Talk:Catherine de' Medici's building projects

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Contents

[edit] Chateau/château

After Awadewit italicised the word "châteaux" as a foreign word, I had a careful thought about how to establish consistency in the article on this point. I can understand why Awadewit made the change, but "châteaux" is now accepted as an English-language variant. However, it does look distractingly French with the circumflex, and so I have changed all the occurrences to "chateau" and "chateaux". Without the circumflex, these now look more English. This usage is recognised as normal in English: for these purposes, the word counts as an English word. "Chateaus" would be acceptable for the English plural, but since it is less common than "chateaux", I've chosen not to use it.

None of this is helped by the fact that the Wikipedia article opts for Château, with the circumflex; but I feel it is more convenient to put consistency within the article ahead of consistency within Wikipedia as a whole. Especially as there isn't any consistency in Wikipedia as a whole, when it comes to this matter. There is no consistency, for example, in the naming of chateaux, whose article names tend to be in the "Château de..." âform, which is essentially French. In this article, I have used the form "chateau of Chambord", etc., which is perfectly good English usage. I hope this will put editors off from italicising chateau names. Some people might like to see a capital on the "chateau" before chateau names, but I have not done that: the word in these contexts is used as a generality rather than part of the name. On the whole, the French do not capitalise in these circumstances. This also harmonises with usages such as "palace of the Tournelles".

With the chateau of Chenonceau, by the way, I have chosen that form instead of "Chenonceaux". Both forms are used in history books, and it's even possible that it would be more accurate to use the "x", since that started to be dropped long after Catherine's day. But both French and English wikipedias leave out the "x", and so I have gone along with that style in setting up this article.--qp10qp 18:53, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

  • I find the whole "chateau of X" business very jarring. Should the names not be in French with circumflexes and de's? For a moment I thought you were following some insane MOS rule. :) Most art history books I've read go out of their way to use the original language for painting titles - is this not the case for architecture? We might as well follow the sources on this. Awadewit | talk 07:46, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
My four main sources, Knecht, Frieda, Blunt, and Thomson, all use the "of" form. Honest. And I agree with it, too, because it's logical. "Chateau de Blois" is not the name of a chateau, in the sense of the name of a painting. It's the chateau of "Blois", or whatever—Blois being a place. Using "de", as we do on so many article titles, turns the whole thing from English to French. That seems to me the most awkward choice. Do we then say "palais des Tuileries", and so forth?
Although I don't choose to use the "de", I don't see any reason not to use the circumflex, because "château" is now accepted as an English word (I've looked into this), circumflex and all. But I took the circumflexes out after your edit in case editors italicise the word believing it to be French (which I agree that it looks). Of course, if we wrote "château de Blois", then the whole thing would turn French and appear to cry out for Italicising. Except that manuals of style say that names of chateaux should not be italicised (presumably because they are aware of the knock-on problems if they were).
As far as the capitalising of "chateau" is concerned, it seems to go either way: Frieda and Thomson do, and Blunt and Knecht don't. Of those four, I believe Blunt and Knecht to be the best scholars, and I go with them: but it's actually a matter of preference. I'm sorry if this all seems terribly awkward and unsatisfactory; but it just is.
I daresay this won't be the last word (advocates of one style or another will probably change things in the future), but at least I've put some thought into it. The trouble is that there's no perfect solution. qp10qp 23:27, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Ok. I would put an internal note into the article, so other people don't come along and change it. :) Awadewit | talk 23:50, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Or use the {{MoSElement}} template. I would also note that this has been discussed elsewhere, and my personal preference is for circumflexes, with or without des. But then I'm a bit of a Francophile, so I'm not really an objective party. Listen to your heart, Qp.
However, I do think it's important – as you say – to be internally consistent. Thus, it will seem very odd to use English-ized versions of chateau if you also include in the first sentence "Hôtel de la Reine". – Scartol · Talk 16:10, 6 November 2007 (UTC)
Yeah, I know. I'm trying to be consistent, but you can never quite get there. The Hôtel de la Reine is a nightmare from the point of view of language, circumflex and capitalisation. The sources haven't cracked it either. Whereas "chateau" is acceptable normal English for château, "hotel" is not acceptable normal English for Hôtel in this sense. I've racked my brains on it, and I don't think that this usage of Hôtel is translatable. Fortunately, every source gives it the way it appears in this article, with nonchalant inconsistency. qp10qp 17:30, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Where did she live after Florence and Rome?

