Talk:James Cook/Archive 5

Well done to @Noleander and all others involved in getting this article to GA status which is thoroughly deserved.

However, I am still concerned about the article's coverage of this issue. It currently states:

Some early biographers of Cook speculated that he became increasingly frustrated and irritable on this voyage: exhibiting irrational behaviour towards his crew, such as forcing them to eat walrus meat, which they considered inedible. However, other historians have rejected the suggestion, arguing that Cook's temperament on his final voyage was no different than on earlier voyages.^[1][2][3]

I would say the overwhelming consensus of scholarship is that Cook became increasingly angry, harsh and irrational on his third voyage and there is no difference between older and more recent scholarship on this point. For example, Thomas states in the cited pages that Beaglehole's view of "a tired, angry, violent and irrational Cook" on the third voyage "is widely repeated perhaps most surprisingly by postcolonial scholars". So Thomas is dissenting from a view which he admits is held by most recent (ie postcolonial) scholars. Williams (2008) p 10 states that by January 1779 "Cook was a weary, disappointed, and possibly quite sick man." He also states: "In the North Pacific [on his third voyage] he would be faced with new problems and dangers. They were met resolutely and, and mostly overcome but at a cost to Cook's judgement that in the end resulted in violence and death." (p 8) Williams (pp. 8-9) and Salmond (2003/2004) pp 392-394 highlight the increase in floggings on Cook's third voyage and Cook's stubborn insistence that the crew follow his health regime which almost led to mutiny. Salmond concludes: "Far from being 'cool' and 'rational' Cook had become 'hot tempered' and 'passionate' (in anger, at least)." John Robson in the Captain Cook Encyclopaedia (2004, p 19) writes: "However, any assessment of the [third] voyage must consider Cook, whose age, poor health and tiredness led to erratic behaviour, and actions on this voyage not witnessed before."

I would rewrite this paragraph along the lines of: "Most scholars consider that Cook became increasingly 'tired, angry, violent and irrational' during the third voyage.[Thomas (2003) p 332]. Tensions between Cook and his crew increased, his reprisals against crew and Indigenous people were harsher, and some officers began to question his judgement."[Salmond (2003). pp. 392-394] [Williams (2008) pp. 8-10]. (Perhaps Thomas's dissenting view can be placed in a footnote Wikipedia:WEIGHT. However, his argument does not square with the figures of floggings which he also quotes and his statement that more islanders were killed in Hawaii than in his three voyages up to then.) 

Happy to discuss     Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 03:47, 20 June 2025 (UTC)

You're analysis looks sound. I also felt that that paragraph was not as precise as it could be. Your suggested text looks like it is an accurate reflection of what the sources say. I'm happy to insert the text, or you can, if you want. One change I'd make: I'd avoid including the quoted phrase 'tired, angry, violent and irrational' ... quotes should only be used _very_ rarely; generally it is better to paraphrase in the encyclopedia's voice. In this case, it may be as simple as using those four adjectives directly, without quote marks. Noleander (talk) 04:46, 20 June 2025 (UTC)

I've fiddled around with the wording and citations. You might like to run an eye over it. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 07:22, 20 June 2025 (UTC)

I believe that there should be a brief elaboration on his reprisals against crew and Indigenous people, which I presume means the Hawaiians. Will Thorpe (talk) 10:55, 20 June 2025 (UTC)

Agree that the article could benefit from some more details on punishments/reprisals/kidnapping. Many sources discuss it. Salmond even has list of every documented flogging incident. But rather than mention it in the "Third Voyage" section, my concept is:

1. Rename "Family life" section to "Character and family"
2. Add one or two new paragraphs into that section that summarize Cook's personality and character
3. Sources say, for example: self-control, stoic, quiet, strict, fair, celibate (when voyaging), etc.
4. Included in those new paragraphs would be a sentence or two summarizing his approach to punishments/reprisals: both to crew and to indigenous.

I'm working on a draft of these proposed paragraphs now.

In contrast, the existing text about "Most scholars consider that Cook became increasingly tired, harsh and volatile on this voyage..." probably should stay where it is in the 3rd Voyage section, since that particular behavior was just in the couple of years of his life. Noleander (talk) 12:56, 20 June 2025 (UTC)

I am alright with this approach. Let us see what Aemilius Adolphin's position is. Cheers, Will Thorpe (talk) 13:21, 20 June 2025 (UTC)

@NoleanderThat sounds a very good approach and would be a step towards getting this article up to FA status, if that is your ambition. The Captain Cook Encyclopaedia has an article summarising the medical debate on Cook's declining health which might also fit into a section on "Character, health and family". If you have access to the book, it is a good scholarly source on all aspects of Cook's life, times and legacy. Also good on who was on his ships and who did what when. Robson, John (ed.). (2004). The Captain Cook Encyclopaedia. Sydney: Random House. ISBN 0759310114. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 00:02, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

Ah, thanks for reminding me about that book. I bought a hardcover a month ago, and I set it aside because it was an encyclopedia, which is a tertiary source, and hence somewhat lower on the priority list than 2ndary sources (of which there are many). But I'm looking at it now (e.g. medical section pp 147-150) and, as you say, it appears to be of great value ... mainly because it comes out and directly says what the 2ndary sources only vaguely/indirectly say. I'll definitely rely on it for the new personality/health material. As for FA, yes, my intention is to keep plowing ahead for FA ... it may take awhile, but this article deserves it. Noleander (talk) 03:10, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

Following up on this topic: There are several topics that are not yet covered to the appropriate depth: including: ship management, punishments, violence, and relations with indigenous peoples. I've drafted several new paragraphs to add into the article, in an attempt to fill those gaps. For clarity, I'll post these draft paragraphs below at the bottom of this Talk page, in a dedicated section (to avoid indentation issues if I placed them here). These draft paragraphs do NOT include any material related to (a) Cook's potential health issues; or (b) Cooks personality & character. Noleander (talk) 22:16, 26 June 2025 (UTC)

Regarding the 2004 Robson book The Captain Cook Encyclopaedia: there is a factual error on page 121: it quotes Cook as saying "Thus ended the most disagreable day My life has yet seen ...", yet that quote is actually from Banks (Beaglehole, 1974, p 200). Also, it has no citations (vs, say Thomas 2003, or Salmond 2003, or Williams 2008). So its articles may be nice for providing ideas (e.g. the article "Indigenous peoples and Cook" p 120-123) ... but if I find anything interesting, I'll probably cross-check it with with other sources. Noleander (talk) 22:21, 29 June 2025 (UTC)

The coat of arms section James_Cook#Heraldic_arms is rather large, relative to other topics in the article. There is a smaller example of a coat of arms at Bernard_Montgomery#Honours_and_awards. That smaller size seems more appropriate for this Cook article. There is a lot of text in the Cook coat of arms, and some of that could be kept as a caption, but some would have to be pushed down into a footnote, or require users to click a citation. Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 19:31, 23 June 2025 (UTC)

I implemented this: made coat of arms material smaller/more concise. I put the more concise material into the existing "Personal Life" section, since it was his widow that requested the arms and more or less was the only person that made use of it. Noleander (talk) 18:04, 30 June 2025 (UTC)

I submitted this article for Do you know?. The submission is at Template:Did you know nominations/James Cook. The "hook" is the blurb that will appear on the front page (in about 3 or 4 months, if all goes well). The hook is supposed to be a fascinating tidbit that induces readers of the WP main page to click on the link to this article. The hook I used was that he won the Copley medal, but there are probably more compelling facts that would grab readers' attention. Several hooks can be suggested, so if anyone wants to propose an alternative hook, feel free to add it into the DYK nomination at: Template:Did you know nominations/James Cook. If you need help with formatting the hook, I can help. Noleander (talk) 18:14, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander How about: Did you know that in 1769 Captain James Cook – known for his voyages of exploration in the Pacific Ocean – and his crew were the first Europeans to witness and describe Polynesians surfing? Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 23:12, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

Oh yeah, that's the one. I'll put it into the DYK. Thx. Noleander (talk) 00:08, 22 June 2025 (UTC)

@Aemilius Adolphin and @Noleander, I would avoid hooks that state someone of something is the first. They generally don't get run. TarnishedPath^talk 08:17, 22 June 2025 (UTC)

Okay, I didn't know that. I'll include both the hooks, so if one is not acceptable, the other one can be used. Noleander (talk) 13:10, 22 June 2025 (UTC)

We shouldn't change the article just because Wikipedia doesn't like reporting "firsts". Both Salmond and Thomas state that Cook's party were the first Europeans to witness surfing and that should be correctly reported in the article. If we want to change the "hook" perhaps we could say: "Did you know that in May 1769 Captain James Cook – known for his voyages of exploration in the Pacific Ocean – and his crew witnessed Tahitians surfing and were amazed at their skill." [Salmond (2003) p. 79 Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 23:00, 22 June 2025 (UTC)

That's a good idea ... tho the hook is limited to 200 chars (including punctuation) so that may be a tight fit. Noleander (talk) 23:13, 22 June 2025 (UTC)

We could write it more concisely as: "Did you know that in May 1769 British explorer Captain James Cook and his crew witnessed Tahitians surfing and were amazed at their skill." Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 23:18, 22 June 2025 (UTC)

Your surfing DYK idea is on the English WP main page right now. I think it remains there for 12 hours. Noleander (talk) 16:43, 1 July 2025 (UTC)

An editor added "Cause of death: Stabbing" to the InfoBox. Does anyone have any thoughts on whether that is appropriate? The sources indicate that the exact events surrounding the death are complex & hazy, and the accounts are contradictory. Certainly he was clubbed, and probably stabbed. Many sources say he was stabbed, and suggest that was the final cause of death. Would "Clubbing and stabbing" be more accurate? Or omit from the InfoBox and let readers read the body text to get a full understanding of the complexity of the details? Or leave it as "Stabbing"? Noleander (talk) 19:34, 1 July 2025 (UTC)

Pinging @Sebbog13:. Noleander (talk) 19:37, 1 July 2025 (UTC)

Template:Infobox person states the cause of death parameter "Should be clearly defined and sourced, and should only be included when the cause of death has significance for the subject's notability". While I think his death is an important part of his notability, the actual method of death is not "clearly defined and sourced", and is in fact still argued. As such it should not be included in the infobox, but I think the note about this confusion should be moved into main text. Pickersgill-Cunliffe (talk) 19:40, 1 July 2025 (UTC)

The body text already has some discussion of the complexities in footnote [ao]. Though it could probably be improved, and maybe some of it should be moved into the body text. But that's another discussion. Noleander (talk) 19:59, 1 July 2025 (UTC)

I would delete it as it is plain wrong. See article and previous discussions on Talk. The info box is not meant to convey complex information and is certainly not meant to make complex information less accurate. MOS:INFOBOXPURPOSE. This article went through a peer review and achieved GA status without that parameter in the info box. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 22:54, 1 July 2025 (UTC)

Seeing no comments yet supporting its inclusion, I reverted the edit. Noleander (talk) 23:03, 1 July 2025 (UTC)

I'm compiling a list of significant injuries/ailments suffered by Cook. So far I have:

• Hand injury in 1764 due to powder explosion in Canada (Collingridge p 86; Thomas pp 391, 401)
• Gastrointestinal ailment on 2nd voyage; lasted a couple of months (Salmond 2003 p 233-234; Beaglehole 1974 p 370)
• Cold / Rheumatic fever (speculated) 2nd voyage (Beaglehole 1974 p 328)
• Stress / irritability / frustration 3rd voyage (Williams 2008 pp 8-10, 159; Beaglehole 1974 pp 711-712; Salmond 2003 pp 368-369, 392-394)

Are there any other significant ailments or injuries? (NB I'm not suggesting that all these should be mentioned in the article; merely compiling a list). Noleander (talk) 18:09, 2 July 2025 (UTC)

There is the incident of pufferfish poisoning during the Second Voyage. —Kusma (talk) 18:39, 2 July 2025 (UTC)

Excellent, thanks. Noleander (talk) 20:10, 2 July 2025 (UTC)

I'm trying to discover if Cook had official orders to establish trade or commerce (either with indigenous peoples; or planting crops that could be used commercially).

The only thing I can find is voyage 1, where the orders instruct him to barter to obtain provisions for his ships (Beaglehole 1974, p 147-151). Otherwise, the orders for all voyages seem to be silent on the topic. Of course, his crew & the naturalists engaged in all sorts of small-scale bartering for curiosities; etc ... but I'm interested in official orders, for example, to establish long-term commercial relations. Does anyone know of a source that documents orders to Cook to establish commercial trade? Or, alternatively, did Cook himself describe his intention to establish long-term commercial relations?

For example: for the 1760's voyages of the Dolphin under Byron & Wallis to the Pacific, the orders included instructions to search for a landmass that is "within Latitudes convenient for navigation and in the Climates adapted to the Produce of Commodities usefull in Commerce". Is there a similar order to Cook? Noleander (talk) 01:45, 1 July 2025 (UTC)

@NoleanderI have been looking for a copy of the instructions for the second and third voyages too. Beaglehole summarises them at pp 304-305, 490-491. In relation to promotion of trade and the discovery of new lands Beaglehole says they are virtually identical to his first instructions. These were making discoveries which would add to the honour, trade and navigation of the nation as a maritime power etc. He was also told to describe any natural resources which might be useful to Britain and to describe the manners, culture and population size of native people he encountered. Thomas makes the point that his instructions to promote trade and describe the land and cultures of newly discovered people made violent conflict very likely if the native population didn't want to be encountered and described, let alone trade. I assume Beaglehole's edition of Cook's journals would contain a transcript of all the official instructions. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 03:01, 1 July 2025 (UTC)

Thanks, that's useful information. Ill keep searching. What page in Thomas did it say that the instructions told Cook to promote trade? Noleander (talk) 04:27, 1 July 2025 (UTC)

"The great aim of the programme of voyaging that the Admiralty had prosecuted with the blessing of the King had been the discovery of new lands and peoples with whom trade could in due course be opened up, to both honour and enrich Britain." Thomas 184-185 (Comment on Second Voyage)

"The inspection of lands visited was an essential part of Cook’s mission. Yet description depended on contact that the inhabitants of newly found places might decline or resist. The necessary negotiation or suppression of their resistance might lead to shooting, and Hawkesworth surely grasps the essentially unpredictable quality of any armed violence, when he insists that once shooting starts, no one ‘can restrain its excess, or prescribe its effect’. This was a bald, but an appalling admission. British scientists and seamen, members of a mission justified by the promise of commerce, mutual improvement and the enhancement of civilization, would somewhere be drawn to commit acts of savagery that could barely be comprehended by humane readers in Europe." 154 (Although this is a comment on First Voyage).

The third voyage, of course, was all about discovering a new trade route. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 04:58, 1 July 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for those quotes, very helpful. Noleander (talk) 14:30, 1 July 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander In case you haven't already found them, the instructions for the three voyages can be found online in The Naval Miscellany 1928 Volume 3, by Perrin, W.G. (William Gordon), 1874-1931, at Internet Archive: The relevant instructions for the second and third voyage are the usual stuff: make observations useful to navigation or commerce, and inviting traffic with the natives. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 05:42, 3 July 2025 (UTC)

Perfect, thanks. (It is nearly impossible to read the instructions in Beaglehole 1974, they are so entangled with his asides). Interesting that so many phrases are repeated in the instructions of multiple missions. Instructions for voyage 1 and voyage 2 both include "... cultivate a friendship and alliance..." which is relevant to Cook's attitude whenever he first stepped ashore. Noleander (talk) 13:41, 3 July 2025 (UTC)

Above in this Talk page was a discussion of some material that was not yet included in the article to the appropriate depth. Here are some rough-draft paragraphs (grouped within subsections) to fill some of those gaps. Note that there is some overlap with existing material in the article (e.g. Cook's attempts to prevent the spread of STDs) and - in those cases of overlap - the plan is to remove the material from the original location in the article. Topics not included in these draft paragraphs are Cook's character/personality; and Cook's potential health issues. If anyone has any suggestions or comments on these draft paragraphs, let me know. (However, these draft paragraphs are very rough, so please ignore any spelling/grammar/style issues.) Alternatively, I can put the text into the article, and we can assess it there, which might be easier (because of sources; easier to compare to other sections, etc). Noleander (talk) 22:27, 26 June 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander I think this should have had a lot more discussion and consensus before it was incorporated into the article. I was preparing comments on your draft but wanted to check things and make my comments as constructive. I think there are a lot of generalisations about relationships with indigenous people which require more nuance and a wider range of sources. Many of these statements are controversial and should be attributed to the authors in text and balanced with dissenting view of other authors. I think there is undue weight given to relationships with Indigenous peoples when you consider far more of Cook's time was spent on ship navigating and charting coasts. Also I think there is confusion about relationships with indigenous communities in Cook's time, and issues of how modern indigenous activists view Cook: which is already covered in the legacy section.

Other quick comments:

Most of the material on "shipboard leadership" has little to do with Cook's personal leadership. It is mostly a collection of standard practices on ships of the time. We need to discuss Cook;s leadership.

