Talk:Portugal/GA1

Initial comments

From a first canter-through looking for typos etc I see that we have a mish-mash of English and American spellings:

• English

• centres
• characterised
• civilisations
• defence (twice)
• favour (twice)
• legalise
• metres (four times)
• organisation/s (twice)
• organised (twice)
• practised
• recognised (twice)
• self-defence
• specialised

• American

• armored (twice)
• autocratization
• center (twice)
• centralized
• colorful
• gray
• harbor (three times)
• labeled
• recognized
• troubadorism

• and a handful of spellings that are neither English nor American but probably typos or just plain wrong:

• anual – annual?
• been conjecture that – conjectured?
• breweed – brewed?
• consitution – constitution?
• hydopower – hydropower?
• overthow – overthrow?
• produtivity – productivity?
• proeminent – preeminent?
• telecomunication – telecommunication?

You should, I think, settle on either English or American spelling and stick throughout to the one you choose. (I see the article talk page says that British English is to be used.) Meanwhile I'll give the article a thorough reading and report back. – Tim riley talk 19:25, 25 April 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for taking this on, Tim Riley. I'll correct those mistakes soon. looking forward to more of your thougths. GumballNine1Nine (talk) 19:57, 25 April 2026 (UTC)

I meant to add, but forgot, that I have good feelings about this article at first glance. I don't think we are going to have much trouble getting it to GA, though we shall see. Tim riley talk 20:15, 25 April 2026 (UTC)

Done: corrected typos and switched to British spelling GumballNine1Nine (talk) 20:42, 25 April 2026 (UTC)

Detailed comments

I shall certainly be promoting this excellent article to GA, but before I do, you may like to consider some or all of these points, all of which are merely advisory and in no sense mandatory:

• "in Southwestern" – but "The western Iberian Peninsula" just below. Consistent capitalisation of compass points would be nice.
• "resulting from the Reconquista against the Muslims" – the Muslims appear out of a blue sky here: something on the lines of "against the Muslims, who had occupied XYZ for ABC years …" would put the sentence in context.
• "a humanoid tooth" – I am perfectly prepared to be told I'm wrong, but I think you want "hominid" rather than "humanoid" here.
• "the Battle of Covadonga which lead to the establishment" – you keep falling into the trap of mixing up "lead" and "led". The latter is the past tense of the former. (There is also the element Pb, which is pronounced "led" just to confuse us all, but that is not to the present point.)
• "With minor readjustments, Portugal's borders have since remained the same, making it one of the oldest established international borders in Europe" – I'm struggling to square this with the later statement about "60 years of the Iberian Union under the House of Habsburg". Wouldn't the Union mean there were no international borders between Portugal and Spain for that period?
• "claimed the throne in 1580, under the pretext that his mother" – "pretext" is a bit loaded: it strongly implies that you think the claim spurious. Something more neutral such as "on the grounds that…" might be safer.
• "Portuguese ibex, became extinct, however some mammalian species have been re-expanding" – if you must use "however" rather than the shorter and usually better "but" you need a stronger stop than a comma here.
• "by direct, universal suffrage" – you clarify the point a few lines down, but it might be as well to add "adult" before "suffrage" here.
• "Olivenza which is claimed by Portugal since the 19th century" – "is" looks a bit odd here: perhaps "has been"?
• "treatment inside of prisons" – do we need the "of"?
• "Portugal is an high-income country" – "high" is aspirated and so needs "a" rather than "an" before it.
• "replaced the escudo with the euro, in 2002" – is the comma wanted here?
• "lower contribution of manufacturing to Portugal's economy has lead to lower real GDP growth rates" – another "lead" that should be "led".
• "the biggest share of the country's exportations … the total value of its exportations" – the Oxford English Dictionary describes this use instead of "exports" as obsolete.
• "As of 2023, oil made up 44% of Portugal's total energy supply while the country produced 82% of its energy from renewable sources" – I am not good with figures and may well be missing a point here but I make 44% + 82% = 126%, which seems odd.
• "that has lead to the country having a median age of 47.3" – another "lead" that ought to be "led".
• "Despite not having any official religion, the Catholic Church has a long history in the country" – This doesn't quite say what you mean it to say. As it stands it says the Catholic Church has no official religion, but you mean that although Portugal has no official religion the church has a long history there.
• "Despite its economic development, the average Portuguese height is among the shortest in Europe since around 1890" – are people generally taller in economically developed countries? I didn't know that, but if so, fine.
• "notable examples as Port and Madeira" – capitalising or not capitalising the names of wines is tricky, and practice varies, but I see that our Wikipedia articles on these two wines capitalise the latter but not the former, and I think that's probably right.
• Language templates: You ought to consider adding language templates before non-English words or phrases, for the benefit of blind and visually impaired users who rely on screen readers. I think there's room for common sense here, and when the English pronunciation is not that different from the original I don't always trouble to add the template, but I think your Etymology section would benefit; I'm not sure "Manifestis Probatum" really needs one. In any case, the use of language templates is not among the Good Article criteria – so it's up to you.
• alt-text: your alt-text annotations are first rate and put the scrappier efforts of the rest of us to shame.

Over to you. Tim riley talk 08:17, 26 April 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for your kind words Tim Riley. All the points you have raised are now done. I only have one point to add to what you said about the borders of Portugal and Spain: Although Portugal was ruled by a Spanish king during the Iberian Union, it remained a separate kingdom rather than becoming part of Spain; hence, an international border continued to exist between the two countries during that time. (Reference 97 explains this point in greater detail; the situation is similar to today's Scotland and England, which are considered separate countries within the UK) Cheers. GumballNine1Nine (talk) 15:10, 27 April 2026 (UTC)

Fine. I'm not persuaded that the border between Scotland and England is what would normally be understood as "international", but I don't press the point. Tim riley talk 19:22, 27 April 2026 (UTC)

Also, the 44% figure regarding Portugal's energy supply is the percentage of energy consumed in the country that comes from oil while the 82% is the percentage of the energy produced in the country that comes from renewable sources. GumballNine1Nine (talk) 15:40, 27 April 2026 (UTC)

I see. I missed the distinction between consumption and production. Now clear, thank you. Tim riley talk 19:22, 27 April 2026 (UTC)

Concluding review

GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria

1. Is it reasonably well written?

   A. Prose quality:

   B. MoS compliance for lead, layout, words to watch, fiction, and lists:

2. Is it factually accurate and verifiable?

   A. References to sources:

   Well referenced.

   B. Citation of reliable sources where necessary:

   Well referenced.

   C. No original research:

3. Is it broad in its coverage?

   A. Major aspects:

   B. Focused:

4. Is it neutral?

   Fair representation without bias:

5. Is it stable?

   No edit wars, etc:

6. Does it contain images to illustrate the topic?

   A. Images are copyright tagged, and non-free images have fair use rationales:

   Well illustrated.

   B. Images are provided where possible and appropriate, with suitable captions:

   Well illustrated.

7. Overall:

   Pass or Fail:

I think it is brave of you to try to cover a huge subject like this in a single article. The more detailed subsidiary articles are certainly a good thing but you seem to me to have got the essence of the topic into less than 8,000 words, which strikes me as very good going indeed. Bravo (or whatever the equivalent is in Portuguese). Very glad to promote the article to GA. Tim riley talk 19:22, 27 April 2026 (UTC)