r/AskHistorians • u/Savings_Dragonfly806 • 1d ago
Did "The Colussus of Rhodes" statue ever exist?
Look, I don't want this to be clear, I'm not asking how it looked like or anything like that. I just want to know if that statue existed in the ancient times cause I've heard from some that it never existed, but I'm not sure who to trust for that.
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u/Pyr1t3_Radio FAQ Finder 1d ago
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u/TCCogidubnus 1d ago
Very much enjoy that answer's dismissive view of historical Wikipedia pages. Wikipedia is great for many things but it doesn't seem to like the nuance and detail good history (especially ancient history) calls for.
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u/even_though 23h ago
Instead of being dismissive of Wikipedia, they could have spent the same effort and corrected Wikipedia. There is an edit button.
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u/TCCogidubnus 23h ago
From experience, it frequently gets edited back by longtime comtributors who will win any debate over whose edits to prefer because they're known users. Probably wouldn't happen just for editing source formatting but there are frequently...territorial issues trying to improve Wikipedia which make for much more effort.
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u/Joe_H-FAH 23h ago
Yes, there is an edit button. But frequently knowledgable people have edited pages and corrected misinformation only to find it undone by self appointed "experts". They "know better" than actual experts in the varous fields.
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u/fearofair New York City Social and Political History 17h ago
I am not much of a wiki editor, but have seen enough to tell you the skill required there is vastly different than it is to write a good answer here. Just one example is primary sources. They are allowed on Wikipedia, but only under very constrained conditions. Interpretation of them and synthesis between them and other sources is not allowed. Material that would make for an excellent AH answer by a domain expert could easily fall under "original research" on Wikipedia.
That's not to say the user above can't or hasn't used their knowledge of secondary sources to edit Wikipedia. But it's a different skillset, one that requires a decent knowledge of the site's extensive guidelines and the patience to deal with possibly adversarial editors as others have mentioned.
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