Talk:James Cook/Archive 6

The second paragraph of the lead includes This acclaim came at a crucial moment in British overseas exploration.... The reader might expect the article to say what was so crucial about this point in the history of British exploration, but it does not seem to explain. It possibly would be clear if the article structure had a "historical context" section, as many Wikipedia articles of this type do. That would have the advantage of being able to briefly mention which other European explorers had preceded Cook's voyages of exploration. The article does not mention, for example, Bougainville, makes only passing mention of Dampier, and Bering gets no mention, even though Cook's last voyage was following up on that explorer's work.

If the reader is to understand the relevance of Cook, I think it would help to set him in the context of the other explorers who covered the same ground. Clearly this would be the briefest summary, but key would be the links to the relevant articles. I do appreciate that there is a link to European maritime exploration of Australia, but we are short of anything similar for other places explored by Cook. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 19:57, 27 July 2025 (UTC)

Excellent points. Carlstak (talk) 20:47, 27 July 2025 (UTC)

Yes, the article would make more sense if it provided a bit more context ... explaining what was happening globally. I don't know if it needs an entire section or just a paragraph. I think it would fit right at the very beginning of the first voyage section. Noleander (talk) 23:29, 27 July 2025 (UTC)

... or, add a sentence or two near the start of each of the 3 voyage sections:

• First voyage: list recent European explorers of Pacific & Australia
• Second voyage: mention search for Terra Australis
• Third voyage: Bering; search for NW passage

Noleander (talk) 23:58, 27 July 2025 (UTC)

I'm researching sources for additional contextual material; It's easy to find raw data: dates, names, places. Harder to find "big picture" contextual info. I'm sure school textbooks have some good overview info, but they are not the best sources. I'll keep looking.

Regarding the sentence in the lead: This acclaim came at a crucial moment in British overseas exploration, and it led to his commission in 1768 as commander of HMS Endeavour for the first voyage of three that he would lead. we may need to modify it a bit since we may not be able to find sources that say 1768 was "a crucial moment in British overseas exploration". Wording more consistent with sources might be Cook's accomplishments in Canada were noticed by Royal Naval leadership, and led to his commission in 1768 as commander of a voyage to explore the South Pacific and search for Terra Australis. Noleander (talk) 18:00, 28 July 2025 (UTC)

I see our good friend Beaglehole has a book that may have some good overview/contextual material: The Exploration of the Pacific https://archive.org/details/bwb_W9-CSN-667 Noleander (talk) 18:04, 28 July 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander Blainey (2020) pp 1-10 explains it quite well: Wallis's discovery of Tahiti in 1767 "had far reaching consequences." finally gave Britain a secure base for exploring the Pacific which was largely unknown. He says: Britain wanted to see how many other useful islands there were and whether the speculated Unknown Southern land existed. The Treaty of Paris (1763) meant that Britain would have naval dominance for some time so the Admiralty wasn't looking for military commanders, it was looking for captains with good mapping and surveying skills for this exploratory work. So rather than saying "The acclaim came at a crucial moment" I should say "the acclaim came at a pivotal moment". Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 22:12, 28 July 2025 (UTC)

Coincidentally, I had considered the replacement of "crucial" with "pivotal". I discounted it, as the thing that made this a pivotal moment in history was Cook's subsequent success. If he had had the same sort of result as, say, Bougainville, or if any of the potential points of disaster for the expedition had come to fruition, then the moment would not have been pivotal at all. A less grand word might be "opportune", because it was for Cook, and for the navy, as they had a skilled and diligent surveyor to employ. But the difficulty with the choice of adjective comes with the ...moment in British overseas exploration. What was so special about this moment in history, when Cook was appointed? If the lead is meant to summarise the article, I can't see anything that explains the significance of this moment versus any other in the whole story. It might simply be better to trim the problem phrase completely, especially if you are worried about article length. In short, if you/we don't know what to say, don't say it. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 22:33, 28 July 2025 (UTC)

But if Blainey is correct, the pivotal moments were the discovery of Tahiti and the end of the military conflict with France which temporarily settled the question of French/British rivalry over colonies in the Americas. In other words, there was a pivot in Admiralty thinking from military conflict with France over the Americas to exploration/colonies/trade in South Pacific. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 01:46, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

The issue (which I rather wandered away from mentioning, above) is that we do not say that in the main body of the article. The only mention of the report of the discovery of Tahiti, a few months before the start of Cook's first voyage of exploration, is well hidden in a footnote. Even there, the event is described in a rather matter-of-fact manner for a "pivotal" aspect of the subject. Nor do we have the context of the end of conflict with France. This all points to the sort of content that a "historical context" section should have. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 07:31, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

Yes, we need to mention all this somewhere in the article, either in a background section or in the section on the First Voyage. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 08:43, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

@Aemilius Adolphin Excellent info ... thanks. I posted a note (below) simultaneously with your post (above) ... so it may look like I was ignoring you, but I had not read your post yet. Noleander (talk) 22:37, 28 July 2025 (UTC)

I've gone thru relevant parts of the Beaglehole book. It looks like the important contextual information that will benefit readers of the James Cook article is:

• At the time of C's first voyage, Europeans had already encountered & documented many lands of the Pacific Ocean, especially around the perimeter. Known lands in 1750 included Tierra del Fuego, Peru, Panama, Mexico, California, Malacca, Batavia, Philippines, Japan, Tasmania, New Zealand, Kamchatka and Bering strait.
• In mid 1700s, there was already thriving trade to the Pacific including: (a) Batavia / Dutch / Spice Islands; (b) Spain: Manila galleon
• However, in 1750 there were still vast portions of the Pacific Ocean that were entirely unexplored, or the locations of lands were uncertain. Including: West coast of North America (North of Oregon); middle portion of Pacific ocean (Tahiti, Hawaii, etc); Southern Ocean (and potential Terra Austr);
• Immediately prior to Cook's voyage, British explorers Samuel Wallis and Philip Carteret conducted major voyages in Pacific & Cook had their reports & data (e.g. Wallis encountered Tahiti in 1767 & returned to England May 1768 .. a few months before Cook departed)
• At the time of Cook's first voyage: Britain's primary goals for Pacific Ocean exploration were: (a) Determine if Terra Australis existed; (b) find NW passage; and (c) find any lands / peoples anywhere in the Pacific.

Noleander (talk) 22:35, 28 July 2025 (UTC)

The post immediately above does not yet incorporate input from users ThoughtIdRetired or Aemilius Adolphin, that was posted (above) about the same time. Noleander (talk) 22:39, 28 July 2025 (UTC)

Sources for overall context: You might want to look at pp 497-502 of Paine, Lincoln P. (2015). The sea and civilization: a maritime history of the world. London: Atlantic Books. ISBN 9781782393580. We at least have Bering, Bougainville and Cook mentioned within a page of each other (and some less memorable names). I also have somewhere another source that might (or might not) assist, for which I am having an intensive search. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 22:56, 28 July 2025 (UTC)

Okay, thanks for that source ... I'll look into it. So far, it is proving difficult to distill the sources; but it always seems hard at first. Noleander (talk) 01:32, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

For the RN context this book looks good. The period 1763-1769 was a period of demobilisation and retrenchment, the period 1776-1770 was a period of managing a peace time fleet. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 01:58, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

A quick note on a source I have yet to fully study: Cock, Randolph (1 January 1999). "Precursors of Cook: The Voyages of the Dolphin, 1764–8". The Mariner's Mirror. 85 (1): 30–52. doi:10.1080/00253359.1999.10656726. ISSN 0025-3359.. I note that this paper is in the bibliography of the ODNB entry for Samuel Wallis (Williams, Glyndwr (23 September 2004). "Wallis, Samuel (1728–1795), naval officer and Pacific explorer". ODNB. Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/28578.)
Has anyone taken a look at Williams, Glyndwr (2013). Naturalists at sea: scientific travellers from Dampier to Darwin. New Haven: Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0300180732.?. It has good specialist reviews and appears to cover the general subject of Pacific exploration. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 08:17, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

This book is a bit dated but has a good chapter on Pacific exploration before Cook. https://archive.org/details/voyagesofdiscove00with/page/50/mode/2up Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 08:36, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

Those all look like they might be pertinent ... I have seen/read any of them yet. Noleander (talk) 13:52, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

@Aemilius Adolphin - FYI: Regarding the book mentioned above: The British Navy and the state in the eighteenth century: I obtained an online copy. It focuses on political/economic analysis of how/why the British Navy became weak in latter half of 1700s. Key question it explores is: was Sandwich to blame? I have only skimmed the book, but the book has no mention at all of: NW passage; Terra Australis, Tahiti, Southern Continent; breadfruit; Alaska; or Wallis. Cook is barely mentioned at all (pp 200-201). So, I have not yet found anything useful (for context info in JC article). If you find some useful quotes in it, let me know. Noleander (talk) 18:20, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

@ThoughtIdRetired The Paine source The Maritime History has some interesting details; e.g. about Russian interest in N. Pacific before Cook; and also says that James Mario Matra (who was on Cook's 1st voyage) was an early person (in addition to Banks) to suggest Botany Bay as a colony. Noleander (talk) 14:28, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

@User:Noleander, I have now studied Cock, Randolph (1 January 1999). "Precursors of Cook: The Voyages of the Dolphin, 1764–8". The Mariner's Mirror. 85 (1): 30–52. doi:10.1080/00253359.1999.10656726. ISSN 0025-3359. (mentioned above). I think this is an essential read for those working on this aspect of the article. Not least because it plainly states things that are actually in Cook biographies, but not in the article. For instance, I had missed the point made in Hough that Cook had in his crew people who had sailed with Wallis.(pp 85, 128)
This paper also challenges the uniqueness of Cook's work on controlling scurvy – an impression that the reader would surely take from the Wikipedia article as it now stands. (The addition of just a few words would fix that: Cook was among the pioneers in the prevention of scurvy....) The source of that opinion (Beaglehole) is challenged with statistics to support the argument.
Wallis's charting of a sandbank in the harbour at Tahiti was of value to Cook (he sent the pinnace ahead to find it and mark it by staying over it) and Cook comments on the value of the charts made by Wallis (though there were not of the technical quality that Cook so often produced). ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 21:56, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for all those insights ... I'll check out the article. If I fail to implement the "among the pioneers" change, feel free to make it yourself, of course. Noleander (talk) 23:52, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

A useful checklist of European explorers of the Pacific: "The force of European discovery by such as Abel Tasman, Ferdinand La Perouse, Samuel Wallis, Louis de Bougainville, and James Cook, and subsequent colonial settlement of Kiwa’s Ocean, altered the entire history of all the peoples of Te Moana nui a Kiwa....." (Witi Ihimaera in Jones, Ryan Tucker; Matsuda, Matt K.. The Cambridge History of the Pacific Ocean: Volume 1, The Pacific Ocean to 1800 (p. 23). Cambridge University Press.) ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 21:58, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

Map to accompany new "context" material

Since a picture is worth a thousand words, readers may find a mid-1700s map helpful, to show the lands Cook was aware of around 1760. Wiki Commons has several maps from 1750s and 1760s. Here is a map from Wiki Commmons (Reduite du Globe Terrestre by Jacques-Nicolas Bellin 1764); this map is from 1764, and it has solid provenance and a good source. Noleander (talk) 18:52, 30 July 2025 (UTC)

Yes, I like the map (a lot). ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 21:46, 30 July 2025 (UTC)

Okay, I put it in the article. Tentatively is in the "First Voyage" section; but we can move it later to be alongside the new "Context" material when we decide where that belongs. Noleander (talk) 22:50, 30 July 2025 (UTC)

@Aemilius Adolphin I'm not sure how much you want to be notified of changes to wording in the I. P. section. FYI: I changed:

• In some cases, local indigenous people and Cook's Polynesian advisers also encouraged him to punish commoners and other indigenous groups severely.

to

• Local indigenous people and Cook's Polynesian advisers sometimes encouraged him to impose more severe punishments on other indigenous groups or commoners.

to provide more clarity to the reader. For example in: ".. to punish commoners and other indigenous groups severely...." the reader might take "other" to contrast against "commoners" (hence, non-commoners), but I think you intended "other" to mean "groups that are foreign/alien/antagonistic to the advisor", correct?

And changed:

• Afterwards, he increasingly used more severe non-lethal punishments against indigenous people, including the destruction of their canoes and homes, extreme floggings, and cropping their ears, which some crew members considered excessive.

to

• Subsequently, he increasingly resorted to harsher punishments against indigenous people – which some crew members considered excessive. These measures included the destruction of canoes and dwellings, extreme floggings, and cropping their ears.

because readers might apply the clause "... which some crew members considered excessive." only to the final " cropping their ears"; but the sources say it was multiple modes of punishments. Noleander (talk) 22:48, 30 July 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander Sorry, I didn't see this earlier. Please feel free to improve the wording of anything I have added anywhere in the article as you see fit. If I disagree I will make a change with an edit summary. It might be worth mentioning that on the third voyage Cook ordered--once only--that a native thief should have crosses carved into his flesh down to the bone. If you think this is worth mentioning, the citation is Thomas (2003) p. 322. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 23:05, 1 August 2025 (UTC)

Okay, sounds good. Noleander (talk) 23:41, 1 August 2025 (UTC)

It's a shame the article does not have a grand total of number of miles travelled. I looked for a reliable source, but could not find a total. I suppose it is nearly impossible to compute precisely due to all the tacking and small movements in & out of harbors. I'd guess 50K miles per voyage, including tacking & small movements; 25K miles per voyage, ignoring small movements. I'm sure there is a Reliable Source out there that has made an estimate. Noleander (talk) 19:07, 31 July 2025 (UTC)

@Aemilius Adolphin: For Salmond's Trial of ... book, I've been using the 2004 Penguin NZ edition, not the original 2003 edition. FA purists insist that the article identify the exact edition of the book actually used by the editor(s), so I changed the book description in the article to the 2004 edition. What edition have you been using? As long as the page numbers are identical, and we are confident no significant revisions were made, the article can identify either edition. Noleander (talk) 23:54, 2 August 2025 (UTC)

I have been using the 2004 penguin edition. I assumed you were using the 2003 edition and when I found the page numbers matched I just changed the citation for content I added to (2003). In the child article on Death of James Cook I have specified the 2004 edition. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 00:07, 3 August 2025 (UTC)

Thanks. So the "Sources" section of this article can continue to specify the 2004 Penguin edition. Noleander (talk) 00:55, 3 August 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander In the sources section you have listed the 1992 edition of Obeyesekere with an explanation that the appendix you refer to is in the 1997 edition. Shouldn't you then simply list the 1997 edition as the one you actually used? Also in my copy of the 1997 edition the appendix starts on page 193, not 197 as stated in the sources. This might just be a different printing of that edition but I noticed the discrepancy and thought you might like to check it. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 23:34, 5 August 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing that out. Looks like the 1997 edition would be more appropriate, since it has that addendum. I'll double check the page numbers too, thanks Noleander (talk) 00:17, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

Done. Noleander (talk) 01:27, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

I have been having an extensive search for where I read the following:
"It was an unfortunate aspect of Cook's personality that he tended to attribute all his remarkably good luck to his own peerless seamanship and all his bad luck, in paranoid fashion, to a malign Fate." McLynn, Frank. Captain Cook: Master of the Seas (p. 360).

