Talk:Battle of Tours

An event mentioned in this article is an October 10 selected anniversary.

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Battle of Tours ? It's considered as the Battle of Poitiers in France.

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MedievalFreak's version has more detail, but it's written in an essay style, not in encyclopedia style, and has a number of biases that are not consistent with the NPOV policy of Wikipedia. It would be better to review some of the other battles in list of battles (for instance Battle of the Coral Sea or Battle of Midway) to see something closer to what the editors (that's all of us) agree is the appropriate style and content. Also we like to see lots of links connecting to the rest of Wikipedia, so that the reader can easily find out more about terms he/she doesn't know. Stan 19:50 May 8, 2003 (UTC)

What he said. ;) -- John Owens 19:53 May 8, 2003 (UTC)

Where can I find MedievalFreaks version? The link brings me to a blank talk page, he seems to have no user contributions.

TeunSpaans 19:56 May 8, 2003 (UTC)

You have to click on the time/date, not the username. -- John Owens 19:59 May 8, 2003 (UTC)

I was refering to MedievalFreak's version has more detail. There is no time in this link.

Oh, you have to go to the "Page history" link in the sidebar, then do as I said above. -- John Owens 20:59 May 8, 2003 (UTC)

Yes, I know the history page, and frequently use it. I just didnt realize you refered to that page. (also, I should have consulted it before starting to translate the dutch wiki article :) )TeunSpaans 05:25 May 9, 2003 (UTC)

Ok ok, I fixed it up. Happy? BTW, you guys are pretty perceptive...I originally wrote this for an assignment at school, and the other ver that I first posted was a research paper on this topic.

MedievalFreak

MF, it seems we have been working at the same time. I from my article in the dutch wiki, you from sources unknown to me. I tried to incorporate the good stuff from your article into mine. Please expand and reinsert where i discarded useful stuff. TeunSpaans 20:55 May 8, 2003 (UTC)

Minor quibble right off the bat: should or shouldn't we capitalize "Battle of Tours"/"battle of Tours" and "Arab"/"arab" (and that depending, perhaps, on whether it's used as a substantive/noun or an adjective)? -- John Owens 20:59 May 8, 2003 (UTC)

I worked off of mostly A. De Re Militari and B. Edward Gibbon's famous The history of the decline and fall of the roman empire. You did a pretty good job, better than me I guess (mostly cuz mine was an essay that i wrote for school...keep in mind I'm not even 13 yet) but you gotta capitalize alot of stuff. I'm gonna have to work on a project from school right now, so if you want me to fix up that stuff, it's gonna have to be another time. MedievalFreak 20:59 May 8, 2003

The article getting better! Still needs some copyediting - I see some typos still, plus every name and term should be linked, for instance Edward Gibbon. Not only is it helpful to the reader, but it's a useful check that you're using spellings consistent with the rest of the encyclopedia - check out USS Shangri-La to see something with my preferred density of links. Stylistically, I noticed a use of "your" which doesn't really fit with the objective style that we promote. (Of course, if you can find an example in Encyclopaedia Britannica, I'll withdraw my objection. :-) ). Stan 21:07 May 8, 2003 (UTC)

Stan, I couldn't resist the temptation, walked in from the outside, & made some of the changes you suggested -- although I didn't read thru your comments until after I was done. (I have a weakness for Medieval subjects.) And I'll admit that this article could benefit from even more work. -- llywrch 23:48 May 8, 2003 (UTC)

Yes, there were too many typos in my work, glad some of them got fixed. The extra links are very useful.

More work needs to be done:

• list medieval sources about the battle, introduce more quotes from them (medieval Freak had a good one, should be put back)
• list sources we use to write this article.
• add map of battle field
• apply layout of Wikipedia:WikiProject Battles
• older versions have some good info which I somehow left out, it should be put back in.

MedievalFreak, strange as it may sound, I dont keep in mind the age of other contributors. I try to be polite to everyone, regardless of age. What you wrote looks like a very, very good essay for school, and it's a good idea to post it here. TeunSpaans 05:24 May 9, 2003 (UTC)

To make it easier to see MedievalFreak's version, and get the good parts from it, I put a copy of it at Battle of Tours/temp. -- John Owens 05:36 May 9, 2003 (UTC)

Just to clarify something: I left the front part of the Gibbon quote out on purpose. It's unneccessary and serves no purpose. And the crossiant thing is interesting. I never knew that, in my 2 months of studying this stuff.MedievalFreak 7:43 May 10, 2003

Contents

1 Myths about croissants 2 Number of combatants doesn't add up 3 comments on Gibbon 4 Oct. 10 vs. Oct. 25? 5 minor or major point depending on one's point of view

Myths about croissants

The croissant was not invented in the eighth century, it was not invented in France and the crescent is not a symbol of Islam. So the last paragraph is wholly wrong and worthy of deletion.

To quote another site [1] (http://islam.about.com/library/weekly/aa060401a.htm):

It wasn't until the Ottoman Empire that the crescent moon and star became affiliated with the Muslim world. When the Turks conquered Constantinople (Istanbul) in 1453, they adopted the city's existing flag and symbol. Legend holds that the founder of the Ottoman Empire, Osman, had a dream in which the crescent moon stretched from one end of the earth to the other. Taking this as a good omen, he chose to keep the crescent and make it the symbol of his dynasty.