When she went off to France to get married, the article says she went to: "the greatest Renaissance court in northern Europe, that of King Francis I of France". Was that in one place, or did it move around? What I'm after is an indication of where in France she lived. As an aside, the description of their wedding night (both were 14, remember!) and the history of Henry (held hostage for 3 years as a child), and his relationship with Diane de Poitiers, is fascinating! Carcharoth 14:41, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

Yes it is! I've indulged in that stuff in the Catherine de' Medici article.
Francis's court was highly peripatetic, but that doesn't mean it wasn't a specific environment. It has been likened to a mobile town (Benvenuto Cellini said it needed stabling for 18,000 horses). Straight after Catherine's wedding, the court was at Lyons; it spent Christmas at Pagny and in early 1534 it moved to Dijon, Joinville and Troyes. Then it went to Paris, the nearest thing to its base. Later that year, it moved from Fontainebleau to Saint-Germain-en-Laye to Amboise. Should I mention the court's mobility, do you think?
It might be an idea. More the idea of whether Catherine travelled to see architects and the buildings, or whether they came to her, or whether the court eventually came to the buildings, if you know what I mean. And do the locations of the court relate to the buildings at all? Carcharoth 16:59, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
She definitely travelled with Francis to all his building projects; he would stay at them every so often, even when they weren't finished. Sometimes the court stayed at his palaces, but it was often hosted by nobles or by towns. For example, at Pagny it was hosted by Admiral Chabot. Only the top courtiers were actually billeted in the king's or the nobles' houses; the rest often had to live under canvas. Sometimes the king and Catherine themselves slept under canvas, when on the move. Their tents were temporary palaces of a sort, though, and not like something from Black's Camping and Leisure. qp10qp 17:22, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
I've now said that the court was "itinerant", using the wiktionary link, which is more helpful than the wikipedia article.
What about later in her life? The article says "Only after Henry's death in 1559, when she found herself at forty the effective ruler of France, did Catherine embark upon her most ambitious building projects." - that would be the period it would be nice to know about. Was the court still peripatetic then, or had it settled down? Carcharoth 17:31, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
The article does deal with that period, once it gets going. It was a transitional phase, I think. One problem was that France collapsed into civil war after 1560 and was either in a state of civil war or armed tension for the next thirty years. The parts of France under the control of the Huguenot lords became less and less visitable by the court. So there was a tendency for the court move about between Paris and the chateaux around it. But Catherine was a real throwback: she consciously copied Francis I and believed that the way to restore the fortunes of the monarchy was to show it to France in all its magnificence. One of the most magnificent journeys of the court was to Bayonne, which is close to the Spanish border. Catherine deliberately and consciously took the young Charles IX on a royal progress around the whole of southern France, which lasted for eighteen months. And during Henry III's reign, she did something similar with her own court. She was a colossal traveller; it has been said that no royal had visited so much of France since Louis XII. However, she was fighting a losing battle. The days of King Francis were gone forever; and the magnificence of the monarchy no longer impressed the people for more than a moment. As with her architecture, Catherine was flogging a dead horse, it seems to me. She was the last of the peripatetic breed. But I so admire her for always putting on a show. qp10qp 18:39, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
Fascinating. I wonder why the people were more cynical than in the past? I'm not sure the article does really make this point though (and I think maybe it should). Passages like "She had outgrown her apartments at the Louvre and needed more room for her swelling household" and "The site was close to the congested Louvre, where she kept her household" give the impression she and her household mostly lived around Paris. I don't get any impression of peripatetic-ness from this article. Maybe you are thinking of the main Catherine article? When you say something like "Catherine decided to enlarge her chateau of Chenonceau", it might be worthwhile making the point that this is not near Paris, but is off to the south near Tours. That is the only thing I think could improve this article (I think all the minor points have been addressed below) - making the geographical and historical context clear to those who aren't familiar with the geography of France or the history of those times. I'll start a new section with some examples. Carcharoth 05:00, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
I think she did use first the Louvre and later the Hôtel de la Reine as her base, if you like. But it's clear that she would often be away, sometimes for years, as during her two great progresses. At the end of her life, she was at Blois for the meeting of the parlement. One example of the increasing difficulties of an itinerant court came when the court was at Montceaux in 1567 and received warning of an advancing Huguenot force only four miles away. Catherine and the king fled by night, and the court upped and scarpered in panic for Paris. The Florentine ambassador commented on the great confusion of this flight, especially of the women and baggage, and said that the kingdom was upside down. I would love to have witnessed that—all the cooks, laundry workers, dwarves, musicians, etc., lammming it with their heaps of clobber, paraphernalia and gear.qp10qp 16:14, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
I've added that Chenonceau is near Blois. Blois was second only to Paris as an administrative centre, and the court often had bed down there for meetings of the parlement. (In fact, for a while, at the end of Catherine and Henry III's lives, Blois was the first base of the court, because Paris had defected to the rebels.) qp10qp 16:48, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Houël