• Zimmerman calls Cook very strict and hot tempered. Always reserved and often didn’t say a word to his officers. (Williams, p 89). Beaglehole also mentions somewhere that on the third voyage Cook didn't communicate well with other officers. For example, he didn't explain why he lay off the Hawaiian islands for six weeks.

• Cook often was the first onshore during first contact with indigenous peoples and went unarmed. Will find citation.

• Trevenen said Cook had a severe disposition and was a despot on ship. However, he relaxed on excursions among natives. (Cook Encyclopaedia, p 165).
• I'm not sure whether we should be distinguishing shipboard leadership from leadership in general. I will have to re-read my books on this topic but from what I recall, crewmembers said Cook rarely conversed with other officers; was a strict disciplinarian ("a despot"); treated crew very fairly (he shared the fresh rations and ate the same meals as the humblest sailors); was a stickler for healthful regimes (which you cover); I'm not sure about the merry-making and rituals, it's hard to determine whether Cook was typical or atypical in this; he relaxed when he was on excursions on land and freely conversed with the junior crew; he seemed to be happier among natives than his crew; some criticised him for treating native better than his crew; others said natives were impressed by his fairness in meeting out justice; When Gore took over leadership of the expedition he immediately hogged the best food for himself but consulted other officers in major decisions. Someone points out that even though Cook was considered more erratic of his third voyage, it was exceptionally long and gruelling and there was no actual mutiny, as experienced by many other captains. Salmond points out that Cook clashed with Williamson on the voyage and flogged the marines more than anyone else which she links to Williamson and the marines running away when Cook was in trouble. Also need to point out that the livestock and plants were meant to be cultivated on new lands so future British expeditions would have meat and potatoes to eat. (The goat wasn't just a goat: it was the future of the empire).
• Many more to follow

Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 05:03, 28 June 2025 (UTC)

Sounds good. All feedback is welcome. Certainly lot more work needs to be done. Noleander (talk) 05:15, 28 June 2025 (UTC)

Then I request that you revert the article to the previous version which was rightly rated as a Good Article so all editors can cooperate in getting the new sections into shape, both in content (neutrality, balance comprehensiveness) and formatting (British English, correct grammar). Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 05:48, 28 June 2025 (UTC)

@Aemilius Adolphin: Sorry for the confusion ... I restored the article to the state it was before adding the "relations with indigenous". The primary purpose of that section was to address a comment from the prior Peer Review which concluded with the important comment: One more general comment: I think the sourcing is acceptable for GA level, but for FA level one should aim to use more varied and recent scholarship. Anne Salmond could be used more for a less Eurocentric view, and it is generally interesting to find out where Beaglehole has been superseded (and at least according to this review [7], Hough is fairly close to Beaglehole).

Above you wrote "I think there is undue weight given to relationships with Indigenous peoples when you consider far more of Cook's time was spent on ship navigating and charting coasts." I think the most recent scholarship (Williams, Salmond, Thomas) devotes a LOT of their content to relations with indigenous peoples, so the article should reflect that proportionately.

I agree with your statement " I think there are a lot of generalisations about relationships with indigenous people which require more nuance and a wider range of sources. Many of these statements are controversial and should be attributed to the authors in text and balanced with dissenting view of other authors." That is a good idea ... can you provide some specific examples of "dissenting view[s] of other authors" that can be included?

Also, can you help me out by creating a list of topics & facts that are missing from the article & are required to improve the article to FA status? Starting with such a list will be a lot more efficient than analyzing the material in the "Relations with indigenous peoples" draft paragraphs. Noleander (talk) 16:10, 28 June 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for restoring the GA version, much appreciated. I have no problems with a section on relationships with Indigenous people, nor with using Salmond and Thomas more with this section, but I think it needs to be more concise and reflect the nuances of their arguments better rather than presenting sometimes contested and provisional hypotheses and the perspectives of individual authors as truths in the Wikipedia voice. (Of course, capturing nuances and presenting these concisely is the tricky part.) The sub-headings and content you had were also loaded towards violence, coercion and punishments rather than, say, trade, consensual sexual relationships, sharing technology and generally friendly relations sometimes marred by cross-cultural misunderstandings. There's plenty of that too in Salmond, Thomas and other recent scholarship. As for a list of missing topics and facts that could help this towards GA status, I am working on an alternative draft, but I think a more important issue is organising current and additional content in a balanced and concise way without needless repetition. (Eg the stuff about livestock and plants could be discussed under crew health, relations with indigenous people, propagation of European technology, globalisation, environmental change, etc.) Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 23:17, 28 June 2025 (UTC)

Sounds good. Regarding your alternative draft: I presume that it is focusing relations with indigenous peoples (including trade, consensual sexual relationships, sharing technology)? If so, I'll suspend work on that topic until your draft is available for review ... no reason duplicating work. Also, user Kusma may provide input (see below).

Likewise: "organising current and additional content in a balanced... " That has to wait until any new material related to indigenous peoples is available. To pick a random example: material related to STD transmission is currently in the Legacy section. There is no way to know where it should ultimately go until any new section(s) related to indigenous peoples is created. Noleander (talk) 23:58, 28 June 2025 (UTC)

Text proposed to be in the article is at Draft:James Cook proposed text 1. We can edit the text directly there. Noleander (talk) 22:57, 27 June 2025 (UTC)

@Kusma: Do you have a few moments provide some input? In your recent Peer Review of this article you wrote "One more general comment: I think the sourcing is acceptable for GA level, but for FA level one should aim to use more varied and recent scholarship. Anne Salmond could be used more for a less Eurocentric view, and it is generally interesting to find out where Beaglehole has been superseded (and at least according to this review [7], Hough is fairly close to Beaglehole)." In response to that I created some draft text, located at Draft:James Cook proposed text 1. If you could help by (a) elaborating a bit more on what you meant by "a less Eurocentric view"; and (b) take a quick glance at the draft text and provide any suggestions ... in particular, whether the draft text is responsive to your comment. Of course, if you are too busy, no worries. Thanks in advance for any help you can provide! Noleander (talk) 19:55, 28 June 2025 (UTC)

I'll try to get to this later this week. Please remind me if I haven't commented by Saturday. —Kusma (talk) 08:48, 30 June 2025 (UTC)

OK, by "Eurocentric" I mean that traditional Cook scholarship is based on the observations of the European discoverers and scientists of the time and does not take into account much the point of view of the Pacific cultures that interacted with Cook and his crew, although that is central for understanding what happened and why. I think relying on Salmond, who is a Maori expert and tries to present more of the islander perspective when she can is the right thing to do here.

In "Violence and punishment", I think it would be worth looking at the more violent and deadly encounters that the Adventure under Fourneaux had with Maori while the ships were separated during the Second Voyage; I think Cook was quite unhappy when he heard about these but I do not have a reference at hand right now. —Kusma (talk) 10:29, 5 July 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for your feedback. Agree that sources (such as Salmond) who attempt to describe events from the perspective of indigenous peoples is essential. Noleander (talk) 21:35, 5 July 2025 (UTC)

I'm looking for sources related sexual relations between indigenous and Cook's crew. I have plenty of sources for consensual relations, and for prostitution. What I'm looking for now are any sources covering coercion. Sources I'm aware of that address coercion include:

• Igler 2013, pp 45, 50-51
• Thomas 2003 p xxiv, 184

Can anyone identify additional sources that discuss either (a) coerced sex; or (b) an overall discussion of sexual relations on the voyages consensual vs prostitution vs coerced; or (c) Comparing indigenous vs European views of willingness to participate. Thanks in advance for any help! Noleander (talk) 00:03, 4 July 2025 (UTC)

I think this might be getting into a topic that goes beyond the scope of this article. This is meant to be a high level biography of Cook and no biography or study I have read has accused Cook of coercing anyone into sex or has said that Cook's crews systematically did so with his blessing. In fact the situation was quite the opposite. Polynesians were much more open about sexuality and the British officers and crew members were delighted to find that Polynesian women found fair skinned men sexually attractive and the British an exciting novelty. Salmond talks about the love and friendships that developed between the British and Polynesians, and of the British crew members who tried to jump ship and live with their new girlfriends. The only discussions of sexual coercion I can remember were accusations by some British officers that some Maori men around Queen Charlotte Sound coerced women into having sex for trade goods. Typically, Cook saw this as yet another example of British civilisation corrupting noble savages. The stories about Cook himself mainly involve Polynesian aristocrats abusing him for not wanting to have sex with their lovely daughters. The whole notion of prostitution is a western concept and the issue of cultural differences about sexuality is largely speculative and varied between indigenous societies. (In some cases indigenous people hid their women from Cook's crews, in other cases the women paddled canoes up to the ships and literally jumped into the sailors bunks.) Of course 18th century sailors being what they were, there were bound to have been examples of sexual assault but no study I have read has said it was a serious cause of the sporadic violence on the three expeditions. The sex issue can perhaps be covered in one or two sentences in the STDs section or in the section about trade, conflict and cooperation. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 04:45, 4 July 2025 (UTC)

I'm simply asking for sources at this point. Noleander (talk) 17:14, 4 July 2025 (UTC)

I'm gathering sources that discuss the perception of Cook by indigenous peoples in the modern era (say, after the 1970s - the bicentennial of his voyages). Preferably scholarly sources. Some I've identified so far are listed below. If anyone can supply additional sources it would be much appreciated.

• Carlson, B., & Farrelly, T. (2022). Monumental upheavals: Unsettled fates of the Captain Cook statue and other colonial monuments in Australia. Thesis Eleven, 169(1), 62-81. https://doi.org/10.1177/07255136211069416 [Has some interesting information, but one of the authors has fallen into disrepute]

• Denoon, Donald (1995). "Settler Capitalism Unsettled". New Zealand Journal of History. 29 (2): 129-141.

• Hanlon, David (June 1994). "On the Practical, Pragmatic, and Political Interpretations of a Death in the Pacific". Pacific Studies. 17 (2): 103=111. Retrieved 4 July 2025. [book review, probably not peer-reviewed]

• Healy, Chris (2000). "Captain Cook: between black and white". In Kleinert, Sylvia (ed.). The Oxford Companion to Aboriginal Art and Culture. pp. 92–96. Retrieved 4 July 2025.

• Kame’eleihiwa, Lilikala (June 1994). "Review of The Apotheosis of Captain Cook by Gananath Obeyesekere". Pacific Studies. 17 (2): 111–118. Retrieved 4 July 2025. [book review, probably not peer-reviewed]

• Robson 2004 p 123

• Salmond 2003 p 428

• Thomas 2003 pp xxxi, xxxii

• Trask, Haunani-Kay (1983). "Cultures in Collision: Hawai'i and England, 1778". Pacific Studies. 7: 91–117.

• Williams 2008 pp 4, 143-145, 148-153, 171-173

Noleander (talk) 22:56, 4 July 2025 (UTC)

Here's one:

• Oliver, Liza (9 December 2019). "Liza Oliver. Review of "Reimagining Captain Cook: Pacific Perspectives"". caa.reviews. doi:10.3202/caa.reviews.2019.137.

Carlstak (talk) 04:20, 5 July 2025 (UTC)

Awesome find, thanks. I wish I could have seen that exhibit ... here is a site that shows some of the artwork https://www.alaintruong.com/archives/2018/12/01/36908651.html Noleander (talk) 04:30, 5 July 2025 (UTC)

Nice. I have to say, though, that personally, I consider the British Museum perhaps the world's largest repository of art and objects of material culture that should be repatriated to their countries of origin, and believe the 1963 act that prohibits repatriation should be repealed. As Liza Oliver, the author of the article, says:

Likewise, recent protests and controversies by Pacific Islander communities directly implicate the British Museum in questions of repatriation, including the Rapa Nui community’s recent request for the museum to return Hoa Hakananai’a, a sculpture stolen from Easter Island in 1868. It is surprising that Pacific Perspectives, whose express aim was to bring indigenous perspectives from that region into dialogue with the British Museum, did not address any of these concerns, instead remaining silent to the benefit of the preservation of ethically questionable institutional policies.

We may admire all these objects, but I would rather admire them knowing they resided close to the places where they were produced, in context of a national or cultural patrimony. I think indigenous peoples everywhere would agree. Carlstak (talk) 15:26, 6 July 2025 (UTC)

User:Carlstak, there is always the point that many items would not have survived if it were not for the British Museum. Read the curator's notes in  – without this object there would be a gaping void in knowledge of this type of sail, and it forms a key component in the debate about how sail technology was used in the first settlement of much of the Pacific (that debate is unresolved, with Atholl Anderson challenging the traditionalists like Geoffrey Irwin). (Sorry to all for being off-topic.) ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 21:53, 6 July 2025 (UTC)

"Off-topic"? I notice that this is catalogued as "probably Cook collection", though the provenance is unknown. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 22:01, 6 July 2025 (UTC)

That may very well be, ThoughtIdRetired, but I don't see that it means the objects that have been thus "saved" shouldn't be returned to their places of origin, especially if a request is made by the indigenous people or the government of place of origin. Ryan J. Wheeler of the Peabody Institute lists some of the most prominent stolen objects that should be returned in "British Museum Top Ten: Repatriation Edition".

He mentions "...two Moai from Rapa Nui (Easter Island) held by the British Museum. According the exhibit text, both Moai were taken from Rapa Nui in 1868 by Commodore Richard Powell and the crew of a British survey ship, HMS Topaze. The Admiralty presented Hoa Hakananai'a to Queen Victoria, who ultimately gave him to the British Museum." This is cultural violence. Carlstak (talk) 23:10, 6 July 2025 (UTC)

Just trying to show the other side of the coin. I could also have mentioned Destruction of cultural heritage by the Islamic State, making the relevant British Museum collection even more important. You will note that the sail I mentioned is now in its country of origin.ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 08:36, 7 July 2025 (UTC)

Coming back to a previous mention, I have reached the conclusion that the word "longitude" should appear in the lead. The point is that Cook was right at the forefront of this aspect of navigation. As a technical point in the history of navigation, it might be less obvious that this is where he made a real contribution to science and technology. The word "longitude" occurs only three times in the article text, relying on links for a greater explanation. So it would be easy for the reader to miss the significance of Cook's involvement with these developments in navigation.

Compare this article with, for instance, Apollo 11 and the (absolutely essential) guidance computers required for the moon landing. Mention of guidance computers in that article is more common than latitude in this article, and there you find a bit of discussion, as well as links to the larger subject. The fix here may be to highlight the subject by mentioning it in the lead. In both articles, we are dealing with an aspect of the story than can be missed because the technical essentials can easily be submerged in the more-easily-told content. The reader should come away from this article with, among many other things, an awareness that Cook was right at the forefront of using the various new methods of calculating longitude. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 09:45, 5 July 2025 (UTC)

I have no objection to updating the Lead to mention that Cook and his crew played a key role in solving the "longitude problem", based on their careful and diligent evaluation of the the K1 chronometer on the 2nd and 3rd voyages. I'd make sure they don't get all the credit: I think the watch-makers like Harrison et al did the most important part of the effort. Noleander (talk) 15:37, 5 July 2025 (UTC)

I was thinking of something like:
"... He displayed a combination of seamanship, superior surveying and cartographic skills, physical courage, and an ability to lead men in adverse conditions. He carried out some of the in-service testing of several prototype chronometers in the competition for solving the longitude problem – checking their timekeeping with the onerous lunar distance method."
I have to say I suspect this might be better phrased. The problem is in getting across the huge amount of mathematics Cook did in determining time (and hence longitude), both before and after he had chronometers to check. Still, getting the word "longitude" in the lead was the original target. Do you think this does the job? ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 21:30, 6 July 2025 (UTC)

I've just taken a look at Blainey's arguments over the lack of seamanship involved in the grounding of Endeavour. (This has just been archived Talk:James Cook/Archive 4#Cook comments) Blainey's arguments seem unconvincing, as they rely extensively on knowledge of safe navigation in waters with coral that significantly postdates Cook. The criticism originates with Dalrymple, an opponent of Cook. Also, I don't detect any particular qualification of Blainey in seamanship that gives any authority to his views.

Since the comment is archived and the matter is not mentioned in the article, I presume we are all OK on this, but having just read the relevant part of the source, I felt obliged to mention. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 10:09, 5 July 2025 (UTC)

It is apparent that the sources have a lot of material related to Cook's relations with indigenous peoples. As user:Aemilius Adolphin has correctly pointed out above, including all that material int he James Cook article has the potential to make the article imbalanced. Specifically: the size of "relations with indigenous" material could be disproportionately large relative to the material on exploration and voyaging.

WP polices cover this exact situation: WP:PROPORTION says "An article should not give undue weight to minor aspects of its subject but should strive to treat each aspect with a weight proportional to its treatment in the body of reliable, published material on the subject." A technique for resolving such situations is covered in the WP:SUMMARY STYLE which says "It is advisable to develop new material in a subtopic article before summarizing it in the parent article."

