Talk:Winter solstice

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Winter solstice article.
Article policies
This article is within the scope of the following WikiProjects:

Contents

[edit] WikiProject Time assessment rating comment

Want to help write or improve articles about Time? Join WikiProject Time or visit the Time Portal for a list of articles that need improving.
—Yamara ✉ 09:13, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Novo Hel

Novo Hel? I can't find any real basis for this except at Neopagan websites that don't site sources earlier than the 1990s. MaryJones 03:59, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Germanic paganism

Right now a bunch of very closely related Germanic Winter-related holidays are spread out all over this list. Not only this but it's hardly wikitized. I've tried to categorize these together cohesively - it's basically the same thing being stated over and over again - but it was reverted as being 'arbitrary' by an anonymous IP, then blanketed with small corrections. Huh? :bloodofox: 11:19, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "DECEMBER Solstice" rather than "Winter..." ?

Hemispherical Chauvanism? Modern astronomical convention has changed from using the term Winter Solstice to the now preferred "December Solstice" since the December solstice is the winter one for folks north of the tropics yet the same December one is the SUMMER Solstice for folks south of the tropics.

These articles seem to be more about folk calendar customs related to the Solstice associated with winter but we must remember that the "winter" themes originating in the astronomical event would properly be associated with the JUNE Solstice were you living in the South Temperate Zone. NOV21,2007 Earrach

Disagree. The majority of the article relates to feasts, events, traditions associated with the darkest day of the year i.e. the winter solstice. The bias is perhaps in that they almost all originate in the northern hemisphere, but the appropriate solution would be to find more info on midwinter (june) events from the southern hemisphere, rather than mixing summer and winter celebrations just because they take place in December. /85.194.44.18 (talk) 18:38, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "Date" section: overkill for a "Winter Solstice" article.

This section, albeit very detailed and interesting, seems way too much info for an article about calendar customs relating to (just) the "winter" solstice. All that date-fixing history and comparative calendar stuff belongs on other articles, not here. It should be noted that the material and illustrations about the creeping-date issue is equally true for the December Solstice, March Equinox, June Solstice, and September Equinoxes as well. NOV21,2007 Earrach

[edit] Darkest morning/evening

Is it true that the darkest evening (i.e. the day on which the sun sets the earliest) occurs before the Solstice, and the darkest morning occurs after the Solstice? Why is this? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.174.136.69 (talk) 16:17, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] BC vs BCE controversy

This is an old issue so lets be careful not to make the same old mistakes. Check the second edit ever made to this artical as of april 7th 2007. there are both BC and BCE annotation present in the article. The BC is only present under "christmas", BCE present under "lenaia" and CE present under Midvinterblót and Modranicht. This article from its original text was mixed annotation, the majority of which was CE/BCE. All further additions of Years to the Article each originally included CE/BCE. The Christmas section has been the only BC annotation. Removing CE leaving only the #s makes sense to me because it is unbiased and doesn't cause any confusion. But replacing BCE with BC is POV. That is why I have reverted those specific edits by 81.109.216.245. on a side note the "Date fixes" made by 81.109.216.245, Changing dates like "December 21st and 22nd" to "December 21 and December 22" don't seem like "fixes" to me.99.140.187.190 (talk) 18:39, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Just a thought on this one - the edit history started long before April 7th. As I recall, this article was orginally called Winter Solstice celebrations or something like that. It was renamed on April 7th. Maybe you should check back further. 86.0.92.57 (talk) 10:40, 24 December 2007 (UTC)
OK we'll be sticklers just to be thorough. Its the same. Here is the first "Winter solstice celebration" post that uses Year annotation, befor this post no year annotation had been used in any prior versian of the article (19:51, 2007 February 11). Again Lenaia and Modresnach use CE/BCE and Christmas alone uses BC. Wowzers, there you have it. Mixed annotation in a single post. Play it as it lay, folks. 99.140.187.190 (talk) 22:13, 24 December 2007 (UTC)
The issue of who did what first is secondary to to matter of consistency within the article. The MOS states that either format is acceptable (incidentally, BCE -> BC is no more POV that BC--> BCE would be) but don't mix them within an article. This article does mix them, so I'll alter it. Question is, to which format? BCE is used most in the article, but not many people know what it means so I'll defer to BC. I agree that CE shouldn't be used at all, given that a linked year is self explanatory, e.g. 1776 rather than AD 1776 or 1776 CE. Accordingly I'll change the article to use BC, given that in Wikipedia we should make the text as understandable as possible to as many people as possible. 81.152.45.50 (talk) 11:53, 26 December 2007 (UTC)
Your BCE>>BC argument is not supported by MOS. If the entire article uses BCE/CE save one instance then if anything you should default to BCE. You again are veneering your POV editing with a thin facade of unfounded reasons. (Before, your reasons were that it was BC first, but once that was proven wrong you came up with this?) I am reverting your edit for the third time. Can someone else way in on this issue? 99.140.187.190 (talk) 01:03, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
What a laugh! I'm the person who made the original move (81.109.216.245) and now someone else has "wayed in" with what are sensible comments. Get your facts right mate! Seems like you've already screwed up over not checking all the edit history and now you've done it again. You should realise that lots of IPs begin with 8. As for BC and BCE I couldn't care less any more on this article but if someone else wants to come in and revert your latest stupid modification then that's fine by me, and no doubt would be supported by the silent majority. 86.31.35.135 (talk) 17:19, 27 December 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Article Picture

I'm kind of OCD about pictures, so forgive me for not critiquing something of greater importance, but a picture of random logs burning to me does not signify anything about the winter soltice. The caption is creative, but that has no relevance to the article.

The image is in a holiday-infobox template. The purpose of holiday infoboxes is to acknowledge the cultural observance and celebratory aspects of an event. Having fires seems to be common,,, 99.140.187.190 (talk) 22:26, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Observance length

I suggest we try to condense (not strip) info in each observance section down to 200 words or if applicable, split parts off into different observance subsections, each being no more than 100 words. 99.140.187.190 (talk) 17:33, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Julleuchter

There is no mention of the Julleuchter (Yule Candlestick or Yule Lantern) that is used during the Winter Solstice. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nicholasweed (talk • contribs) 07:47, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Thats because basically no one uses it or has even heard of it. It is not appropriate to this article, as it is nothing more than an outdated insignificant nazi product, which I can assert without hesitation, that you are trying to use wikipedia to sell it. 99.140.190.221 (talk) 20:55, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
I’m not just using Wikipedia to sell it. I was trying to post information I had about the item. It does have to do with the Winter Solstice because it is a centuries old pagan item and not just a “nazi product.” There are Neopagan individuals use the lantern.[1]

17:43, 16 January 2008

[edit] References

  1. ^ Puryear, Mark. The Nature of Asatru: An Overview of the Ideals and Philosophy of the Indigenous Religion of Northern Europe (2006) ISBN 978-0595389643