursa, Turkey)
Died	c. 120 BC (around age 70) Rhodes, Roman Republic (modern-day Greece)
Occupations	Astronomer Mathematician Geographer

How about this? 𝕱𝖎𝖈𝖆𝖎𝖆 (talk) 08:37, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I think that looks great. We should go ahead and put it in. SaturatedFatts (talk) 08:41, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

That looks like an improvement on the former. Per MOS:LEADIMAGE, "Lead images should be natural and appropriate representations of the topic; they should not only illustrate the topic specifically, but also be the type of image used for similar purposes in high-quality reference works, and therefore what our readers will expect to see." If there is an image emblazoned on a handbook of astronomy, that is a high-quality reference work, and a portrait is what one would naturally/appropriately expect to see on a biography. Iskandar323 (talk) 08:40, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Drop the part about the 'antique cameo' which seems to be a made up story, and replace with 'possibly based on a Poniatowski gem' or similar. –jacobolus (t) 08:58, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I added a footnote and uploaded a crop of a better scan. –jacobolus (t) 09:58, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

This image and the provenance you found for it should definitely be included in the article somewhere, possibly also with a textual description of its re-use in the 1965 postage stamp. I'm still not convinced that it's good as a lead image, but the caption helps. If we have a section on later depictions of Hipparchus, we should also discuss the Roman coins, and the anachronism of showing him in Egypt with non-contemporary instruments, to the extent that we can source that. —David Eppstein (talk) 17:48, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I'm going to try to make a composite image of 4–5 coins showing Hipparchus on the reverse. –jacobolus (t) 17:52, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Two more possible images to include (cropped) somewhere on this page: File:Astronomy; the allegorical titlepage to frisicae lunae-solar Wellcome V0024840.jpg, File:Astronomy; the allegorical titlepage to Tabulae frisicae lun Wellcome V0024826.jpg. –jacobolus (t) 09:01, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Here is a nice high-resolution 19th century engraving of a seated Hipparchus, as found in the 1880 book Museum of Antiquity. We can tell it's supposed to be him because the coin at his feet says 'ΙΠΠΑΡΧΟΣ' on it, but it's bizarrely included in an irrelevant section of the book. Update: I found the original source, Figuier 1866. –jacobolus (t) 19:17, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Dang, if I saw this in time I could’ve told you that. That’s the exact image from the exact same book I uploaded and used as the lead image before David reverted it. SaturatedFatts (talk) 20:07, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

@SaturatedFatts: Where'd you find the scan of File:Hipparchus.jpg? –jacobolus (t) 02:20, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

@Jacobolus I found it here: https://archive.org/details/b24873986/page/n348/mode/1up SaturatedFatts (talk) 05:04, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

In case people aren't following over at Poniatowski gem, I'm now reasonably convinced that Smyth's gem was one; a (real) fake antique, matching Poniatowski's description of one. See:

"Head of Hipparchus", CARC (Oxford):1839-881, described in Poniatowski's (c. 1830 – 1833) catalog (VIII.2.60, vol. 1, p. 105, vol. 2, p. 52) and included in Christie's 1839 auction (No. 881), with whereabouts since unknown.

From Poniatowski (1833), p. 52: "... Dans‎ ‎le‎ ‎champ‎ ‎de‎ ‎cette‎ ‎pierre‎ ‎on‎ ‎voit‎ ‎une étoile‎ ‎et‎ ‎en‎ ‎beaux‎ ‎caractères‎ ‎le‎ ‎nom‎ ‎du‎ ‎sujet.‎ ‎Améthyste‎." [In the field of this stone we see a star and in beautiful characters the name of the subject. Amethyst.]

–jacobolus (t) 23:29, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

The Commons images depicting or linked from Q159905 (Hipparchus) that you view here may be useful. Peaceray (talk) 17:06, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

More images

It is suggested here that this carved (16th century) Lapis Lazuli at the Fitzwilliam museum may represent Hipparchus. –jacobolus (t) 15:59, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

Improving citations

There is are problems an inconsistencies with the citations in this article.