The article does discuss Cook's character. What we have sounds rather like the assessment of someone's character in an obituary – i.e. being as polite as possible about them. Does this quote have any value in adding a more critical aspect? I appreciate that the source is McLynn, who seems to fail to impress other editors. However, based on my (limited) reading of Cook's journal, it seems to be fair comment ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 20:32, 3 August 2025 (UTC)

There's nothing wrong with adding negative aspects of his character into the article... We don't want this to be a hagiography:-)

Are there two or more sources that discuss this issue? Or only Mclynn? And does that source give specific examples of where Cook is attributing his failures to bad luck? Or is the source just waving his hands? Noleander (talk) 20:53, 3 August 2025 (UTC)

I have looked in a lot of places (having lost the original reference) and only found this in McLynn. He cites Beaglehole's edited diaries of Cook, pages 428-424. So that is McLynn's interpretation of Cook's diaries. It would be interesting to hear other views on this point. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 21:26, 3 August 2025 (UTC)

This is just one author's opinion and it is absurd and unscholarly to call Cook paranoid. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 23:30, 3 August 2025 (UTC)

Ugh. Yale University published this? McLynn seems to have a fixation on Cook's "paranoia", and discusses it in pop psychology terms. Not only is there the instance ThoughtIdRetired quotes, but there are:

"...Cook ever more angry and semi-paranoid about their disobedience. He exhibited much bipolar behaviour in the northern latitudes."

"On the other, he was wont to indulge in quasi-paranoid reflections, anticipating possible criticisms of his behaviour."

"There was an almost paranoid chippiness about his journal entries on the incident, almost as though he felt the Admiralty would be bound to blame him..."

"Once again this is the paranoid Cook protesting too much."

"Yet such was Cook's modesty – or was it continuing paranoia?"

Good lord. Carlstak (talk) 01:27, 4 August 2025 (UTC)

OK, point taken. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 08:11, 7 August 2025 (UTC)

I understand that there is a paper by Skelton:
"Early Atlases", April, 1960, issue of The Geographical Magazine, R.A.Skelton
If I have understood correctly, this paper suggests that Cook's work as a cartographer led to the establishment of the British Hydrographic Department in 1795. Does anyone have access to this paper? Does it actually state this? In which case, would this be suitable to include in the legacy section?

The "Admiralty chart", the output from this department, has had an enviable reputation for most of its history. So Cook's work being a catalyst for the formation of the department seems to be relevant for inclusion – if, of course, the source confirms this material. If not, a different 1960 paper needs to be tracked down. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 22:48, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

I've not seen that paper, but you can post a request at WP:RX and volunteers there will - almost always - obtain a copy of the article for you. Noleander (talk) 22:54, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

Thanks. I have requested there. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 08:12, 7 August 2025 (UTC)

Got access to the article by this route. It is exactly the right paper, but it does not make the link between Cook and the Hydrographic Department. The suggestion that it did came from Canadian Government papers surrounding the Captain Cook Monument Corner Brook.jpg plaque that used to be in the article. Their historians who discussed the wording for the plaque were not as professional as one would like, so demonstrating the risks of using museum information, etc. as an RS. In light of this experience, unsurprising that I am not allowed to pass those government papers on to anyone or put them on the internet (not that there is any need, now). ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 08:37, 7 August 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander "Modern era" is vague and in academic history "modern history" includes the 18th and 19th centuries. All the examples given are from the 21st century so I think 21st century is fine. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 22:19, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

@Aemilius Adolphin That is a good point.

I changed it because the Trask source (Haunani-Kay Trask) is an article published in 1983. Though she died in 2021, so maybe it could be considered as 21st century, under the theory that her views were still carried by her into the 21st.

Is there any wording for the section title that would permit content from, say, the 200th anniversary commemorations in the 1970's, yet avoid the "modern era" confusion? Noleander (talk) 22:40, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

I didn't see the Trask quote in the footnote. I can't think of any commonly used descriptor for the period 1980 to now. Williams uses "post-colonial world" but that is contentious and would need a lengthy explanation. Perhaps we could find a similar quote from Trask from the 21st century? Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 23:23, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

Alright, I'll look for a newer source from Trask. In the meantime, I reverted the title back to "21st century". Noleander (talk) 23:37, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

Also: Trask is/was a source for the main body text located before the footnote: Many people ... consider him to be a violent invader and a symbol of the adverse consequences of European contact and colonisation. She's not only a source for the footnote. Trask has been a source for that body text for awhile. Noleander (talk) 23:40, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

@Aemilius Adolphin I've been looking at this section & its source, and it seems best to come up with an approach that permits editors (present and future) to include material in that section from 1970 to 1999, because several sources describe notable discussions of Cook's reputation in the time frame around the 200th anniversary of his voyages. Do any of these subsection titles look satisfactory?

• Reputation
• Modern reputation
• Reputation 1970 to present
• Assessment
• Modern assessment

If none of those look acceptable, we could simply eliminate the "Reputation in 21st c" subsection, and move the text (unchanged) to appear at the very top of the "Legacy" section (i.e. before the "Commemorations" subsection, but not within any subsection). If we took that approach, we could consider renaming "Legacy" section to "Legacy and reputation". Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 01:44, 7 August 2025 (UTC)

One again I apologise. There have been so many recent improvements that didn't notice that you added Trask to the section after I had drafted it. I'm not complaining--I think the Trask quote you found is excellent and summarises a particular view in a nutshell. It does, however, raise a difficulty in that Williams (2008) already cited Trask and therefore allowed us to discuss this as the 21st Century/contemporary state of play. I still like the idea of such a subsection as it neatly rounds of the Legacy section. For this reason, I think moving this content to the beginning of the legacy section would be the worst option. What about keeping it where it is and retitling it: "Recent assessments"? Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 11:02, 7 August 2025 (UTC)

Done ... changed subsec title to "Recent assessments". Noleander (talk) 12:51, 7 August 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander. I see you have changed "British" to "European" in some instances with the explanation that some of the crew were not British. The problem is that some of the crew were not European either. According to Ashley (2007) the crew of the third voyage included: 91 English, 13 Scots, 10 Irish, 7 Americans, 4 Welsh, 3 Germans, a Guernsey man, a Bengali and a Bermudan. The crew of the first two voyages included several black Africans and Indians. However, they were British expeditions and every member was a British subject or had pledged loyalty to the British Crown for the duration of the voyages. The Polynesians greeted the returning ships with the cry: " BrittaneeI Brittanee!" I therefore believe that "British" is a far more accurate description of the expeditions and their members than "European". An alternative would be to refer to "crew members" where this does not strain the sentence. I am not British but I always find it odd that modern historians invariably refer to the members of French expeditions as "French", of Spanish expeditions as "Spanish" but members of British expeditions magically become " Europeans". Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 11:37, 7 August 2025 (UTC)

Makes sense. Thanks for updating the terminology in several places in the article. Noleander (talk) 12:49, 7 August 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander I did a word search in Salmond and Thomas and found that they both used "British" and " European" interchangeably to refer collectively to Cook and crew. So I tried to use "British" , " European" and " English" according to the word the source used, and I used " crew members" where it seemed unnecessary to specify ethnicity. One sentence I am unsure about is: " Sexual relations between European crews and indigenous persons were widespread in nearly every place visited." Did you mean British crews or is it a general point about all European contact with indigenous peoples? The Salmond citation only refers to Wallis and Tahiti. I don't have access to the Igler citation. Is the sentence even necessary? The paragraph reads better without it. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 13:22, 7 August 2025 (UTC)

I deleted that sentence. I vaguely recall that the purpose of the sentence was to transition between paragraphs: often, it is good to have an introductory sentence at the start of a paragraph (especially 1st paragr of a section) letting the reader know what is coming next. But, if the sources don't support it, it should be removed. Noleander (talk) 14:07, 7 August 2025 (UTC)

WP guidelines do not require the use of these particular conventions, but applying conventions throughout an article improves the uniformity of the article, which is essential for meeting the FA criteria. For reference, some of the conventions currently used in this article are:

• UK spelling
• Date format: 15 July 1775 (DMY)
• Measurement units: Imperial
• Sources: All sources are defined in the Sources section using a "Cite" template
• Citations use "sfn" or "harvnb" template; use "sfnRef" template for anonymous sources
• Bundle citations: multiple adjacent cites are bundled into a single [nn] superscript using Template:Multiref
• Book sources: include only one of ISBN, OCLC, LCCN, etc. No dashes in ISBNs.
• Sources: include author-link, if available
• Footnotes: any facts stated in an explanatory footnote require a citation. Same for image captions.
• Journal & magazine sources: include ISSN, if available (format nnnn-nnnn)
• No quotes in citations. If quote is needed: put into an efn footnote (or body text)
• All page numbers (or ranges) end with a period.
• Titles of all sources use Title Case (regardless of how the source capitalizes itself)
• All images aligned on right side
• Dashes use n-dash (not m-dash or hyphen)
• Citations to sources with 10 or more pages require a specific page number
• If referring to a ship by a pronoun, use "she", not "it"
• Use Oxford comma
• Follow WP:Summary style and use subarticles to keep this article consistent with WP:SIZERULE
• Spell-out numbers twelve and smaller
• Foreign words and phrases: italicize them, and put English translation in parenthesis after the foreign word/phrase (unless there is a good reason to do otherwise)
• Sources do not display "location" field/city.

If anyone thinks we should modify any of these conventions, discussion is welcome! Noleander (talk) 15:08, 26 July 2025 (UTC)

Date format: don't you mean 26 July 2025 (rather than 26-07-25)? Gawaon (talk) 15:44, 26 July 2025 (UTC)

@Gawaon: Thanks for pointing that out; I've corrected it. Noleander (talk) 15:50, 26 July 2025 (UTC)

What's this newly added thing about sources not displaying "location"? That goes very much against the usual conventions at least for citing books, where the publisher's city is traditionally considered essential information. Gawaon (talk) 07:40, 8 August 2025 (UTC)

@Gawaon The display of source location is optional. See, for example, recently promoted FA article Abraham Lincoln, which does not display any locations. The WP:Featured article criteria include: "Consistent citations: where required by criterion 1c, consistently formatted inline citations using footnotes..." which means, among other things, that locations need to be displayed for all sources (when available) or none. If an article displays location data inconsistently (that is, some sources have location, some do not) FA reviewers will insist it be changed to "no locations" or "all locations". Introducing location data into this article would be especially problematic because many sources have multiple editions, and each edition has a unique publication location; it would be time-consuming and error-prone to identify the locations of the specific editions utilized. Several of the books were published in multiple cities simultaneously (UK, Australia, USA). WP:CITEVAR says Editors should not attempt to change an article's established citation style, merely on the grounds of personal preference or to make it match other articles, without first seeking consensus for the change. Noleander (talk) 09:53, 8 August 2025 (UTC)

Following up on the discussion above, I created a new sub-article named Navigation and seamanship of James Cook. That sub-article can hold material that doesn't fit into this main James Cook article.

This sub-article continues the pattern set by other sub-articles that already exist:

• First voyage of James Cook
• Second voyage of James Cook
• Third voyage of James Cook
• James Cook and indigenous peoples
• List of commemorations of Captain James Cook

These sub-articles help the James Cook article act as a top-level overview article, which is suggested by WP:Summary style. Also, it helps this article stay under the 9,000 prose word count suggested by WP:SIZERULE (it is currently over by about 100 words).

The new sub-article Navigation and seamanship of James Cook is very rough and needs work so - of course - everyone is invited to improve it. Noleander (talk) 23:14, 8 August 2025 (UTC)

I note the change to On his first voyage, Cook carried the newly published Nautical Almanac...", with the useful link to The Nautical Almanac. But the source (Cock) is unsure whether Cook carried the actual almanac or advance copies of the tables of this newly published work. The precise words in the source are:

 Cook was supplied with the Nautical Almanac, or advance proofs of the tables in it, for the years 1768 and 1769

Beaglehole is not much use, discussing the almanac only on page 116, as far as I can see. As an academic working on the subject, Cock must have got the idea from somewhere that Cook possibly did not have the full, finished almanac available to him.

