User talk:WikiArtax

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Hi, I'll reply here rather than at my talk page. First of all, I'm sure it was an innocent infraction. Secondly, don't worry about it, we were all new and have all made the same mistakes.

The big trick is to learn to summarise your sources and put them into your own words. As there's no other copyright issues showing in the draft I guess you're learning this already. Try and make sure you are using your own words and not just paraphrasing. There are times when you can't do anything but paraphrase but see WP:LIMITED as to when it is acceptable.

Quotes are ok but should always be sourced, even if out of copyright e.g. the quotes attributed to Procopius need a source. If you're quoting from a copyrighted source, keep your quote as short as possible, enough to make your point but no more.

On tone Wikipedia voice is as neutral as it can be and tries to avoid pronouns so you might want to think about rephrasing sentences like Traveling east from Hebdomon on the Via Egnatia, one reached the famous "Golden Gate" in Constantinople's walls, to something like Traveling east from Hedomon on the Via Egnatia, the Golden Gate in the walls of Constantinople was reached. Also, don't use words like "famous" unless you can provide sources that say the Golden Gate was famous. Similarly numerous and fine edifices, "numerous" probably doesn't need sourcing but "fine" is like "famous" and the word needs justifying.

Try and source as much as possible. If someone could read a sentence or paragraph and ask "says who?" or "why?" then it really needs a source. Just a couple of examples;

1. The presence of the emperor and the army at the seventh milestone from Constantinople also required fortifications. - why? Or, depending on what the sources say you might want to make the statement more definite e.g. As the site of an imperial palace and a large military presence, the site was fortified
2. Certain historians interpret Septimium as an allusion to the Roman Emperor Septimius Severus - which historians?

All the above aside, you've made a really good job of it so far, even more impressive as I'm guessing that English isn't your first language. Please ask if you have any more questions. Nthep (talk) 21:12, 22 April 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for the advice and information, it helps a lot. I have made the suggested changes and applied the same corrections to other segments in the article.

Regarding Septimius Severus, I cited a source stating that certain historians credit him with this, but the book does not specify which historians. Although the book has an extensive bibliography and I have used some of its cited sources, the book itself does not indicate which source the Septimius Severus claim comes from. This raises questions about the source's reliability. The book lacks an ISBN, though it was printed by the Bakırköy Municipality, which suggests it could be reliable. However, on a second thought the claim about Septimius Severus would ideally require other sources as well. So for now, I think it's best to leave it, but I have changed its phrasing to make clear that the Septimius Severus interpretation is one theory among others which remains debated, and I highlighted that the alternative explanation, that both names refer to the site's position on the Via Egnatia, is more likely to be accurate.

I have another question regarding images. A few of the images that I have uploaded, (which can be seen on the Draft at the archaeology section) such as the image containing the inscription of Theodosius II taken during excavations and the image of sarcophagus of Basil II, are both from the 1910s or 1920s and were published no later than the 1950s. I put them on Wikipedia through Wikimedia Commons and cited the website I sourced them from as well as the authors responsible for them. I did this under the assumption that works more than 70 years since publication fall into the public domain. If I upload other images that are older than 70 years since publication, is it acceptable?

Thanks again for the feedback!

WikiArtax (talk) 11:02, 23 April 2026 (UTC)

Re Severus, that's fine. Sometimes you can't go further than you have.

Images. To be hosted on Commons, images have to be out of copyright in both their source country and the US. Unfortunately the US doesn't use life of author plus 70 years - the European standard and fairly common across the rest of the world. Instead the US uses years since publication and also was copyright ever registered and if so was it ever renewed. There's a very useful chart explaining US copyright at commons:Commons:Hirtle chart. Determining US copyright status needs you to know if the author is known or not, was the image ever published in the US and when, was it registered with the US copyright office, and was it ever renewed. Sounds daunting and it can be, but sometimes it fairly straight-forward.

Just looking at File:Sarcophagus of Basil II.png, you've dated it at 1950 but https://www.thebyzantinelegacy.com/hebdomon says it's from Macridy & Ebersolt. In the notes the only reference to Macridy & Ebersolt I see is this much earlier paper from 1921 which doesn't have the photo in it as far as I can see. So is it by Macridy or Ebersolt and is earlier than 1950 or is it by someone else? Let's assume it is by Macridy or Ebersolt and was published in the 1921 paper then we need to know their death dates to establish if it's out of copyright in France - the source country. Macridy died in 1940 and Ebersolt in 1933 so yes to that even if we don't know which one took the photo. Next part was the photo ever published in the US? So we're looking here to see if the Bulletin de Correspondance Hellénique was ever published in the US? Actually in this case it doesn't matter because as this edition of the journal was published in 1921 it's deemed to out of copyright in the US. But if it was published in say 1933 we'd need to check if it was published in the US and follow the Hirtle Chart accordingly.

Where we are with this photo is that we don't know who took it, when it was taken or when it was first published. Not particularly helpful. You might want to find out more about the photo before we go any further. Nthep (talk) 12:15, 23 April 2026 (UTC)