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)

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)
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)
Those French Christian names are a right pain, aren't they? :-) Carcharoth 17:24, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

Speaking of off-topic stuff, I see you mention Bernard Palissy. Nice to see him mentioned. I've always had a soft spot for him after reading that: "he burned his furniture and even, it is said, the floor boards of his house to feed the fires of his furnaces" - makes you stop and think, sometimes. Carcharoth 17:24, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

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

[edit] Architectural terms

I see epitaph is used here. Is that the normal meaning of the word, or some architectural term? Carcharoth 17:08, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

I just assumed it means those slabs of marble with epitaphs on them, which you see in churches. Knowing Primaticcio, they would have been grandiose scroll-like things with clusters of cherubs on the corners. And nymphs playing bugles. qp10qp 17:56, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

The article mentions ruins in the École des Beaux-Arts (disambiguation page), but the phrasing of the sentence means is sounds like this is in Corsica. Do you actually mean the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts (the one in Paris)? Carcharoth 17:16, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

I always use the serial comma to avoid this problem. But this is a quote, so I was stuck with Thomson's punctuation. I've got round it now by inserting [Paris] in square brackets at the point of miscue. qp10qp 17:56, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
Fair enough. It would have been nice to link to the article École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts, but being in a quote makes it difficult. I'm unclear as to when and how these fragments ended up there, let alone in Corsica! That might make an interesting story. I notice that you said (at the peer review) that architecture is not really your thing - it is not relly mine either, so please do make sure you get an architecture buff to check the article - the linking to architectural terms seems OK, but there may be more possibilities and subtle errors that are being missed. Carcharoth 05:04, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Exactly, very much so. This is my fear, too. I've really concentrated, though. I've dropped a line to the Architecture project's talk page, but it's not very active.
There is a mention in one note of the fact that the Pozzo di Borgo brothers bought parts of the ruins and rebuilt them in Corsica. What happened was that after the communards burned down the Tuileries, the ruins stood there for a decade, until the authorities decided to have them pulled down and sold off. Some of these bits were re-erected elsewhere, such as at the Ecole and in Corsica. (In fact, the chateau in Corsica, in my opinion, gives the best insight into what the de l'Orme wing looked like, but I can't find a free picture of it.) The reason why they survived was that the artists and architects of the time accused the authorities of republican cultural vandalism (the building was burnt out but structurally sound and could have been restored), and so there was an effort to save the best bits, of which the prime ones were de l'Orme's. qp10qp 14:17, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
I hope you don't mind, but I'm going to point this article out to User:Giano II. He does good work on architecture articles, so hopefully he will be able to advise. Carcharoth 00:29, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Polish Crown

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)

Ah well, I see he left them the Henrician Articles at least. Carcharoth 17:43, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
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)
Huh? That's more scandalous than James I! :-) Carcharoth 18:13, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
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)

[edit] Rebuilding the Tuileries Palace

Do you think it is worth mentioning the plans to rebuild the Tuileries Palace? Carcharoth 17:12, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

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)

Tsk! You are advertising your work... :-) That was an interesting article. What I like about reading around articles that you edit is that you take care to fill out the articles that link to and from each other. So much more satisfying than ending up at a stub that doesn't really lead the reader on from the original article. Carcharoth 17:29, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

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)

[edit] Strange glitch

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)

