Wikipedia:Peer review/Catherine de' Medici/archive1

Catherine de' Medici

This peer review discussion has been closed.

I've listed this article for peer review because I am planning to submit it as a featured-article candidate, all being well. I hope we can iron out any problems here first. Many thanks to anyone who takes the trouble to have a look: I will respond promptly and fully to any comments (knowing me, too fully!). qp10qp (talk) 21:39, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Just a few points that jumped out at me:

• The last paragraph of the introduction seems a bit confused; Frieda is never mentioned explicitly, so the last few sentences are explicitly tied to Sutherland. I'm not sure if it would be better to avoid naming specific historians there entirely, or to name one explicitly in each sentence; but I don't think a mix of the two is the most easily comprehensible option.

Agreed; I've rewritten this to remove the names of the historians and combine the judgements, since the references here are to summative parts of Knecht, Sutherland, and Frieda where they weigh all angles. I did have a note here pointing the reader to places where they could find accounts of the differing interpretations, but I cut it on the grounds of overkill. qp10qp (talk) 15:51, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

• "The city withstood bombardment, but hunger and plague finally forced its surrender on 12 August 1530" - I think the last is somewhat of an oversimplification, as there's much to be said about, e.g. the role of Malatesta Baglioni in the affair, and so forth. I'm not convinced that it's necessary to attribute the fall of Florence to a particular cause in this article, in any case.

On balance, even though that came from Knecht, I think you are right. I've been checking with several books, and it looks like there were probably five contributory reasons for the surrender: famine, plague, treachery, defeat outside the city (at Gavinana, etc.), and apparently generous imperial/papal peace terms. This is far too much to express briefly, so I have removed specific causes. qp10qp (talk) 15:51, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

• "who despite her wealth was only a commoner" - out of curiosity, was she considered a commoner despite her father's claim to Urbino, or was the claim itself ignored after his death?

Basically, it was a stolen title, as everyone knew. According to Frieda, "Francis felt snobbishly sceptical about Lorenzo's ability to keep the newly acquired fief of Urbino, commenting that he was after all 'only a tradesman' " (even so, the title was not ignored, because Francis made it one of his war aims to win Urbino back). I remember once reading up about Cesare Borgia, so I am aware of the history of this title. It was significant under the Montefeltro dukes in the fifteenth century, who made Urbino one of the great centres of Renaissance culture. But Borgia rampaged round Italy seizing towns and titles on behalf of his dad the pope, including Urbino, which then became a papal gift. After the Borgias, the delle Rovere pope followed suit and gave it to his relatives, so Leo X saw no reason why he shouldn't do the same. Therefore, as a title, the Duchy of Urbino had become pretty debased. Also, the title was nicked back by the delle Roveres after Catherine's father died, so she was really no more than a pretender—though, of course, another branch of her family was set up as a new aristocracy in Florence after the siege (from what I've read, the subsequent ostentatious pomp of the sixteenth-century Medici dukes in Florence was a symptom of their desperate need to escape their non-noble past as financiers and be accepted as the real cheese). qp10qp (talk) 15:51, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

• "Under Henry, the brothers, sons of Claude, Duke of Guise, also rose to power" - is there a word missing here?

Good spot. Corrected. It was all right until I copyedited it yesterday—so much for my copyediting. I daresay there is more where that came from. qp10qp (talk) 16:09, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

• Somewhat more technically, dates should be linked to allow auto-formatting to work properly.

Done. qp10qp (talk) 17:23, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Overall, though, I think this is an excellent article. Kirill 03:05, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Many thanks for taking the trouble to review the article, which has now imporved as a result. qp10qp (talk) 17:23, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

It's a huge article! However, rather than doing a full review, perhaps one or two small comments might be helpful?

1. I wonder whether it might not be wise to give the second François his full name of 'Hercule-François'?

OK, what I've done for the moment is added this to the horrible "marriage and issue" table at the bottom. It's a tricky matter, though, because for consistency it also means saying that Charles was Charles-Maximilien and Henry was Alexandre-Édouard. I think to try and add all this variety to the main text might risk messing with the readers' minds, particularly as, to make matters worse, François was both duke of Alençon and duke of Anjou, Henry having also been duke of Anjou (and both wooing Queen Elizabeth [what a couple of losers] under that title). None of this is helped by some messiness and contradiction in the sources (both primary and secondary) as to the order of their names and whether hyphens are required or not, and also the wretched business of having some of their names (Francis, Henry) in anglicised versions and some (François, Marguerite) in French. Quelle messe, as the bishop said to the choirboy. qp10qp (talk) 18:18, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

