User:Rosedouglas

Article Critique

I've always been extremely interested in history. I usually find myself leaning towards European history, no matter the era or event, I always want to research and know more. When I began sifting through the thousands of articles I found myself starting with the War of the Roses. Of course that topic itself was much too general and, as I slowly delved in the extensive amounts of articles, I found myself at a topic I had never read. I visited the Searcher of the dead page on Wikipedia, and found three aspects of it worth commenting on: much of the information doesn't have up to date sources, the citation listed for information doesn't concern the information itself, and theres a lack of information of John Graunt.

Resource Dates

Upon reading the article I found that all the sources were not from within the last decade. Now although that does not make a source unreliable in every case, I believe having all sources not be current does not work to back up the information they present. Each paragraph has one citation, so none of the information if corroborated with multiple sources. In addition as only one source is cited in each paragraph much of the information doesn't have a reference of where it was retrieved from.

Citation Information

As I was reading the article I was very interested in Goodwife Pattson as she was listed as one of the only women recorded by name to be a searcher of the dead. When I click the reference listed for her and her information I found that in fact none of the information had to do with her. The information given was general on women during the black death era and didn't serve to help me. I will concede that finding information on Goodwife Pattson is not easy, as I did it myself to see if I could find information, but it took quite a bit of research until her name appeared.

John Graunt

One of the major points in the final paragraph was that some were opposed to the searchers of the dead. John Graunt believed women to be untrustworthy in their numbers. I believe it should have mentioned his work and how that further impacted his view. John Graunt wrote a book titled Natural and Political Observations Made upon the Bills of Mortality. In this novel Graunt explores the Bills of mortality, these being recorded by the searchers of the dead, in order to find a way to stop the spread of the black death. Although he did not believe the information of the searchers to be entirely trustworthy, he did use it to validate his research.

Conclusion

Although there are some errors with this article I found it to be rather interesting. It made me want to know more about the figures listed, and if there is more information added with credible sources, I believe it would greatly improve the quality. Further research on the topic would only help to enhance the article as there is not much written on it. There are primary documents with further information, it just requires the time and dedication to bring to light the hard work of the searchers of the dead.

(I have left a comment requesting more information on Goodwife Pattson here Searcher of the dead)