I do not have a good history of the nautical alamanac available, but suggests that the first edition (1766) gave data for 1767. (Skelton's lecture to the Society for Nautical Research confirms this with "...and in 1767 he [Maskelyne] produced the first edition of The Nautical Almanac, with tables of lunar distances for every three hours of Greenwich time, calculated for 1768.")we can see that Skelton is in error on this from

Another potential source is, saying

...calculating these Observations they would not find them so very difficult as they at first imagine, especially with the Assistance of the Nautical Almanack and Astronomical Ephemeris, by the help of which the Calculation for finding the Longitude takes up but little more time than that of an Azimuth for finding the Variation of the Compass; but unless this Ephemeris is Published for some time to come, more than either one or 2 Years, it can never be of general use in long Voyages, and in short Voyages it's not so much wanted.* (* The "Nautical Almanac" was first published for 1767. That for 1770 was not published until 1769; but it seems probable that Cook either had proof sheets, or the manuscript calculations.)

The footnote is missing in Beaglehole's version (). Cook's observation that the navigators who really needed the almanac wanted it several years in advance is indicative that there was an issue and is consistent with him having got an advance copy of some sort (but that thought is not for the article, as it is WP:OR – I am just trying to explore the subject, here.)

(1) This article's text quoted at the beginning of this section could suggest to the reader that Cook sailed with a copy of the almanac in its first year of publication, which would be wrong.
(2) Sources suggest that he may well have had advance copies of the almanac when he sailed in August of 1768, rather than the actual newly published work. I think we could do with a bit more precision on this, since the almanac was clearly a part of Cook's (almost) daily work.

I appreciate that we need concise text, but not at the expense of precision. And you may feel a little more research is needed before making a decision. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 15:24, 8 August 2025 (UTC)

Looking at , I see that the 1769 tables have a preamble (or whatever you call the bit before the preface) dated 18 June 1768. Since the text seems to be the authority to go ahead and print the book, this also suggests that Cook had an advance copy of the tables of some sort. Again, WP:OR from a primary source, but I thought worth pointing out. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 15:42, 8 August 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for catching that ... certainly precision is paramount. I looked at Skelton, Cock, and two Beaglehole sources (Life and Volume 1), and they seem to be in disagreement. Even on such a simple fact as when the Almanac was first published (1766 or 1767); and also if Cook carried the official publication or just an advance copy. Since the sources are in disagreement, the article needs reflect that. So, I changed the wording so it no longer imply they carried the officially published first edition; and added a footnote explaining that it is not clear if they carried the official publication, or just advance data. And added some more citations. Take a look and let me know if it is not consistent with the sources. Noleander (talk) 17:26, 8 August 2025 (UTC)

I am now moving towards the view that we need more data to produce the final version. I am trying to get hold of another source, dealing with navigation in Cook's era, but no guarantee that it will address this point. What is crystal clear to me (using the resource of the internet that was not available to the likes of Skelton, Beaglehole or Cock) is that there was an almanac for 1767 (the first one), then annual editions continuing through 1768, 1769 and onwards. We know this as we can read them via . These individual copies of each year's almanac are primary sources. However, without going to study WP:PRIMARY in detail, a primary source is allowed to be used as a source that confirms its existence. (The 1769 edition has the date 18 June 1768 in the preamble – somewhat in the style of an imprimatur, but of course that law had lapsed by then. Cook sailed from Deptford on 21 July, so that could be just over a month from that edition going to press. It would be tight for him to have a standard printed and bound edition. But this bit in brackets is OR.) I'll give what is in the article some further thought – right now I am tempted by "...and Cook may have only had an advance proof or manuscript copies of the tables from the 1769 edition." But that might look overlong. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 19:43, 8 August 2025 (UTC)

@ThoughtIdRetired The body text now reads On his first voyage, Cook had available the 1768 and 1769 editions of the recently developed... That has a few issues: (a) overly detailed (user does not need to know that the book had various editions); (b) Ambiguous: "available" could mean they were available in UK and he may or may not have taken them; or it could mean he took them both on the ship; (c) Too definitive, when the sources indicate there is some confusion on the topic.

For a general-purpose encyclopedia, the readers will want to know that there was a new kind of book available, that Cook had a copy of it on the ship, and it made their calculations faster. Anything else can go into the footnotes (and even there, of course, it needs to be consistent with the sources). Noleander (talk) 20:38, 8 August 2025 (UTC)

@ThoughtIdRetired If you are interested, I'd be happy to create a sub-article named James Cook and the longitude problem or James Cook and navigation or something like that. That would continue the pattern set by other sub-articles that already exist:

• First voyage of James Cook
• Second voyage of James Cook
• Third voyage of James Cook
• James Cook and indigenous peoples
• List of commemorations of Captain James Cook

These sub-articles help the James Cook article act as a top-level overview article, which is suggested by WP:Summary style. Also, it helps this article stay under the 9,000 prose word count suggested by WP:SIZERULE (it is currently over by about 100 words).

Are you interested in working on a sub-article on navigation/longitude? It would not have any size or "too detailed" issues that we are facing in this article. I'd be happy to help set it up. Noleander (talk) 20:51, 8 August 2025 (UTC)

OK, I've found a source that means (I think) we should all be happy with the text in the article. I have made a bit of a shift about of some of it, because there seemed to be an enormous amount in footnotes as opposed to the main text.

This connects with a niggling concern about the balance of the article between "Cook topics" that you will find in sources more than 20 years (or so) ago and more recent ones. Later sources have more content on Cook's interactions with the people in the lands he visited. Earlier ones have a balance that is slightly more shifted to looking at Cook as a navigator, cartographer and seaman. The difference is subtle, but it is there.

But, of course, what we are writing now is a 2025 encyclopaedia entry. I get that. But it is not as if anyone has said that the earlier "navigational" aspects of Cook's life are wrong/irrelevant/or any other reason for that material not being here. I suggest that it is simply because (a) pretty much everything has been said on the subject, so why write another book on it? (you get that with some other maritime subjects, where libraries have denuded themselves of old books that are still the go-to source for information) (b) aspects of interactions with people are a topic of current interest.

The point I am making is that whilst current in print sources have little emphasis on Cook as a navigator/cartographer, it is still part of the story. That may not sit well in a GPS age, but the article is about history.

Anyway, take a look and see what you think.

On the "Cook as a navigator" idea, I would certainly need to know more about the subject to get into that. I might do so with sight of a few extra sources. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 22:17, 8 August 2025 (UTC)

There are still some issues:

1. Cook had available the 1768 and 1769 editions of the ... Is confusing to the reader. He had data that covered two years, but the use of the word "edition" implies a version of a bound book. Better to say something like "Almanac data for 1768 and 1769" or "Almanac tables for 1768 and 1769" something like that. The sources are all over the place, so it is better to avoid suggesting to the readers that it was a bound volume, and - rather - the text should indicate that the "tables" or "data" were what was carried & used.
2. Cook had available the 1768 and 1769 editions of the ... Ambiguous: "available" could mean they were available in UK and he may or may not have taken them on the ship; or it could mean he took them both on the ship (and they were both "available" on the ship). Yet neither of those interpretations is quite accurate. The wording should simply say that he "Carried the almanac data" or "took the almanac data on the voyage" or something like that, to make it clear it was on the ship.
3. The topic of using the almanac data to validate the chronometers is now mentioned twice: once in a footnote, and once in the body text. It should be only once.

Is it possible to propose some text here in the Talk page (to address the above issues) and work it out here first, before updating the article? Noleander (talk) 22:57, 8 August 2025 (UTC)

Criticism noted and another go at these paragraphs is below. I got over-enthusiastic after reading so much newly found (to me) source material.

(1) and (2) "Had available..." etc. Yes, this is unhelpfully worded, so another cut is shown below. One problem is that the sources are not totally precise. We know that the 1768 almanac had been published by December 1767 (Croarken 2002), but those who talk about "advance copies" or "manuscript tables" lump the two years in together. It is the 1769 edition that is in question. The "had available" is imprecise and also addressed below. Leaving the possibility that he had just advance copies of the 1769 data in the footnote seems to be the best solution, qualifying the main article text. I think "editions" has value in the main text, and I am guessing that those who used and produced the almanacs would identify with the language.

(3) The footnote about testing chronometers against time from lunar distance was removed as part of the original edit. There is some duplication of the need to revert to the longer calculations when the tables run out (between footnote and article). This additional point is addressed in the modified text below.

(4) An additional failing of the article text is that it does not explain that you needed the nautical almanac to work out longitude using a chronometer. I am checking sources on this so that I have a full understanding of the tables before suggesting a solution to this aspect. (If I have understood correctly, there are some differences between the modern tables for astro-navigation and the ones Maskelyne produced.) If we include this fact (once fully researched), the reader should realise that you needed more than just a chronometer to navigate, which the more "sound-bitey" narratives tend to gloss over. I am only thinking of adding a few extra words, something like "the almanac also contained tables needed to calculate longitude using a chronometer and astronomical observations."

(5) I have removed the bit about Green being the most common user of the almanac for lunar distance calculations. In the source, the reason is explained: because Cook had plenty of other duties. Without that explanation, it rather implies that Cook was in a similar position to Wallis and needed someone to do the arithmetic for him. Once Green was dead and the almanacs had run out, it was Cook who had to make the lengthier calculations. I feel that the reader could take the wrong inference from the brief mention of Green. The choices are: explain more fully or not mention at all. I have gone for the latter.

Suggested changes to article paragraphs follow:

Cook's naval career coincided with the advent of practical methods of determining longitude. On his first voyage, Cook took with him the 1768 and 1769 editions of the recently developed Nautical Almanac,^[a] which significantly streamlined the time taken to calculate longitude from lunar distance observations.^[1][b] On his second and third voyages, Cook carried Larcum Kendall's K1 chronometer – a copy of John Harrison's H4 – to test if it could accurately keep time for extended periods while withstanding the violent motions of a ship and the temperature changes of different climates. It performed well and thus made a key contribution to solving the longitude problem that had plagued mariners for centuries.^[2] Cook praised the timepiece profusely.^[3][c]

Cook's testing of chronometers relied on the lunar distance method to check their timekeeping. On all three of his voyages, he therefore needed Nautical Almanacs that had been prepared sufficiently ahead to cover the duration of the voyage, but in each case, the voyage lasted longer than the tables in the almanacs he had brought with him, and he had to revert to using lengthier calculations.^[5][2]

end of suggested text ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 09:08, 9 August 2025 (UTC)

While in Newfoundland, Cook precisely recorded the start and end times of a solar eclipse gives rise to questions about when the eclipse happened and how time was determined.

There is more to say about this and I do not fully agree with the answer from Noleander.

Looking at the source, Hough, we see that the date of the eclipse was 5 August 1766. This source quotes part of the reference Bevis and Cook 1767, where we find a fuller explanation of what is going on. Cook observes the start of the eclipse and notes the time. He then measures the altitude of the sun, recording it reaching its zenith just a minute after the start of the eclipse. The times given are astronomical time, where each day starts at noon. Cook's conclusion from these measurements is that the eclipse started at four minutes and 48 seconds before "local" noon (i.e. "apparent time"). If you have the same observations made from a place of known longitude, you can compare the time difference, making all the appropriate corrections for parallax, etc. This refining of the calculations was done by the astronomer to whom Cook gave his raw data, that astronomer having details of an observation made in Oxford. Hence the result was a good figure for the longitude of the place from which Cook observed.

So, in essence, Cook was using the eclipse as his reference point for determining "absolute" time. He observed local time by the altitude of the sun. This was conveniently very close to the start of the eclipse. Comparison with the local time at a place of known longitude, observing the same event (the start of the eclipse), allowed calculation of the difference in longitude. The only timepiece needed was a simple pendulum clock, positioned on a nice stable base on shore. I recollect that there is a source that states that Cook had with him a good quality pendulum clock for this purpose, but would need to find the source to determine whether or not this applied to his time in Newfoundland.

Cook used the longitude that was calculated from the eclipse in his printed sailing directions for Newfoundland. He did not put a longitude scale on his chart of Newfoundland. (David 2009 is the reference in the article for these two facts.) I think we can reasonably presume that the absence of a longitude scale is because he had only one place with a good longitude figure and all of the rest of his longitudes were from dead reckoning. (There is probably a source out there that says this, but I do not have it to hand.) So I disagree with the statements that the longitude figure from the eclipse were not important and were not used for anything. Its presence in the sailing directions meant that this number would be used for navigation.

I feel that the article should say something like:

While in Newfoundland, Cook precisely recorded apparent (or local) time of the start and end of the solar eclipse of 5 August 1766.[a] He sent the results to John Bevis in England, who compared them with the same data from an observation of the eclipse carried out in Oxford and calculated the difference in longitude between the two locations.[1][b] The results were communicated to the Royal Society in 1767 and the longitude position obtained was used by Cook in his printed sailing directions for Newfoundland.[3][2]

end of suggested text. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 19:53, 9 August 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for correcting my mistake: it appears that the longitude calculated form the eclipse was used for something ... though the usage is rather minor (I don't think any biographer mentions it). The PR reviewer asked about the timepiece used for the eclipse: was it a chronometer? I'm fairly certain that it ws not, and the type of timepiece is not significant. Regarding additional details of the eclipse, the article currently has:

While in Newfoundland, Cook precisely recorded the start and end times of a solar eclipse. He sent the results to John Bevis in England, who compared them with data from a known location and calculated the longitude of the observation site in Newfoundland. The results were communicated to the Royal Society in 1767.