2 I seem to recall that Catherine actually *designed* Chenonceau. You may care to check.

I've added the information that she set out to efface and outdo Diane de Poitiers' work there. She did design at Chenonceau, particularly the gardens and the galleries over Diane's bridge (see Catherine de' Medici's building projects), but Chenonceau had seen a good deal of original architecture before her time, particularly from Philibert de l'Orme. qp10qp (talk) 19:27, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

3. Catherine was, I believe, one of John Knox's famous 'regiment (i.e. rule) of women' (Catherine, Mary, Mary of Guise?): might it be worth mentioning?

I'm not sure about that, because I think he wrote it with Mary I of England and Mary I of Scotland in mind, before Catherine de' Medici came to power (I don't find much mention of Knox in my books on Catherine). No doubt he despised Catherine just as much though. qp10qp (talk) 19:13, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

4. Legend has it that Catherine was a great poisoner: they still show you her alleged 'poison cabinets' at Blois!

I have mentioned in the lead that she was accused of poisoning, and later, in particular, of poisoning Jeanne d'Albret (though Jeanne was found by the autopsy to have terminal diseases). To be honest, all the historians I have read dismiss these Huguenot-sourced tales, though she would, quite normally for a ruler of that time, have condoned poison as a weapon of warfare, when carried out by her supporters. My instinct is not to make too much of this; on the other hand, I am planning to write a separate article on the history of her reputation, sourced mainly to Sutherland's "The Legend of the Wicked Italian Queen". As with Nostradamus, such legends are often demonstrably false or dodgy (for example, the story that Catherine gave Jeanne d'Albret poisoned gloves was concocted well after Jeanne's death, when Huguenot pamphleteers discovered that both women had the same perfumier and glove supplier, a Florentine). qp10qp (talk) 19:13, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

5. For more light on her activities, see Prosper Merimée's 'Chronique du regne de Charles IX', mere novel that it is.

Erk, did Colomba for A Level, which sort of put me off him. Quite easy to read, though, so might give it a go. qp10qp (talk) 19:21, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

5. Check the spelling of 'surprisedn'?

Fixedn! qp10qp (talk) 16:11, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Best --PL (talk) 11:11, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Many thanks for your review. It's much appreciated. qp10qp (talk) 19:21, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback and info. My point about Hercule-François was simply that it might be a good idea to distinguish him from the other François whom they already had! --PL (talk) 09:39, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

I know nothing about the subject, so please pardon any ignorance in the notes that follow.

• Should it be "Machiavellian princess", rather than "prince", in the lead? If it's intended as a reference to "The Prince" I think it might be better with a capital P, in quotes, though I think that's a bit obscure for the lead.

Female rulers were called "prince", oddly enough, so that wasn't just a reference to The Prince. But I admit it could look confusing, so I've changed it to "tyrant". (I was a bit nervous about the change at first, since Machiavelli was regarded as a book of statecraft rather than of tyranny. However, I've looked it up, and this seems to have changed in the 1570s, so I think the new wording is justified.) qp10qp (talk)

• Shouldn't it be "excused [her] for" rather than "from" (again in the lead)?

Changed to "excused from blame for", which is the meaning I intended (rather than "excused for", which implies blame). (I think I must have flashed back to asking if I could be "excused from" games at school.) qp10qp (talk) 18:04, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

• "bestriding" seems too much connotation and not enough denotation for the sentence it's in. How about something more straightforward such as "dominating" or "controlling"?

Reworded. qp10qp (talk) 18:04, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

• "Jeanne, whose decision to rebel posed a dynastic threat to the Valois": can we have a brief explanation of who the Valois are before this point, for those who don't know much about this period?

I've added that they had ruled the country since the fourteenth century, but I don't want to try to say too much. They were just a dynasty, like the Tudors. qp10qp (talk) 18:04, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

• The paragraph about the siege of Florence doesn't mention who took Florence from the Medicis. I can see we don't want too much detail here, but the lack of a named opponent leaves a distracting hole in the narrative.

