Talk:Siege of Szigetvár

According to Miki Filigranski, primary sources are " outdated sources"

I have been on Wikipedia for a mere few days, trying to contribute, but am blow away by the absurdity of this place.

Seeing how "editors" willy-nilly" delete contributions that require much time and effort with simplistic reasons for deleting things. I do not want to waste time and effort making improvements and so I placed into the talk section old resources that provide a wealth of information. The value is that they are translations from old books that are in either Croatian, Hungarian or Latin.

After placing resources that can be used to improve the story of the Siege of Sziget, which can be so much better, editor Miki Filigranski deleted the work claiming " outdated sources". Mind blown - the siege happened in 1566. An eye-witness to the event writes a book and that is called a PRIMARY SOURCE. How can two 450 year old primary source, by participants in the siege, be deemed to be OUTDATED? That is just absurd.

Then I look at the approved sources and some of them are pathetic sources.

It seems that the editors are spending more time using their power to delete the work of others and these editors have done very little to add to the story. Why is that? Why is this story not being built up to reach its potential?

NikolaZrinski (talk) 21:39, 24 September 2023 (UTC)

Hi NikolaZrinski, when I started edit Wikipedia I also did not understand why old primarly sources was not good for a medieval history event. But now I understand. Wikipedia based on modern reliable academic secondary sources. For example 1000 years old source says “500,000 enemy attacked” but modern respected historian say it is exaggeration and the real number can be 50,000 of the enemy army so we use that modern academic source. Of course we could mention old sources what those claimed but if modern academic sources are refering to them like “chronicle from 1500 claimed this” and mark the modern source, which should be reliable academic historian source not a facebook post by random user. Also it was many propaganda by many old regimes (for example communist) in the past, so it is better to use modern academic sources of certain events than exclusively the narrative of those old sources. OrionNimrod (talk) 22:19, 24 September 2023 (UTC)

I am a subject matter expert in Nikola Zrinski and the siege of Szigetvar, having researched Zrinski during the last decade. I do agree that some of the old numbers about how many soldiers were involved and how many were killed are exaggerated but the facts of the event are valid and valuable. Now think of this - if the numbers given in old books are all exaggerated, then the present day numbers are merely SPECULATION on how big the armies might have been. Ponder this, when a source says that the Ottoman army was almost 200,000 people, while it might sound too big it could in fact be true. The regular army might have been about 40,000, the provincial army might have been 60,000, the supply train might have had 30,000 and then there could have been up to 70,000 opportunists that were only there to raid and plunder.

The books I presented in "Further Reading" is just a resource for those that are interested in learning more. Why did I add them? Because this article on the Siege of Szigetvar is merely acceptable but not great. Many of the modern day books have lost a lot of the interesting details available in the old books. I disagree with you that old sources are not useful. For example, is the eyewitness account by a participant in the siege not a valuable resource? Are you saying the Hungarian historian Istvanffy is "useless"? Are you aware that Istvanffy is considered on of Hungary's greatest historians?

I have also seen that modern day historian lose a lot and sometimes even corrupt facts. Using only modern day sources can lead to historical revisionism.

The mass deletion by Miki Filigranski is absurd and does not lead to the development of trust. NikolaZrinski (talk) 00:10, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Hi @NikolaZrinski, my example was a general not about the Szigetvar battle. For example the personal story writer of Suleiman wrote the Hungarian army was 300,000 at the battle of Mohacs which is very irrealistic, so modern historians use them with their critical analysis. I did not say that old sources are bad or Istvanffy is bad. But Istvanffy lived in the 16th century, clearly not a modern academic source. All modern academic historians use that old sources but with their modern interpretations (you can call it speculation) Many reliable historians have many different opinions, in this case we can list historian A claims this and historian B claims this. This is the Wiki rule, that we need use secondary reliable academic sources. If you are expert in the topic as you said, I bet you will have modern historians who are referring or use those old sources what you like, in this way you can add them to the article through by modern historians who had many modern tools, archeogenetic, tons of sources from many countries, archehology, etc. OrionNimrod (talk) 12:17, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

So, you are saying that an eye-witness account by Ferenc Crnko, who was at the siege of Szigetvar in 1566 and wrote a story about the events is "outdated"?

The problem with modern day historians is that they do not include, or have forgotten, many of the old books and a lot of detail has been lost in present day books. When I compare the old stories to present day stories - the old ones are far more interesting when it comes to Croatian and Hungarian history.

By your philosophy, what is the age of "outdated" books? 50 years? 100 years? NikolaZrinski (talk) 14:05, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

I am talking only about the rules in the Wikipedia to help you understand the situtation, other users are follow that rules, it is not about the content. It is not my philosophy, I personally like very much the old medieval sources, but I used modern sources to create article like this: Epitome rerum Hungarorum. Usually many modern sources show old quotes, so you can use them through them. OrionNimrod (talk) 14:17, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Thank you. I have read the guidelines on credibility and they are very vague but that is not the problem. The problem is with editors who have widely differing opinions on what is and what is not credible. Such subjectivity and diversity in opinions does not build an environment of trust. Especially when some editors act like jerks.