And the proposal is to add:

• 5 August 1766
• Oxford is the location of the other observation
• a subtraction action
• used by Cook in his printed sailing directions for Newfoundland

These additional details are interesting, but don't seem sufficiently important to go into the body text of this top-level article. For example: the article does not even specify the date of the transit of Venus, which was a very major event described by all the major biographers. What if we put the additional details about the eclipse into footnotes or the Navigation and seamanship of James Cook sub-article? As the Peer Reviewer noted, they article is already over the 9,000 prose word limit recommended in WP:SIZERULE. Noleander (talk) 21:32, 9 August 2025 (UTC)

The year of the eclipse was a question by the reviewer – I don't know whether that was for their own purposes or for the benefit of the article. I note, though, that the article states the year of the Transit of Venus and links to an article on that subject, which has a subsection for that event.

usage is rather minor – not sure about that. What's more important to the navigator who has recently learnt the lunar distance method of finding longitude, has a copy of Cook's sailing directions, is sailing prior to the printing of the Newfoundland chart that has a longitude scale and is trying to make a safe landfall in Newfoundland?
I think we need to accept that many of the biographers do not seem to have grasped how the navigation and surveying worked. We know, for instance, that Beaglehole's edited Cook's diaries relied on Skelton for the navigational and cartographical bit. It's just a pity that Skelton died before the definitive biography was written. The history of this aspect of Cook's life is amply covered by academic articles, some of them in the most prestigious of journals covering maritime history. If we are worried about the word count, how about:

While in Newfoundland, Cook determined the local time of the 1766 solar eclipse. He sent the results to John Bevis, who, knowing measurements taken of the eclipse in Oxford, calculated the difference in longitude between the two locations. The longitude position obtained was used by Cook in his printed sailing directions for Newfoundland.

That has the exact word count of the original text and the footnotes and references can be added back in without affecting the parameter being measured. The first footnote would become:^[c] and the second would remain: ^[d]. On consideration, the second footnote could be dropped if you felt the number of footnotes had become excessive.

I accept it is all a matter of opinion, but just wanted to lay out a point of view. I persist with my view that the techniques used by Cook are a large part of his life and tend to be ignored by the more "people-based" nature of biographers. I leave it to you to make the decision. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 12:55, 10 August 2025 (UTC)

I'm willing to accept that my vantage point is not the only one ... so I retract any objections to the proposed changes. I've inserted your proposed text & citations into the article. Thanks for taking the time to provide all that background & details! Noleander (talk) 23:59, 10 August 2025 (UTC)

@Aemilius Adolphin: A peer reviewer (Nick D) suggested two changes (among others):

1) The article doesn't really address the reasons why commemorations of Cook have become controversial - whether he exceeded his orders by claiming Australia and various other places, and whether he should be seen as the spearhead of colonialism or an apolitical explorer.

and

2) [quoting from the Lead section] "and allegations that he facilitated British colonialism in the Pacific." - I don't think that these are allegations, as it is an established fact that he did this. What's controversial is whether he should be celebrated for his role in expanding the British Empire.

In response to (2) I changed the sentence in the lead from:

He is a controversial figure because of his occasionally violent encounters with indigenous peoples, and allegations that he facilitated British colonialism in the Pacific.

to

He is a controversial figure due to his sometimes violent encounters with indigenous peoples, transmission of infectious diseases, and the role he played in enabling British colonialism in the Pacific.

I added "infectious diseases" as a partial way of addressing issue (1).

Any thoughts on this? Do you think it is consistent with the sources? Are there any tweaks that should be made? Noleander (talk) 03:31, 10 August 2025 (UTC)

@NoleanderIn the commemorations section, the article states: "In the years surrounding the 250th anniversary of Cook's first voyage of exploration, various memorials to Cook in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and Hawaii were vandalised, and there were public calls for their removal or modification due to their perceived association with colonialism." In the Recent Assessments section it states: "Many people – particularly indigenous people of the lands he visited – consider him to be a violent invader and a symbol of the adverse consequences of European contact and colonisation." In the Ethnographic collections section, it states: "The art historian Alice Proctor argues that the controversies over public representations of Cook and the display of indigenous artefacts from his voyages are part of a broader debate over resistance to colonialist narratives and the decolonisation of museums and public spaces." I think further elaboration would be labouring a point already made several times.

Please also see my further tweak to the wording of the lead, which I am happy to discuss. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 03:47, 10 August 2025 (UTC)

Your tweak to the Lead looks good. You are correct that the article enumerates several issues already. I think adding "transmission of infectious diseases" was important ... because it is significant, and the article did not mention it (as a cause of controversy) before.

The only additional changes I can conceive are:

a) Add any remaining significant sources of controversy that are not yet mentioned (e.g. Cook's role (symbolic?) in introducing capitalism, materialism, & Christianity); tho if only 1 or 2 lesser sources discuss those, it is probably not warranted.

b) Consider consolidating the causes of controversy into one place ... but that would entail removing from other sections, which would diminish those sections.

May be best to leave as-is? Noleander (talk) 03:58, 10 August 2025 (UTC)

I would leave it as it is. You will remember that we did have all the causes of controversy in one place then after some discussion decided to separate them to their most relevant sections. As for Cook introducing capitalism and Christianity...this is a classic case of blaming him for things that happened long after his death. I agree with adding diseases to the lead although no one at the time understood about bacteria and viruses and the idea that indigenous people would otherwise have lived in splendid isolation until modern vaccines were developed is rather dubious. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 04:14, 10 August 2025 (UTC)

"that indigenous people would otherwise have lived in splendid isolation" I get the point about counterfactual history, but the phrase "splendid isolation" refers to a British policy of maintaining no long-term alliances and refusing to take action with the rest of the Concert of Europe. We summarize British political ideas in the 19th century with this quotation: "Non-intervention; no European police system; every nation for itself, and God for us all". Dimadick (talk) 06:14, 10 August 2025 (UTC)

I was aware of the origins of the phrase. It is often also used in other contexts for satirical effect. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 06:51, 10 August 2025 (UTC)

A peer reviewer asked why some of the orders from Voyage 1 were sealed. I found these details in Beaglehole 1974, p 151:

" As to the secrecy of the instructions, they were probably only conventionally secret, an aid to fobbing off possible inconvenient enquiries from Spain. The details were not known; but everybody at all interested knew about the Transit of Venus. ... the usual balloons were flown by the press—the Gazetteer, the Public Advertiser. ‘It is said’ that two sloops of war were to go in quest of the missing Swallow, to rendezvous at the newly discovered island, and from there to attempt the discovery of the Southern Continent. ‘On the other hand, we are told that no further discoveries in the South Seas will be attempted for the present.’— ‘We are informed’ that the principal and almost sole national advantage of George’s Land is, ‘its Situation for exploring the Terra Incognita of the Southern Hemisphere.’-—‘The gentlemen, who are to sail in a few days for George’s Land, the new discovered island in the Pacific ocean, with an intention to observe the Transit of Venus, are likewise, we are credibly informed, to attempt some new discoveries in that vast unknown tract, above the latitude 40."

Thus, the orders to look for Southern Continent were only nominally secret; that goal was available to anyone who read the the Gazetteer or Public Advertiser. Granted, there may have been some other instructions in the sealed orders (e.g. to claim land for Britain) ... but the article emphasizes the word "sealed" in a way that misleads readers into thinking the public, and perhaps even Cook, was unaware of the goal to search for the Southern Continent. Therefore I propose to remove the word "sealed" by changing from:

After the observations were completed, [in Tahiti] Cook was permitted to open the sealed orders, which instructed him to search for the postulated southern continent of Terra Australis.. [Emphasis added]

Change it to something like:

After the observations were completed, Cook began a search for the postulated southern continent of Terra Australis.

Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 12:59, 11 August 2025 (UTC)

I'd still add "as instructed / following his instructions / orders" or similar. Reads good otherwise. Gawaon (talk) 14:42, 11 August 2025 (UTC)

Agree. Noleander (talk) 16:51, 11 August 2025 (UTC)

I have no problem with changing "sealed" to "secret". However, Beaglehole is probably wrong to think that the Admiralty's instructions were only nominally secret. (Then, like now, they couldn't prevent leaks to the press.) They were all about discovering and claiming strategic ports for military and commercial advantage. The late 18th century was a time of great superpower rivalry. The peace between Britain and France was fragile. Spain and Portugal were declining powers and their trade routes and ports were there for the taking. (Cook didn't dismantle and write over Spanish markers of their claims of possession for nothing.) This article is a good antidote to Beaglehole. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 01:39, 13 August 2025 (UTC)

A Peer Reviewer said that there are too many footnotes. I think there are about 84 ... which is definitely a huge number, compared to other WP articles. I don't recall ever seeing an Featured Article with more than about 30. Although WP guidelines do not impose an upper limit on the footnote quantity, it may be prudent to reduce the quantity to a more reasonable number. A count of 26 is an attractive target, since that would produce footnote identifiers ranging from "a" to "z". Alternatively, 52 footnotes would extend that to include identifiers "aa" to "az" (27 to 52). My plan is:

1. Keep footnotes that are important and interesting
2. Eliminate the trivial/unimportant footnotes
3. Move footnotes that are relevant to a sub-article (e.g. First voyage of James Cook, etc) into that sub-article (perhaps as (more visible) body text).
4. See how many are remaining and go from there.

In all cases: I will NOT remove the footnote text from this James Cook article: I will simply disable (hide) it. That way, future editors will see the footnote, and maybe it will assist them. Also, it would be easy to restore the footnote.

I've starting disabling footnotes. If I disable a footnote that someone thinks should remain in the article, go ahead and revert the change (or inform me, and I will revert it). Noleander (talk) 17:44, 11 August 2025 (UTC)

Some footnotes that I believe can be dispensed with, or shortened, and why. I am focusing on redundancy, especially where the footnote might direct the reader away from the offered link that may give more information and sources. In some cases the linked article might need a bit of minor work, but where major surgery is needed, the footnote here should be retained for the meantime. Some minor modifications to the main article text might assist and are shown where necessary.
Each footnote is identified with its opening text, which I have tested for uniqueness. It may be that a different part of the footnote is the issue, this is just a means of identification. The suggestion is for removal, unless noted otherwise.

• The master of a ship was responsible..... Redundancies: We have the link to Master (naval) and ...as ship's master under Captain Robert Craig [bold added for this post] which reminds the reader of the chain of command or sends them off to read the link.
• As master of Grenville..... Could be dealt with by changing the article text to say ...was given command of HMS Grenville. We know that he has the rank of master, but if not totally clear, ...was given command of HMS Grenville, with the rank of MasterThe link to the ship could give the number of crew (I recollect it was increased at some point, needs checking and putting into the linked article.)edit linked article
• Shorten footnote: The lunar distance method of determining longitude.... Delete the part reading ...Cook did make extensive use of the lunar distance method on his voyages of discovery, as the sole method of determining longitude on the first voyage, and to check the chronometers he was testing and using on his later voyages. is now dealt with in the main body of the article text.
• The Earl of Pembroke was built.... A link to HMS Endeavour tells the reader a lot about her. The article already tells us that Cook had sailed on a collier out of Whitby. That text (earlier in the article) could be made more emphatic of this point by rewording it to say His first assignment was aboard Freelove, and he spent several years on this and similar Whitby-built colliers. The removal of the link to Coastal trading vessel may assist, as this is a rather US-centric article that does little to help our reader (of James Cook).
• (tentative)William Bligh would later be..... Isn't this what the link to William Bligh is for?

I don't know enough about other aspects of the article for a hunt for redundancy to be complete. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 21:19, 11 August 2025 (UTC)

@ThoughtIdRetired - Thanks for the suggestions, I'll go thru and implement them. The two footnotes regarding "master" may require some careful consideration ... one of those was created within the past week in response to suggestions from Peer Reviewers who were getting confused about the terminology: master vs commander vs captain (rank vs responsibility, etc). Since the reviewers bring a fresh "independent reader" viewpoint, without detailed insider knowledge, is is important to make sure their concerns are addressed. As you point out above, maybe adding a few words into the body text can lead to eliminating the footnotes. Noleander (talk) 13:29, 12 August 2025 (UTC)

The number of footnotes is now down to around 40 (largest footnote identifier is now [an]) which seems like a reasonable number which won't raise any eyebrows in an FA review. Noleander (talk) 15:24, 12 August 2025 (UTC)

Noted. Some article text changes mentioned above (e.g not linking to Coastal trading vessel) may generally assist the article. As for the original question over "master", when I first saw that, I felt the solution was tweaking the article text to make the link more obvious. That is why I went to Master (naval) and checked it for errors (found one, at least), but it still needs a bit of work – at a minimum, there are some better references to use. But the aspects affecting this article are not, perhaps, too much of an issue if you feel the problem of the number of footnotes has been addressed. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 20:25, 12 August 2025 (UTC)

Regarding spelling errors in quotes: the WP MOS has WP:QUOTETYPO which says:

If there is a significant error in the original [quote], follow it with [sic] (producing [sic] ) to show that the error was not made by Wikipedia. (for example, "his interview with the Dolly Llama [sic]") However, insignificant spelling and typographic errors should simply be silently corrected (for example, correct basicly to basically). [Emphasis added].