In fact the received wisdom--the really good apocrypha, if that is what it is--is that the croissant was invented in 1683 in Vienna to celebrate the defeat of the Trukish siege of that city. That makes more sense--for one thing, I doubt they had decent enough baking equipment to produce croissants in the eighth century. The lack of any reference to them anywhere in the literature of the next nine centuries also weighs against that theory. And while the internet sometimes only multiplies other people's mistakes, there is plenty of google support for the Vienna connection. Plus I read it in Ripley's believe it or not 35 years ago, so it must be true.

Number of combatants doesn't add up

40000 to 60000 cavalry? No way. That kind of an army would have been impossible then. 40,000 cavalry required 40,000 horses, plus a tremendous number of mules or other pack animals. The logistics aren't possible. Stargoat 19:53, 5 May 2004 (UTC)

comments on Gibbon

I have some comments on the paragraph quoted from Gibbon:

"A victorious line of march had been prolonged above a thousand miles from the rock of Gibraltar to the banks of the Loire"

First: There was no straight victorious line, the Arab had been defeated in the Battle of Toulouse at 721. Second: The Arab's base was Cordoba and not Gibraltar. Third: The line from Gibraltar to the banks of the Loire was just short of 800 miles (1250 km) and the line from Cordoba was 650 miles (1050 km).

Gibraltar is at the southern tip of Spain. Gibbon is quite entitled to use this as the base for this measurement.

"the repetition of an equal space would have carried the Saracens to the confines of Poland and the Highlands of Scotland;"

First: The repetition of a distance from Cordoba to the banks of the Loire would not cross the modern borders of Poland (let alone those at the time Gibbon wrote). Second: Although the distance does reach the Highlands of Scotland, it is highly unlikely that that the Arabs would have been able to cross the channel and invade Britain.

Gibraltar to Tours is 1700km by road. Tours to Poznan is 1500km. QED. England was not even united in the 8th century and was shortly to be invaded by the Vikings. There is no way the English could have resisted an invasion by Arabs who were at that stage a couple of centuries ahead in military technology.

"the Rhine is not more impassable than the Nile or Euphrates, and the Arabian fleet might have sailed without a naval combat into the mouth of the Thames."

First: Where is this Arabian fleet? Why didn't play any role in France. Why didn't it sail under protection from the Arab army into the mouth of the Rhome, the Garonne or the Loir?! Second: Going into the mouth of the Thames is the easy part, it's the landing which is difficult. Third: The Arabs never invaded a country through water (except Cyrus and Malta), they were invited into Spain.

The Arab fleet dominated the Mediterranean. The primitive English fleet wouldn't have proved much of an obstacle. It couldn't resist the Viking fleet.

"Perhaps the interpretation of the Koran would now be taught in the schools of Oxford, and her pulpits might demonstrate to a circumcised people the sanctity and truth of the revelation of Muhammed."

First: This part is completely false, it's written in the context of post-Catholic Church, but at 731 the Catholic Church had yet to be built. Second: The Arabs were not spreading a religion.

Don't know what this means. Gibbon was using a certain amount of hyperbole of course but had the Arabs not been stopped - who knows?

Of course it is actually probable that the internal divisions that beset the Arab empire would have prevented any of this happening regardless of the result of Tours. We don't know, but it is interesting to speculate!

Exile 17:00, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

--130.161.31.17 19:39, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)

DEFENDING GIBBONS VIEW OF HISTORY -- Old Windy Bear

I don't know; revisionist historians would like to pretend that this battle did not have macrohistorical significance, but given the Muslim spread into all the regions of the Old Roman Empire, it is pretty clear that Gibbon is more correct than his critics. Rahman intended to lay waste to anyone endangering his emirite, and the Franks were clearly a danger. Martel saw very clearly that it was far better to stop Rahman in lower Gaul than wait for him to advance into his homeland. Martel's managing to inspire unarmoured infantry to stand their ground against armoured horsemen is an incredible feat of arms. Granted, the Muslims defeated themselves by rushing off to secure their loot in the middle of the battle, but it does not take from the fact that the Franks did what no one else ever did, in standing their ground without archers, without armour and a shield wall, such as the Saxons used. This battle was highly important, and by bringing the Frankish army into the field -- a fact buttressed by the Arab histories speaking more of the Franks than any other christian people except the Romans, or Byzantines -- it secured the safety of Europe during a time Islam was rapidly expanding everywhere else.

Oct. 10 vs. Oct. 25?

Someone just changed the date in the infobox (but not in the text) from October 25 to October 10. I also see the top of the talk page here says it's listed as an October 10 anniversary. A quick scan on Google shows some results supporting each date. Is this one of those that depends on which calendar one uses? If so, which one is in the Wikipedia standard calendar? (And which calendar is Wikipedia standard, anyway?) If not, then what is the cause for this confusion, and which date should we stick with? --John Owens (talk) 18:12, 2005 Mar 18 (UTC)

minor or major point depending on one's point of view

Abd ar-Rahman ought always to be written out and not shortened to Rahman as Rahman is a word/name/title only applied to God (abd ar-Rahman meaning servant of the Merciful (or Almighty, depending on one's translation of the term)). While such abbreviation is conventional in english, it really shouldn't be done in this case. Why am I writing this?