Talk:Catherine de' Medici's building projects

message: Do you think the Houël mentioned here is related to Jean-Pierre-Louis-Laurent Hoüel? Note the different placement of the diacritic. Carcharoth 14:51, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Ha ha, one of your flights of lateral thinking. I can't find any connection. Our boy was an apothecary, and apparently this other one came from a family of artisans. Doesn't mean they couldn't have been related, of course. On the diacritic, looking closely, I notice to my surprise that only Knecht uses the diacritic: others leave it out. So I might do so, now, being a sheep. On the other hand, Knecht is a good scholar, and his middle name is Jean. Yes, it's intriguing it's on a different letter. qp10qp 17:05, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh, I just checked French Wikipedia, and all the Houëls there have the diacritic, and on the e, too (so kudos to Knechty: I've got a lot of faith in him). Their Pierre article likewise, so I wonder if our Pierre article has got the dots wrong? The French don't bother with stacking up all Pierre's Christian names, either, I notice. See, you've done it again and got me chasing geese! qp10qp 17:15, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Those French Christian names are a right pain, aren't they? :-) Carcharoth 17:24, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

text: I've been there, myself, don't remind me. Palissy was pretty neurotic, I believe.qp10qp 17:36, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Houël 

message: This is getting a bit random now. I'm linking the reference to the Polish crown to Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, as that fits the 1573 date for when the Polish crown was offered to Henry (her son, later III of France). Union of Lublin and all that. Would Henry have become Grand Duke of Lithuania as well, or was the Union still being consolidated? Ah, I see that he actually became Polish-Lithuanian King!! And then skedaddled back to France. The cad! :-) Carcharoth 17:39, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Ah well, I see he left them the Henrician Articles at least. Carcharoth 17:43, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's one of the most peculiar episodes in French history, that. It's not as if he was a great choice: he wore women's clothes, was an obsessive flagellant, and carried miniature dogs around with him in jewelled baskets tied round his neck with ribbons. qp10qp 18:01, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Huh? That's more scandalous than James I! :-) Carcharoth 18:13, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh, he was a thousand times more scandalous than dear dour James. I hope to work on Henry's article one day, because I have some good sources. It will be difficult, though, because he was nutty as a fruitcake, and people might think I'm making it up. qp10qp 16:54, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Polish Crown

message: Do you think it is worth mentioning the plans to rebuild the Tuileries Palace? Carcharoth 17:12, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I considered mentioning the plans, but I doubt they are realistic; and I suspect some POV behind the amount on them in the Tuileries article. The reason I haven't mentioned it, or indeed put in some of the later drawings and nineteenth-century photos of the Tuileries, is that the work this article talks about was not only extended by later architects and bodgers but, in my view, adulterated. Later photos show Bullant's roof, and the proportions of his pavilion, utterly ruined by clusters of thoughtless windows. And de l'Orme's wing was later wrecked by front-door-style staircases (my impression is that the building had been broken up within into lots of small apartments and rooms, hence the need for more staircases and windows, etc.) So, which Tuileries would be rebuilt? qp10qp 17:48, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

text: I've still got plenty to do. I am going to do an article on Cath's patronage of the arts in general and one on her magnificent entertainments, as they were called. When I get to that, I will fill out the Valois Tapestries article more en passant, because they are a prime visual source for her magnificences. qp10qp 17:39, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rebuilding the Tuileries Palace 

message: At the end, there is this "A large-scale project in development.|" The "|" seems to be a stange glitch. I can't get rid of it. Do you know what is causing it? Carcharoth 17:46, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Well spotted. It was among the cats. Sorted. qp10qp 17:51, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Strange glitch 

message: I'm off soon, but just wanted to ask if Paris Bourse is the same as the "Bourse de Commerce" mentioned in the article. Also called the Palais Brongniart. Alexandre-Théodore Brongniart says that building was completed in 1825. Carcharoth 18:00, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I remember going round in circles on that one. They have two different pages on French Wikipedia. But when you read the text of Bourse de commerce de Paris, it does link to Bourse de Paris. So why don't they look anything like each other? I need to ask a Parisian. qp10qp 18:17, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I looked into this a bit further, and found a handy website giving brief histories of monuments in Paris. See http://www.paris.org/Monuments/. This tells us that the Bourse de Commerce is different from the Paris Bourse. We have an article on the Paris Bourse, as I said above, but not on the Bourse de Commerce. Hope that helps. Carcharoth 02:30, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, that really does help—many thanks. I was pretty sure they were different because of the different look of the buildings and the fact that the French wikipedia has separate articles. You are right to do a red link because it is now clear that we need an article on the one depicted in our photograph, which seems to have quite a history. I may have a go at translating the French article. (I really admire the way you winkle away at things like this; it makes you an invaluable wikipedian.) qp10qp 17:09, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bourses 

message: I like the way you end the article. Very piquant. Just one thing, when you say "at a time of plague, famine and economic hardship", is is possible to link to articles about these events, or expand this slightly? Was the plague, for example the Plague of 1575 listed at List of historical plagues? Do the famines have a name? Are the economic events described anywhere? Carcharoth 18:12, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I'll look into naming one or two of them in particular. That bit is referenced to a generalised statement from Thomson that makes the juxtaposition. But there is a lot about the plagues and famines in the biographies, so I'll check it out. qp10qp 18:20, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I've added a note about the plague of 1565, since Catherine commissioned a study of it. qp10qp 17:52, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  End of article 

message: Hello,
there is a mistake in the map :Image:Catherine de' Medici's building projects.png. It is written Saint-Maur les Fossés instead of Saint-Maur-des-Fossés. Furthermore, the city position is really wrong (see Google maps for example). Poppy (talk) 14:31, 7 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: You are quite right, the map is kack, so I've removed it. I was asked at peer review for a map, but it is terrible to do because most of the projects were in and around Paris and had long names into the bargain, so how do you fit them in? You can't just blow up a map of Paris, because you also have to show Chenonceau. The old map of Paris that I've included a detail of elsewhere is not entirely accurate, and it does not have the Hôtel de la Reine on it, as such. The word Paris on the map was just a generality and there was no dot for it, though I admit it looked like there was. Yes, Saint-Maur was too high up because it would have got tangled up with Montceaux-en-Brie. I believe I should have just refused to do  a map. It is enough to tell readers that these projects were in and around Paris and to give some directions ("south-east of", etc.) in the text. I could not find a map dedicated to these places and just had to take dots from the feeble general maps of the period you find in history books (the architectural books don't have overall maps, for some reason). Les or des Fossés is a good question: it has been called both, and my sources largely have "les". I was not comfortable having a contradiction between the map and the article text, but one wanted the text to reflect our article on the present-day place, and the map to reflect its sources. Thanks for forcing  me to do what I wanted all along and not have a map. qp10qp (talk) 17:10, 7 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mistake