Talk:Maria Faydherbe

Family relationships

According to the Biographie Nationale de Belgique, this Maria Faydherbe was "born in 1611 the daughter of Antoine and of Charlotte van Casteele" (that is, of Antoine the brother of Hendrik, not the father of Hendrik). While there may be a Maria Faydherbe born in 1587 to Antoine and Hendrik's parents, the information in BNB suggests this would be an aunt of the artist Maria, and not Maria herself. I suspect her 1632 request to be registered in the guild also makes more sense if she was 21 than if she was 45 at the time. --Andreas Philopater (talk) 13:51, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

I think it's probably the other way around. The RKD claims the older one was the artist, and quotes a 2014 source: Maria Faydherbe: a seventeenth-century sculptor in Mechelen by Marjorie Trusted in The Burlington Magazine 156 (2014), nr. 1331, p. 104-106. I went ahead and assumed we weren't going to find anything later than 2014. How old is your Biographie Nationale de Belgique? Jane (talk) 18:27, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Best to actually source the changes to the article, though, I'd have thought? That way other users don't have to ask. --Andreas Philopater (talk) 19:11, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Which I did? Not sure what you mean. The RKD is a valid reference and it also agrees with VIAF. If you mean that I should be using the article by Trusted, I suppose that is OK to put in there, but I can't access it myself. The only thing I can see the RKD, which is what I linked in the article. Jane (talk) 20:10, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Don't worry, I'll fix it. --Andreas Philopater (talk) 21:56, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Thanks! Jane (talk) 23:15, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Name Marie etc

On English wiki it is also not Pierre Paul Rubens, Antoine van Dyck, Juste Lipse, Érasme, Jules César etc. French-language sources not to be used for naming purposes on En-wiki. Therefore not 'Marie' unless we have contemporary source which shows she was known by that name. Reginadelmondo (talk) 17:45, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

Since a fair proportion of the sources on her are in fact in French (half of those in the article, for a start), it is surely more useful to identify the two names as equivalent than to fight out some petty linguistic rivalry that English-speakers care nothing about? --Andreas Philopater (talk) 18:08, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

There's no reason not to mention the French alternative. The Anthony van Dyck article has, in a note: "Originally "van Dijck", with the "IJ" digraph, in Dutch. Anthony is the English for the Dutch Anthonis or Antoon, though Anthonie, Antonio or Anthonio was also used; in French he is often Antoine, in Italian Anthonio or Antonio. In English a capitalised "Van" in Van Dyck was more usual until recent decades (used by Waterhouse for example), and Dyke was often used during his lifetime and later". The edit by Reginadelmondo introduced a number of other questionable changes, eg putting my "not signing her own output, and indeed probably having her work signed by her male relations." in front of a reference which I have not seen, and removing from the lead that there are no works certainly known to be hers. There were some small improving tweaks though. It should mostly be reverted. Johnbod (talk) 18:20, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

It is not a petty linguistic rivalry. It is about what she was actually called. We now have two (French) sources that call her Marie, two English sources and one French source that call her Maria. If instead of the two first French sources we had found two Chinese sources would we then have an article starting as follows: 'Maria Faydherbe or 玛丽 辉草 (1587-1643) was a Flemish sculptor who lived and worked in Mechelen, in the Southern Netherlands?' That is not how scholarly research is done. With respect to Johnbod's own changes to the article one is indeed curious about the sources for these statements: 'not signing her own output, and indeed probably having her work signed by her male relations' and 'No works certainly by her have survived'. JeanBod has failed to provide any or reliable sources (unless a 19th century source for a statement on the attribution or existence of artworks should in any way be relied on today. There are also many other errors in the article of Emmanuel Neeffs in the Biographie Nationale de Belgique). It is very difficult to make such a negative statement ('there are no works etc.') if one has not read all the scholarly work on the subject (and I am not claiming I have). Reginadelmondo (talk) 07:25, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

No it isn't. Especially when I think some pre-V&A sources say there is none. Johnbod (talk) 14:02, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