Based on the above, I propose to create a new subarticle (of the James Cook article) that contains all encyclopedic material from sources that is related to "Cook's relations with indigenous peoples". After that subarticle is ready, we would then ensure that the James Cook article contains a concise summary of the subarticle.

This proposal should mitigate any concerns that the James Cook article might get unbalanced; and also ensures that curious WP readers will still have access to the detailed information (by viewing the subarticle). Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 16:08, 5 July 2025 (UTC)

Another benefit to creating a subarticle dedicated to "Relations with indigenous peoples" is that it could improve the awkward James_Cook#Controversy section. Specifically: some of the material from the Controversy section could be moved into the subarticle, making the Controversy section more concise. Perhaps the Controversy section would disappear, and become a couple of paragraphs within a section with a different name? Noleander (talk) 18:55, 5 July 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander A sub-article on Cook's relationships with indigenous people is a good idea. I have been trying to get a draft together for this article but have found it difficult to capture the complexities in a summary style. Thomas estimates that Cook had encounters with 20 to 30 different indigenous societies: in many cases this was first contact or very early contact and each encounter presented unique issues. I am quite busy with other matters at the moment, but should be able to get a draft together in a few days. If you would like to start a new article on indigenous relations based on the material you have collected, I can try to incorporate my material into it . Then we can summarise it for the James Cook article. I was also thinking that some detail of the key encounters in New Zealand, Tahiti, Tonga and Hawaii might belong in the separate articles on the three voyages and the one on death of Cook. But once we get an article on Indigenous relations into good shape, we can incorporate it into the other articles to make them more consistent. There might also be enough material for an article on Cook's cultural legacy. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 03:57, 6 July 2025 (UTC)

Okay, I'm glad to hear you concur it's a good idea. I have a draft available For the subarticle, I can post it tomorrow. Any improvements you can make are welcome. Alternatively, if you see errors or omissions, just notify me and I'll take care of it. Noleander (talk) 04:14, 6 July 2025 (UTC)

The new subarticle has been created, it is at James Cook and indigenous peoples. Any discussion about that subarticle should be in that article's talk page at Talk:James_Cook_and_indigenous_peoples. Except, of course, discussions of creating material within James Cook article that concisely summarizes that material should be here, within Talk:James_Cook. Noleander (talk) 13:32, 6 July 2025 (UTC)

As discussed above in this Talk page, the article is missing some material (Cook's personality, indigenous relations, Cook's own illnesses, commerce, etc). We'll need to adjust the article's outline to accommodate the new material: at a minimum, a few new subsections will be needed. One way to meet this goal is is to reorganize the Legacy section by replacing it with the following new sections:

1. Navigation, charting; chronometer; longitude problem; etc
2. Science; scurvy; Copley medal; Cook's interest in languages/ethnography/anthropology; etc
3. Ship practices, crew health; scurvy prevention; cleanliness; crew discipline/punishments; management, leadership; etc
4. Relations with indigenous peoples. This would be a concise summary of the content of the James Cook and indigenous peoples subarticle. This would include any material from the current "Controversy" section.
5. Exploration; globalization; search for new lands & passages to promote commerce; etc
6. Cook's own illnesses & injuries; hand injury; 2nd voyage gastro; 3rd voyage irritability; etc
7. Character; personality; attributes; crew's perception of C; Cook abstained from sexual relations; etc
8. Personal life; family, church/religion; politics; children; coat of arms; etc
9. Commemorations
10. Ethnographic collections; museums

Notes on this proposal:

1. This is just a suggestion, if anyone has an alternative section layout, please post it here so we can discuss.
2. These new sections will replace the existing Legacy section and its subsections. There will no longer be a section named "Legacy". But if anyone thinks keeping a section named "Legacy" is important, we can do that
3. The sequence of the sections above is not significant; they could be re-ordered
4. Some of these new sections could be arranged in a nested (hierarchical) manner, if that is better
5. It may be wise to combine some of the above sections, if they are similar (e.g. "Personal life" & "Personality/character", etc)
6. No existing material in the Legacy section is deleted: it is simply moved into the most relevant new section.
7. The sections above do not yet have titles; titles can be decided later
8. The existing sections above "Legacy" (namely 1st/2nd/3rd Voyage & Canada) are not impacted at all by this suggestion

Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 18:10, 7 July 2025 (UTC)

I'll start implementing this suggestion for the Legacy section. Again, no content is being deleted or changed: just a minor re-leveling of sections, perhaps with some minor section renaming ... the goal is to establish a section outline that will support the addition of a small amount of new material. These changes do not impact the 90% of the article above the "Legacy" section. Noleander (talk) 16:09, 9 July 2025 (UTC)

I'm still working on this, should be done within a day or so. Noleander (talk) 21:32, 9 July 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander I don't like the idea of removing the Legacy section as Commemorations, Ethnographic collections and recent controversies are to do with Cook's legacy. I am also opposed to the idea of conflating Cook's relationship with indigenous peoples at the time with changes in the way some indigenous groups view Cook after his death and the way some activists have used Cook as a symbol for the perceived evils of colonisation: the latter is a legacy issue. Why not retain the Legacy section and add contemporary indigenous/non-indigenous views of Cook to that? This might also include a sub-section on Cook historiography. @ThoughtIdRetired Do you have an opinion on this? Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 22:42, 9 July 2025 (UTC)

That's fine, I have no problem with a Legacy section... I didn't know what other people' opinions were. I can restore it, and put those sections you list into it. I should be able to do it in the next few hours or worst case tomorrow. Noleander (talk) 23:26, 9 July 2025 (UTC)

I restored the Legacy section. Within it I placed (a) Commemorations; (b) Ethn. Collections; (c) Perception of Cook by modern indigenous peoples. I did not include Navigation or Science sections, since those are primarily describing actions he performed while alive (e.g. "He performed amazing navigation feats"; "He evaluated the chronometer"; "He experimented ways to prevent scurvy") rather than subjects that still actively discussed today.

I'm still working on: (1) Cook's personality/character (probably will end up being 1 or 2 sentences in "Peronal Life" section?); and (2) his own injuries/illnesses (probably 3 sentences, not sure where yet); (3) Trying to make the "Indigenous peoples" section more concise. Noleander (talk) 03:07, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

In answer to the above, where User:Aemilius Adolphin asked my opinion: Yes, we need a legacy section. However, looking at the comment in the next topic (content fork?) where WP:CRIT says that we should not have a separate "controversy" section, I think that obliges us to have a Legacy section that includes a brief mention of the "negative" side of his legacy. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 07:59, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

I inserted a few new sentences that summarize what three biographers say about Cook's character / personality. Tentatively, I put the sentences into a subsection within the "Personal Life" section and renamed it to Personal life and character. This seems like a decent location, but maybe there is a better place. Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 15:35, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

There should be some kind of footnote explaining the birthdate. 7 November is New Style; when Cook was born, his birthday was called 27 October (which is the date given by Beaglehole 1974 and by the ODNB ). Articles that include dates before and after England switched from Old Style to New Style in 1752 usually carry a footnote explaining their date convention, for example footnote c at Anna Blackburne. —Kusma (talk) 06:09, 12 July 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestion. Added a footnote re new vs old style (shared footnote, placed at the three places the birth date is mentioned). Noleander (talk) 14:34, 12 July 2025 (UTC)

Regarding Cooks illnesses/injuries: the article is missing some things such as 2nd voyage gastrointestinal illness, and his hand injury from Canada. Here are the notable injuries/illnesses:

1. Hand injury in 1764 due to powder explosion in Canada (Collingridge p 86; Thomas pp 391, 401)
2. Gastrointestinal ailment on 2nd voyage; lasted a couple of months (Salmond 2003 p 233-234; Beaglehole 1974 p 370)
3. Cold / Rheumatic fever (speculated) 2nd voyage (Beaglehole 1974 p 328)
4. incident of pufferfish poisoning during the Second Voyage.
5. Stress / irritability / frustration 3rd voyage (Williams 2008 pp 8-10, 159; Beaglehole 1974 pp 711-712; Salmond 2003 pp 368-369, 392-394)

Regarding placement in the article, options include:

a) Put all this information scattered through the Voyages & Canada sections, interspersed chronologically with other events (which is more or less how the 3rd voyage irritability is currently placed).

b) Create a new section dedicated to Cook's health/illness/injuries

c) Same as (b) put put into some exiting section ... not sure which one.

Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 15:31, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

I added medical issues 1, 2, and 4. Number 5 was already in the article. I did not add 3, since it is relatively minor. I used approach (a), namely interspersed chronologically with other events. Noleander (talk) 15:05, 13 July 2025 (UTC)

@Willthorpe: WP prohibits scare quotes ... they are not encyclopedic. The sources use the word "decolonisation" without scare quotes, and it is a legitimate word. If there is anything controversial about decolonization (in the context of Cook) the article should explain the controversy with additional text (sentence, footnote, etc) ... but not scare quotes. Noleander (talk) 15:01, 14 July 2025 (UTC)

The placing of a contentious term within quotation marks is not to serve any nefarious purpose; it is merely definitional as it concerns a subjective application of the term. If the term is directly from the source, then this is reasonable. Will Thorpe (talk) 15:39, 14 July 2025 (UTC)

Would you please point me to the relevant policy? Cheers, Will Thorpe (talk) 15:41, 14 July 2025 (UTC)

Your placement of the term in scare quotes is "subjective" (your word here), and therefore editorial, altering the usage given by the source, therefore it is a form of original research. We go by what reliable sources say, not by editors' interpretations. Carlstak (talk) 16:19, 14 July 2025 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Quotations says:

• Acceptable: The animal is listed as endangered on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.
• Unacceptable: The animal is listed as "Endangered" on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.

But I think you are missing the point. If the connection between Cook and decolonization is disputed you should supply some sources that say so, and - based on what those sources say - we can decide what (if anything) to put into the article. But, as user: Carlstak says above, we - as editors - cannot insert scare quotes around words we personally find objectionable or contentious. Noleander (talk) 16:36, 14 July 2025 (UTC)

Fair enough. Thank you for referencing the style manual. Will Thorpe (talk) 10:04, 15 July 2025 (UTC)

I'm planning to request another peer review (PR) soon, specifically to ask the reviewer(s) to identify any aspects of the article that fail to meet the FA criteria. One area that I will work on before the PR is the prose, which - for FA - must be "engaging and of a professional standard". Much of the prose in the article is in fine shape, but there are some sentences that need minor work: word choice, sentence structure, tightening verbose phrases, and transition between paragraphs. I have no intention of changing the meaning or emphasis of any material. If I do find a sentence where the sources indicate a change in tone or emphasis is warranted, I'll post a note here in the Talk page. Noleander (talk) 18:52, 14 July 2025 (UTC)

I have made some corrections to this:

1) The footnote "ax", stated that Cook was responsible for killing a Maori man. He also shot a Hawaiian dead, so he actually killed two. The citation for the Hawaiian victim is Salmond (2003) p. 413.

2) Footnote "ay" stated correctly that 10 crew members of the Adventure were killed by Maori at Grass Cove. But the citation was to Hough who says 11. The figure of ten comes from Beaglehole (1974) p. 446 and Thomas (2003) p. 302

So total British dead should be 15 (10 Adventure crewmen, Cook, and four marines.) Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 01:14, 16 July 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying that 10 versus 11. I thought for sure it was 11, and then I saw a source that said 10 .... I thought I was going crazy. Noleander (talk) 01:23, 16 July 2025 (UTC)

The article uses a variety of wordings to name ships:

1. "... HMS Grenville ran aground ..."
2. "... Grenville ran aground ..."
3. "... the Grenville ran aground ..."

I looked in other WP articles on British ships, and they appear to use (1) or (2) exclusively, and very rarely (never?) use (3). So, I changed this article to eliminate (3) phrasings (converted them to (2)). In the other WP articles, approach (1) tends to be used the first time the ship is mentioned (in a section or article), then it shifts to (2). Noleander (talk) 18:09, 16 July 2025 (UTC)

Yes, that is the correct approach, "HMS" (or an equivalent) plus name in the first mention and then just the name, but avoid preceding with "the". Wikipedia:Naming conventions (ships) covers this. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 22:33, 16 July 2025 (UTC)

I have restored this because I think it includes important content and there is no consensus for its removal. For example, there is no evidence that the physical attacks on Cook statues were done by Indigenous people alone, it is more likely to be part of the broader movement on decolonisation and is linked to the campaigns for return of artefacts. It is also important to give the counter view that Cook did not establish colonies nor promote British colonisation in most places he visited. Salmond, Thomas, Williams and Blainey, among others, all make this point. I am certainly open to rewording the section and making it more concise or even changing the the sub-heading, but we need to establish a consensus for any changes. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 05:04, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

Your perspective on those particular issues is a good one. But I agree with Wikipedia policy that Controversy sections are a bad idea. They concentrate a lot of negatives in one place. Better to address those issues at the relevant sections.HiLo48 (talk) 06:21, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

Can you remind me of the relevant policy? Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 07:05, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

It's WP:CRIT: "In most cases, editors should avoid devoting a section to criticisms or controversies, as this violates neutral point of view." Gawaon (talk) 07:48, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

That's an essay, not policy or a guideline. It also doesn't make sense: if something is a controversy there is no reason not to call it such and as long as all significant points of view are stated in proportion to their weight in reliable secondary sources NPOV is preserved. it's also more convenient than repeating the same arguments in several different sections. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 08:06, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander I'm not clear on what your main concerns are with the controversy section. Perhaps it's something we can rectify without deleting the section altogether? Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 06:09, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

As per my remarks in the previous section, it appears that "controversy" content will need to be put in the Legacy section. That section would then need to be very carefully balanced. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 08:01, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

Yes, that sounds reasonable. Gawaon (talk) 08:05, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

Disagree. We aren't obliged to follow the view of a couple of random editors in an essay especially when the result will be unnecessarily repeating the same arguments. It's simple: some people say Cook was a violent coloniser who spread VD and all his statues should be torn down and some people say he didn't colonise any country and tried to avoid violence and we shouldn't blame him for things that happened long after he was dead, and he is worth honouring for his many achievements. We only need to say this once and concisely and a controversy section (howsoever named) seems the best way to do this Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 08:17, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

@Aemilius Adolphin - The topics in the Controversy section are important, and I think everyone agrees they need to be in the article. My concerns are mostly stylistic, namely:

1. The material in the Controversy section is very, very similar to the material in the "Perception of indigenous peoples in modern era" section; so they should be merged, or perhaps one is a subsection of the other
2. The title "Controversy" is not ideal ... it is lazy and click-baity. "Controversy" is singular: if there is only one controversy, we should be able to attach a name to the controversy and use that as the section title.
3. Some of the sources in the Controversy are non-scholarly, i.e., newspapers or magazine articles. Those are not prohibited, but if there are scholarly sources that discuss the underlying motivation behind the controversy (namely: Cook as a symbol of imperialism and colonialism) those scholarly sources should be used as the driving force of the section(s).
4. The prose in the Controversy section (and Commemoration section) is below the quality of the other sections in the article. Specifically, the flow and logic of those two sections is jarring and inelegant.

I agree with you that the topics in the Controversy are important, but the prose, formatting, sourcing, and relation to "Perception of indigenous peoples in modern era" section needs work. Noleander (talk) 10:59, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

Personally as a casual reader, I think the restored section right now is more about the broader decolonisation movement as mentioned above so a rename is ideal for me. I also don't see a significant issue with the non scholarly sourcing considering it's an ongoing issue particularly defined by recent events. ~ BlueTurtles | talk 12:13, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

By "... a rename is ideal for me" do you mean that the Controversy section should be renamed? If so, what is your recommendation for new name? Noleander (talk) 14:17, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

Why don't we rename the section "Reputation in 21st Century". The we could include:

1) His reputation among various indigenous peoples. (I would exclude the sentence about the Cook Islands because it doesn't tell us why they wanted to change the name, why they decided to keep it, what the issues were, what their current attitude towards their name is, etc).

2) A summary of what Willimiams, Salmond, Blainey and Thomas say: ie that he is generally regarded as one of the greatest navigators and maritime explorers, that many in Australia and New Zealand still see him as a founding figure, etc, but that for some (not just indigenous people) he has become a symbol of colonisations even though he didn't personally colonise anything.

3) A sentence on the 21st century commemorations and protests. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 22:08, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

Sounds like a good plan. Noleander (talk) 23:23, 10 July 2025 (UTC)

Generally no issues from me, I think within the second point of Cook becoming a symbol of colonisation, this should remain detailed enough to provide adequate context for point three. Point three should also be open for further expansion by other editors. ~ BlueTurtles | talk 02:19, 11 July 2025 (UTC)

Seeing no objections to this 3-point "Reputation in 21st Century" proposal, I'll implement it in the next day or two. Noleander (talk) 17:58, 13 July 2025 (UTC)

I'm beginning to implement this proposal now: The section now has the new title, and is merged with the "Perception in modern era". I'm still working on tightening it and improving the prose. Of course, anyone is welcome to edit it.