I believe the purpose of that MOS rule is to help readers, so they don't have to slow down and puzzle about the spelling (also: readers with English as their 2nd language may not be able to understand the quote at all). In this article there are already about six trivial spelling errors within quotes that have been silently corrected. So, we should continue to adhere to that guideline. Noleander (talk) 13:16, 12 August 2025 (UTC)

WP:QUOTETYPO, also called among other things MOS:TYPOFIX, seems to be directed to clarity, and to clarity of very modern texts, i.e. after mid-19th century. It ends with an exception: "In direct quotations, retain dialectal and archaic spellings". Cook's "its" might be regarded as an archaic spelling, although I'd be inclined to grant that it is an error. However, the exception introduces a further criterion: authenticity. This suggests an argument for retaining "its"—that that is how he spelled (or spelt). Retention of "its" leaves the text unclear for today's reader, but does it actually mislead? Actually, it doesn't mislead, because it just doesn't make sense. The reader is compelled to read "its" as "it's". I think a reader with fluent ordinary English would not find that difficult. If we should cater for readers without fluent ordinary English (and I'm not sure that we should), then let us have "it[']s". But not "its [sic]", which doesn't really help since it doesn't say what correction is advised. Errantios (talk) 00:52, 13 August 2025 (UTC)

I changed "its" to "it's" for the sake of conforming to the established style of silently correcting obvious spelling mistakes. I originally had all quotes as written, to illustrate that Cook's spelling and grammar were poor by the standards of officers and gentlemen of the day. This would have the advantage of showing that he was very much the uneducated "outsider" to the officer class. Thomas, Salmond and Ashley talk a great deal about this and the class tensions on board. But given that the article doesn't explore this issue, there's probably no real advantage in having original quotes riddled with "sic"s. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 02:01, 13 August 2025 (UTC)

A viable alternative might be to retain the original spellings without [sic]s, as long as that doesn't create undue confusion. A hidden source-code comment "Original spellings retained" could be added in such cases for the benefit or other editors. Gawaon (talk) 06:48, 13 August 2025 (UTC)

In a world where we all "read through" typos and autocorrect errors on a mobile phone, I see less of a need to correct/modernise spelling than, say, when R. C. Anderson corrected various seafarers' spelling in his Journals and narratives of the Third Dutch War (1946). Works such as that give a substantial misimpression of when English spelling became fixed. Language historians often point to Samuel Johnson's 1755 dictionary as being a key step in that gradual change, so I would caution against inferring a class issue from Cook's spelling (yes, you have sources, but exactly how do they interpret this point?). As further guidance for this article, here is something from the introduction to the 2020 publication of letters between Nelson and Lady Hamilton – which suggests current practice of historians is to avoid '[sic]' and retain non-standard (to us) spelling. Quotation follows:

"Nelson’s spelling tended to be fairly consistent. Spellings that were common in his day have been maintained without marking them with ‘[sic]’ in this edition. Examples are: cabbin, chuse, cloaths, compleat, doat, encrease, gulph, inclosed, œconomy, shew and shewn as well as endings in expence(s) / (non)sence / suspence / dispence / advice (as verb), cotts / sett / fitt, surprize (as noun), honor / honorable / dishonor, favorable / favor / favorite, vigor, color and diplomatick / domestick / politicks / republick / rhumatick (but: public). .... The ‘[sic]’ has also been omitted to indicate those idiosyncrasies of Nelson’s spelling that he used consistently or at least repeatedly. Apart from specific words that will be listed below, he was weak in spelling vowels, particularly in distinguishing between a and e. ..." Navy Records Society:

Nelson was born three years after Cook joined the navy, and was from a reasonably prosperous family, his father being a vicar, so we can presume a decent level of education.
The purpose of '[sic]' is to make clear to the reader that this is not an error by a typesetter. If anything, I think this would confuse someone whose English language skills are limited. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 09:30, 13 August 2025 (UTC)

The MOS guidance is clear: "insignificant spelling and typographic errors should simply be silently corrected" [emphasis added]. That guideline does not distinguish between (a) the article quoting directly from a primary source; vs (b) using a secondary source (Beaglehole, for example) which is quoting a primary source (Cook). The fact that the MOS doesn't distinguish means it doesn't matter. Therefore, spelling errors should be silently corrected even if Beaglehole chose to replicate Cook's errors. Beaglehole writes in his Introduction to Volume I (p. cclxxii):

Cook’s spelling and capitalization have been followed; but the remark must be made that this has sometimes been done by guesswork, founded on experience of his habits. In his spelling he is both reckless with e’s and 7’s, and presents the complication that he frequently forms them the same way, and omits to dot the 7. The simple solution of conventionalizing the order of these letters, however, is forbidden by the occasional very distinct writing of words like ‘wiegh’ or ‘thier’. Writing rapidly, Cook also tends to find a pitfall in ‘were’ and ‘where’. Literal printing has been modified by the silent correction of quite obvious slips (e.g. ‘it’ for ‘is’, ‘havy’ for ‘have’, ‘thing’ for ‘think’, ‘sunch’ for ‘such’); and where letters have been omitted, they have generally been supplied within square brackets. The rule has been to avoid change where it would seem pointless.

Cook was a poor speller; these are not "archaic" spellings that the article should reproduce for future generations of etymologists to ponder. These are childish plain spelling errors. Spelling "it's" follows the letter and spirit of the MOS guideline. Noleander (talk) 13:35, 13 August 2025 (UTC)

If we are going with correcting spelling errors in quotes and not using '[sic]', (per Wikipedia MOS) then that is all fine. For the rest of it, though the point may now be redundant, English spelling was not fixed in Cook's time, Beaglehole (as a historian) is more in line with RC Anderson than Marianne Czisnik writing in 2020. Even Beaglehole says: "apparently a phonetic speller, like most of his shipmates"[bold added], a group of people that includes the likes of Banks. At a minimum, his spelling is, compared to those around him, relatively unremarkable. Beaglehole is also commenting on Cook's handwriting, alongside spelling and punctuation, but remember the injury to his right hand from the exploding powder horn. My concern was that we should be careful drawing any conclusions about Cook's level of education from 20th-century thinking about spelling. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 14:09, 13 August 2025 (UTC)

Since the question of Cook's level of education has come up here, I'll create a new topic in this Talk page to explore if this article should include some material on Cook's level of education. Noleander (talk) 16:51, 13 August 2025 (UTC)

In the spelling discussion above, a couple of editors mentioned Cook's level of education. User:Aemilius Adolphin wrote "This would have the advantage of showing that he was very much the uneducated 'outsider' to the officer class. Thomas, Salmond and Ashley talk a great deal about this and the class tensions on board."

Salmond writes:

"A man who rose from the lower decks to the wardroom had to be gifted and lucky, and his progress was likely to be slow and painful. James Cook, with his labouring background, was no exception — as he wryly noted in the preface to the account of his second Pacific expedition: ‘[I am] a man, who has not the advantage of Education, acquired, nor Natural abilities for writing; but ... one who has been constantly at sea from his youth and who, with the Assistance of a few good friends has gone through all the Stations belonging to a Seaman, from a prentice boy in the Coal Trade to a Commander in the Navy."

Thomas has:

"Cook’s thinking was shaped by his upbringing in a northern rural community, by an informal and limited Quaker education and most notably by his experience on and around many merchant and naval ships. More broadly, he was a product of the sort of conflict-ridden, heterogeneous and inventive place that modern Britain-in-the-making was. A gentleman-scientist such as Joseph Banks, the Admiralty lords who drafted Cook’s instructions, and the literary ladies who later wrote his elegies likewise belonged to this highly commercial modern society, but the experiences that made them were very different from those that had formed Cook."

Ashley writes:

"There are significant numbers of men from what we might call the periphery of England on board the ships. Cook himself was the classic case, a farm labourer's son from the modest metropolis of Great Ayton, but he was by no means unusual. Although some of these peripheral places were coastal, few were major ports and most were inland; we are not just tracing transient maritime labour. Towns such as Durham, Sunderland, Honiton, Tiverton and Clitheroe can all boast a man that sailed round the world with Cook. Cornwall can claim three: James Trevenen, the son of the vicar of Cam bourne, was pretty well connected; William Lanyon of Tregoney and Robert Armstrong of Falmouth, quarter gunner of the Discovery, rather less so. Yet socially favoured or not, these men could be construed as being from the primitive edge of modern Britannia, from a country that was difficult of access and econom ically underdeveloped."

But those quotes are merely scratching the surface ... I'm not suggesting they are exhaustive, or even representative, of what the sources say.

Question: Should material be added to the article to discuss Cook's education/class, particularly as measured relative to other officers or naturalists? How much material? One sentence? One paragraph? Or is it a relatively insignificant topic, and does not merit any additional material? Noleander (talk) 17:07, 13 August 2025 (UTC)

I think the problem for the article is: exactly what does anyone mean by "education"? By today's standards, one might regard Cook as "educated" by virtue of his substantial skill in mathematics. Until quite recently, Classics was considered an essential part of education. I doubt that Cook had the ability to read Latin or Greek (something to be confirmed from sources), nor viewed military history through the lens of Commentarii de Bello Gallico. So how on earth do we concisely explain the criteria for "education" that existed in Cook's time, and how relevant that was to his ability to get on in life?

The concept of "gentlemen and tarpaulins" has been addressed by historians (see, for instance, Davies, J. D. (1991). Gentlemen and tarpaulins: the officers and men of the Restoration Navy. Oxford: Clarendon Pr. ISBN 978-0-19-820263-9.), and it is a big subject that I do not believe we can do justice to in the space available. Anyway, whatever defect in Cook's class or education there may be would probably have been wiped out if he had not got himself killed, because he no doubt would have been knighted if he had returned from his third voyage. (Those of you who know the sources better than me can probably identify which biographer says this.) Being in the Navy was a very effective way of achieving social mobility in the 18th century.

Of course, my opinion on how easily this can all be explained may be wrong, but I will be impressed if we find an adequate solution. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 20:10, 13 August 2025 (UTC)

It's an issue of social class, of which education is only a part. (To most "gentlemen", Cook underwent training in a trade and wasn't educated at all: a public school followed by Oxbridge was the only real education). In 18th century Britain, the navy was one of the few areas where a lad from a humble background could rise on merit (although not to the very top). But no matter how high they might rise, they would always be the vulgar, uneducated famer's son. As far as Banks was concerned, he was the real head of the first voyage and Cook was simply a tradesman who provided him with a carriage service around the world. (After the first voyage, Banks was presented to the king before Cook.) Hence, Banks's fit of pique when he didn't get his way on the second voyage. I agree that this is a vast topic which we can't handle fully in this article, but we might be able to add a couple of sentences in appropriate places to get the point across. As for a knighthood: that didn't eradicate class, for the landed gentry they were seen as a vulgar trinket handed out to grocers who did something useful for the Crown--the royal equivalent of tipping a tradesman. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 22:33, 13 August 2025 (UTC)

Cook's presumably strong 'northern rural' accent would have marked him clearly as an inferior. Errantios (talk) 00:04, 14 August 2025 (UTC)

I'm of the opinion that just mentioning he was born in a two-roomed mud cottage would tell everything about fossilized class in the UK that needs to be said, since you're operating under draconian FA word-count limits. Down with the nobility! Abolish the monarchy! ;-) Carlstak (talk) 01:29, 14 August 2025 (UTC)

Yes, it is more a matter of class than education. Getting to explain the whole matter of how this worked in the Navy is also a challenge. If anything is included, it would be fair to make clear that the navy of that time was probably the best way of achieving social mobility. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 08:00, 14 August 2025 (UTC)

Agreed. Carlstak (talk) 15:16, 14 August 2025 (UTC)

For what it's worth, I did find this older (1978) article, "Education and Social Mobility in the 18th Century: the Schooling of Captain James Cook", on Taylor & Francis online that appears to address the interplay of education and class in Cook's life directly, Even though I have Wikipedia Library access to the site, this is not among the articles it grants access to for poor Wikipedians. Down with the commodification of scholarly information! ;-) Carlstak (talk) 16:39, 14 August 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for locating that source. I also could not access it from WP:TWL. I posted a query at WP:RX here: Wikipedia:WikiProject_Resource_Exchange/Resource_Request#Article_from_1978_Journal_of_Educational_Administration_and_History Noleander (talk) 16:47, 14 August 2025 (UTC)

WP:RX found a copy of the article mentioned immediately above, and I read it. The article is Crellin, V. H. (1978). "{EDUCATION AND SOCIAL MOBILITY IN THE 18th CENTURY: THE SCHOOLING OF CAPTAIN JAMES COOK". Journal of Educational Administration and History. 10 (1). Routledge: 12–19. doi:10.1080/0022062780100102.

According to Google: "Dr. V. H. Crellin appears to be an academic researcher who focused on the history of education. Their doctoral thesis from 1976 at the University of London's Institute of Education was titled "The teaching of writing and the use of the copy book in schools: the influences of the writing schoolmaster with special reference to the period c 1700-1873" "

The article calls itself an "essay" and is not especially rigorous. It discusses social mobility in Britain, and asks how prevalent it was. Especially focuses on Cooks early schooling. Article is not only about Cook, also about James Hogg and Bligh. Article is rather vague due to lack of hard data ... it is very anecdotal. Article does not have an Abstract or a Conclusion section. The article includes:

"He [Cook] learned his letters at a dame school When James was seven years old, the family moved to Great Ayton where his father became manager at Aireyholme Farm for Thomas Skottowe, the Lord of the Manor of Ayton. Skottowe paid the small fee asked for James's schooling at Postgate School, a Charity school and poorhouse, which had been founded in 1704. Postgate was endowed for only eight poor boys to be educated freely; but many more attended, and in 1743 when James left, between twenty and thirty boys were being taught reading, writing, arithmetic and the catechism by Pullen, the schoolmaster"

If the article has a point, it is that it that social mobility in Britain during Cook's era was based on a combination of merit, luck, and connections. It also seems to be saying that the mobility that Cook experienced was not rare in those year, but not common either. I'm not sure I see any specific fact that could be used in this WP James Cook article, except perhaps the fact that one of Cook's early schools was a charity school. And I suppose this source could be used as one of multiple sources to support a general statement in the article about Cooks upward mobility. The article does not appear to be especially reliable or scholarly, it is more of an essay. Noleander (talk) 13:18, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

Ah well, thanks for your efforts, Nolelander. Just as an aside, I assume that your Google quote was their "AI" Gemini summary. Nothing to do with you, but seems anachronistic to call "he" (Cook) "they" before people chose their pronouns (a practice I respect). Anyway, I much prefer ChatGPT Scholar to Gemini, and routinely use it to find sources (not this one, though). With a very precise and well-targeted prompt along with a specific request for links I often get excellent results. Carlstak (talk) 15:09, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

I'm not seeing a consensus here to add any new material on education/class. Beaglhole 1974 p 4 writes:

"Skottowe belonged to the gentry rather than to the class of yeomen-farmers— Cook was to come across one of his sons in official position at a later date—a benevolent as well as substantial man; and noticing that the boy had some brains, he paid the small fees asked for him at the Postgate School at Ayton, where Mr Pullen the master taught him writing, arithmetic and his catechism, and perhaps more reading than Mrs Walker could. The school, the charitable foundation in 1704 of Michael Postgate, a local yeoman-farmer, was rebuilt in 1785, part of an oblong block of schoolhouse and poorhouse combined, so that the present-day pilgrim will find nothing on which to exercise emotion but original stones." [emphasis added]

Based on that, I changed the sentence in the "Early Life" section from

...Thomas Skottowe, paid for Cook to attend the local school

to

...Thomas Skottowe, paid for Cook to attend a school run by a charitable foundation.

