Good articleHadrian has been listed as one of the History good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.
On this day... Article milestones
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May 27, 2007Good article nomineeNot listed
September 1, 2015Good article nomineeNot listed
April 27, 2016Good article nomineeNot listed
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January 31, 2019Good article nomineeListed
On this day... Facts from this article were featured on Wikipedia's Main Page in the "On this day..." column on July 10, 2017, and July 10, 2023.
Current status: Good article

His estate[edit]

At Hadrian's villa in Tivoli(?)

So far, 15 steps, each 27 feet wide, have been identified and archaeologists did not rule out uncovering more. [1]

Archaeologists who have been digging for more than a year at the villa of Roman Emperor Hadrian in Tivoli have unearthed a monumental staircase, a statue of an athlete and what appears to be a headless sphinx.

There is no evidence Hadrian stated in his autobiography that he was born in Rome.[edit]

This is a conjecture of the Wikipedia article, based on a faulty reading of the 'Augustan History' biography of Hadrian, purportedly written by one Aelius Spartianus.
I refer to the actual text of the biography.
http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Hadrian/1*.html
In the opening paragraph of the the biography, only one reference is made to claims Hadrian made himself in his autobiography:
"The original home of the family of the Emperor Hadrian was Picenum, the later, Spain; for Hadrian himself relates in his autobiography that his forefathers came from Hadria, but settled at Italica in the time of the Scipios."
However, the mention of Hadrian's birth in Rome is an inference of the Augustan History biographer:
"Hadrian was born in Rome on the ninth day before the Kalends of February in the seventh consulship of Vespasian and the fifth of Titus."
Nevertheless, the footnote referring to this claim in the English translation (Loeb Classical Library) says:
"This is, of course, a fiction, and the biography contradicts itself, for Italica is clearly the patria referred to in c. ii.1 and 2, and c. xix.1."
As for the reference to Hadrian's own autobiography, the footnote says:
"For the Autobiography of Hadrian, now lost, cf. c. xvi. It seems to have been written toward the close of his life, and, to judge from scanty citations from it, its purpose was to contradict current statements about himself which he considered derogatory to his reputation and to present him in a favourable light to posterity."
Jacob Davidson

Name and title[edit]

I have deleted a weird sentence, but the page was updated before I could explain what I had done:

Deleted sentence:

"In Latin, the full imperial title of Hadrian was also rendered as Tito Ael[io] Hadriano, just as it appears in ancient epigraphic records."

Commentary:

The "full imperial title" is not given of any emperor, only part of a name. Moreover, this is not Hadrian (whose praenomen was Publius) but Antoninus Pius whose praenomen was Titus and whose full imperial name was (CIL III 116 = 6639): [Imp(eratori) Caes(ari)] Tito Ael(io) Hadriano Antonino Aug(usto) Pio p(atri) p(atriae) pontiflici) augur(i) d(ecreto) d(ecurionum)

As this is a dedicatio to the emperor the names and titles are in the dative. They should be rendered in the nominative in an English translation of the Latin text!!!

GA Review[edit]

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Reviewer: Tim riley (talk · contribs) 10:52, 25 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]


Starting first read-through. More soonest. Tim riley talk 10:52, 25 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

This is an impressive and substantial article, and unless I run across unexpected obstacles I fully expect to promote it to GA (and perhaps see it at FAC in due course) but there are some drafting points I should like you to look at first. It will take me two or three goes to get through them. Here is the first batch:

Here endeth the first batch. More soonest. Tim riley talk 21:03, 25 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Before resuming my review of the individual sections of the text, I pause here to mention the quite remarkable excess of WP:OVERLINKs. In Early life alone Italica is linked four times. Rome does not need one link, let alone the five it has at present. I spotted other duplicate links (and there may be more) to:

Resuming the section-by-section review:

More anon. Tim riley talk 09:51, 26 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Please consider the above point about copy-editing before I go any further. I fear I am inclined to fail the candidacy if it is not addressed. – Tim riley talk 14:26, 28 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]


Cerme (talk) 13:27, 1 September 2015 (UTC) I will revise the article, mainly by adding some materials from the German version, which is a FA. Then I shall ask for copy edit.Cerme (talk) 13:27, 1 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Fair enough. I'll obviously have to fail the GAN on this occasion, but it is fundamentally a fine piece of work and I look forward to its future progress. Regards, Tim riley talk 20:33, 1 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