@Aemilius Adolphin - I am using Blainey as a source for "Cook is considered to be one of the greatest sea explorers of all time and a founding figure of Australia and New Zealand." but the edition I have is online, and I do not have a page number for the "Postscript" chapter that contains Blainey's statements about that. Can you provide a page number? Noleander (talk) 14:41, 14 July 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander The postscript is pp 293-294. Also see the Section "How High was Cook's Pedestal" (pages 289-291): "Cook and Banks also brought home to London, without exactly saying so, the ingredients of a vague blueprint for the ultimate colonisation of both New Zealand and Australia." P 289

"He [Cook] was a discoverer on a different scale to his predecessors. He took risks by going ashore again and again. His exploration had a perceptiveness and thoroughness matched by no earlier European explorer in these seas or probably in any seas." P 290

The statement that "Cook is considered a founding figure of Australia and New Zealand" probably would need to be restated along the lines of: "Cook is still considered by many as one of the founding figures of modern Australia and New Zealand."

Sources for this are:

Blainey: "Above all he grasped this continent [Australia] and began unknowingly the work of knitting it again to the outside world." p. 294

Thomas (2003) p. xxxii "In the twentieth, Cook celebrations were of special national importance in Australia and New Zealand, but the perception of him as a major historical figure was equally sustained in Britain, Canada and elsewhere. The level of interest has not diminished in recent years, despite the discredited status of the imperial ideologies with which Cook was for so long associated."

Williams (2008): "For many Australians, Cook discovered Australia. As the 1822 plate at Kurnell proclaimed, he was their Columbus; the fact that the Dutch had charted two-thirds of the Australian coastline more than a century earlier seemed not to count." p 141

"And as in Australia, Cook's sturdy, unassuming virtues fitted New Zealanders' rugged perspectives of themselves. Again, as in early Australia, there was a lack of alternative founding fathers – no other explorer to match him, no war of independence to produce a George Washington, and in the country's days as a colony few charismatic political leaders." 141-142

Williams in mainly talking about 19th and 20th century attitudes to Cook among white settlers, but he states that this attitude has persisted among many in England and white settler societies despite recent challenges as evidenced by the flood of popular biographies, commemorations etc. See especially pp 138-142, 164-172. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 05:42, 15 July 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for the page #s and quotes from sources. Question: you suggest wording "Cook is still considered by many as one of the founding figures of modern Australia and New Zealand." The word "modern" is a good addition, and I put that in the article. But I do not understand the purpose of the word "still" ... what is the significance of that word? The sentence seems accurate without the word "still". Noleander (talk) 13:32, 15 July 2025 (UTC)

I would indeed consider the word "still" an NPOV violation in that context, since it would suggested that that'll change in the future, which is both POV and OR. Gawaon (talk) 15:22, 15 July 2025 (UTC)

I have made some changes to the section, simply to add a sentence on the important discourse of reconciliation in Australia, to insert a lone sentence into the prior paragraph and to change 'Australian Aborigines' to the contemporary phrase 'Aboriginal Australians'. Forgive me for making these adjustments or additions, which I believe to be common sense and uniformly beneficiary, rather than attempting to raise them first in this discussion which appears at a glance a little overwhelming. I am supportive of the efforts that have been made and believe these changes to be in keeping with the general objective of the recent edits. ~~~ Will Thorpe (talk) 15:02, 14 July 2025 (UTC)

@Willthorpe Regarding the new sentence: However, he also seen to play a role in reconciliation, helped by his recording of Aboriginal society and the events of his stay in the area of today's Cooktown. That is supported by two sources:

• Collins, Ben (2020-04-19). "What Australians often get wrong about Captain Cook". ABC News. Retrieved 2025-06-28.
• Miller, Gretchen (16 September 2015). "The story of Australia's first reconciliation". Earshot. ABC Radio National. Retrieved 28 June 2025.

Those sources are rather weak. Cook is covered by over 200 biographies and thousands of scholarly articles, so newspapers & TV should only be used as sources for recent events that have not yet made it into journal articles. Do you have any scholarly sources that state that "Cook is seen to play a role in reconciliation ..."? Noleander (talk) 15:11, 14 July 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander I have just inserted one. The ABC (as a broadly trusted and reliable public broadcaster) meets reliable source requirements, and the first of those articles cites a relevant academic, so I contend that they are sufficient beyond this (not to diminish the benefit of citing scholarly works). The point about Cook's role in the discourse of reconciliation is significant, and counters any potential simplistic assumptions about Aboriginal Australians' perceptions of Captain Cook. Will Thorpe (talk) 15:24, 14 July 2025 (UTC)

@Willthorpe Thanks for that additional source. I've read all three sources, but I'm not quite seeing how they support the sentence in the article However, he is also seen to play a role in reconciliation, helped by the events of his stay in the area of today's Cooktown and his recording of Aboriginal society. Could you post some quotes here (in the Talk page) from those sources that support that sentence. Also: the sentnece uses the word "seen" ... seen by who? And is this reconciliation an event that happened in 1700s? or in 21st century? Noleander (talk) 15:39, 14 July 2025 (UTC)

'Reconciliation' is a phrase from the last few decades during which it has played a significant role in Australian societal discourse. Still, in this context it acutely concerns the actions of Cook and his crew during the time of their expedition (hence the frequent reference to Australia's 'first action of reconciliation'). Here are sections from each article, which I am happy to add to the references themselves:

'Reconciling his history'

Abstract: '[the] annual re-enactment of Captain Cook’s visit in 1770 has transformed from a narrative of colonisation to one of reconciliation. This article argues that it is the very local processes of engaging with the history that has made history a useful tool to help facilitate forms of reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous residents in Cooktown.' This very much concerns community responses to history, but Cook himself is still essential to it.

'In Cooktown Indigenous and non-Indigenous residents have come together to renegotiate how they remember their shared history. It has required a collaborative approach between Indigenous and non-Indigenous residents that has moved beyond the event in 1770. By revisiting the encounter between Cook’s crew and the Guugu Yimithirr people, community members and institutions have begun a process of remembering histories that have previously been overshadowed by the public remembrance of Cook.'

'What Australians often get wrong about Captain Cook'

I: recording of Indigenous society

Not only did Cook write about the Indigenous inhabitants of Australia, Ms Page said he disputed William Dampier's view that Australian Aboriginal people were the 'miserabalist people in the world'. "He said, 'The natives of New Holland, they may seem to be the most wretched people on Earth, but in fact they are the happiest people I have ever witnessed'," Ms Page said.

Cook wrote with admiration of the lives he had witnessed, relatively free of the oppressive hierarchy and work of European society.

"To have that understanding of Aboriginal cultural values, these are values that Australians today are only just starting to understand now," Ms Page said.

II:

"But Alison Page said the most important detail about Cook's voyage to Australia is that it marked the beginning of a relationship between two long-separated cultures. ... "Really it is around the reconciliation of those values, and those stories from both the ship and the shore, somewhere in that tidal zone in-between is the identity of modern Australia.""

'The story of Australia's first reconciliation' – role in present-day reconciliation following from events in Cooktown

"But all that came after one of the most significant events in Australian history—the first contact between Indigenous Australians and Europeans. The area also witnessed the first sharing of languages, the first notating of Indigenous words, the first sighting and naming of the kangaroo, the first conflict—and eventually the first steps to reconciliation."

'So they managed to communicate somehow, and Cook writes in his journal that "I handed the spears back to him, which reconciled everything." And we believe that was the first recorded reconciliation in Australia's history, and that occurred here, on the Endeavour River.'

Will Thorpe (talk) 15:56, 14 July 2025 (UTC)

As to who Cook is 'seen' to play a role in reconciliation by, the answer could be Aboriginal Australians such as the Guugu Yimithirr and Ms. Page, relevantly informed members of the public, commentators on the matter, or all of such. Cheers, Will Thorpe (talk) 16:00, 14 July 2025 (UTC)

The section under discussion is "21st century reputation", so the source that talks about a reconciliation event in 1770 is not relevant.

The "Often Get Wrong" source is a very casual, informal news piece, and the reconciliation information is quoting Alison Page; I'm not sure that her opinion is significant. Is she significant?

The Charlotte Ward source is decent. I think that the article should simply paraphrase the abstract's statement "...the processes and performances of reconciliation that have taken place in Cooktown since the early 1990s and have attracted national attention. Specifically, their annual re-enactment of Captain Cook’s visit in 1770 has transformed from a narrative of colonisation to one of reconciliation." I seem to recall that Salmond or Williams sources also talk about those re-enactments as a form of collaboration, so I don't think Ward is the only source that discusses that. Can you see if Salmond or Williams mention those reenactments? What do they say? Noleander (talk) 17:49, 14 July 2025 (UTC)

Also, the Charlotte Ward article is 18 pages long, and so you'll need to provide specific page numbers that support the assertion(s). WP does not have a hard rule, but for articles under, say, ten pages you can omit a specific page number; but over ten pages, a specific page number(s) is required to help validators verify the source.

Also, journal articles belong in the "Sources" section (the "ref" format is only for websites, magazine articles, and newspapers). Do you mind moving the Charlotte Ward source into the "Sources" section? Noleander (talk) 18:12, 14 July 2025 (UTC)

There is already content on the Cooktown incident in the article under Commemorations and I don't think we need to include it twice. I would prefer it stay only there because the cited articles are really saying that it was the Indigenous elder who initiated the act of reconciliation, not Cook. Also highlighting this one example is probably undue because we are dealing with a high level overview and there is no doubt that Cook is seen by most advocates for Aboriginal causes and in most Aboriginal oral histories as primarily a symbol for colonisation, not reconciliation. The secondary point that Cook said some relatively sympathetic things about Aboriginal people should be in the section on Indigenous peoples. I propose we add a sub-section there along the lines I discuss below. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 11:35, 15 July 2025 (UTC)

It is relevant to both sections. A sentence suffices in the latter section, and the events of Cooktown have certainly gained increased prominence as regards Cook's stay in Australia for the very fact of his interactions with its Aboriginal inhabitants.

there is no doubt that Cook is seen by most advocates for Aboriginal causes and in most Aboriginal oral histories as primarily a symbol for colonisation, not reconciliation.

This is true, but he can be – and is – seen as both. Alison Page, who is quoted in one of the sources, provides a good example of this; her sculpture adorns Cook's landing place in Kurnell, where he first set foot on Australia. Ms. Page, further, is a Sydneysider, rather than being from the area of Cooktown.

Stan Grant, in a critical piece, even so still argues or acknowledges that there are different "versions" of Cook.

Will Thorpe (talk) 12:20, 15 July 2025 (UTC)

It's a question of balance, wording and where this incident should be placed. The wording is poor: "However, he is also seen to play a role in reconciliation." Who sees this? What role? From what I see, the sources are saying that his role in this incident is as an intruder who didn't follow Aboriginal customs for sharing food gathered on Aboriginal territory. The act of reconciliation was by a local elder. So some people have reinterpreted an incident involving Cook as a parable of reconciliation but not because of the actions of Cook but because of the actions of an indigenous elder. It therefore best goes in the section on Commemorations. The overwhelming majority of recent academic sources (and indeed non academic sources) state that Cook has become a symbol of colonisation (justly or unjustly) among Aboriginal Australians. Yes, there are many Captain Cooks but we can't include all of them and we shouldn't include one twice in two different sections.

I would say the whole section needs a rewrite as there are too many dubious generalisations uses of "some", "many" etc which are hard to justify based on the sources and the vast number of different indigenous cultures, tribes, clans involved. I also don't like "Some Nuu-chah-nulth people in British Columbia view Cook as an invader who took provisions without compensating the local people.^[1]" This is from Williams and is a quote from one indigenous person and is apparently entangled in Canadian legal disputes. According to Thomas, local tradition was that they integrated the British with song and rituals and welcomed them as tourists who brought good trade. They charged a hefty fee for local grass and resources and Cook generally paid up. [Thomas 2003 pp 361-365].

I don't know whether we can capture the complexities in one section of a high level biographical article. The best approach might be to make the discussion even more high level, along the lines of "there are widespread negative perceptions of Cook among indigenous peoples of the Pacific, and he has become a symbol of the adverse consequences of European contact and colonisation for many indigenous peoples and the decolonisation movement. However, X, Y, Z and others have variously argued that although Cook sometimes claimed indigenous lands without consent, and that his expeditions resulted in some violence and the spread of exotic diseases, he should not be blamed for the colonialist policies that were initiated long after his death." or words to that effect. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 13:35, 15 July 2025 (UTC)

I would support your proposal for ... make the discussion even more high level, along the lines of "there are widespread negative perceptions of Cook among indigenous peoples of the Pacific, and he has become a symbol of the adverse consequences of European... That solves a lot of problems; in particular; if the (biographical) article contains too many specific examples/incidents it runs the risk of never-ending criticism of balance issues. It may be wisest to keep this "reputation" info more general in this article; after all, readers can always get more insight by (a) reading the cited sources; or (b) reading linked WP articles. Noleander (talk) 13:47, 15 July 2025 (UTC)

The section under discussion is "21st century reputation", so the source that talks about a reconciliation event in 1770 is not relevant.

I am afraid that is just not true. The scholarly source makes the point that reconciliation today is a function of history and the remembrance thereof. It is not only relevant, it is central, since it is in the past few decades that Cook's role as a figure of reconciliation through his actions in 1770 has been widely recognised as such.

Following your feedback, I removed one of the news articles, only to reinsert it given a specific quotation which I find useful about his recording of Aboriginal society (no doubt there are more detailed sources as regards this). Do with it what you may.

I seem to recall that Salmond or Williams sources also talk about those re-enactments as a form of collaboration, so I don't think Ward is the only source that discusses that. Can you see if Salmond or Williams mention those reenactments?

I am not the one to ask in that regard, I am afraid! Will Thorpe (talk) 12:03, 15 July 2025 (UTC)

The article cannot have similar/duplicate material in two different sections. It now has:

1. Commemoration section: An annual re-enactment of Cook's 1770 landing at the site of modern Cooktown, Australia, has taken place since 1959, with the support and participation of many of the local Guugu Yimithirr people. They celebrate the first act of reconciliation between Indigenous Australians and non-indigenous people, when a Guugu Yimithirr elder stepped in after some of Cook's men had violated custom by taking green turtles from the river and not sharing with the local people. He presented Cook with a broken-tipped spear as a peace offering, thus preventing possible bloodshed.
2. Reputation section: However, he is also seen to play a role in reconciliation, owing to the events of his stay in the area of today's Cooktown and his recording of Aboriginal society.

In this case, the same scholarly source, C. Ward, is used to support the material in both sections. It often happens that a certain fact could go into any of 2 or 3 sections. The editors have to pick the best section. The material should be consolidated into the Commemoration section. It cannot be in both sections. Noleander (talk) 13:41, 15 July 2025 (UTC)

Seeing no objection to merging the two redundant groups of text (one in Commemorations, other in "Reputation in 21st century" section), I merged them. Now in the Commemoration section at James_Cook#Commemorations.

There were two distinct sources written by the same author Charlotte Ward, one a university press release, another a Journal article; I eliminated the press release & used the other. I eliminated two minor news articles that were redundant (that is, not needed because the other sources support the material).

To recap: it is very common for material to "fit" into 2 or more sections; in that situation, the editors have to pick one section that seems best. Duplicating material in multiple sections is not an alternative. One can find sixty sentences in this article, each of which could be reasonably placed in 2 or more sections ... but those sentences are not duplicated. It would be a disservice to the reader to duplicate material in two locations.

That said, the "Reputation in 21st century" is far from perfect and needs additional research and sources to make it more general and informative (as it stands, some of the material is based on anecdotes and opinions of individuals, which is far from ideal). Noleander (talk) 04:31, 17 July 2025 (UTC)

Also: the page number you supplied for the C. Ward source was erroneous: you cited page 1, but the article occupies pages 3 to 20 of volume 44 of the journal. I changed the citation to the five or six specific pages that support the reconciliation/reenactment material of the article. Noleander (talk) 04:38, 17 July 2025 (UTC)

I have implemented the changes discussed above. I have concentrated on citing sources that give a broad summary of 21st reputation rather than detailed information on particular countries and indigenous groups. The information on attacks on monuments seems to fit better in the Commemorations section so I have moved it there. I am not entirely happy with the wording because the last sentence might read like an apology which others might be tempted to challenge with further citations. Happy to discuss any modifications. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 05:45, 17 July 2025 (UTC)

Whilst the article covers deaths from dysentery in Batavia, there is no mention of the much greater number of deaths after leaving that port. This is at variance with several sources: both Hough's and McLynn's biographies give significant coverage to those who died at sea from dysentery, while Moore's Endeavour gives emphasis to the important expedition members who died in this phase of the expedition: Herman Spöring, Charles Green (astronomer), Sydney Parkinson, Molyneux (sailing master who had put in good work among the reefs of Australia). Moore does not mention (though the others do) that Satterly, the carpenter, died after leaving Batavia.