Those word "charitable" should paint a fuller picture for readers. Noleander (talk) 18:24, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

On rereading the article, it looks to me as if there is a disparity in the amount of space and detail devoted to Australia compared with Tahiti and New Zealand where Cook spent quite a lot of time and many other notable things happened. If I were writing a one paragraph account of the main events on each land, I would add:

Tahiti. That Cook claimed the Society Islands for Britain. "From Huahine Cook sailed to the neighbouring island of Raiatea and claimed Raiatea-Tahaa and the islands of Huahine, Borabora, Tupai (Motu Iti) and Maurua (Maupiti) for Great Britain, naming them the Society Islands "as they lay contiguous to one another".^[1]

New Zealand. I would add the observation of the Transit of Mercury, that he "discovered" Cook Strait, that he found an important base for future explorations at Queen Charlotte Sound, that he claimed several ports (Mercury Bay, Queen Charlotte Sound, and others) for Britain.

To make space for this, I would make the following cuts to the sub-section on Australia:

Is there any aspect of the article that doe not meet the Featured Article criteria? The FA criteria are (my assessment is displayed in green):

1a) Well-written: its prose is engaging and of a professional standard; - Prose is not perfect, but sufficient for FA nomination. If anyone feels some prose needs work, please identify specific sentence(s).

1b) Comprehensive: it neglects no major facts or details and places the subject in context; [see also criterion (4) below] - I believe it meets FA criteria. This Talk page had a request a few weeks ago at Talk:James_Cook/Archive_5#Are_any_"major_facts_or_details"_missing_from_the_article? and that led to some important material being added to the article. I believe that all shortcomings raised in that discussion have been addressed. Due to the WP:SIZERULE guideline, this James Cook article cannot hold all details about Cook. Therefore, we need to make use of the seven sub-articles to hold details that cannot fit into this article. If any editor still feels this article is missing information, or has too much detail on certain topics, please identify the material, thanks!

1c) Well-researched: it is a thorough and representative survey of the relevant literature; claims are verifiable against high-quality reliable sources and are supported by inline citations where appropriate; - Meets FA criteria

1d) Neutral: it presents views fairly and without bias; - Meets FA criteria. The "controversy" material may never meet everyone's expectations, but it seems adequate. Sub-article James Cook and indigenous peoples is available for elaboration & details.

1e) Stable: it is not subject to ongoing edit wars and its content does not change significantly from day to day, except in response to the featured article process; - Not ready today. This article is still undergoing minor changes, but should stabilize soon.

1f) Copyright: compliant with Wikipedia's copyright policy and free of plagiarism or too-close paraphrasing. - Meets FA criteria

2) Complies with WP Manual of Style: - Meets FA criteria

2a) Lead: a concise lead section that summarizes the topic and prepares the reader for the detail in the subsequent sections; - Meets FA criteria

2b) Appropriate structure: a substantial but not overwhelming system of hierarchical section headings; - Meets FA criteria

2c) Consistent citations: where required by criterion 1c, consistently formatted inline citations using footnotes—see citing sources for suggestions on formatting references. Citation templates are not required. - Meets FA criteria

3) Media. It has images and other media, where appropriate, with succinct captions and acceptable copyright status. Images follow the image use policy. Non-free images or media must satisfy the criteria for inclusion of non-free content and be labeled accordingly.- Meets FA criteria

4) Length. It stays focused on the main topic without going into unnecessary detail and uses summary style where appropriate.- The article exceeds the 9,000 prose word suggestion of WP:SIZERULE, but it is only 2% over, so it may fall within the exception: "... the scope of a topic can sometimes justify the added reading material." Regaredless, the article should stay close to 9,000 or FA reviewers may object.

If anyone feels the article does not meet FA criteria, please post a note below so the shortcomings can be addressed. If you feel material should be added or deleted, or if certain prose needs work, please provide specifics. Thanks! Noleander (talk) 17:25, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

For reference, here are the current sizes of the top-level sections, measured in prose-words (article total is about 9,200 today):

• 354 - Lead
• 883 - Royal Navy (includes Canada material)
• 1,346 - First Voyage
• 1,266 - Second Voyage
• 1,574 - Third Voyage
• 497 - Science, Navigation, Seamanship
• 2,187 - Indigenous Peoples
• 302 - Personal Life & Character
• 447 - Legacy

And here are the seven sub-articles available to hold details that cannot fit in this article:

• First voyage of James Cook
• Second voyage of James Cook
• Third voyage of James Cook
• Death of James Cook
• Navigation and seamanship of James Cook
• James Cook and indigenous peoples
• List of commemorations of Captain James Cook

Noleander (talk) 17:49, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

Given that "indigenous peoples" in a general sense is mentioned so many times in the text, shouldn't the first instance be linked? Carlstak (talk) 18:32, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

Yes, you are correct. I'll fix that. [Edit: Done.] Noleander (talk) 18:40, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

Beaglehole says on page 39:

Although the final figure of the date is gone, it must have been 1758, to match the heading of the column, 'Place and Time when there'; while the wreck of the Prudent, used as a mark, further confines the date.

Perhaps the article should say "with Cook most likely the author of the sailing directions for the river written *apparently* in 1758." Carlstak (talk) 19:41, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

That's a good question. Beaglehole uses the word "must", which is a pretty solid conclusion from an expert secondary source. IMHO just because the primary source document doesn't have the date doesn't require the article to qualify the year with "apparently". Are there any sources that say it was not 1758? Noleander (talk) 19:57, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

It seems to me that this sentence:

Cook's achievements in Canada – hydrographic and astronomical – were noticed by the Admiralty, and came at a pivotal moment in British overseas exploration.

should come at the end of the paragraph it's in. The heading of the section is "Exploration of the Pacific Ocean" so I would think that the discussion of European exploration of the Pacific should immediately follow it, and then segue, logically, to "Cook's achievements in Canada". At present the introductory sentence is marooned at the beginning, as a sort of non sequitur separated from the text that should naturally follow. Carlstak (talk) 20:18, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

That might be a good suggestion. The reason the sentence is at the beginning is to transition from the previous Canada section to the following 1st voyage section. The previous section outlines various surveying accomplishments of Cook. And the following section states that Cook was selected for the first voyage of exploration. This sentence is explaining why Cook was selected; that is: what was so special about that point in history that made Cook's skills valuable? Not to say that sentence is best at the beginning... I'm just explaining why it was put there. Noleander (talk) 20:32, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

In several places in the article, as in "The third voyage began by sailing south from England, around South Africa into the Indian Ocean, where they stopped...", the construction of the sentence anthropomorphizes "voyage" with the pronoun "they". I think "the expedition" or "Cook and his crew" would serve better in these instances. Carlstak (talk) 22:16, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

@Carlstak - Are you saying that "voyage... they" is not okay, but that "expedition ... they" is okay?

Probably 30% of the sentences in the article have the same subject, namely the expedition/voyage/crew. The FA criterion "prose must be of a professional standard" requires varying the wording in that situation. The article currently rotates between wordings such as:

• "the expedition... "
• "the voyage... "
• "Cook and his crew... "

Reducing those choices from three to two (i.e. changing "voyage" to "expedition") for may result in unacceptably repetitive phrasing. (However: I have no idea how many sentences would be impacted: if it is less than five, it may be unnoticeable).

As an alternative solution: for sentences that contain "the voyage" or "the n-th voyage", rather than change to "the expedition" maybe convert "they" to "it". Example: Change

"The third voyage began by sailing south ... to the Indian Ocean, where they stopped..."

to

"The third voyage began by sailing south ... to the Indian Ocean, where it stopped..."

Does that seem satisfactory? Noleander (talk) 22:50, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

I'm saying that "voyage" refers to a long journey by ship, but not to the people who are making the voyage. I would say, "Our expedition of thirty men and women", but I would not say "our voyage of thirty men and women". I would never refer to the people on my ship making the voyage as "the voyage", so neither of your examples is satisfactory, in my view. Carlstak (talk) 00:32, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

PS: I just saw that you've made 2,078 edits to the article. Much respect for your dedication, even though I think that's insane (speaking as someone quite insane by society's standards). I'm sure James is looking down from Sailor's Nirvana at the article and smiling.;-) Carlstak (talk) 00:46, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

How about Voyages of Christopher Columbus? Errantios (talk) 00:52, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

OK, let me go through the article and count how many situations we have the "voyage" followed by "they". It's probably only 4 or 5, so changing those to a better phrasing will have virtually no adverse impact on that repetitive phrasing issue I described above. Noleander (talk) 00:56, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

Sounds good. Carlstak (talk) 01:01, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

There were only two sentences that had "voyage" followed by "they", and I changed both of those "voyage"s to "expedition". They were:

• The voyage continued northward until they reached the north-east ...
• The third voyage began by sailing south from England, around South Africa into the Indian Ocean, where they stopped,...

I appreciate the feedback on the prose ... keep it coming! Noleander (talk) 01:27, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

I love this stuff.;-) Carlstak (talk) 01:36, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

Rather than:

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.

I would write:

Cook's outstanding seamanship and navigation skills enabled him to lead three expeditions which travelled tens of thousands of miles across mostly uncharted oceans and successfully gathered vast amounts of scientific and geographic knowledge, without the loss of a single ship.

to avoid the awkwardness of having the words "which travelled" in a phrase set off by dashes followed immediately by the words "that successfully gathered". Carlstak (talk) 02:31, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

I have no objections; you can make that change if you want. Noleander (talk) 03:31, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

I've gone through the article as it stands and copy edited the text, according to my lights. I'll fact-check as time allows—385 citations is a lot (as one would expect)—I'll check the ones that catch my eye. Carlstak (talk) 04:13, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

When identifying an occupation, WP articles have a choice of phrasing:

a) Historian John Smith ... - Perhaps more common in US (aka "False title")

b) The historian John Smith ... - Perhaps more common in UK (avoids false title)

The WP Manual of Style is silent on the choice, so every article can pick one or the other. During a Peer Review on this article in early June 2025, a peer reviewer objected to the (a) approach used in some sentences in the article, based on the False title principle. Before then, I don't think the question ever came up. I concurred with the peer reviewer, because (1) in the past I've had two or three FA reviewers (in other articles) insist on approach (b); and (2) according to False title, approach (b) is more common in UK, and this article uses UK language conventions. So, in response to the Peer Review issue, on 8 June 2025, I eliminated all false titles by adding the word "the" (https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=James_Cook&diff=1294615920&oldid=1294615728).

We should probably keep using convention (b) for the article, otherwise we may end up thrashing back and forth. (Pinging User:Errantios). Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 14:36, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

Agreed. I was just going to post a comment referring to False title#British usage. Carlstak (talk) 14:54, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

I asked about this recently. My take on that discussion is "Either way is fine, pick one and be consistent". There appears to be some preference depending on British vs American English, but even that doesn't seem to be a strict rule. RoySmith (talk) 15:05, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

When there is no strict rule, I think it's prudent to follow the most common practice in formal British English. Carlstak (talk) 15:09, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

@RoySmith - Thanks for that link ... interesting discussion. I wonder if the WP MOS will be updated some day to provide some guidance on false titles (even if it is nothing more than "Pick one and stick with it"). Noleander (talk) 15:14, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

I think that would be a good idea, but WP:MOSCREEP argues not. RoySmith (talk) 15:25, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

Ha ... I just posted a query about this on the MOS Talk page Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style#Should_brief_guidance_on_False_titles_be_added_to_MOS?. As you say, MOS cannot (and should not) cover every topic, but if a question arises regularly, _some_ WP page (not an essay) should have guidance. Noleander (talk) 15:43, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

I am neutral on the issue, but b) is the established usage for this article and so should be retained. Also we should not state the nationality/ethnicity of the author of a cited source unless it is relevant to the point made. Otherwise it raises a NPOV issue. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 22:18, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

Agree that it is better to omit nationality of authors/sources, unless significant. It is certainly interesting information, but it poses more problems than it solves. For authors that have a linked WP article, curious readers are able to click it. Ethnicity is arguably relevant in this sentence: "Native Hawaiian scholar Haunani-Kay Trask wrote:..." But even there, doesn't that require _this_ article to include a cite verifying her ethnicity? Also it could be construed as a back-handed way of implying she is biased, hence her analysis is suspect. Simpler and safer to omit entirely. Noleander (talk) 00:17, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

False titles. Excuse me, but I simply do not see the alleged false titles. The article False titles warns of wording that "formally resembles a title". Its early examples include capitalisation of the descriptive word, but it notes that this usage seems to have lapsed. There is said to still be a problem if there is no capitalisation, as has been explained very clearly when Popcornfud first raised the issue:

A false title is when you remove the article (the/a/an) or posessive pronoun (her/his/their/its/etc) before a noun, making it into a sort of pseudo-adjective.

False title: The documentary follows songwriter Bob Dylan.

No false title: The documentary follows the songwriter Bob Dylan.

They're called false titles because they use an ordinary noun, such as "songwriter", as you would a title such as "Captain", "Mr." or "Dr."

Well, in "follows songwriter", I simply do not find that "songwriter" is used "as you would a title". The article “False titles” gives as example that in “convicted bomber Timothy McVeigh” the phrase "convicted bomber appears to be a title, an error that "the convicted bomber" would avoid. Sorry: that example is absurd. One would never say: “Introducing President George Hoop, convicted bomber Timothy McVeigh and Vice-President Georgia La”. Thus, if I am a typical reader, the alleged issue of "false titles", if it ever existed, no longer exists.

