The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: No consensus. This discussion has been running for over one month and there is no clear consensus. Supporters cite WP:NCCAPS while opposers point to frequent capitalization in sources. Both sides cite Ngram evidence in their favor. We can discuss this again in a few months. (non-admin closure) Mast303 (talk) 01:24, 29 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Ethiopian Revolution → Ethiopian revolutionEthiopian revolution – Per WP:NCCAPS: For multiword page titles, one should leave the second and subsequent words in lowercase unless the title phrase is a proper name that would always occur capitalized, even mid-sentence. Per google ngrams (here) this is far from always capped in sources and therefore not a proper name that we should cap per NCCAPS. Cinderella157 (talk) 11:14, 31 March 2025 (UTC) Cinderella157 (talk) 11:14, 31 March 2025 (UTC) — Relisting. Jeffrey34555 (talk) 14:26, 7 April 2025 (UTC) — Relisting. TarnishedPath^talk 07:01, 19 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose – Google ngrams appears to show that the capitalized title has since become more commonly used. Also, no name is always capped or uncapped. Charles Essie (talk) 14:32, 1 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Support – The n-gram evidence is compelling: this term does not meet the "consistently capitalized" criterion of MOS:CAPS, not even close. Dicklyon (talk) 03:49, 4 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  I’d call 60% a substantial majority, at least in politics that’s a super majority Kowal2701 (talk) 21:09, 15 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  But it's not even near 60% in sentence contexts. See [1]. Most capitalized uses are citations to "The Ethiopian Revolution 1974-1987". Dicklyon (talk) 05:12, 26 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Relisting comment: Relisting to get a more thorough consensus Jeffrey34555 (talk) 14:26, 7 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Note: WikiProject Africa and WikiProject Ethiopia have been notified of this discussion. ASUKITE 19:45, 15 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Oppose, capitalised version has been consistently more common since ~2000 per ngrams. The spike at 1980 isn’t particularly compelling since that was over 40 years ago. Scrolling through Google Scholar, there’s a pretty even mix, while there seems to be more lowercase use in prose rather than titles, that’s not great evidence anyway. Also makes sense to capitalise it since it seems like a trivial proper name, like other revolutions (French Revolution, Cuban Revolution etc.) Kowal2701 (talk) 21:05, 15 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

This comment is actually making a strong case for lowercasing when one considers the prevailing P&G - though I don't know how one defines a trivial proper name. Cinderella157 (talk) 02:44, 16 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The guideline doesn’t say it has to always be capped (like the nom says), it says in a substantial majority of sources Kowal2701 (talk) 08:04, 16 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I have quoted what WP:NCCAPS states. Cinderella157 (talk) 11:10, 16 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Strange that NCCAPS says would always be capitalised while MOS:CAPS says in a substantial majority of sources. See what other !voters think Kowal2701 (talk) 11:47, 16 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

See [2] for why this comment is plain wrong. The only context in which it's commonly capitalized is in citations to "The Ethiopian Revolution 1974-1987". In sentences, it's usually lowercase, and per WP:NCCAPS, that's where we should be looking. Dicklyon (talk) 05:18, 26 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Oppose per the timeline. 'Revolutions' traditionally become uppercased proper names if they are successful during their occurrence and then 'stand the test of time' as the starting point for stable new governments. This is what happened in Ethiopia, first with this revolution followed by the Ethiopian Civil War. Going by the n-grams of other stable revolutions, where uppercasing eventually takes over from lowercasing, the uppercasing here will not reverse itself in sources (yes, that is WP:CRYSTAL, but would reflect the established trend). Randy Kryn (talk) 12:42, 19 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  It should not be our job to help uppercasing "eventually" take over. Wikipedia avoids overcapitalization, as opposed to accelerating it. Dicklyon (talk) 05:20, 26 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Support per NCCAPS, MOS:CAPS. The standard set forth at MOS:CAPS § Military terms is: Accepted names of […] revolutions […] and so forth are capitalized if they are usually capitalized in sources (emphasis added). The Ngram provided by the nominator shows usage is mixed. I tend to be sympathetic to this sort of capitalization when there is a clear trend towards increasing divergence in, say, the last 10–20 years, but we don't really see that here. When we consider that Ngram can be biased towards capitalization because of the inclusion of book, chapter, and section titles/headings, the recent lead for Revolution looks even less impressive. As Kowal2701 concedes, there seems to be more lowercase use in prose. I attempted a few Ngrams that should capture use in running text and filter out more titles and headings, and all of these show a preference for lowercase revolution.[3][4][5][6][7] As for consistency, revolution can occur as a general modifier or as part of an established proper name and our task is to determine which is the case here. The evidence for French Revolution is overwhelming.[8][9] That is not the case for Ethiopian Revolution. I don't think the threshold for capitalization is as high, nor as obvious, as some editors insist. The usually capitalized standard for military terms arguably sets a lower bar than other portions of MOS:CAPS and NCCAPS. Even this threshold is not met when considering evidence from running text. --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 16:45, 19 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]