Given that the article covers Cook's efforts to keep his crew healthy, the overwhelming sickness on board after Batavia is surely worthy of mention. If nothing else, around 3 times as many deaths occurred after Batavia as happened while there. The only difficulty with this is making sense of the numbers, as I feel that either I or the two biographers mentioned above have messed up their arithmetic on the exact number who died at sea – but perhaps Beaglehole comes to the rescue on that with "in the next 6 weeks, 23 men were to die" (pg 264). All these sources make clear that Cook had difficulty finding enough healthy crew members to work the ship and nurse those too sick to look after themselves.

I suggest adding something like "The death toll from dysentery continued after leaving Batavia, with a further 23 men dying in this phase of the voyage. They included key members of the expedition, Sydney Parkinson (expedition artist), Herman Spöring Jr. (assistant to Banks) , Charles Green (astronomer), and important crew members such as John Satterly, the ship's carpenter who had carried out the repairs after the grounding on the Barrier Reef. So many of the crew were ill that those who were fit could barely work the ship and tend to those too sick to look after themselves." ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 23:25, 16 July 2025 (UTC)

That's a great suggestion. I'll read the sources and insert a couple of sentences along the lines you suggest. PS: Can you look at the question above ( Talk:James_Cook#Better_source_needed_for_Surveying_feats_in_Newfoundland ) about finding a better source for a couple of sentences in the Canada section? Noleander (talk) 23:56, 16 July 2025 (UTC)

I added a couple of sentences covering the deaths & illness. Located in section James_Cook#Return_to_England. If you see any errors, or ways it can be improved, let me know. I'm still thinking if/how to include these facts:

• "40 were sick onboard when they departed Batavia"
• "ship was very short-handed after departure due to deaths/illnesses".

At some point, details such as those have to be left to the sub-articles, e.g. First voyage of James Cook. If the James Cook article included every interesting detail about all three voyages, the article would be 10x larger than it is :-) Noleander (talk) 01:13, 17 July 2025 (UTC)

MOS guideline MOS:SHE4SHIPS says an article can use "she" or "it", but not both. The article, as far as I can tell, did not have any pronouns (she or it) for ships until about a year ago, so it is a good time to pick one or the other. My preference is "it", mostly because WP has a hard time attracting women editors, so anything we can do to make WP more inviting and less male-dominated should be done. Whereas "she" may offend some editors (and readers), "it" has no such problems. Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 17:54, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

Ships are always "she". Skeptic2 (talk) 19:38, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

I was hoping for a more nuanced discussion of Gender bias on Wikipedia :-) It is certainly true that ships are commonly referred to as she, especially within naval communities, but the use of she is not mandated within wikipedia articles, as can be seen by following the manual of style link above. Noleander (talk) 19:50, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

In modern times, ships are not always "she", and there is no rule that they should be denominated that way. In modern academic discourse and professional contexts, the gender-neutral pronoun "it" is used when referring to inanimate objects. It is true that ships have long been anthropomorphized and traditionally referred to as "she", and, as the Merchant Mariner Guide blog says, "the use of "she" for ships remains deeply embedded in nautical culture", but this is an encyclopedia, after all. Carlstak (talk) 20:15, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

Just as an aside, I've known women captains who referred to their boats as "he", and I always thought of the motor yacht I lived on as "he", not that it proves anything at all. The crew of the motor yacht Lady [... ], on which I spent a fair amount of time, referred to the ship as "it" when said Lady was aboard, but as "she" when the lady was absent from her namesake.;-) Carlstak (talk) 20:32, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

For those not familiar with the statistics: only about 8% to 18% of WP editors are women (see Gender bias on Wikipedia). Historically, WP has tried to improve the engagement and retention of women editors (a target of 25% was set at one time), but participation remains low.

I understand that the choice of "it" vs "she" in this single James Cook article, is not going to miraculously make WP more inviting to women editors, but every little bit helps. Noleander (talk) 22:01, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

Strict application of the MOS guideline says that we should stick with the first usage as the article developed. This is what I was trying to do with my edit . Since I have strong personal views on she versus it, and have seen some pretty pointless arguments in Wikipedia on the matter, I always carefully research the article's history before making any changes. So, at the time, it seemed to me that she/her was the predominant form.

Looking for the next oldest edit of this sort, we find , which is User:Noleander adding one "she" and one "her" (referring to a ship). Prior to that the article has had a long-standing use of "her" (five occurrences) in Benjamin Franklin's instructions to leave Cook's ship alone, which pairs up with a single use of "it" ("Tobias Furneaux commanded its companion"). I have gone back a long way and not found the origin of either. (There are only so many old article verions one can sample in a day!)

I think that we should consider that the related articles HMS Endeavour, HMS Resolution (1771), HMS Adventure (1771) HMS Discovery (1774) use "she/her" exclusively; First voyage of James Cook and Second voyage of James Cook both use "she/her" extensively with one use of "it", while Third voyage of James Cook also makes extensive use of "she/her" with two instances of "it" for a ship. Overall, this demonstrates that "Cook related articles" predominantly use "she/her". Whilst this aspect is not considered in the MOS, it would clearly be easier for the reader (who we all serve) if the same style was used in such closely related articles.

If you want my own personal opinion on the matter, please ask. However, I see the above as a strong case for using the feminine personal pronouns. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 22:29, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

What do you mean, ThoughtIdRetired, this looks like your personal opinion. Occurrences of "she" in quotations are not Wikivoice speaking, so they shouldn't count in a tally to determine the predominance of usage, that's absurd. Carlstak (talk) 01:28, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

User:Carlstak, whilst considering wikivoice is an aspect, it is an annoying inconsistency for the reader if quotations use one style and the text another. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 09:01, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

Disagree. That's not a rule, and it would appear to be "stacking the deck", so to speak, in favor of a desired outcome. Carlstak (talk) 14:49, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

Okay, it sounds like there is no consensus to change from "she" to "it", so - as the MOS says - the article should remain the same. Noleander (talk) 00:57, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

Agree with "she". I am always amused when HMS Prince of Wales is called "she". Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 01:13, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

Why the hurry? This is a perennial topic at Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (ships). Carlstak (talk) 01:28, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

MOS:SHE4SHIPS makes several points, which I’ll turn into a numbered list:

1. Ships (military or private-sector) may be referred to by either neuter pronouns (it, its) or feminine pronouns (she, her).
2. Both usages are acceptable,
3. but each article should be internally consistent and exclusively employ only one style.
4. As with all optional styles, articles should not be changed from one style to another without clear and substantial reason.
5. Try to avoid close, successive uses of the same referent for a ship, by using different referents in rotation; for example, it or she, the ship, and the ship's name.
6. The she/her optional style does not apply to other vessel/vehicle types, such as trains.

Comments:

1. A correct summary of current practice, which is what is now in question. The issue is general, not confined to any single article.
2. As for 1.
3. Not itself contentious: usage within an article can and should be made consistent throughout.
4. Avoidance of plain and gratuitous sexism is a clear and substantial reason.
5. As for 3.
6. So how vessels or vehicles are referred to is not generally a big deal. There is no weighty counter-argument to the objection to sexism.

Thus I'm all for "it/s” in this context and thus for changing to that throughout this article. Errantios (talk) 01:57, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

If "avoidance of plain and gratuitous sexism" is a "clear and substantial reason" not to refer to ships as "she", then point 2) "Both usages are acceptable" would be redundant. The fact is that under policy both pronouns are acceptable. It is a matter of local consensus whether the established usage in an article should be overturned. It's a matter of personal opinion as to whether a particular editor prefers the traditional "she" pronoun or the "it" pronoun for ships. I think the argument that more female editors would be attracted to wikipedia if only ships were always referred to as "it" is nonsense. Editors will be divided between: "she is sexist and causes harm" and "she is traditional and causes no harm". So rather than trying to convince each other with elaborate restatements of the basic division, I think that those interested should just record their preference. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 02:20, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

Perceived sexism – this is all in the eye of the beholder, but consider
(1) the women who work in maritime history and their usage, for example: Alexandra Hildred, director of research at the Mary Rose Trust and of course Margaret Rule who led the excavation; historian Susan Rose (e.g. doi/pdf/10.1080/00253359.1977.10658996). All use feminine personal pronouns for ships. Study of academic journals (e.g. The Mariner's Mirror or the Nautical Archaeology Society's International Journal of Nautical Archaeology) shows pretty much exclusive use of "she/her", with the very rare exceptions being where the author is not a native English speaker. A good number of the authors of papers therein are women.
(2) Why is the feminine personal pronoun sexist? I have never seen a cohesive argument that it is. Other languages have gendered inanimate objects. English has used "she/her" in a number of cases, particularly for countries. Whilst that usage is obsolescent, it gives a clue to what is going on with ships. The term "mother country" is not obviously sexist. I suggest that many who worked on or owned ships used a feminine pronoun in exactly the same way. After all, a ship protected you, but provided the crew with obligations as to how the work was done (OK, children probably don't have household chores to do any more). And a ship could die, either slowly or suddenly, just like a living being. Nor is grammatical gender the sole preserve of people. In Cook's time, many people had a house cow (to provide milk) or a pig (to eat). They, too, would have been "he/she", as appropriate. So the usage question for ships is more whether it is OK to characterise them as living beings. Is that a question of sexism? ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 08:47, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

Leave it to the inimitable ThoughtIdRetired to make the most persuasive case for using "she". I confess that I drank more beer than water when I was young participated in my share of nautical traditions, though I've never been one to uphold tradition for tradition's sake. The captain of the small vessel I first worked on was constantly quoting Mountaine's Seaman's Vade-Mecum, for god's sake, and the owner gave me a bosun's whistle (I still have it) and, ridiculously, insisted that I pipe him and his guests aboard. Traditions, shmaditions.;-) Carlstak (talk) 18:28, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

My personal preference is for ships to be "she/her". I have, however, worked on articles where the precedent has been set for "it" – demonstrating that the MOS rule does work and prevents lengthy discussions among editors who could be doing other things. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 08:47, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

The MOS rule allows either "she/her" or "it/its" but not both in the same article. Editors of a particular article therefore have to decide for the one or the other. For myself, I find it demeaning to women to refer to a tool, which a ship is, as "she". Errantios (talk) 10:30, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

The obvious logic gap, User:Errantios is that if I refer to a female horse, sheep, dog, spider, hummingbird or whatever as "she", then by your measure it is demeaning to women as I am using the same word for a non-human member of the animal kingdom as I do for them. Anyway, a ship is much more than a tool; for much of history, it is the greatest technological expression that any culture/community can achieve. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 21:59, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

The Canada section has Cook's hydrographic surveys in Newfoundland – conducted over five seasons – produced the first large-scale, accurate maps of the island's coasts. They were the first large-scale surveys to use precise triangulation to establish land outlines. Undoubtedly true, but the source is rather poor: it is a brass plaque, anonymously prepared by a govmt agency:

• Government of Canada (2012). "Captain James Cook R. N." Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada. Archived from the original on 8 January 2014. Retrieved 2 November 2012.

Does anyone have a better source? (Notifying User:ThoughtIdRetired of this query).

The Hough source (pp 31-33) talks about how outstanding the charts were, and how they were used for 100 years, but doesn't say "They were the first large-scale surveys to use precise triangulation to establish land outlines."

The latter claim ("They were the first ...") is also a bit ambiguous: is it talking about Newfoundland? Canada? surveys performed by Royal Navy? Any survey in the entire globe? (latter seems unlikely; certainly some European coastlines must have had great surveying) Noleander (talk) 00:05, 16 July 2025 (UTC)

Not a total solution, but we have
"Holland added an extra dimension to his skills. He taught Cook all the secrets of his tripod-based table and the telescope mounted on it. By marking headlands and other relief features on drawing paper pinned down on the table and surrounding the telescope, and using an appropriate scale, the observer first collated the angles of observation and then by trigonometry calculated the distances between the different geographical features. For Cook this opened up the vista of a really accurate survey of coastlines. He already had the expertise necessary to make accurate hydrographic soundings and to estimate bearings at sea. By marrying Holland's skills with his own, he glimpsed the possibility of coastal surveys accurate far beyond anything yet achieved in Admiralty charts. Further refinements were later added, including the use of sextants, theodolites and a measuring rod known as a Gunter's Chain." McLynn, Frank. Captain Cook: Master of the Seas (p. 34 in a Kindle version). Yale University Press.

Looking at a new source: Suthren, Victor (2000). To Go Upon Discovery: James Cook and Canada, from 1758 to 1779. Toronto: Dundurn. ISBN 978-1459713062., we find:
"The significance of Holland’s tutoring of Cook is that it led Cook to establish the precision of the land survey process as an integral part of coastal chartmaking. Cook’s principal contribution to hydrography was this particular marriage of method that allowed charts to be produced which contained the soundings, bearings, and navigational notations required by the mariner, present in concert with a coastline fixed and delineated with calculated accuracy heretofore found only in surveying work ashore." (p. 62, Kindle page numbering).
This passage goes on to provide more detail on Cook's early version of this sort of surveying (before the capture of Quebec). Page 155 has a comment about the charts of Newfoundland that Cook produced having, to a hydrographer of more than 100 years later, accuracy that was "truly astonishing". Page 209 has further comments on accuracy and long-term use of his charts. (On the same page, Cook's visit to Nootka on the Pacific coast provides an argument that, but for Cook, present-day Canada would not reach beyond the Rocky Mountains.) Page 100-101 of this source has further description of Cook's surveying technique with theodolites. I recommend that you take a look at this source – for me the cost of a Kindle version was less than driving to the library and paying for parking (and they probably wouldn't have had a copy).

For anything else, I think we would need a history of hydrography. Looking into that, I have found "The Society's Annual Lecture / Captain James Cook as a Hydrographer". The Mariner's Mirror. 40 (2): 91–119. 1 January 1954. doi:10.1080/00253359.1954.10658197. ISSN 0025-3359., which I am out of time to read properly and have only given the briefest of skim reads. I will get back to that, but possibly not today. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 13:43, 17 July 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for doing that research and finding those sources. One thing we should consider is consolidating three pieces of text in the Canada section, that are currently separate (emphasis added in bold):

• The integration of Holland’s land-surveying techniques with Cook’s hydrographic expertise enabled Cook, from that point forward, to produce nautical charts of coastal regions that significantly exceeded the accuracy of contemporary Admiralty charts.
• Cook's hydrographic surveys in Newfoundland – conducted over five seasons – produced the first large-scale, accurate maps of the island's coasts. They were the first large-scale surveys to use precise triangulation to establish land outlines.
• Cook's charts were used for over 100 years.

So, the solution may involve:

1. Consolidating those three texts, to some degree.
2. Updating the wording to precisely reflect what the sources say
3. Elimiate any redundancy/repetition.

No rush on the additional sources, but the article has "Citation needed" tags now, and we should probably get that resolved sooner rather than later. Noleander (talk) 16:20, 17 July 2025 (UTC)

Another source that appears useful for the Canadian surveying aspect: , found in . Need to check the reputation of this journal. Just noted here so I don't lose it. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 07:34, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

Also which appears to identify author and provides his credentials. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 07:51, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

Interim thoughts for article content:
"Admiralty charts" did not exist at this time, so wrong to use that term. Perhaps "British charts"?
It seems that hydrographers had used triangulation before Cook, but nothing like to the same extent. (nail down ref!!) So perhaps what the plaque reference is trying to say is accurate. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 07:59, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

Files uploaded to academia.edu are not, as such, reliable sources. Gawaon (talk) 10:40, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

OK, but here is his obituary in a highly regarded peer-reviewed journal: Barritt, Michael (2 January 2022). "A. C. F. David (1924–2021)". The Mariner's Mirror. 108 (1): 4–5. doi:10.1080/00253359.2022.2009240. ISSN 0025-3359.. From this I think that we can conclude that his output is probably sound. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 22:42, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

WP:ACADEMIA.EDU says there is no consensus regarding its status, and: "Determine the original source of what is being cited to establish reliability. When possible, cite the original source in preference to the repository." Carlstak (talk) 21:50, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

I've taken a stab at rewording the text, and changed it to: The charts compiled by Cook were of such quality and accuracy – some were printed at a scale of one inch to one league – that they were still in use by the Royal Navy one hundred years later. His reputation for accuracy and precision would later be a significant factor in his selection to lead the first Pacific voyage.

I looked at the McLynn source, but I don't think that can be used for the article since it says " .. he glimpsed the possibility of coastal surveys accurate far beyond anything ... " which is not the same as saying " he produced coastal surveys accurate far beyond anything ...."

I committed the change before I saw the post above about the "Northern Mariner" source ... I'm reading it now to see how it applies. Noleander (talk) 22:49, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

... also, I moved the "charts were super accurate & used for 100 years" material to the end of the Canada section, since (a) it seems like a good conclusion to the preceding four paragraphs (covering Cooks time in Newfoundland); and (b) it is a good transition to the next section: the first Pacific Voyage. That is: the quality of the charts was a factor in his selection to lead the 1st voyage.