Johnbod, I believe the query was about what you wrote, but about the sources you are looking at. Your Google search is going to turn up totally different things than what I see. Jane (talk) 14:20, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

I think is clearly not as good as this source says. JB has not provided a source for any of his additions to the article. In 1932 a signed boxwood sculpture by Maria Faydherbe was already the subject of a scholarly article by G. Van Doorslaer, see: G. Van Doorslaer, Une madonne en buis signée Maria Faydherbe. In: Revue belge d'archéologie et d'histoire de l'art = Belgisch tijdschrift voor oudheidkunde en kunstgeschiedenis, 2, 1, 1932, p. 1-9. That is why one needs to know all the scholarly sources before one can make the type of radical statements JB has made (and for which we are all still lacking any sources). But still JB thinks my (not his) changes should be reverted. Reginadelmondo (talk) 15:28, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

I don't see anything wrong with the text as it stands; unfortunately this text is pretty certain to be about some other member of the family, so just get some text that IS about her (from that French source?) and put the whole guild thing at the bottom under the guild heading but with lead sentence something like "This artist is often confused with a Maria Faydherbe who...", etc. Jane (talk) 16:12, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

Hmm interesting discussion. I don't really care one way or another on spelling of names, but I tend to follow what the RKD uses for Dutch and Flemish names. Oddly, they only list two, the preferred spelling Maria, and secondary spelling "Mari". The RKD (whose primary source seems to be Marjorie Trusted's article on the recent acqisition at the V&A, which I don't have access to) says that the woman who wrote to the guild was her aunt by the same name. I am inclined to agree on Reginadelmondo's comments about her signature, though I would assume all members probably worked in the same family workshop. Nice find on dozijnwerker! Maybe it's time for an article on that - see dozijnschilder. In any case, if someone attributed the V&A sculpture, they must have done it on the basis of other work. Anyone have any idea where to look for that? Probably squirreled away in the depots of some Belgian museum, I imagine. Jane (talk) 12:19, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

Considering the dates, a woman who wanted to become a guild member was probably younger than sixteen, so it must have been her niece and not her aunt. Also I found this source from 1859 which claims the whole guild thing was a letter from Anna-Barbara Faydherbe, daughter of Lucas and Maria Snyders. Jane (talk) 12:51, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for the additional source which unfortunately still does not allow us to determine with certainty the identity of the bold woman who challenged the Mechelen establishment. I agree with Jane's suggestion that it was the niece or at least a younger person who would dare to make such a bold move. It is likely that the Maria laying down the challenge was of the same generation as Lucas as she appears to have been working in the newer idiom of the Baroque. So there were likely two Maria's: the aunt and the niece. As to works attributed to a Maria Faydherbe there are works in the Church of St Peter and Paul in Mechelen that are attributed to her although I am not sure on what basis (http://www.mechelenblogt.be/2008/12/maria-en-lucas and http://www.jezuieten.org/nl/nieuw/sint-pieter-en-pauluskerk-mechelen) and in Tongerlo Abbey (an attribution made apparently on the basis of the abbey's records, possibly purchase records?: http://www.tongerlo.org/abdij/adb_archief_index.htm). Reginadelmondo (talk) 13:28, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

To suggest that Chinese sources on Belgian figures are likely to be predominant is rather a stretch, isn't it? Do you really expect anyone to take that seriously? [Editing to add]: Of course in the few cases where there actually is substantial Chinese sourcing, we do give the Chinese name. See Ferdinand Verbiest, for example. We don't do "scholarly work" – we just repeat what the sources say. --Andreas Philopater (talk) 08:12, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

Given that the argument against including the French variant of the name is "Would we include a Chinese name if there were substantial Chinese sources?" and the answer to that is obviously "Yes", I'm restoring it to the lead. --Andreas Philopater (talk) 08:32, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

Fact and fiction

It is strange (sad, worrying) to note that certain editors on wiki don’t seem to be able to distinguish fact from fiction (or their own thoughts).