False specification. But I do find another issue, which might be termed "false specification". Noleander has generously come here because in James Cook I changed, for example, “The anthropologist Nicholas Thomas” to “Anthropologist Nicholas Thomas”. When making changes of that kind in that article, I had never heard of “false titles”. My reason for the changes was different. In my reading, simply “A/anthropologist” identifies the person just as an anthropologist, whereas “The anthropologist” suggests some special relationship with the subject matter, not possessed by others—perhaps, for anthropology, an official appointment.

Nationality. Whereas I am sure that "scholar" and "academic" are insufficiently precise, I agree that nationality should not be identified unless it has a specific connection to the topic. I had thought that Gananath Obeyesekere being Sri Lankan was sufficient, as a writer about colonialism and Sri Lanka being another western-colonised country, but accept that this is not close enough—although it is good that he is still described as an anthropologist. Whereas "Native Hawaiian scholar Haunani-Kay Trask" seems clearly on the right side of the line. Her own article, linked, both verifies her ethnicity and shows her record of anticolonialism. Errantios (talk) 01:41, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

? You say, Errantios:

The article “False titles” gives as example that in “convicted bomber Timothy McVeigh” the phrase "convicted bomber appears to be a title, an error that "the convicted bomber" would avoid. Sorry: that example is absurd.

That's not in the Cook article itself, or even on this talk page till now, so what does it matter? The issue that Nolander is concerned with, as I understand it, is that there's no clear guidance on the issue of using the definite article article or not in the "False titles essay", and in a way he's deprecating that article too, so I don't see the utility of litigating your issue here (it belongs on that talk page), or the point of this rhetorical exercise. As I say, we want a lodestar for navigation. Carlstak (talk) 02:14, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

@Errantios - Thanks for taking the time to do some copy editing in the article, and for presenting your thoughts on false titles. Your analysis makes some sense: I can see how removing "the" in some false title situations would not, arguably, mislead readers into thinking there is a false honorific/title.

My immediate goal is to get the article ready for an FA nomination, and the false titles have historically been an issue in FA: Some FA reviewers will absolutely ask for false titles to be removed. Conversely, I've never seen a reviewer ask for false titles to be used. On top of that, there are other reasons to avoid the false titles:

• Removing the false titles make the article sound more professional and academic, some people say
• The peer reviewer in June 2025 asked for the false titles to be removed
• False titles are avoided in professional writing in UK (so it says in the False title article ... I have not verified that) and this article is using UK English.
• It looks like several editors (above in this Talk page discussion) prefer to avoid false titles in the article (not to say there is a consensus, but it is a data point)

Your arguments make some sense, but can you live with the word "the" in this article for the near term? We can always revisit the question after the FA process is complete. Noleander (talk) 03:44, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

No worries: I couldn't live with having got in the way of FA; revert my changes if you think it necessary to that end. BTW1, my native professional English dialect is British. BTW2, perhaps the "False titles" article, in its older examples, is misunderstanding residual capitalisation of nouns. Errantios (talk) 09:50, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander sadly, it looks like this won't make it into the MOS. If people give you grief about this at FAC, please ping me and I'll weigh in on the review. RoySmith (talk) 12:32, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

@Errantios - Thanks ... I'll take you up on your offer, and I'll remove the false title constructs. We can revive the discussion after the FA process completes.

@RoySmith - Okay, I'll keep that in mind, but I hope it won't be necessary. Noleander (talk) 14:19, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

Noted for future comparison—1769 transit of Venus observed from Tahiti begins (IMO properly):

On 3 June 1769, navigator Captain James Cook, naturalist Joseph Banks, astronomer Charles Green and naturalist Daniel Solander recorded the transit of Venus from the island of Tahiti during Cook's first voyage around the world.

Errantios (talk) 22:09, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

My dander being upped, I've canvassed deletion of False titles - see its Talk, #"Is there a real problem? Delete this article?". I won't, of course, draw any attention to James Cook. Errantios (talk) 06:22, 19 August 2025 (UTC)

The article used a mixture of past and present tense in constructions such as: Thomas wrote: "Lorem ipsum ..." or : Salmond argues: "Lorem ipsum ...". It seems like those should all use the same tense (I don't think the MOS guidelines specify one way or another, but I'm not sure). I changed them all to be past tense. Noleander (talk) 14:58, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander I definitely prefer the present tense for a living author who wrote the work recently and where there is no evidence that the author's views have changed. Using the past tense, to me, suggests that the author no longer holds these views. Also, before your recent changes here and here the established style was overwhelmingly to use the present tense. Even with your recent changes to tense, many references still use the present tense (because you didn't change the tense in all the footnotes). Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 22:56, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

That's fine, I have no preference one way or another. I just wanted to have a uniform algorithm that was used. I can change it, or you can if you want to. Noleander (talk) 23:04, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for that. I will make the changes. I also noticed a couple of typos. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 23:14, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

Changes look good. Thank you for cleaning up my mess. Noleander (talk) 00:00, 18 August 2025 (UTC)

I think present tense is also consistent with MOS: "By default, write articles in the present tense..." MOS:TENSE Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 23:03, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

In section James_Cook#Seven_Years'_War is the sentence They collaborated on developing preliminary charts of the entrance to the Saint Lawrence River, with Cook most likely the author of the sailing directions for the river written in 1758.. The phrase "... with Cook most likely the author ..." is factually correct, but does not sound right to my ears. I'm wondering if another phrasing is better, such as:

1. ... blah blah, with Cook most likely the author of ... [original wording]
2. ... blah blah, with Cook most likely being the author of ...
3. ... blah blah, with Cook the likely author of the ....
4. ... blah blah. Cook is probably the author of ...
5. ... blah blah. Cook is generally regarded as the author of ...
6. ... blah blah. Most likely, Cook is the author of ...
7. ?? other ??

Both (1) and (2) sound wrong to my ears. (4), (5), (6) - which utilize a new sentence - seem better. Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 18:41, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

"Most likely" is not grammatically incorrect, but it is idiomatic, so I would go with "Cook is probably the author of ..." Carlstak (talk) 19:35, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

Perhaps the solution is to be more certain about the authorship of the sailing directions. Pg 70 of To go upon discovery: James Cook and Canada, from 1758-1779. Toronto: Dundurn Press. 2000. ISBN 1-55002-327-6. discusses this, relying on a substantial quote from Skelton, R.A., and R.V. Tooley. The Marine Surveys of James Cook in North America, 1758- 1768, Particularly the Survey of Newfoundland. A Bibliography of Printed Charts and Sailing-Directions. London: Map Collectors’ Circle, 1967. (I do not have access to Skelton and Tooley.) The quotation includes "...Although neither the chart nor the accompanying sailing directions bear Cook’s name, there can be no doubt of his authorship." [Bold added] I think that would entitle you to delete the words "most likely". ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 20:57, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

Incidentally, "most likely" seems to be applied to a lot of Cook's early unsigned work. I've just dipped into a copy of the archive of Imray, Laurie, Norie and Wilson (an independent chart publisher) and the historical commentary has this usage. Skelton and Tooley as a source, and the less certain mention in Beaglehole is further evidence of how that biography suffered with the death of Skelton. ThoughtIdRetired _TIR 21:11, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

I have no objection to removing the "most likely" based on the Suthren source and Beaglehole. The 2000 Suthren book To Go Upon Discovery on p 70 has:

What did appear off the table was a major chart folio of the river ... Hence it was that the final product of Cook’s and Holland’s work at the table was titled "A New Chart of the River St. Lawrence from the Island of Anticosti to the Falls of Richelieu: with all the Islands, Rocks, Shoals, and Soundings. Also Particular Directions For Navigating the River with Safety. Taken by Order of Charles Saunders, Essqr. Vice Admiral of the Blue, and Commander in Chief of His Majesty’s Ships in the Expedition Against Quebec in 1759." It was a package of some twelve sheets, in dimensions each thirtyfive inches by ninety inches, with a main scale of one inch to two leagues (a league being three miles) and an inset scale of one inch to one league. Skelton and ‘Tooley, cataloguers of Cook’s chart output, describe it as follows: "The origin of this chart is described in a letter of Major Samuel Holland, 11 January, 1792, to John Graves Simcoe, LieutenantGovernor of Upper Canada. The chart was first compiled, mainly from French maps, by Cook and Holland on board HMS Pembroke in the winter of 1759-60 at Halifax, where the English fleet was wintering; Captain John Simcoe (father of the governor) commanded the Pembroke, and Cook was her master. The chart was completed, corrected and fairdrawn from the surveys made jointly by Holland and Cook to Quebec, in the spring of 1760. It was ready by April, when Admiral Saunders recommended its publication to the Admiralty. Although neither the chart nor the accompanying sailing directions beat Cook’s name, there can be no doubt of his authorship. Three MS originals are known — two in the Admiralty (one of them signed by Cook) the third in a private collection in Montreal; and one was listed in Jeffreys’ MS “Catalogue” of 1775.""

The current citation for the "most likely" sentence is Beagleehole 1974, p 39:

"It is possible, too, or probable, that to this period belongs the first example of ‘sailing directions’ by Cook himself now extant—one of those ‘Descriptions for sailing in and out of Ports, with soundings, Marks for particular Rocks, Shoals, &c. with the Latt4 Long’, Tides, and Variation of the Compass’, which ships’ masters were encouraged in general terms to produce and produced not very frequently. These directions are for the ‘Harbour of Louisbourg in Cape Breton’. They bear the marks of Cook’s own style, a precise and economical composition. He gives the latitude, 46°11 N (a few minutes out) ; the ‘Longitude by Computation’ is a blank. Although the final figure of the date is gone, it must have been 1758, to match the heading of the column, ‘Place and Time when there’; while the wreck of the Prudent, used as a mark, further confines the date. " Noleander (talk) 21:43, 17 August 2025 (UTC)

I changed the sentence in the article to now read: They collaborated on developing preliminary charts of the entrance to the Saint Lawrence River, with Cook writing the accompanying sailing directions. I also added a wikilink to sailing directions. Noleander (talk) 18:12, 18 August 2025 (UTC)

Section James_Cook#Cross-cultural_exchanges has the sentence The Māori enjoyed the ship's salted meat and Mai tried to produce wine on his island. The cite for "tried to produce wine" is Salmond p. 357 " [when the 3rd voyage returned Mai to his home islands] Mai was delighted to find some grapevines that the Spaniards had planted. He took some cuttings, hoping to make his own wine." The source doesn't say that Mai did anything other than take some cuttings. Considering the importance of some material that has been relegated to sub-articles, taking a cutting doesn't seem to belong in the article.

Maybe we can find sources that covers the adoption of European food by indigenous peoples (that Cook encountered) in a broader, deeper manner? In any case, the "wine" phrase should probably be removed. Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 13:45, 18 August 2025 (UTC)

It would be nice to see this article appear on the front page of English Wikipedia on the anniversary of Cook's death, 14 Feb 2026. For that to happen, the FA nomination must be initiated by 1 September 2025 ... because it takes two months to process the nomination, and - if it is approved for FA status - it take another three months to reserve a specific date on the front page. Adding a couple of weeks of padding yields a nomination date no later than 1 September 2025.

One of the FA criteria is: Stable: [the article] is not subject to ongoing edit wars and its content does not change significantly from day to day, That means that any significant changes to the article must to be completed prior to 1 September 2025, in order to get on the front page for 14 Feb 2026. (Minor changes - such as copy editing, spelling, grammar - can continue during the nomination process).

Of course, the quality of the article takes priority over an artificial deadline, so if there are significant changes that cannot be completed by early September, the front page will have to wait until later date.

With that said, are there any aspects of the article that need work? Are there any POV or bias issues that are a concern? If there are, please bring them up, and we can start addressing them. Noleander (talk) 01:35, 19 August 2025 (UTC)

The "Royal Navy" section begins ... Cook realised his career would advance more quickly in the Royal Navy than in commercial shipping, despite the need to start at the bottom of the naval hierarchy ... but the sources do not support that. The cited source is Rigby:

• Rigby p 26-27: "Astonishingly, it was an offer Cook declined. He instead decided to enter the Royal Navy, volunteering as an able seaman at Wapping, London, on 17 June 1755. In terms of pay and status it was a backward step for, as Nelson later said of his own 1770s experience, merchant seamen then had ‘a horror of the Royal Navy’. Cook himself gave no reason for it except a later hint, after his second Pacific voyage, that his ‘ambition’ led him to range further than other men. Although in 1755 he could not know how far and in what remarkable capacity this would be, the Navy was then already embroiled in the undeclared phase of the Seven Years War with France (1756-63). Fought substantially in North America and India, this was to take Cook farther than he had yet been and — not without risk — give him opportunities beyond those open to a provincial short-trade shipmaster."

Beaghlehole 1974 says this:

• P 15: "HE VOLUNTEERED at Wapping on 17 June 1755; and the only recorded reason is that he determined to ‘take his future fortune’ that way; or, much the same thing as recollected by Walker, ‘he had always an ambition to go into the Navy’. Among merchant seamen this was unusual. As between the two services there might seem to be no possible claim that the navy had on the rational man. If such a man, for his own purposes, wanted a different sort of ship from colliers, or a longer voyage than those of the coal or Baltic trades, he could join an Atlantic vessel, or enter the service of the East India Company. The disadvantage of that choice was that any seaman in the merchant service was in time of war subject to the depredations of the press gang, on shore or afloat, in his home port or as he finished a hard passage at Bombay or Calcutta. But there were years of peace as well as years of war; and in any case Cook, as the master of a merchant ship, could not have been pressed. We do not take at face value Dr Johnson’s reflections on the sailor’s life in general, that no man would be a sailor, who had contrivance enough to get himself into a jail; ‘for, being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned’. Men enough went to sea to give the lie to that remark; the merchant service at least was adequately manned. The navy was a different matter. Its physical conditions were worse; its pay was worse; its food was worse, its discipline was harsh, its record of sickness was appalling. To the chance of being drowned could be added the chance of being flogged, hanged or being shot, though it was true that deaths in battle were infinitely fewer than deaths from disease.