I also changed the intro sentence to the Newfoundland paragaraphs from:

Cook’s surveying expertise was further demonstrated in the 1760s, when he served as master of HMS Grenville and undertook the charting of Newfoundland’s rugged coastline

to

As the Seven Years' War came to a close, Cook was given the task of charting the rugged coast of Newfoundland. He was appointed master of HMS Grenville, and spent five seasons producing charts.

as a way of transitioning from the Seven Years war paragraphs into the Newf paragraphs. An alternative would be to create subsections under Canada section (one for 7 yr war; another for Newfoundland). Noleander (talk) 23:26, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

@ThoughtIdRetired - I'm looking at the article by Andrew David, and I don't see material (yet) that says something like "Cook's charts were higher accuracy/quality than other charts in Canada/the world". But I might be overlooking it: is there a particular sentence in that article that is applicable to the "They were the first large-scale surveys to use precise triangulation" assertion that is under discussion here? Noleander (talk) 22:54, 18 July 2025 (UTC)

I am working on it. Not easy to give a quick answer. It's the precise references that are the work – I think I am clear on what the article should say. I hope to get back to this later today, but this competes with (1) a promise to another editor to do something with a problem on Talk:Banana#Ancient spread by Austronesians: not supported by the sources which is another one that needs a whole lot of reading to give an answer, and (2) non-Wikipedia stuff. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 09:11, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

One issue is that sources are not totally clear on comparing when Cook was surveying with theodolites in Canada and when others were doing the same. It appears that one source at least is confusing on who was first. There is a risk of this degenerating into WP:OR if sources have to be over-interpreted. Hopefully it won't come to that. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 09:16, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

The research to answer these questions has now morphed into a larger question: Cook as a surveyor/cartographer/hydrographer. I will open a new section on this talk page to cover these points. I will also try to get back to answering the original question. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 20:28, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

I have been looking at
"THE SOCIETY'S ANNUAL LECTURE / CAPTAIN JAMES COOK AS A HYDROGRAPHER". The Mariner's Mirror. 40 (2): 91–119. January 1954. doi:10.1080/00253359.1954.10658197.
This article does not seem to cover many points mentioned in this source. That may be understandable, since hydrography is a bit of a specialist discipline (aside: the article Hydrography doesn't seem to be one of Wikipedia's best). But Cook is one of the key chart-makers in maritime history, so I am wondering if we need to give those aspects of his life more prominence. The following is my rough notes from reading this source, which I have left in a random order of importance. Page numbers refer just to this new source. On the source itself, I appreciate that it is somewhat old, but I cannot see any reason to doubt it based on age. The author had good access to primary sources from which to write it.

Rough notes:
Cook’s charts of Newfoundland did not have a longitude scale, because there was no method of calculating it. The lunar distance method had not yet been developed for use. (to confirm, Cook certainly did not have the necessary tables and my understanding is that this is because they had not yet been written.) Cook’s observation of an eclipse had to be put in the hands of an astronomer to calculate the longitude of one place in Newfoundland. pg 111
Importance: the chart used as an illustration in the article does have a longitude scale, which was presumably added at a later date. That scale, without an explanation, somewhat misleads the reader.

Cook was learning his trade and then working as a hydrographer, surveyor and cartographer at a time when the instrumentation and techniques used were undergoing significant advances. “Among these may be mentioned Hadley's reflecting quadrant ('a portable observatory' as George Adams called it); the sextant, developed from Hadley's quadrant by Captain John Campbell in I757; John Bird's astronomical quadrants; Dr Gowin Knight's azimuth compasses, adopted by the Navy in 1751, Ramsden's theodolites; and the chronometers of John Harrison, with their copies by other watchmakers. All these instruments are known to have been used by Cook during his career, although in Newfoundland he had no chronometer and probably no sextant “ pg 94-95 Sources on the early history of hydrography seem to be hard to track down.
Importance: shows Cook at the forefront of a rapidly developing field

“Some of Cook's Pacific surveys had not been superseded by the end of the nineteenth century, and Admiral Wharton was prepared to uphold the authority of Cook's charting in the New Hebrides against amendments reported in his own day to the Hydrographic Department.” ?William Wharton (Royal Navy officer)? pg 115
Importance: might be needed for existing article content.

The great efforts made in achieving accurate navigation: lunar distance observations were usually made simultaneously by the captain (Cook), the astronomer, one of the lieutenants, the master, master’s mate, with material differences rarely being found. pg 112. These continued even when the ship was in great peril: for instance, 17 August 1770 (date given in Cook’s journal), 80 to 100 yards from breakers that she ship was struggling to escape, Green, the master’s mate and the gunner made lunar observations and these were judged to be good quality observations. pg 112)
Importance: this would have been a huge amount of hard work (what do we think Cook was doing all day?) and demonstrates the teamwork involved. The observations when the ship could have been wrecked at any moment demonstrate the importance given to navigation.

The time taken to calculate a position from lunar distances was very long., estimated to take “some four hours”. Pg 111
Importance: more “what was Cook doing all day?”

Local names: “In naming his discoveries Cook anticipated modern practice. Unlike his predecessors, he diligently attempted to ascertain the place-names used by the natives and to put them on his charts…….” He was prevented from doing this when the indigenous population were too aggressive or if they appeared not to have a name for the feature concerned. For example, Nootka sound was originally named for King George in March 1778, but was given the name used by its inhabitants when that was discovered. p118
Importance: this gives some clue to Cook’s attitude to the residents of the places he visited.

Cook’s surveys involved teamwork from others on board: “I had several young men amongst my sea-officers who, under my direction, could be usefully employed in constructing charts, in taking views of the coasts ... and in drawing plans of the bays and harbours in which we should anchor” p115
Importance: relevant to Cook as a leader.

Cook was the first on a voyage of discovery to use Greenwich as his prime meridian, presumably because he used Nautical Almanac tables that were produced there. P 118
Importance: we use Greenwich as the Prime meridian today.

The source also describes the likely methods by which Cook surveyed in different circumstances. (Running surveys, using the shore as reference, not the log, so giving greater accuracy, versus surveys using triangulated shore stations, which is more accurate still.) It mentions the speed of his work: “Nevertheless, the rapidity of the surveys is no less remarkable than their accuracy. On the first voyage the coasts of New Zealand-2400 miles were charted in six months and the east coast of Australia-2000 miles-in four months. On the second voyage the New Hebrides group, extending over six degrees of latitude, was surveyed in six weeks; and the north-east coast of New Caledonia-some 300 miles-in under four weeks. On the third voyage over 3000 miles of the Pacific seaboard of North America (with two major breaks) were charted in little over four months” pg 109
Importance: probably just the speed and volume of work for the article, but to anyone who has navigated a coastline pre-GPS, this amount of work is amazing.

Magnetic variation and dip were frequently measured and recorded; tide tables were established for some locations. Pg 113
Importance: further demonstrates the amount of work done.

end of notes. I appreciate that not all of this will get into the article, but the above is a pick list for you. There is a lot more in the source, so I have already thinned it down. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 20:28, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

Link to article on author of this source: Raleigh Ashlin Skelton
ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 22:50, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander I see you deleted the link to the Trove website version of Cook's Endeavour Journal. I have no problem with this as it is more relevant to the First Voyage article. I just wanted to point out that despite first impressions, Trove is a very high quality resource developed by the National Library of Australia and includes many documents which aren't otherwise available online. (Its unprofessional appearance is because of the dire government funding of libraries in Australia.) The South Seas collection includes journals from Banks and other crew members of Cook's expeditions as well as useful nautical dictionaries and indigenous sources. I've always found their versions of Cook's journals handy because they indicate all his deletions and amendments inline. This is the link to the homepage. It's worth checking out. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 01:20, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

Amen: but that link to a Trove homepage goeth nowhere. Try here. Errantios (talk) 01:25, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

Sod's law! The link works fine on my computer but not when I try to link it via Wikipedia. https://webarchive.nla.gov.au/awa/20110215212800/http://southseas.nla.gov.au/index_voyaging.html Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 01:30, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

Shivering timbers. That new link works from WP on my computer (iMac with Safari). This too works from my computer and from WP ("show preview"). Errantios (talk) 01:40, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for the information about the Trove website. I clicked on it and visited the site, but it was very confusing. I didn't quite understand where I was or what its purpose was. I was expecting a more conventional museum website. Good to know it is high quality... tho I think they need to have a team go over that website and make it look more inviting :-) Noleander (talk) 02:10, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

It's funding. NLA got a big budget cut so we are stuck with a cruddy user interface. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 02:22, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander I have made a major revision to this section for the following reasons:

1) I have tried to write it in a more summary style, especially as we now have a separate article on the topic.

2) I still think the previous version devoted too much space to violence and punishments, whereas Salmond, Thomas and others make it clear that violence fluctuated and there were many peaceful encounters where trade and friendly relations predominated. For example, merely listing the range of punishments Cook used against theft is misleading without providing more information on the context and how frequent these punishments were.

3) I have added content on British violations of religious and other local customs which caused considerable offence. Sometimes these were innocent (picking a flower from a tree that turned out to be sacred) sometimes deliberate (Cook and Banks desecrating sacred ceremonies, sacred sites, and sacred wildlife when they were told repeatedly not to do so.) As Salmond said of one incident: "it is surprising that Cook wasn't killed on the spot."

4) I have put a little more information on cross-cultural cooperation and the important role of Cook's Polynesian ambassadors.

5) I have tried to put the conflict in context up front: I think Thomas does this best with his point that Cook had to spend frequent periods in harbours to fulfil his mission ad this was very likely to cause conflict when he encountered indigenous peoples who habitually resisted any approach by strangers. Cook understood this.

6) I have tried to emphasise the point made by Salmond, Thomas and Williams that Cook's ceremonial friendships brought obligations that he didn't fully understand and embroiled him in local politics and wars.

I still think the section needs more work. This is a very complex topic and likely to be one of the most controversial. We perhaps should add more on cross cultural exchanges: eg the way the crew adopted tattoos, Polynesian words, formed friendships and love affairs that they were prepared to risk their lives for; the way some Polynesians adopted English clothing and consumer goods, took the British side in disputes etc. I think we need to add a few lines on Cook's actual writings on the indigenous societies he encountered: the extent to which they reflected or contrasted with the prejudices of his times and crew mates. After all, the article is about Cook.

Please feel free to revert my changes if you think we should discuss them further on Talk before implementing any of them. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 07:51, 15 July 2025 (UTC)

Your improvements look good, thanks for taking the time to do them. Agree that the section still needs work. Capturing your notes for future work:

1. more on cross cultural exchanges: eg the way the crew adopted tattoos, Polynesian words, formed friendships and love affairs that they were prepared to risk their lives for;
2. the way some Polynesians adopted English clothing and consumer goods, took the British side in disputes etc
3. add a few lines on Cook's actual writings on the indigenous societies he encountered: the extent to which they reflected or contrasted with the prejudices of his times and crew mates.

All good suggestions. For #3 I think we'd have to find secondary source that select and analyze Cook's writings (vs crew mates thoughts) ... it would verge on OR if we (editors) selected some quotes from Cook ourselves; and also if we compared them with crew thoughts and drew conclusions. But I recall there are secondary sources that did exactly that, so it shouldn't be hard to create such material. Thanks again! Noleander (talk) 13:22, 15 July 2025 (UTC)

For number 3, it is discussed in Thomas and Salmond. It's bed time in my time zone but I will look them up in the morning and draft something for discussion. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 13:41, 15 July 2025 (UTC)

@Aemilius Adolphin Thanks so much for working on the Indigenous Peoples section ... it is looking great! Two questions: (a) Are the three items above (1,2,3) still needed? If not, are you in the process of implementing them, or should I? (b) Is it a good time for me to make a pass thru the section to look at the prose/wording for FA criteria (or are you planning on making some more changes soon)? Noleander (talk) 13:41, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander Sorry for the delay, I have been busy on other life matters.

a) I should be able to add something on this within 24 hours from this post. It will probably amount to 1 or 2 additional short subsections. We can then decide whether to keep them, incorporate them into existing sections, or discard them.

b) It's always a good time to check anything I have added! Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 22:07, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

Okay, thanks for the update. I'll wait a couple of days for you to add the new material before I look for any potential prose improvements. Noleander (talk) 22:39, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander I have added a subsection on Cook's reports on indigenous peoples and have opened a new discussion topic on it below. I will add a paragraph on cultural exchange today. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 23:02, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

Pinging User:Elrondil - Thanks for improving the article by inserting Parkinson book as a source.

Regarding Template:Cite Q used for the Parkinson book ... that is the only use of that template in the article, and it is producing a source description that is not consistent with the other book descriptions, specifically:

1. Title of book is a bizarre case (convention of the article is Title Case )
2. Shows the city of publication (convention in this article is to not display it)
3. Has two links to Internet Archive: (a) clicking on title of the book; and (b) "OL" field (convention of the article is only (a) )
4. Shows the WikiData Q link (Convention of this article is to not show Wikidata link)

I tried to adjust the Cite Q to make the source description consistent with the article conventions, but was only able to resolve (1). So, I converted it to "Cite Book" template, and that fixed everything. The goal here is to adhere to the FA criteria, and they are very strict about uniformity across all cites within an article. If you know of a way to use "Cite Q" and get it to produce a description that adheres to the conventions of this article, let me know. Noleander (talk) 14:29, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander: Almost everything can be overridden (try {{cite Q |‪Q19022466 |last=Parkinson |first=Sydney |author-link=Sydney Parkinson |publication-date=1784 |title=A Journal of a Voyage to the South Seas, in His Majesty's Ship the Endeavour |publication-place=unset |ol=unset |access-date=2025-07-19 }}{{sfn whitelist|CITEREFParkinson1784}}), but it seems the Wikidata Q-identifier can’t currently be suppressed (although that sounds like a reasonable addition to {{cite Q}} functionality).

Still, as this would currently be the only citation drawn from Wikidata, it could be reasoned it is consistent because all citations in the article drawn from Wikidata would be shown with their Q-identifier. Or to put it another way, citations without Q-identifiers would be shown without a Q-identifier (because they don’t have one), just like books without ISBNs are currently shown without an ISBN (because they don’t have one).

(Note that the first edition is also defined; see A Journal of a Voyage to the South Seas (Q109760452).) Elrondil (talk) 17:19, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for the educational information. I'm not sure which books (in this article's Sources or Further Reading sections) have Q identifiers. Some books that might have Q identifiers include:

• Banks, Joseph; Byron, John; Wallis, Samuel; Carteret, Philip; Cook, James (1773). Hawkesworth, John (ed.). An Account of the Voyages Undertaken by the Order of his Present Majesty for Making Discoveries in the Southern Hemisphere, and Successively Performed by ...
• Kippis, Andrew (1788). Narrative of the Voyages Round the World, Performed by Captain James Cook; with an Account of His Life During the Previous and Intervening Periods.
• Beaglehole, John, ed. (1968) [1955]. The Journals of Captain James Cook on His Voyages of Discovery. Vol. I: The Voyage of the Endeavour 1768–1771.
• Beaglehole, John (1974). The Life of Captain James Cook.
• Forster: The Resolution Journal of Johann Reinhold Forster, ..
• Forster, George (2000) [1777]. Thomas, Nicholas; Berghof, Oliver (eds.). A Voyage Round the World.
• Parkinson, Sydney (1784). A Journal of a Voyage to the South Seas, in His Majesty's Ship the Endeavour.
• Samwell, David (1893) [1779]. "An Account of Cook's Death (Some Account of a Voyage to South Seas in 1776, 1777, 1778 Written by David Samwell, Surgeon of the Discovery)
• Cook, James (1777). A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World.

I have no idea how many of the above books have a Q identifier, but it is probably between 2 and 5.

Question: Is there a way to simply add the Q identifier to the end of an existing "Cite book" template? E.g. change from

{{cite book | title = Hamlet | last= Shakespeare }}

to

{{cite book | title = Hamlet | last= Shakespeare }} [ https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7324 Wikidata link]

or

{{cite book | title = Hamlet | last= Shakespeare | Q-identifier = Q7324 }}

I'm not suggesting that is superior to using "cite Q" ... but knowing the answer would help with determining the best path forward. Noleander (talk) 21:06, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

I'm looking at Template:Cite book to see if it has a field/tag for the QID. I cannot see one. In that template's Talk page at Help_talk:Citation_Style_1/Archive_83#Wikidata_QID_parameter is a discussion from 2022 about adding a Q-ID to cite book, but I'm not sure if it was implemented or not.

I'm wondering if it is safer to stick with "cite book" because: when the editor populated the "cite book" template, a lot of work went into specifying the list of authors, chapter name, publication year (and possibly the "original publication" year), the list of editors, the exact publication year of the specific edition, and the ISBN of the specific edition that the editor read when consulting the source (to generate the material for this article). By shifting to "Cite Q" ... what guarantee is there that the Wikidata has the same list of authors, same ISBN, same chapter title, same edition etc? Seems like shifting from "Cite book" to "Cite Q" might introduce errors that no one would notice until years into the future (or never).