My sources are vague about this, and I think I would need some books about the history of Florence and the Medici to go further (would like to work on all that one day). Florence was an unusual city, since it was not ruled dynastically: in other words, though the Medici often ran it, they had no constitutional right to do so. And so the history of the Medici to this point shows them sporadically being thrown out by the citizenry, who prided themselves on their republicanism. The reason the Medici were overthrown at this time resulted from only having minors in the city to represent them, while Clement governed remotely through a rapacious cardinal, regarded by the authorities as plundering the city's coffers. The defeat of the anti-Medici faction turned out to be the last nail in the coffin of republicanism in Florence, and the Medici thereafter called themselves dukes and ran Florence and Tuscany by heredity and decree. I've added something about the reasons for the overthrow, anyway. qp10qp (talk) 18:04, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

• Was it the death of Pope Clement that destroyed Catherine's standing, or the election of a Pope who broke the alliance with France?

I've changed it from "destroyed" to "undermined", since there must have been a gap between Clement's death and the election of the next pope. On the other hand, Francis no doubt realised straight away that the game was up. Clement VII was quite young for a pope, and Francis must have thought he'd last a bit later before pegging out. qp10qp (talk) 18:04, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

• Is "overheating" really a cause of death we can cite without comment? Perhaps it was described that way then, but I'd almost be inclined to put it in scare quotes; or more usefully to add a comment in a note if there's more information to be had.

I've found it described that way in the secondary sources, but since he developed a fever afterwards, I've now put the emphasis on that. qp10qp (talk) 18:04, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

• Can we have an attributive noun before "Brantôme", such as "historian"?

Done. I must have cut an earlier Brantôme quote. qp10qp (talk) 18:04, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

• I think it might be worth mentioning the births of all three of the children that subsequently become king, and possibly also Francois, in the chronological outline.

I've now mentioned them after the birth of Francis. qp10qp (talk) 18:04, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

• "Under Henry, the sons of Claude, Duke of Guise, also rose to power." This is the first mention of Claude, I think. Could you either give his relationship to Henry, if there is one (cousin, etc.) or give some information to quell the reader's speculation that they are related -- by saying they became favourites of the king, or something similar? As it is Claude is mentioned with no introduction.

I've decided to lose Claude. I have now added that Francis of Guise (don't ask me why his article title calls him "Francis") was Henry's boyhood friend, which is the reason for his favouritism. qp10qp (talk) 18:04, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

• I saw a note on the talk page that you plan to hive off material to other articles. I can see that more sub-articles are possible, but for what it's worth, I didn't find the article too long -- it's interesting, concise, detailed and coherent. I wouldn't cut without someone telling me to.

I did the cuts a few days ago, so this will have to be it. qp10qp (talk) 18:04, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

• "Henry signed the Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis with the empire and England": you mention the Holy Roman Emperor earlier, but you don't say "Holy Roman Empire" anywhere. This is probably obvious to those who know this period, but I think you might avoid piping at least one link -- perhaps this one -- to make it clearer to less informed readers.

The Holy Roman Empire/eror is now mentioned twice in the main text. qp10qp (talk) 18:04, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

• What's the significance of the Cardinal of Lorraine and the Duke of Guise moving Francis and Mary into the Louvre? I only know it as a museum; I take it it was a palace belonging to the House of Guise, or something like that?

I've changed the wording slightly to make it clearer. It's a bit too complicated to go into all the ins and outs, but the Guises tried to get the jump on Catherine by quickly setting themselves up with Francis II and Mary, QoS, at the Louvre (the main royal palace in Paris) while Catherine was stuck mourning Henry II over at the Tournelles, where he had died. They banked on the tradition that a royal widow was obliged to mourn by her husband's body for x number of days. But Catherine wasn't having any of that, and she chased them over to the Louvre and moved right in with them, so that she could keep control of Francis and get her finger in the new pudding. qp10qp (talk) 18:04, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

• You have a one-sentence paragraph in the Huguenots section. I don't oppose these for doctrinaire reasons, but if you plan to take this to FAC, as you know, you're like to get someone objecting to this.

Blended it in with the previous paragraph. qp10qp (talk) 18:04, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

• "the Forty-five" are capitalized at one mention, but not at another; which should it be?

Made it consistent.qp10qp (talk) 18:04, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

• "which fused with her own body" seems an odd choice of words. How about "thus incorporating them into her own body"?

The word was from the source, but I've put it into plainer language. qp10qp (talk) 18:45, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

That's all I can see. This is an outstanding article. Mike Christie (talk) 02:09, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Many thanks for the time and care you have taken. These are good spots, and the article has now improved as a result. Great copyedit, too. Highly valued. qp10qp (talk) 18:45, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

I went through and looked at all the fixes, and everything looks fine, so I won't respond under each one. A top-class article, and a fascinating topic too. Mike Christie (talk) 19:36, 31 March 2008 (UTC)