• Fiction: My argument against the name ‘Marie’ is: "I don't like".
• Fact: The argument I made for not using Marie is that we do not have any evidence that Marie is a name actually used by or for Maria in her lifetime and that French-language naming conventions should not be used on En-wiki since we also do not use them for other people with foreign names. We do not commence the En-wiki article on the English queen Mary with: ‘Mary II or Marie II’, although there are certainly more (likely even ‘substantial’) French-speaking sources on her than on our Maria Faydherbe.

• Fiction: The Chinese name of Verbiest is added to the article because there is ‘substantial Chinese sourcing’.
• Fact: The Chinese name is used because Verbiest lived the last half of his life in China where he himself adopted that Chinese name, used it in his Chinese-language publications and at the Chinese imperial court where he held an official position. And that is the reason why it is appropriate to add the Chinese name as an equivalent of his original name. Let’s also note that the En-wiki article does not reference any Chinese language sources (let alone ‘substantial Chinese sources’) so this is clearly irrelevant to the argument. The article could, however, be improved because it should not read 'He is known as Nan Huairen (南懷仁) in Chinese' but rather 'He adopted the name and was known as 南懷仁 (pinyin: ‘Nan Huairen’) in China.'

For completeness sake, the use of the name “Anthony van Dyck” on English wiki is acceptable for a different reason than the use of that name in a person’s lifetime: Anthony is the name whereby he is now generally known in the English-speaking world. All the other stuff Jean writes about the naming of van Dyck is irrelevant. We cannot claim that Maria Faydherbe is now generally known as ‘Marie’ in the English-speaking world.

• Fiction: Maria Faydherbe is referred to in ‘the French literature’ as “Marie Fayd’herbe”.
• Fact: I am not sure what the expression ‘the French literature’ means but let’s assume André means ‘French-language academic literature’. André used one single 19th century Belgian, French-language source to create three articles on the three Faydherbe siblings (and one wonders why they all end up with French names?) and to tamper with the article on Lucas Faydherbe. Others including myself have since dug up other sources in the French and other languages. Of the French-language sources two (both from the 19th century) call her Marie and two (20th century) sources call her Maria. So it is factually wrong to state, as André does, that ‘the French literature’ refers to her as ‘Marie’ if some (possibly only older, but clearly not a 'substantial' number of) examples do and clearly other French-language sources call her ‘Maria’.

• Fiction: We don't do "scholarly work" – we just repeat what the sources say.

• Fact: André just repeats what a single source says.

In an ideal world, wiki editors would first do extensive research, find multiple sources for their subject, weigh these sources and then draft the article using something called a brain and intellect based on their reasoned evaluation of the source material. But some editors like Jean and André just use no sources (they are the so-called ‘thinkers’) or a single source. Because of this intellectual laziness the original version of the article by André had the whole affair surrounding Maria completely wrong. André’s version (relying on a single, unreliable source) was that Maria challenged the other sculptors. The reproduction of the original letter to the city council of Mechelen written by 8 Mechelen sculptors (for which someone else had to find the source since a single source is good enough for André) clearly shows that it was the other way around: the 8 sculptors challenged Maria to a competition. Another person had to dig up a source (RKD) to alert André to the fact that there were likely two Maria’s and that there is serious doubt about which one of the two (or maybe even whether a third family member) was involved in the conflict with the guild.