GA Review[edit]

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Reviewer: Caeciliusinhorto (talk · contribs) 08:51, 9 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]


I'll review this. Might be 24 hours before I get you any substantial comments, though. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 08:51, 9 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Right, I've started to go through this (and made some minor copyedits). Some initial commentary:

Sources
Early life
Public service

I've only got up to the end of the section on public service so far. Nonetheless, that gives you something to work on. I'll try to crack on with this, but it's a 14,000 word article: it's going to take me some time to do it justice... Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 15:16, 10 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

More comments:

Emperor
Securing power
Hadrian and the military
Cultural pursuits and patronage

Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 19:43, 11 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Managed to work my way through the rest of the article. More commentary:

Hadrian's travels
Purpose
Greece, Asia, and Egypt
Legal reforms and state apparatus
Hadrian and Judea
In Rabbinic literature
Final years
Succession
Legacy and modern historiography

Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 18:31, 19 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

And now thinking specifically about the GA criteria:

Now I've made my way through the whole article, and formed my own impression, I shall also have a look at the previous reviews and quickly check that there's nothing still outstanding that they picked up on and I haven't.

Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 09:16, 20 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, pictures seem to all be freely licensed or out of copyright. No issues there. Captions seem okay too. I've started to check some of the references, and haven't found any problems there yet. There aren't any obviously inappropriate sources used.

One final concern I have is that there are a few uses of constructions such as "op.cit." and "ibid." in the references, which should generally be avoided in Wikipedia: see WP:IBID for the reasons. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 09:37, 22 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Waiting on improvements to the article per Cerme's comment here. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 21:22, 1 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

GA Review[edit]

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Reviewer: Jens Lallensack (talk · contribs) 14:34, 22 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]


Currently reading. Reads very good so far, I don't expect larger issues. Comments to follow during the next days. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 14:34, 22 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Cerme: please let me know if you are still on it. Otherwise we have to – again – archive this shortly due to lack of response. If I don't hear from you, I will archive the first of January. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 08:50, 25 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I.m still in, and I have begun to edit the artigle according to the GA review! Cerme (talk) 16:23, 26 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

That is great to hear, let me know when it is time for me to take a second look! --Jens Lallensack (talk) 19:59, 2 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Please, take a second look. I've done my best so far.Cerme (talk) 03:04, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

User:Cerme: Thank you for your all those fixes so far. We are nearly there; the only remaining issue is that some sentences at the end of paragraphs do not come with a citation. This information is therefore not easily verifiable, but verifiability is an important GA criterion.

The historicity of Hadrian's sexuality[edit]

It is somewhat anachronistic to categorise Hadrian under the contemporary socio-political heading of "LGBT". It's impossible to know whether these categories would align with Hadrian's own understanding of his sexuality and I wonder to what extent it might be more accurate to create a new category along the lines of "Homosexuality/bisexuality in the ancient world" or something similar. There are issues with this too but it would perhaps feel less like retrospective recruitment. Perhaps a more experienced Wikipedian with the necessary academic understanding might consider this? Either way, if "LGBT" is retained, it's applied unevenly to ancient world pages. For example, Plato is not listed in that category. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A00:23C6:1403:B801:99DA:914D:1566:454B (talk) 23:11, 30 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The article does not provide any sourced information on the LGBT claim, and the categories must be removed. (I remember I removed them a few years ago, but apparently some of them were restored). Ymblanter (talk) 17:21, 1 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
If the "LGBT Roman Emperors" category continues to exist, I find it difficult to see how Hadrian can reasonably be excluded from it. This page and the Antinous page both have references to the fact that they were lovers and it is common to talk about Hadrian as gay/homosexual/LGBT in contemporary media (e.g. [2]) and scholarship (e.g. R. B. Parkinson, A Little Gay History 2013; Danziger & Purcell, Hadrian's Empire, 2006 "Like his predecessor Trajan, Hadrian's orientation seems to have been exclusively homosexual"). I'm not aware of any current scholarship that disputes this. The attention paid to this in contemporary media means that it is probably a "defining" characteristic. Obviously, "LGBT" is a modern term, but any discussion of the appropriateness of using it to categorise ancient people should happen elsewhere (CfD or relevant wikiprojects), not here. 21:28, 28 December 2022 (UTC)
Right now, the statement is not sourced. Why do not you source it and then you can add the category.--Ymblanter (talk) 21:34, 28 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
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