I can see three kinds of errors happening when shifting from "cite book" to "cite Q": (1) the Q-id is referencing a different edition of the book; (2) the Wikidata has errors in it; or (3) the Wikidata is missing some information (e.g. editor name) that is in the original "cite book". All of that would have to be manually validated if doing the change to "cite q".

On the other hand: adding the Q-identifer to an existing "Cite book" seems rather low risk. Noleander (talk) 21:13, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

Totally agree with concerns about {{Cite Q}}, to which should be added that the widely understood {{cite book}} (used on 1,790,000 pages) compares with the little used Cite Q (used on 55,000 pages): isn't this just a barrier to editors not familiar with this rarer template? Isn't there a risk of more incorrectly formatted citations? Is it easier to check a reference? ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 21:44, 19 July 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander and ThoughtIdRetired: If a genuine interest exists, I’m happy to take a look to see which ones are already defined in Wikidata, clean up their Wikidata items if needed, and add the {{cite Q}}s for them. I did have a quick look, and one I think is, as is the "bare-bones" of another ... but it was just a quick look.

When citing a specific edition of a source, it doesn’t make sense to use any other Wikidata item than the one for that specific edition. It also doesn’t make sense for the Wikidata item for a specific edition to ever be for any other edition, or indeed thing; that would be akin to turning the Wikipedia article for A into a Wikipedia article for different thing B. (Although when duplicates are found they are merged into the older item – by convention – and the Q-identifier of the younger becomes a redirect to the older, similar to the way redirects happen in Wikipedia. Conversely, sometimes a Wikidata item sadly is a mess of multiple things that need to be untangled and separated into multiple Wikidata items, just like some Wikipedia articles.) However, in a nutshell, Q19022466 is for Parkinson (1784), and shouldn’t ever be for anything else, even if it should become a redirect to an older Wikidata item for Parkinson (1784). A Wikidata item that isn’t correct and sufficiently complete isn’t suitable for {{cite Q}} until it is correct and sufficiently complete ... but it is for the thing it represents – Parkinson (1784) – rather than Parkinson (1784) for Wikipedia article James Cook. Finally, a Wikidata item may be monitored by subscribing to it, similar to subscribing to a Wikipedia article.

I think of {{cite Q}} as a {{cite xxx}} that is backed by a Wikidata item that may be shared across, and therefore leveraged by, many Wikipedia articles across many languages, as well as other projects and purposes, and it gets its own unique identifier in the Wiki universe in the process. If a correction or addition is made, it just needs to be made to the Wikidata item, instead of many Wikipedia articles across many languages. If a URL changes, change it once in the Wikidata item, if a new identifier becomes a thing, add it once. That is, all the long-understood benefits of data normalisation become available.

As for adding a Q-identifier to a {{cite book}}, try adding |id=[[WDQ (identifier)|Wikidata]]{{nbsp}}[[:d:Q19022466|Q19022466]] to it (for Q19022466). That is what {{cite Q}} currently does underneath.

{{cite Q}} should be very familiar to anyone familiar with the {{cite xxx}} templates. Yes there is a small learning curve to using {{cite Q}}, but beyond that learning curve are many benefits and no respectable scholar ought to be averse to a little bit of learning 😀. Elrondil (talk) 07:34, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

Frankly, I think it's better to stick with {{cite book}} and friends. In this way, not only do we get the usual formatting (from which {{cite Q}} sadly and unnecessarily deviates – at least last time I checked), but we also keep local control over the data. With {{cite Q}}, if somebody decides to change things on Wikidata, say replacing one edition with another one, the text of this page would change (possibly meaning that cited page numbers are now wrong etc.) without any of the watchers even noticing. Not a good thing. Gawaon (talk) 07:38, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

By subscribing to the Wikidata item, you do get notified of changes to that Wikidata item. Elrondil (talk) 07:42, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

It doesn’t make sense to change the Wikidata item for A into a Wikidata item for B, just like it doesn’t make sense to change the Wikipedia article for A into a Wikipedia article for B. Elrondil (talk) 07:50, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

Vandalism Traumnovelle (talk) 08:54, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

Yes, that can happen in Wikipedia and Wikidata. And it is handled in both the same way. Elrondil (talk) 08:58, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

If someone vandalises a Wikipedia page I can easily check the article history. Wikidata vandalism does not show up on Wikipedia Traumnovelle (talk) 09:35, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

You can subscribe to a Wikidata item just like you can to a Wikipedia article. A Wikidata item has a revision history just like a Wikipedia article, and to me at least they look, feel and work the same. And yes, you can do diffs and revert in Wikidata just like you can in Wikipedia. Elrondil (talk) 09:43, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

Yes, but I need to logon to Wikidata and know which item has been vandalised, where as if the citation is in the article I can revert the vandalism instantly. Traumnovelle (talk) 10:10, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

@ThoughtIdRetired: One benefit of {{cite Q}} is being able to share a citation across many articles and languages. That increases the pool of editors available to scrutinise the data behind that citation, and if a correction, repair or improvement is made, not just one Wikipedia article in one language benefits.

Yes, once correct, some data doesn’t change (the title for example doesn’t change no matter how much time passes, and the date of publication is unlikely to change too), but publishers sometimes change names, as do places where publications happen, and these are included in the citation in part to help find the citation in the present and in part to help verify you’ve got the right version. However, most change probably happens around URLs, and not just because of link rot: sometimes a better online source becomes available (better scan of a higher quality original, faster server, better UI/UX, etc), sometimes for just a while.

As for the entry barrier to adding a citation, if you’re in luck and a Wikidata item already exists, say Q19090938 for the 1859 edition of Early Voyages to Terra Australis, then {{cite Q |Q19090938}} gets you there most of the way, and if you want or need to override then {{cite Q |Q19090938 |expand=yes}} and the Wikidata item itself at {{Q |Q19090938}} may be faster (and less boringtedious 😄) than building it from scratch. Yes, you still need to verify.

In the case of Q19090938, if you hop up (see "edition or translation of", which isn’t always there, but in this case it is) to the Wikidata item for the work (as opposed to the edition) at Q135264712 and look at "has edition or translation", you may even find different editions such as the 2006 Project Gutenberg edition at Q135264721 in this case. For Q19022466, the 1773 edition is at Q109760452.

So is it easier to check a reference? The output citation in this case looks the same, except for the addition of the Q-identifier. So the reader isn’t better off ... other than benefiting from a more scrutinised citation ... and the addition of the Q-identifier. Most readers wishing to look at the cited source will use the hyperlinked title. But they also have the hyperlinked Q-identifier to get to the Wikidata item, where for Q19022466 they’ll currently find the work available at three URLs (Internet Archive, State Library of New South Wales and Bibliothèque nationale de France), so there is redundancy should any of them currently be, or more permanently become, unavailable. OCLC numbers and Open Library IDs are also still there to those that find them helpful, and sometimes there are also Google identifiers and links to Wikisource.

And the editor gets to benefit from more trodden ground, from more scrutiny, from reuse instead of constantly having to reinvent the wheel.

So yeah, I think it makes it easier. Elrondil (talk) 01:23, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

"some data doesn’t change ..., but publishers sometimes change names, as do places where publications happen". That's exactly why I wouldn't want to give the control over the citation data away to a place where normal page watches won't notice a change. When I add a reference, I personally check that metadata (publisher's name, location etc.) are correct as stated in the source. If then later someone at Wikidata decides to change the name or location because the publisher has subsequently changed its name or moved elsewhere, then that information is no longer correct, not matching the info actually given in the source itself. But page watchers wouldn't notice. Which is why I think keeping publication data local is the best way to ensure that it's correct and agrees to the info which editors actually saw when adding a citation. Gawaon (talk) 07:23, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

I appreciate User:Elrondil's efforts in making a case for this, but I remain unconvinced. I subscribe to the theory that the "editor toolkit" that we use should be as simple and concise as possible. We should be learning subjects for articles, not the mechanics and methods of Wikipedia editing. I rather feel that the effort expended in this project would have been better devoted to a tool to trawl existing references and adding electronic versions of books, if available. Though I see that such an idea would have its own range of problems. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 07:26, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

@ThoughtIdRetired:, yes there is a small learning curve, but it solves many problems and enables many things, including incidentally the groundwork for the very sort of stuff you’re talking about that I’ll just call “parse and connect” here. Because to do that, we need to parse citations, build a database, connect these to URLs, enable scrubbing and verification, make it possible to use previously parsed, connected, scrubbed and verified citations, and manage them going forward. In other words, build Wikidata items for citations and provide a template for using them.

I am not currently convinced the parsing is possible without some form of human assistance and verification. Elrondil (talk) 10:21, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

@ThoughtIdRetired: To put it another way, Wikipedia is more than just an awkward way of allowing multiple editors to concurrently edit a large collection of articles as self-contained documents. If that’s all it were, a file system of Word documents, one folder for each language, would suffice these days. Elrondil (talk) 19:09, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

@Gawaon: Again, you are free to subscribe to any Wikidata item, as you are free to subscribe to any Wikipedia article. That is the Wiki way of keeping a watch on something. Elrondil (talk) 07:33, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

I'm free to do a lot of things, but how practical are they? What you suggest would only be practical if, whenever an editor clicks the Watch icon for a page, an "Including all Q items used on this page" option pops up, and it's checked by default. Even then, however, these items wouldn't actually show up on my watchlist, since Wikidata has its own watchlist system. So I have would have keep track of two watchlists instead of one. No thanks, that's really too much to ask for. Gawaon (talk) 07:43, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

@Gawaon: Are you also proposing to move all images from Commons to Wikipedia? Elrondil (talk) 07:44, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

No. Though actually, all images used in the English Wikipedia automatically get their own page in it. If the same happened for Wikidata items, that would sure be a step towards making it more convenient for editors to interact with them. Gawaon (talk) 07:50, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

Just don't use {{cite Q}} if you want to get the article through FAC, especially not for a single citation. —Kusma (talk) 08:41, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

The output for {{cite Q |‪Q19022466 |last=Parkinson |first=Sydney |author-link=Sydney Parkinson |publication-date=1784 |title=A Journal of a Voyage to the South Seas, in His Majesty's Ship the Endeavour |publication-place=unset |ol=unset |oclc=unset |access-date=18 July 2025 |mode=cs1 }} (I also suppressed the OCLC, since the current {{cite book}} version doesn’t have it, and manually set mode to CS1 here on the talk page) is:

• Parkinson, Sydney (1784). A Journal of a Voyage to the South Seas, in His Majesty's Ship the Endeavour. Charles Dilly. Wikidata Q19022466. Retrieved 18 July 2025.

The output for the current {{cite book}} version {{cite book |title=A Journal of a Voyage to the South Seas, in His Majesty's Ship the Endeavour |last=Parkinson |first=Sydney |author-link=Sydney Parkinson |year=1784 |publisher=[[Charles Dilly]] |url=https://archive.org/details/b30452545/page/n8 |access-date=18 July 2025 |id=[[WDQ (identifier)|Wikidata]]{{nbsp}}[[:d:Q19022466|Q19022466]] }} (to which I added the id as suggested by Noleander, and used the shorter "https://archive.org/details/b30452545/page/n8" URL for the title page) is:

• Parkinson, Sydney (1784). A Journal of a Voyage to the South Seas, in His Majesty's Ship the Endeavour. Charles Dilly. Wikidata Q19022466. Retrieved 18 July 2025.

The output is identical. Elrondil (talk) 10:30, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

User:Elrondil - My preference is to avoid using "cite Q" in this article at this point in time. I understand the value of Wikidata: if it did not exist, it would have to be invented. Wikidata is a valuable addition to any article ... in the right circumstances. However, the James Cook article is in the middle of a lengthy process to upgrade it to meet WP:FA criteria. The article has 513 footnotes (combined citations & notes) .. that is more than the Cher article! Examples of tasks that were recently done for James Cook include (a) reviewing all sources to ensure that potential "author-link" fields are added; (b) changing all source titles to Title case; and (c) ensuring all source URLs are correct. Introducing "cite Q" at this point in time could introduce problems. After the article has been thru the FA process would be a good time to do any "cite Q" work. Until then, a good middle ground is to add available Wikidata links to existing citations. Noleander (talk) 14:01, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

To put it another way: introducing more Wikidata links into WP articles is a laudable goal, but the best articles to work on would be high-visibility articles that are very mature and very stable. To pick some random examples: Douglas MacArthur (FA from 2012), Australia (FA may 2004), Charles Darwin (FA 2006), ... etc. These articles are very stable, so any Wikidata work could be conducted in a low-risk manner, and easily validated. Noleander (talk) 15:07, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander: I accept this mightn't be the right time for this article in the middle of that process. I'll see what I can do to help adding Q-identifiers. Elrondil (talk) 21:41, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

The lead section says that Cook claimed "many territories" for Britain, but I think the total number is only about 8 ... so I changed it to "several territories". But now I'm not sure that is is the best word.

I don't recall reading a source that gives a total count. I know that on the first voyage there were four:

• Raʻiātea (the second largest island in Society Islands, after Tahiti), Taha'a, Huahine and Bora Bora, 21 July 1769.
• Mercury Bay in modern New Zealand, 15 November 1769.
• Queen Charlotte Sound in modern New Zealand, 30 January 1770.
• Entire east coast of modern Australia (Cook called it New South Wales), 22 August 1770.

On later voyages were:

• New Caledonia
• South Georgia Island
• South Sandwich Islands

So that is seven (I don't think he claimed Hawaii). So perhaps the total count is around 7 or 8? Returning to the lead wording: it looks like the total # is somewhere on the borderline of "several" and "many". I don't have a strong feeling one way or another. Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 18:15, 20 July 2025 (UTC)

"Numerous" wouldn't work, but it seems to me that "a number of" is imprecise enough, without being too emphatic, to do the job. Carlstak (talk) 18:20, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

Hello all

I have added a sub-section on this as per the discussion above. I am starting to think that the indigenous section is becoming too long and some content might need to be moved to the main article on that topic.

Happy to discuss Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 22:59, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

New subsection looks good. Some thoughts:

1. Regarding size: The entire article is currently at 8,560 prose words, which is not too big. WP:SIZERULE suggests a maximum of about 9,000 prose words. As for the relative size of the Indigenous Peoples section: the WP:PROPORTION guideline suggests that the section size should reflect the percentage that sources talk about the topic. I think the trend is for modern sources on Cook to spend an increasing % of material on relations with indigenous peoples (compared to 20th century sources). So, I think the Indigenous Peoples section could be roughly the size of one of the Voyages section.
2. Subsection title: "Cook's reports" - Can that be improved? "Reports" may lead some readers to think that Cook prepared documents specifically dedicated to indigenous peoples (when in fact the material is based on selected entries in his journals and diary, correct?) Perhaps a word like "Observations" or "Insights" or "Reflections" would be more precise? The word "Cook's" might be unnecessary since the article is about Cook, so every subsection is implicitly about him or his products; on the other hand it doesn't hurt to include it if it adds clarity.
3. Word-smithing: you say you're adding another subsection on cultural exchange soon, so I'll wait until that to start reviewing the Indigenous Peoples section for any words to touch up for FA quality purposes.

Thanks for adding that important material! Noleander (talk) 23:59, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

I have gone with "Cook's observations" for the moment, but that doesn't seem right either as some of this comments are judgements rather than observations. I think we need to put "Cook's" in there because even though the article is about Cook, the section is about indigenous peoples so simply "Observations" could mean the observations of Cook, indigenous peoples, or we editors. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 00:43, 22 July 2025 (UTC)

Hello all

I have added a sub-section on this topic as discussed above. Any feedback would be welcome. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 12:36, 22 July 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for adding that section ... looks comprehensive & detailed! The article is now at 8,989 prose words ... just under the 9,000 quasi-limit :-)

A few citations in the new section had years that seemed wrong: Salmond 2013, Salmond 2004, etc. I changed them to Salmond 2003, but I have not verified that was what you intended.

There are a few statements/events within the Indigenous Peoples section that are duplicates of statements in the Voyages sections. Sometimes it is okay to have a few duplicates. Perhaps this article could strive for the guideline: Specific events/anecdotes go in the Voyages sections; generalizations and summaries go in the Indigenous Peoples section.

Not sure if any of the subsections in the Indigenous Peoples section should be tightened. Hard to say at this point.

