Talk:Tamraparni

I don't understand the significance of quoting Yoga vasishta, a 10 century CE work. Are there not other quotes from earlier works? --Aadal 19:32, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Either the author of the Yogavasishta does not know where Tambraparani is, or he is referring to some other place. The dexcription and quotation there do not add anything to clarify. It is better to remove this confusing quote from this article. Can I remove this quote?

Best version of Article

Best version with more to come — Preceding unsigned comment added by 178.167.254.218 (talk) 21:35, 12 June 2016 (UTC)

The Best Version so far with even more to come ;)

Best so far :D :P ;) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:BB6:5001:8858:94DD:639C:FF91:5192 (talk) 10:27, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

Best so far :'D :P — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:BB6:5001:8858:94A9:A38A:5729:73F7 (talk) 22:52, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

What is this article about?

If it's about the history of Sri Lanka then shouldn't it be merged with History of Sri Lanka (or one or more of its sub-articles like Prehistory of Sri Lanka, Early kingdoms period etc.)? If it's about the name Tamraparni itself, shouldn't it be a lot shorter? And possibly merged with Taprobana? (See WP:CONTENTFORK)

Also, I've noticed some really unusual editing patterns on this article, where virtually all of the content has come from IP editors during two intense waves of contributions: one from April-July 2016, the other from May 2019 to present. I don't imagine there's anything sinister going on here, but I'd be interested in learning more about the humans behind the screen. Are you just one editor whose IP is variable? Or has this article been the subject of some kind of school projects in 2016 and now? Just curious. If you're at all inclined, I'd highly recommend registering a user account, just because user talk pages make communication easier, and it makes easier for other users to understand the article's edit history. Colin M (talk) 00:59, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi Colin M, it also looks like this article also have a duplicate article Thamirabarani River. Both looks one and same but with different title. Tamraparni seems more common name to the river and is one of the main rivers in India. I am not sure why there exists two articles for same river. It would be better to merge one into the other. There is too much detailing which is not relevant to the article title- we can clean it. aggi007(talk) 08:42, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

Yes, that's a good point, Thamirabarani River is another potential merge target. Though it seems like in parts of the body the authors are talking about Sri Lanka as a whole, rather than the river or the area around it. This is even more clear in some of their edits outside of this article. e.g. This edit at Garnet, where they write "Tamraparni (ancient Sri Lanka)". The edit talks about "Tamraparniyan gold, silver, and red garnet", but none of the included citations use the term 'Tamraparni', and instead just refer to the material as having origins in Sri Lanka. Colin M (talk) 14:39, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

Colin M Thanks for bringing this up. I too was thinking the same thing but was going to wait until the editing was finished to raise the question, but the editing never seems to end. I'm not an expert on the topic but it looks like a few subjects rolled into one, as you guys have discussed above. If it's the Sri Lankan Kingdom, an article already exists, Kingdom of Tambapanni. A lot of the content also seems to be about Agastya. My initial thoughts are perhaps its best to go through the article and divide its relevant content into either the river of the kingdom, and have this page be a Disambiguation page. I think we need more people to look at this, and preferably some experts who work in and around this topic. Hi Joshua Jonathan and Utcursch, could you guys take a look at this article?--Blackknight12 (talk) 07:46, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

I've stumbled upon this page while fixing a link or two in the past, but had never read the content. A quick look at the content and the revision history indicates that a bunch of IPs (probably the same person) have turned this page into ridiculous OR and poorly-sourced content masquerading as a well-written article. Consider the following examples:

• "The earliest known royal influences in Tamraparni are that of the family members Kubera – the original ruler of Lanka, Pulastya, Agastya, Vishravas and Ravana, who feature in megalithic Pandyan era society." - Kubera and others are mythical figures, and have nothing to do with a "megalithic Pandyan era society"
• "Tamraparniyan calendar utilised lunisolar fractions" - there is no such thing as a "Tamraparniyan calendar"
• "Cinnamon is also mentioned in Hebrew texts" - the statement is supported by two sources, neither of which even mention the word "Tamraparni"

The entire page is mythology and legends combined with history of Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka, sourced with citations many of which do not mention Tamraparni.

I'm tempted to restore the article to this version, but I'd wait for suggestions from others. utcursch | talk 15:20, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

I wrote some more about the editing patterns on this article here. Basically, 99% of the article's edits have come from IP editors during two very distinct time periods (April-July 2016, and May 2019-now). This makes me wonder if it was maybe the subject of some kind of school project in 2016, and again now? Or maybe it really is just one person who did a lot of editing in 2016, fell off the map, and returned recently.

I agree that reverting to that older version is a reasonable option. My inclination would be to go a bit further ahead to Dec 2015, the last version before the beginning of the first wave of IP edits. Since it seems like Tamraparni is an old name that has been identified with several entities for which we have articles (Sri Lanka - aka Taprobana, Thamirabarani River, Tirunelveli, maybe Kingdom of Tambapanni), I think the page should be a WP:DABCONCEPT page (with emphasis on the DAB) that links to all the things that Tamraparni can refer to, and gives as much verifiable information as we can find about the word itself (i.e. its etymology, the history of its use).

I feel bad "erasing" so much content which must have been the result of a lot of earnest work. But it would always be accessible in the version history, and anyone (including the original authors), would be welcome to (carefully) merge portions of it into other articles like Agastya, Taprobana, History of Sri Lanka, etc. Based on a few spot checks, I do think some of the article's content is factual and appropriately sourced - but as you say, some of it has major issues with WP:OR and MOS:INUNIVERSE. Colin M (talk) 16:25, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

Sorry, I didn't get further than the first line of the lead, which reads like the start of an essay, not like the start of a lead. Which says enough: clean-up is required, and will take time... Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 04:10, 13 July 2019 (UTC)

@Colin M: I agree with your suggestion to restore the article to Dec 2015 version. We can move the current article to draft space, and gradually work on merging the salvageable content to the main article. utcursch | talk 14:21, 15 July 2019 (UTC)

Sounds good. I don't have any experience with draft space, so I'm not sure how to draftify this - is it okay to just copy-paste the source into a new draft (even though that loses the edit history)?

Another cleanup task I want to do after restoring to the 2015 version is reviewing Special:WhatLinksHere/Tamraparni (well, the ones that aren't from Template:Tribes and kingdoms of the Mahabharata). The editor(s) working on this article have inserted references to it in a few other articles, and in many of those cases, it would probably be more appropriate to replace "Tampraparni" with "Sri Lanka" (since the citations often only mention the latter, not the former). Colin M (talk) 14:50, 15 July 2019 (UTC)

For now, I've moved it to Talk:Tamraparni/draft: the article history still mentions the original contributors, so if we move certain parts back to the main article, we should be good. utcursch | talk 16:18, 17 July 2019 (UTC)