Anyway, let’s just summarize: serious editors on wiki make an effort to engage in scholarly research in that they look for and evaluate sources, others live in that simpler, merrier world where one just copies a single source or ‘thinks’ it up. Happy editing, André ! Reginadelmondo (talk) 05:09, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

This is a remarkably long edit for somebody whose thoroughly researched scholarly contributions to Wikipedia mostly seem to consist of adding the words "Flanders" or "Flemish" to biographical articles. And you're a bit harsh on this André fellow, whoever he is. I'm not sure you really carry your point though. Your main contention seems to be that we shouldn't start an article before we can produce an ideal one, but this is emphatically not how Wikipedia works. A subsidiary point seems to be that we should synthesize sources rather than report them, which is an idiosyncratic reading of WP:SYN. As to not reporting names that are found in the literature because we don't have evidence of the subject using them when alive, that is not policy or style on en-wiki, and would indeed present rather a problem for many biographical articles (not just van Dyck's). --Andreas Philopater (talk) 19:03, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

I am very glad you enjoyed my ‘long’ edit. While it may not be wiki policy to create ‘ideal’ articles, one suspects it is also not wiki policy to create articles which do not contain one grain of truth such as the one this André fellow created on our beloved Maria Faydherbe. You are clearly not familiar with André and seem very keen to get to know him. So please let me introduce him as I am sure you guys will hit if off. What we have learned from the available source on this guy (i.e. wiki) is that André is a wiki ‘editor’ who seems to struggle with a lot of personal issues: he has developed an unhealthy attachment to a single, outdated and completely unreliable document he keeps referring to as a ‘source’, is unable to make or understand a cogent argument, cannot distinguish fact from fiction and believes it is more useful to spend time investigating the editorial history of other wiki editors than on actual research (i.e. finding reliable sources) for the articles that he drops on wiki.

As I would really like to help this André, I offer him this sincere and simple advice: find reliable sources before you create or edit a wiki article…. and in moments of doubt, pray for help to Maria, Reginadelmondo (talk) 13:28, 28 February 2015 (UTC).

The way forward: proper sourcing

It is useless to enter into discussion with a person who puts forward all kinds of arguments for a position and after these arguments have been blown out of the water comes up with another set of arguments that are also untenable and completely besides the point. The root of the problem is the fatal decision of the elusive André to construct three articles from material that has proven to be completely unreliable. The way forward is to redo the articles using reliable sources. With respect to the article on Maria Faydherbe, the following sources appear to be the basis from which any article should start:

• Marjorie Trusted, Maria Faydherbe: a seventeenth-century sculptor in Mechelen in: The Burlington Magazine 156 (2014), nr. 1331, p. 104-106.
• G. Van Doorslaer, Une madonne en buis signée Maria Faydherbe. In: Revue belge d'archéologie et d'histoire de l'art = Belgisch tijdschrift voor oudheidkunde en kunstgeschiedenis, 2, 1, 1932, p. 1-9.
• Heidi De Nijn, Hans Vlieghe, Hans Devisscher, Lucas Faydherbe (1617-1697). Mechels beeldhouwer en architect, Mechelen, 1997, p. 20 en 125
• Jaak Jansen, Het geschil van Maria Faydherbe in 1632-1633 of de spanning tussen Renaissance- en Barokbeeldhouwkunst te Mechelen, Belgium, Bulletin (Koninklijk Instituut voor het Kunstpatrimonium), Bulletin (Institut Royal du Patrimoine Artistique) , Volume Number: 22, 1988, p. 78-103
• An upcoming publication to look out for is: Klara Alen, Envy and pride: Maria Faydherbe (Mechelen, 1587-after 1633), a woman sculptor in a man’s world. Facts & Feelings, (Brepols), forthcoming in April this year.

The BNB material should be rejected in its entirety. This is the last message I will be posting on this topic. Reginadelmondo (talk) 13:28, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

No, the basis from which any article should start is any WP:RS that happens to be to hand, and it can then be improved and revised on the basis of whatever other material other contributors can bring to it. You've probably been too narrowly focused on your own abstruse area of interest to notice, but things tend to work incrementally here. Oh, and the reason for keeping the French version of the name in the article is still what it always was: the name occurs in existing sources, and we do no service to users by failing to identify it as a synonym for the title of the article. That might seem so obvious to you as not to warrant mention, but it certainly won't be to everybody. I don't think there's any problem here that a sit down and a cup of tea won't solve. --Andreas Philopater (talk) 21:59, 1 March 2015 (UTC)