• Most citations use templates, some do not.
• There are a couple of citation templates that generate an error or a warning. Users who have have a common.css file with the line .citation-comment {display: inline !important;} will see these warnings.
• There are shortened footnotes & full citations, but the shortened footnotes are unlinked to these citations. The guide on how to do this is at Help:Shortened footnotes.

Among the list at WP:CITEVAR#Generally considered helpful are:

• improving existing citations by adding missing information, such as by replacing bare URLs with full bibliographic citations: an improvement because it aids verifiability, and fights link rot;
• imposing one style on an article with inconsistent citation styles (e.g., some of the citations in footnotes and others as parenthetical references): an improvement because it makes the citations easier to understand and edit;
• fixing errors in citation coding, including incorrectly used template parameters, and <ref> markup problems: an improvement because it helps the citations to be parsed correctly;
• replacing opaque named reference names with conventional ones, such as "Einstein-1905" instead of ":27".

I plan to convert citations to citation templates, improve citations when possible, add ISBN, OCLC, URL & other applicable parameters such as, correct errors, & link shortened footnotes to full citations. Peaceray (talk) 16:54, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

Go for it! (At this article and others. No need for a detailed explanation. If anyone disagrees with your specific choices they can start a discussion / suggest alternatives.) Feel free to copyedit, reorganize, etc. while you are at it; this article could use some amount of general cleanup. –jacobolus (t) 19:31, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

@Peaceray do you mind making the reference names a bit shorter? "hoffmann" or "hoffmann2018" is fine, it doesn't have to be "Hoffmann 2018 pp. 281–281". –jacobolus (t) 06:04, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

I am fine with shortening. We should use at least the author year combination. If there is more than one reference with the same author/year, so in that case we would use hoffman2017, hoffman2017b, hoffman2017c, etc.

I am back at work, so there is limited amount of editing that I can do during the day, so if you wish to make the changes, go ahead.

Incidentally, I use citer.toolforge.org to generate citations, so that is from where the "Hoffmann 2018 p." originates.

I am using "Reply" instead of "edit source", so hopefully that should prevent unintentional insertion of &​nbsp;. Peaceray (talk) 15:50, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

For sources like journal articles where there's no need for explicit page numbers, it might be better to leave the full citation in the footnote instead of adding an extra layer of indirection to the "works cited" list at the bottom. If the markup for the citation is cluttering the article's source markup, it's possible to move it down into the {{references}} template under refs=... with a clear name and then insert the footnote into the text using the {{r}} template. –jacobolus (t) 20:10, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

That makes some sense. If the citation has appeared in both the footnotes & Sources section, then I have been improving the Sources citation & put the footnote into {{sfn}} format. But for a journal, we could just as easily put the citation in the footnote, reusing the footnote as need be, & to removed it altogether from the Sources section. Peaceray (talk) 22:19, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

Thinned "works cited" section

Many of the "works cited" were not ever explicitly cited, so I removed them. It's plausible they would be useful to cite, or worth adding to the "further reading" section. –jacobolus (t) 20:06, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

Here is a list of sources I took out

• Duke D.W. (2002). "Associations between the ancient star catalogs". Archive for History of Exact Sciences 56(5):435–450. (Author's draft here.)
• Bianchetti S. (2001). "Dall’astronomia alla cartografia: Ipparco di Nicea". ПОΙΚΙΛΜΑ. Studi in onore di Michelle R. Cataudella in occasione del 60° compleanno. La Spezia: Agorà Edizioni: 145–156.
• Bowen A.C., Goldstein B.R. (1991). "Hipparchus' Treatment of Early Greek Astronomy: The Case of Eudoxus and the Length of Daytime Author(s)". Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 135(2): 233–254.
• Honigmann E. (1929). Die sieben Klimata und die πολεις επισημοι. Eine Untersuchung zur Geschichte der Geographie und Astrologie in Altertum und Mittelalter. Heidelberg: Carl Winter's Universitätsbuchhandlung. 247 S.
• Moore P. (1994). Atlas of the Universe, Octopus Publishing Group LTD (Slovene translation and completion by Tomaž Zwitter and Savina Zwitter (1999): Atlas vesolja): 225.
• Nadal R., Brunet J.P. (1984). "Le "Commentaire" d'Hipparque. I. La sphère mobile. Archive for History of Exact Sciences 29: 201–236.
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