I am a bit of an amateur subject matter expert on Zrinski. I would love to contribute but find that it is a waste of time. Why should I spend an hour writing something that would be more than credible for a university report but here, anonymous people with unknown levels of expertise can delete the contribution. The most ocnfusing aspect is when one editor deletes, then another reverts, and then another editor deletes.

This article about the Siege of Szigetvar could be so much better but the editors hold back progress. I look at this article for example, and over the last five years I have not seen any notable improvements. I do see people shuffling things around to boost their edit rankings and debating/arguing but not improving the information base.

To me, it is unbelievable that the definitive biography about Nikola Zrinski by Matija Mesic is not once referenced, either here or on the article for Nikola Zrinski. How do you explain that?

The strangest thing is when non-Croats try to tell Croats they know Croatian history better than Croats.

I can now understand why Wikipedia has a low level of respect NikolaZrinski (talk) 16:40, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

I forgot to mention the "Telephone Game". I see the same concept in history books where over generations translation and interpretation corrupts the information. It is rather silly, IMHO, to reference a 21st century historian who writes about Ferenc Crnko, a participant in the siege, rather than reference him directly. NikolaZrinski (talk) 16:58, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

You can use academic Croatian historian sources. Use them. I use many Hungarian historian sources written in Hungarian because not everything is in English, but I also use many foreign historian sources for Hungarian topics and works from Hungarian historians who published in English. OrionNimrod (talk) 18:28, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

If only it could be that easy. I have already been told by an "editor" that personal translations do not have credibility because I am not a professional translator and my translation is not referenced in an academic work.

I use more Hungarian sources than Croatian for Croatian history from the 1500s because you folks had more and better historians - ha ha ha - sadly, all online translation services do a poor job translating the Hungarian language.

It is very frustrating when I am new and passionate to contribute but there are so many obstacles - that inconsistencies in how editors operate and for some reason the one that deletes seems to have higher authority. It is almost as if some editors acting as bureaucrats hold back progress. Is there a culture problem here? So so frustrating. NikolaZrinski (talk) 22:08, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

I think personal translation mean if you want translate exactly a quote.

It could be also a copyright issue here in Wiki if you copy paste full English text (not a quote) from a source, or even if you translate a Croatian text to English (my experience). So you need say the same thing what is in the sources by your own words. I know it is really hard and need experience.

I suggest you start edit small things then you get experience as you can see there are many articles so it is not impossible. Also you can check the Croatian wiki and if certain things are sourced well there you can copy to the English wiki. (Wiki itself is not copyrigthed). OrionNimrod (talk) 22:27, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Most of the references and translations that I contribute are from old sources that are not copyrighted. - TY for your help - and for being a decent person. NikolaZrinski (talk) 14:26, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Structure of the article

The article is about 3,500 words long

Intro - 400 words  (12%)

Background = 820 (23%)

Campaign of 1566 = 1,800 (51%) words, of this, the siege is 1,200 (34%) words

Legacy is 520 (15%)

The siege of Szigetvar is far far richer than what is presented in this article. Though the article is large, only 1/3 of the article is about the siege. I would recommend shrinking the intro and background sections and adding more detail to the siege. The long intro is repetitive with the rest of the article. Most of the background should be in a separate article about the "Little War".

By adding more details to the siege, then the human drama and the valour of the defenders can be better illustrated. This will also improve the flow of storytelling because as the story is now, it is rather dull. I assume that the basics of storytelling are not forbidden on Wikipedia. This article truly needs better storytelling.

For example, the siege can be broken down into phases: the fall of New Town, the fall of Old Town, the fall of the Outer Citadel (fortress) and the fall of the Inner Citadel (final battle). During each phase there are very interesting events. Sadly most modern tales of the siege ignore the wealth of interesting details.

So, I wonder, with such a large swarm of editors working on this article, why is the article not better? Or maybe the swarm of editors is the problem.

NikolaZrinski (talk) 01:14, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Where can I put a lot of information that is useful for this article?

I placed in this talk section a treasure trove of information about Nikola Zrinski and the Siege of Szigetvar. The data was from old books that I translated to English. Miki Filigranski deleted it (like he deletes almost everything I post) calling it a "Wall of text".

If this is not the right place to contribute, then where is the right place to post it? It would have been nice if he had moved it to the appropriate place but he merely deleted it. I know that there is a requirement for "good faith" but it does not feel like I am the recipient of good faith from Miki Filigranski.

A valuable resource is a biography of Nikola IV Zrinski by Matija Mesic. The biography is in Croatian.

I have posted a part of the book here for easier translation.

https://koszeg1532.blogspot.com/2023/09/zivot-nikole-zrinjskoga-sigetskoga.html NikolaZrinski (talk) 00:03, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

This is not the purpose of the talk page. Maybe Wikiquote, but the source is outdated and not needed. Please slow down on commenting or editing before reading and understanding how editing is done on Wikipedia and gain experience on articles with stub or start level. You're dealing with high quality rated article. Your edits are not constructive here. Sorry, but there's no bad faith by any editor here for reverting your edits or not accepting your advices. --Miki Filigranski (talk) 00:15, 26 September 2023 (UTC)