I'll start word-smithing the Indigenous Peoples section soon, with the goal of meeting the FA prose quality requirement. Noleander (talk) 15:24, 22 July 2025 (UTC)

Salmond should be 2003. I use the 2004 edition but the pages are the same. 2013 was just a typo. Thanks for picking that up. Yes, we should avoid repetitions, but sometimes the specific detail is better in the Indigenous Peoples section because that's the section where we discuss specific indigenous issues. Think we should omit the following passage altogether: "In his journal, Cook affirmed the humanity of Aboriginal peoples, responding to accounts by explorer William Dampier whose descriptions of their appearance had led some Europeans to speculate on a supposed close relation to black Africans. At the time, apologists for slavery often argued that people of African descent were not of the same species as white Europeans, using such claims to justify the slave trade." (This comes from Thomas and no other source. It's a bit of tangential point-stretching by him because nowhere does Cook talk about slaves or the humanity of the Aborigines or negroes. He notes their straight hair merely as a piece of empirical observation. Banks notes it isn't woolly like negroes and makes a point about classification: ie straight hair therefore not negroes. Nowhere does Cook or Banks go on to say or imply: "Therefore they are human, unlike the subhuman negroes who some think are only fit to be slaves."). At the very least, this passage should be attributed to Thomas and relegated to a footnote. it shouldn't be presented in the wikipedia voice as a fact supported by the consensus of secondary sources. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 02:04, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

You are correct. I moved the "... affirmed the humanity..." statement into a footnote, and added words attributing that interpretation to Thomas. The footnote may disappear in the future (I'll make a pass thru the article at some point to remove minor/unimportant footnotes; or if the footnote is speculative & unique to a single source). Noleander (talk) 13:11, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

I'm planning on requesting a peer review soon to ask a reviewer if the article meets FA criteria. The FA criteria say that an article must be: Comprehensive: it neglects no major facts or details and places the subject in context.

Before requesting the peer review: Is anyone aware of any "major facts or details" that are missing from this article? Bear in mind that the WP:Summary Style guideline says that the article doesn't have to contain all facts about Cook, because subarticles can (and should) be used to hold non-major facts. Noleander (talk) 15:36, 22 July 2025 (UTC)

As above (Cook as a surveyor/cartographer/hydrographer), we need some mention of the processes by which his chart-making was achieved. Cook was working at a time of the development of instruments and methods for map and chart making. It seems to me strange that an article of this length does not give some clue of how his activities fit into the changes in this discipline. Currently, the reader has little insight into how Cook determined the positions of the points he charted. There is an early mention of plane tables (Canada), but once Cook's knowledge had developed, he was using the more accurate and versatile theodolite (Newfoundland). The word "theodolite" does not appear anywhere in the article, nor does "sextant" or "quadrant". The term "lunar distance" appears just once in a footnote, but we now know that (a) Cook did not have the lunar distance method available to him in Newfoundland (b) a lot of work was done to observe lunar distances on his second and third voyages. Looking in the article for other words that one would expect to see in a brief mention of how Cook made charts, there is no mention of "triangle", "triangulate" or other derivatives. If we could explain it concisely, the method by which the coast of New Zealand was charted would be an important inclusion. (That is to say, running surveys, but using coastal features charted just minutes beforehand to fix the ship's position from which a bearing of the next coastal feature is taken. This is more accurate than estimating the ship's position by use of the log.) The current version of the article has extensive coverage of Cook's interactions with the people he encountered – nothing wrong with that, it's an essential part of the story – but very little about his use of the skills that got him each of the tasks for which he is known.ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 22:38, 22 July 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for reminding me of the discussion above in the topic #Cook as a surveyor/cartographer/hydrographer. I think it is reasonable to include some additional material on map-making skill, much as the article already has a couple of sentences on Cook's anthropological & navigation skills. I think one of the reasons I did not follow-up before is the major source you mentioned above was an article from The Mariners Mirror by Raleigh Ashlin Skelton ... that source is okay, but a bit weak. In the James Cook article we are faced with a surfeit of material, so limiting ourselves to material covered by the major biographers such as Thomas/Beaglehole/etc helps us sift the wheat from the chaff. I'll go thru Beaglehole and some other more prominent sources and see what they say about Cook's map-making skills & techniques. Ideally, they'll have some great material and we can rely on them rather than lesser sources like Skelton (tho Skelton could be used as a last resort). Noleander (talk) 22:59, 22 July 2025 (UTC)

Looking at Beaglehole 1974, it appears that he provides ample material to support a few sentences on Cook's surveying/charting/cartographic skills: pages 33, 50, 60, 67, 69-70, 80, 99, 136. I'll put together some material and insert it, tentatively, into the existing James_Cook#Navigation_and_science section, which already covers his skills at navigation & exploration. Noleander (talk) 01:20, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

I am not sure that I understand your point about Skelton as a source. First of all, the Mariner's Mirror is the leading journal for maritime historians working on British subjects. There is no more authoritative journal for this sort of subject. Secondly, you will have noticed that Skelton is cited by Beaglehole (footnote 1 on pg 69). You will also see from Skelton's entry in ODNB () that he was an essential collaborator with Beaglehole for his edited Cook's journals. If you don't have free access to the ODNB, then will do the job. What is key about Skelton as a source is that he was able to deduce how Cook surveyed the coastline of New Zealand. Having taken a peek at ODNB's entry for Cook, even they miss the point about the nature of Cook's running survey of that coastline, though they are clear that he could not fix longitude for his survey of Newfoundland until he got an astronomer to calculate it from his eclipse observations.

Skelton puts Cook in the context of contemporary cartography. Using a theodolite to chart a coastline is not that remarkable unless you are one of the first to be doing it, and certainly the first in such quantity. Using a sextant is unremarkable (well, perhaps it is now that everyone uses GPS) for fixing your position relative to coastal landmarks, but it is when a sextant was a relatively new instrument and it is very remarkable to use it in a running survey that does not have the log as a key reference. (I kind of presume that you know how to use a sextant to measure angles between coastal landmarks and thereby fix a position – but perhaps that is not the case.)

The bits of Beaglehole that you cite seem generally to be a bit anaemic. One has to wonder if Beaglehole had relied too much on Skelton in his edited journals of Cook and then when he came to write the biography, Skelton was dead and not there to help. Whatever the cause, I do not see Beaglehole as having a good grasp of where Cook stands in the history of cartography or in providing the basic headline detail of the two surveying methods he used for coastlines.

Sorry to have come straight back with a load of criticism, but I fear that we may be missing something important for the article. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 20:44, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

I stand corrected. I'll double check that Skelton source and see how it can be used to improve the new sentences related to Cooks surveying/hydrography etc. Noleander (talk) 20:58, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

Skelton is also good for the accuracy of Cook's work. Any search of the article for the words "error" or "accuracy" will get you to that material. You are spoilt for choice, but I would pick the combination of "rapidity" and "accuracy" in the same sentence, or the absolute error in locating the longitude of Point Venus being around a mile.ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 08:22, 24 July 2025 (UTC)

I updated the article to include some material about Cook's surveying & charting skills, and relies on Skelton as a source (tho sometimes coupled with other sources). Most is in the "Science, technology, and seamanship" section:

• Cook's outstanding seamanship and navigation skills enabled him to lead three expeditions – which travelled tens of thousands of miles across mostly uncharted oceans – that successfully gathered vast amounts of scientific and geographic knowledge, without the loss of a single ship... Cook was an expert surveyor, cartographer, and hydrographer; and was well-versed in the use of instruments such as the theodolite, plane table, and sextant. The charts of Newfoundland compiled by Cook – some were printed at a scale of one inch to one league – were more accurate than new charts produced by the Royal Navy one hundred years later. The charting skills he displayed in Newfoundland were a significant factor in his selection to lead the first Pacific voyage.

I also added a footnote about Greenwich meridian:

• Endeavour was the first Royal Navy ship to use Greenwich as the prime meridian..

I debated putting it in the body text, but Skelton implies that Cook simply used Greenwich because he was carrying the Nautical Almanac (as you mention above) which happened to use Greenwich; that is, Cook himself did not care which meridian it was. A footnote seemed like a good compromise to let readers know that Cook was "cutting edge" in some regards, without suggesting that he get credit for choosing Greenwich. Noleander (talk) 22:24, 24 July 2025 (UTC)

I was thinking more of something like Cook was working at a time when the instruments^[a] and methods of cartography were developing. For his survey of Newfoundland, there was no standard method of determining longitude.^[b] On his first voyage of exploration, he assiduously used the lunar distance method; thereafter he both tested and used an early chronometers. The high level of accuracy of his surveys was commented on by cartographers working 100 years after him. For coastal surveys, he used a theodolite from measured baseline whenever possible. When a large distance had to be covered (for instance, New Zealand), he used a running survey. To improve accuracy, the chart he was making gave him the “distance run” that was needed to plot the bearings for the next point charted. Alongside the accuracy of his work, the speed with which it was accomplished was commented on by cartographers who came after him. This is written in haste, as I need to get to work. There may be a good link for "distance run". If not, it might be worth writing one.
On the Greenwich Meridian point, describing this as the first instance of a Royal Navy ship to use this meridian is surely questionable as there must have been others who had the same tables as Cook. The point in the source (from memory) is that this was the first major exploration voyage to use a Greenwich-based meridian (compare with, for instance, Bougainville). Without Cook's voyage, we may well have had a Prime Meridian that goes through Paris. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 08:42, 25 July 2025 (UTC)

Not that I can see, but I will have a thorough check today. However, it might be worth including a footnote with his full quote about the condition of the Aborigines as it confounds many assumptions about Cook's attitudes. Currently we say: "He believed that Aboriginal Australians were happier than the British because they enjoyed social equality in a warm climate and were provided with all the necessities of life, and therefore had no need of trade with Britain. This is a paraphrase of the full quote: "From what I have said of the Natives of New-Holland they may appear to some to be the most wretched people upon Earth, but in reality they are far more happy than we Europeans; being wholy unacquainted not only with the superfluous but the necessary Conveniencies so much sought after in Europe, they are happy in not knowing the use of them. They live in a Tranquillity which is not disturb’d by the Inequality of Condition: The Earth and sea of their own accord furnishes them with all things necessary for life, they covet not Magnificent Houses, Houshold-stuff &c’, they live in a warm and fine Climate and enjoy a very wholsome Air, so that they have very little need of Clothing and this they seem to be fully sencible of, for many to whome we gave Cloth &c’ to, left it carlessly upon the Sea beach and in the woods as a thing they had no manner of use for. In short they seem’d to set no value on any thing we gave them, nor would they ever part with any thing of their own for any one article we could offer them; this in my opinion argues that they think themselves provided with all the necessarys of Life and that they have no superfluities." Thomas (2003) p 128 Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 02:17, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

I have just remembered that in the section on Cross-cultural exchange I was going to add a few sentences on how the official accounts, unauthorised crew accounts, artefacts, wordlists and artworks of the voyages exposed Europe to many Pacific cultures for the first time and produced much knowledge but also many misunderstanding. (For all Cook's dispassionate accounts, there were more popular stories of blood thirsty cannibals, human sacrifices, free sex and pagan rituals.) However, the topic is so large and complex that I gave up. Nevertheless, I do think we need to mention somewhere that the official accounts of the voyages were lavish productions and immensely popular and spawned plays, poems etc and that the artworks changed the way Europeans saw the world. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 02:36, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

Sounds good. If you're too busy, let me know and I can take care of it. Noleander (talk) 13:00, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

Thanks Aemilius Adolphin for the quote from Thomas. Really don't think it supports the statement that Cook felt Aboriginal Australians had social equality, at least not by our definition of the term: a state of affairs in which all individuals within society have equal rights, liberties, and status, possibly including civil rights, freedom of expression, autonomy, and equal access to certain public goods and social services. Nothing in Cook's description implies he felt there were equal rights or liberties, or that pre-colonial Australia had civil rights or freedom of expression. Might it be better to replace this claim with a more specific paraphrase of the first sentence quoted above, referring to the "wretched people" opinion but also the reason for happiness being unacquaintance with the superfluous? -- Euryalus (talk) 03:40, 24 July 2025 (UTC)

The phrase is: "They live in a Tranquillity which is not disturb’d by the Inequality of Condition". Thomas speculates that Cook was making an implied comment on the social inequality of England. I don't think the notion of social equality you quote above is right. For a start, civil rights and freedom of expression are modern western notions. And you can have a great deal of social equality and very little freedom of expression or civil liberties as many Communist societies have shown. So I will stand by my paraphrase for now, but if a consensus emerges for different wording (for example "economic equality") that's fine. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 04:09, 24 July 2025 (UTC)

One of this article's top-level sections is "Health and disease" ... it is very small. Another top-level section is "Science and navigation". To help readers navigate the article, I did this:

• Expanded the scope of the "Science and navigation" top-level section to include any accomplishments of Cook (or his voyages) related to anything scientific or technological, including: surveying, seamanship, hydrography, anthropology, health, etc. I renamed the section to "Science, technology, and navigation" ... but maybe there is a better name?
• In that section, I added new material about Cook's surveying & hydrographic skills (see above in this Talk page).
• Moved "Health and disease" top-level section to be a sub-section within "Science, technology, and navigation"

One benefit of this change is that the article had ten top-level sections (before minor sections at the end), and now it has nine. Ten top-level sections is not prohibited, but the more there are, the harder it is for readers so navigate the article. If anyone thinks this is not an improvement, let me know. Noleander (talk) 18:29, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

Perhaps a better title for the "Science, technology, and navigation" section is "Science, technology, and seamanship" ... because seamanship is a broad term that encompasses navigation, seafaring skills, and - arguably - actions Cook took to ensure crew health (airing-out bedding, fresh vegetables, etc). Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 18:37, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

I changed the section title to "Science, technology, and seamanship". Noleander (talk) 21:50, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

The article needs a source that supports " ... he sailed tens of thousands of miles ... " or " ... he sailed tens of thousands of miles without losing a ship ..." or similar. That fact is in the Lead, and I want to add it to the Science/Navigation section ... but to do so I need a source. I thought it would be easy to find a source, but I'm drawing a blank. Google is not helping so far ... I'm sure it is staring me in the face: probably in the Introduction section of one of the biographies. Any suggestions? Noleander (talk) 22:06, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander Williams (2008) p 1 referring, only to the Pacific, says "Sailing many thousands of miles across the largely unchartered ocean..." Salmond (2003) p 292 says the Resolution sailed "more than twenty thousand leagues" (ie 60,000 miles) on the second voyage "equivalent to sailing three times around the equator." Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 23:28, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

Perfect, that should be sufficient. Thanks. Noleander (talk) 23:47, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

This may be a better illustration of Cook's chartmaking in Newfoundland. It is more of a "work in progress" and has less added by others. Additionally, the longitude scale is missing, because it could not be measured at that stage (a significant fact in the history of cartography and exploration). It might not be as pretty as the image currently doing this job, but I think it tells the reader more and it is closer to Cook's actual work.

If used in the article, the caption should point out the absence of a longitude scale. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 08:04, 24 July 2025 (UTC)

It looks interesting. One issue may be the resolution: when I try to enlarge it, it gets blurry, and I cannot read the text in the middle. The chart that is currently in the article permits zooming to read the fine details, even the soundings, etc. Can you find a higher resolution version of this proposed chart? I'm sure readers will want to zoom in and read the text printed int he middle of Newfoundland. Noleander (talk) 15:47, 24 July 2025 (UTC)

This one might be better, but I am having internet problems and cannot upload a cropped version of it. Is it an improvement, especially if you can crop it satisfactorily? ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 21:21, 24 July 2025 (UTC)

I downloaded the highest resolution version of image #2 (at right) which is 1,239 × 1,752 pixels, and it is still rather blurry when I magnify it. I can read "Sketch" and "Island of Newfoundland" and kinda read "James Cook"; but I cannot read anything below that. Noleander (talk) 22:17, 24 July 2025 (UTC)

I tried looking for other versions (there are plenty) but am now connected to the internet by an ancient copper cable rather than a nice satellite, so I can't handle any files of any size. I suspect that a better version is out there, but I can't access it today. Or more likely the upload defaulted to a lower resolution (it looked fine before I uploaded it.) Anyway, there are specialists in uploading good illustrations that might know more about finding a good version than me. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 22:24, 24 July 2025 (UTC)

I have added the following text to the sub-section on Cross cultural exchange: "European knowledge of the indigenous peoples of the Pacific region increased with the publication of the official and unofficial accounts of the voyages. These accounts were popular but spread some misconceptions about indigenous peoples.^[1][2][c] The art of the voyages also proved popular, many works being reproduced in cheap editions and as book illustrations.^[6][7] The artists strove for scientific accuracy but sometimes distorted actual events and fostered a particularly European vision of the Pacific and its cultures.^[8][7]"

My first thought was to add a whole section on the art and literature of the voyages (official and unofficial accounts) which had a major impact on increasing European knowledge of the Pacific region and its cultures but also fostered popular misconceptions and a particular "official" view of Cook as heroic, humanitarian explorer, and the Pacific as a region of barbarous cannibals, miserable primitives, exotic sensuous women and noble warriors. My concerns with the latter approach were 1) The article is already on the margins of acceptable length; 2) The topic is vast and might be better suited to its own article; 3) The topic is more about the impact of the voyages rather than the biography of Cook himself.

Any comments or suggestions on the this approach welcomed.

Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 06:05, 25 July 2025 (UTC)