So, it looks like that phrase should be deleted, and simply state that Cook joined the Navy, without speculating on a reason. However, it would be odd to omit any mention of the reason. Perhaps state "Cook never gave a reason"; or repeat the statement from Walker quoted by Beaglehole: "[Cook] had always an ambition to go into the Navy". Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 17:58, 19 August 2025 (UTC)

Besides its content, that phrase bothered me because of its use of the word "needed", which doesn't seem quite right. I was thinking "imperative" might be better. In any case, whatever statement is made should at least mention the contrast between conditions in the merchant service and in the Royal Navy and the fact that joining the Navy was a sort of demotion. Carlstak (talk) 18:22, 19 August 2025 (UTC)

I made some changes in the ariticle, and changed the cite.

Regarding suggestion to "mention the contrast between conditions..": Maybe a few words about merchant vs navy could be in a footnote; but it would be best to attribute it to Beaglehole (or another source) rather than in encyclopedia's voice (since it is so subjective). Noleander (talk) 18:26, 19 August 2025 (UTC)

Agreed. Carlstak (talk) 18:34, 19 August 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander@Carlstak. I think it is worth recording that Cook turned down a promotion as captain of the Friendship in order to start at the bottom in the RN. This was very unusual at his age. Walker--who should know--said that Cook's ambition had always been to join the RN. So this tells us he was an ambitious man who was willing to accept a temporary setback to reach his ultimate goal. Sources: Beaglehole pp14-15; Salmond (2004) p 22; B;ainey (2020) p. 6 Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 22:05, 19 August 2025 (UTC)

Ah, I was not aware of that fact. Definitely pertinent and illuminating, readers will appreciate it. I will add it into the article. Thanks. Noleander (talk) 22:21, 19 August 2025 (UTC)

I updated the text in the first paragraph of James_Cook#Royal_Navy. If anyone sees possible improvements, feel free to make them; or notify me and I'll take care of it. Noleander (talk) 00:38, 20 August 2025 (UTC)

Yes, this addition is definitely an improvement. Thanks to Aemilius Adolphin. Carlstak (talk) 02:15, 20 August 2025 (UTC)

The article includes the three Beaglehole volumes The Journals of Captain James Cook. The citation template accomoidates author(s) and, separately, editor(s). For these volumes, we can choose from several approaches to including their names in the citations:

1. Author: Cook; Editor: Beaglehole
2. Authors: Cook & Beaglehole (in that order)
3. Authors: Beaglehole & Cook (in that order)
4. Abuse the citation template and name both Cook and Beaglehole as authors, but put "(ed.)" after Beaglehole's name, to let readers know that one author was also the editor.

Considering the four approaches:

• Approach (1) is the canonical approach, I believe. Cook is the author of more than half of the words in the books. The fact that Beaglehole wrote a massive introduction doesn't make him an author. There are scores of famous books where famous editors add commentary to books/poems/novels written by another famous author (Dante, Dickens, Conan Doyle, Shakespeare, Carrol, Twain ... all have works where editors supply a huge amount of commentary). In many cases, the editor's writings approach the word count of the original author. But the author in any library catalog is always the original author. It would be peculiar to have a rule that is based on what percentage of the words in the pages were written by the editor ... and when it crosses a certain threshold, the editor magically becomes an author.

• Approach (2) and (3) - Inaccurate: fail to identify Beaglehole as the editor. I know that many academics may call these books "Beaglehole volume N", but that shorthand doesn't dictate how Wikipedia citations should be displayed.

• Approach (4) The article is currently using (4), which I implemented about a month ago (but I regret it now) in attempt to find a solution to this dilemma. Approach (4) will almost certainly will be rejected by FA reviewers (if they notice it) because it improperly abuses the citation template.

The title page of Volume 1 reads: The Journals of Captain James Cook - The Voyage of the Endeavour 1768-1771 - Edited by John Beaglehole ... so Beaglehold describes himself as the editor, not an author.

For those reasons, I'm leaning towards approach (1). I'll look around WP and see if there is any guideline covering this. Thoughts? Noleander (talk) 03:43, 20 August 2025 (UTC)

Approach (1) looks good to me. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 04:10, 20 August 2025 (UTC)

Is there a way to properly "abuse the citation template"?. Just kidding. Approach (1) looks okay. Carlstak (talk) 04:18, 20 August 2025 (UTC)

Have I missed something? Shouldn't the {{okina}} template be used consistently in the article? There are only three instances of its use, in "Hawaiʻi Island". Carlstak (talk) 15:20, 20 August 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for finding that: definitely an oversight. I'll take care of it. Noleander (talk) 16:48, 20 August 2025 (UTC)

@Carlstak It looks like it is already used correctly in the article. The state of Hawaii does not use the okina; and "Hawaii" meaning the whole archipelago does not use the okina. The okina is used for identifying the large island as "Hawaiʻi Island".

When the article has a sentence like "Cook was the first to see Hawaii" the absence of the okina means the sentence is referring to Hawaii in the broad sense: the whole archipelago.

For example, in the section title "Return to Hawaii" he is returning to the archipelago (from the Bering Strait), so no okina there. His first stop was Maui island.

Does that make sense, or is there a specific place where an okina is misssing? Noleander (talk) 16:56, 20 August 2025 (UTC)

As in "Some academics state that Cook's clockwise route around the island of Hawaii...", in "When Cook arrived in Hawaii in 1778, Hawaiian king Kalaniʻōpuʻu gave him several gifts, including this" [Kalaniʻōpuʻ was supreme monarch of the island of Hawaiʻi], in "argue that Cook's ships' clockwise route around the island of Hawaii", and in "University of Hawaii at Manoa". I guess it is not used when referring to the inhabitants of the island of Hawaiʻi, because "Hawaiian" or its plural are English words. Carlstak (talk) 19:22, 20 August 2025 (UTC)

Ah, yes, those need to be corrected .. thanks. Noleander (talk) 00:51, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

Are those quotes (in your most recent post) from this article? I cannot find them. I did find "Some academics state that Cook's clockwise route ..." in the James Cook and indigenous peoples article. That latter article certainly needs a lot of work ... but I'm not sure that I have time at the moment. Noleander (talk) 02:20, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

Sorry, I'm still trying to figure out what happened; either I was looking at the wrong tab in my browser of the many open (which one I have no idea) or the doings of my alternative self in a parallel universe have finally intersected with my own doings. If so, I'm doomed! I have long feared this day.;-) Apologies. Carlstak (talk) 02:41, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

No worries. Noleander (talk) 02:56, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

There was some inconsistency in the italics & capitalization surrounding "almanac"; so I implemented this: Nautical Almanac for the book from Greenwich; and almanac (lowercase, not italic) when used in a generic sense to mean any nautical table(s) from any source. Let me know if the change does not look correct. Noleander (talk) 00:55, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

The "Recent Assessment" reads:

Cook is widely regarded as one of the greatest sea explorers, and is often considered a founding figure of modern Australia and New Zealand. Many people, particularly indigenous people of the lands he visited, consider him to be a violent invader and a symbol of the adverse consequences of European contact and colonisation. Scholars such as Robert Tombs, Thomas, and Williams have variously contended that – although Cook claimed some indigenous lands for Britain without the consent of the local people, and his expeditions sometimes resulted in violence and the spread of infectious diseases – he should not be held responsible for the consequences of colonialist policies that were initiated after his death.

Very concise & to the point. There are three sentences, each with a unique thrust:

• List of achievements / accolades
• Negative criticisms
• Rebuttal to negative

However, the negative information is split: half in the 2nd sentence, and half is embedded in the middle of the rebuttal sentence (highlighted in blue above). That awkward composition makes it harder for readers to grasp the information. All the negative criticism should be adjacent, contiguously in the the middle (before the rebuttal sentence). So I changed it to:

Cook is widely regarded as one of the greatest sea explorers, and is often considered a founding figure of modern Australia and New Zealand. His voyages greatly expanded geographical knowledge and paved the way for later British engagement in the Pacific. However, some Many Native Hawaiians and Aboriginal Australians associate Cook’s expeditions with lasting adverse impacts on indigenous peoples, leading them to view him as a symbol of invasion and colonisation. Critics, such as Native Hawaiian scholar Haunani-Kay Trask, highlight violent encounters, the spread of infectious diseases, and the claiming of Indigenous lands without consent. Scholars such as Robert Tombs, Thomas, and Williams – while acknowledging the negative impacts of the expeditions – contend that Cook should not be held responsible for the consequences of colonialist policies that were initiated after his death.

Anyone is free to modify or improve this, of course, but I think it is best to keep all the negative criticism clustered together in the middle (before the rebuttal sentence). (Pinging @Aemilius Adolphin: ). Noleander (talk) 18:29, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

The *some* in "However, some associate Cook’s expeditions" is a weasel word per MOS:WEASEL and *However* is deprecated by MOS:EDITORIAL. Carlstak (talk) 20:12, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

That's a good point. The text originally read:

a) Many indigenous people [have the following negative assessments]..."

I felt it should not be limited to indigenous so changed it (a few weeks ago?) to:

b) Many people, particularly indigenous people of the lands he visited, [have the following negative assessments]..."

I guess we could keep (b) wording for that particular sentence. Or: Thomas explicitly names native Hawaiians and Aboriginal Australians, which supports (a). McLynn writes ".., the subsequent unhappy fate of indigenous societies has gravely vitiated Cook’s reputation" but doesn't identify those who hold that view. Is it biased to enumerate those who hold negative views, yet not list those that hold the "widely held" positive viewpoints? Certainly the most non-POV approach is to list the specific authors/view-holders for all of the sentences in that paragraph. Noleander (talk) 20:56, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

I've changed that sentence to start with Many Native Hawaiians and Aboriginal Australians associate ... , which is supported by the Thomas source. Not to say that is the best wording, but at least it is supported by the sources, and avoids the WEASEL word issue. I also added "... such as Native Hawaiian scholar Haunani-Kay Trask... ". Noleander (talk) 21:01, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

"However" is not deprecated, it's just a word to watch. Gawaon (talk) 21:24, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

To clarify: I think the paragraph was in great shape before this change. My one and only goal was to move two sentence fragments (that listed critical points) so they were adjacent. Nothing more. When I did the move, I had to reword a few things things to get a sensible flow. I think it is fine now .... I'm not looking to re-write the entire paragraph!  :-) Noleander (talk) 22:18, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

Looks fine to me. Much better now. Carlstak (talk) 23:07, 21 August 2025 (UTC)

@Noleander@Carlstak@Gawaon To me, the revised version is inferior to what we had before. For example, "Many Native Hawaiians and Aboriginal Australians associate .." is worse than "many indigenous peoples of the lands he visited" because it excludes the Maori, First nations of Alaska/Canada etc. However, combining the negative assessment does have the value of highlighting some unnecessary repetition. I suggest:

"Cook is widely regarded as one of the greatest sea explorers, and is often considered a founding figure of modern Australia and New Zealand. His voyages greatly expanded geographical knowledge and paved the way for later British engagement in the Pacific. [But for many people – particularly indigenous people of the lands he visited – he is a symbol of the adverse consequences of European contact and colonisation.] Critics such as Native Hawaiian scholar Haunani-Kay Trask, highlight the role of Cook's expeditions in violent encounters, the spread of infectious diseases, and the claiming of Indigenous lands without consent. Scholars such as Robert Tombs, Thomas, and Williams – while acknowledging the negative impacts of the expeditions – contend that Cook should not be held responsible for the consequences of colonialist policies that were initiated after his death."

The sentence in brackets could be deleted to make the paragraph even more concise. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 00:21, 22 August 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback. Your text looks like an improvement, so I implemented it in the article.

I think the sentence in brackets "But for many people .... he is a symbol of the adverse consequences of European contact and colonisation." (emphasis on "colonisation" added) should be kept, because that is what the "rebuttal" sentence (Tombs, etc) is responding to.

The rebuttal is not responding to "Cook did violence / disease / claimed lands " ... events happened _during_ Cooks lifetime. The rebuttals are responding to claims that "Cook is responsible for (or a symbol of) all the evils that followed from colonisation". So the word "colonisation" should appear somewhere before the rebuttal sentence. Noleander (talk) 00:44, 22 August 2025 (UTC)

That's fine. Aemilius Adolphin (talk) 01:05, 22 August 2025 (UTC)

Agree with Aemilius Adolphin's points and the final result with Noleander's input. Nice work. Carlstak (talk) 01:46, 22 August 2025 (UTC)

Since there are no remaining issues in the "Ready for FA?" queries above (here and here) I'm planning on starting the Featured Article nomination process soon, perhaps tomorrow. For those not familiar with FA, the nominations usually go like this:

• The process takes about two months.
• Several FA reviewers will submit suggested changes to the article. The suggestions will arrive sporadically, over 5 to 7 weeks.
• If a suggestion is reasonable, I'll implement it; if not, I'll discuss with the reviewer and we'll come to a consensus. For an article of this size, there may be 100 to 200 changes ... most of them small. I will make the changes directly, without posting a notification in this article's Talk page (much like the process used for the Good Article review and the Peer Reviews).
• If you observe change to the article (arising from the FA review) that you disagree with, by all means bring it up ... either here in this Talk page, or in the nomination page. Or, you can wait until the nomination is over, to avoid impacting the nomination process.
• Anyone can edit the article during the nomination - you don't need to ask permission. Please try to limit such changes to straightforward, non-controversial improvements.
• Major changes are discouraged during the nomination, because it may delay or even terminate the nomination. If there is a major change you want to make, please wait until the nomination is finished.

If anyone has any concerns, or thinks the article is not ready, please let me know. Thanks to all editors for the work you all have performed over the past few months ... it is a great article! Noleander (talk) 23:22, 21 August 2025 (UTC)