Well spotted. It was among the cats. Sorted. qp10qp 17:51, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Bourses

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)

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)
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)
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)

[edit] End of article

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)

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)
I've added a note about the plague of 1565, since Catherine commissioned a study of it. qp10qp 17:52, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Title of article

One other thing, before the promised new section - the title strikes me as being slightly forced in its description of the topic of the article. Is "building projects" the best way to describe this, or could there be a better way to phrase this? "Catherine de' Medici's architectural patronage" might be too verbose. I wonder how other articles have tackled this. Do we have articles on other architects or patrons of the arts, focusing on their building works? From the category I just added to the article (Category:Architectural history), we have: Merovingian art and architecture, European medieval architecture in North America, but nothing really focused on a person like this article. It sounds from the title like this article is a biographical subpage of Catherine de' Medici (and it is indeed linked from a section of that article), but it also feels like an article on 16th-century French architecture. It should probably go in Category:Renaissance architecture somewhere as well. For now, I've put it in Category:Renaissance architecture by country, in the hope that someone will start a French subcategory there. Carcharoth 05:20, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

You're absolutely right that the title sounds like a subpage of Catherine de' Medici. And if it's forced, it's because I felt that if I called it Catherine de' Medici's architectural projects, someone might come along and kick out the sculpture parts (though those who understand this aspect know that sculpture designed as part of a building does count as an element of architecture). The trouble is that the Valois chapel was never built, so we have instead the tomb and some statues. But they were part of the project.
In terms of links between articles, though, I would call this a main rather than a sub-article. It is a main article, of which there will be a summary in the Catherine article. Note that this article is being written before the summary: obvious way to do it, I know, but I've only grasped the principle recently. Once it is shipshape, I will then add a summary of it to the other article. Often people seem to go round the other way and simply offload information into daughter articles, as I confess I did with James. It doesn't really work, though, because the daughter articles are rarely worked on as independent articles in their own right. The other thing I would say is that Wikipedia is by its nature a set of linked articles that overlap and partake of each other (when I do an article on Catherine and the arts, there will be an architecture section in that too). None is intrinsically more important than another, in my opinion. With so many links, it is inevitable that some titles will seem a little lame. But this is Wikipedia's prerogative, I think. It's not paper, as the saying goes. It's a new form, where anything can be an article, so long as there are sources for it. qp10qp 02:15, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Geographical and historical context

As promised, a listing of some of the points in the article that could maybe benefit from additional historical and geographical context for those less familiar with the history and geography. In most cases, they can find this information in other articles, but that can get tiresome. It's up to you really what balance you want to strike (if you feel the flow of the article would be disrupted by trying to incorporate all these changes, don't worry), but these are the bits where I found myself running off to check dates and locations:

  • "Valois chapel, the Tuileries palace, the Hôtel de la Reine, and extensions to the chateau of Chenonceau" - is it clear that these are in France? Probably best to get a mention of France in the lead, before Italy, otherwise people may get confused.
The first sentence, though at the cost of becoming weighed down, I fear, now says where those projects were located.qp10qp 18:07, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
  • The lead section currently repeats the stuff about who she married and the King Francis bit, so a little rewrite is probably needed there. Also, despite the request that the title be bolded in the lead, this is not essential for descriptive titles like this. See WP:LEAD and the discussion of the example of Electrical characteristics of a dynamic loudspeaker. I have a few ideas on how to start off the first sentence, but nothing wonderful yet. Mainly trying to get France, Renaissance and 16th century in there up front. What do you think?
I'm not a great fan of stuffing the first sentence, but it seems to be a Wikipedia obligation. I agree with you that repeating the title in the first sentence seems unnecessary in cases like this. But I don't like to go against Sandy, who is somewhat oracular on these things.
I've addressed the repetition. Cheers. qp10qp 18:50, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Overall, the lead concentrates too much on introducing Catherine, and switches around in time too much. First talking about the "age of CdeM" and then switching back to her early period while observing Francis's projects. Only the last paragraph really covers details of what she did - I'd say two whole paragraphs in the lead should cover this, and the first paragraph cover the background.
Addressed. And down to three paragraphs now.qp10qp 19:01, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
  • First section - is it possible to mention Italy earlier and bring in the date earlier than the 1533 mention in the second paragraph? Also, with the first mention of Francis I, is it possible to mention that we are now talking about France, and in particular that he is the French king? I know this is covered in the lead, but I always feel that the article should be as independent from the lead as possible. For example, the marriage of Catherine and Henry should be mentioned in this introductory section, but in a different way from the lead section, if you know what I mean.
Addressed. I've peppered in some dates and places to locate the readers better. qp10qp 19:33, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Geographical context - I think (haven't checked) that most of the chateaux are either in (or near) Paris, or in the Loire Valley. Is it possible to make this distinction in the article?
All her schemes were in and around Paris, except Chenonceau; I've added geographical tags to most places now.qp10qp 20:42, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
  • "After moving to Rome" - do we know the year? 1530? Also, "moving" doesn't really cover why she left Florence! That was rather a traumatic time for her, I see.
Added the year. I've decided not to add why she left Florence, as I'm trying to follow your other suggestion not to over-introduce her. I'm taking the line that her childhood is only really significant for this article insofar as it was Medici and Italian, because of the Florentine and Italian influences on her building schemes.qp10qp 20:42, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
  • "Artemisia, who had built the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus" - it might be worth making clear in the main text of the article that this is a deep reference back to antiquity, and one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. I know the footnote mentions it, but it would be nice to make sure people don't miss this.
Done. qp10qp 20:54, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
  • One idea, to set the geographical context, would be to see if you can find someone willing to do an outline map of France, with all the locations you mention marked on it? And for the historical context, some sort of graphical timeline?
See comments on the peer review page. I might leave the map for the biographical article, as that covers events in most parts of France rather than the smaller area covered in this article.qp10qp 20:54, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Stuff like "Work on the chapel began in 1563 and continued over the next two decades" is perfect. Earlier, you say "In memory of Henry II, Catherine decided to add a new chapel to the basilica of Saint Denis" and "to lead the project she chose" - Henry died in 1559 - do we have a date for when the decision was made and when the architect was chosen? Obviously this is not essential - as I said, the 1563 date is enough.
All the sources together say that work began in 1563 and nothing else. I can't add anything, therefore. But I wish I could find some back up for a theory I've got. You see, de l'Orme was sacked as head of royal architecture in 1559 and sent into disgrace, to be replaced by Primaticcio (I suspect Primaticccio backstabbed de l'Orme). The next we hear, Primaticcio is in charge of the Valois chapel. Catherine later brings de l'Orme back, and he works on the Tuileries. Since there is no record of Primaticcio working on the Tuileries, which he should have been doing as chief architect, and since there is no record of de l'Orme working on the Valois chapel, which he should have been doing as the best architect (Primaticcio was really a painter-stuccoist), was there some kind of architectural soap opera going on, with Catherine juggling the egos of two primadonnas? (We know that during this time, de l'Orme killed two men in a brawl, but Zerner says that this was an unrelated matter.) qp10qp 22:41, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
  • The "Tuileries" section is a bit skimpy on dates. Could the article also make clear this is in Paris? "To design the new palace, Catherine brought back Philibert de l'Orme from disgrace. This arrogant genius had been sacked as surintendant of royal buildings at the end of Henry II's reign..." so obviously this took place at some point after 1559, and he died in 1570, so when did construction work start at Tuileries? You also mention that construction was finished later, in the reign of another monarch. I put in regnal dates, but dates for the later construction would be better.
I've made clear that the Tuileries was in Paris. The work under Henry IV took place at several different times: the petite galerie was finished and the grand galerie added, and new wings were added to the main palace, plus a section joined Bullant's pavilion to the grand galerie. It's so piecemeal that I don't think it's worth going into superficially. I've added the date when Catherine decided to build the Tuileries and chose de l'Orme to plan it: 1563, presumably when he came back from disgrace. I've done my best to add to dating of the Tuileries. I've mentioned that two years after de l'Orme died in 1570, work stopped on his design, and also that we know Catherine had decided on the link between the Louvre and the Tuileries—not in de l'Orme's plans—by 1576 (because this was when du Cerceau published his first volume of Les plus excellents bastiments). But I'm struggling; you'd be surprised how fugitive all this is. A lot is unknown. qp10qp 23:27, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
  • "the palace of Saint-Maur-des-Fossés, to the south-east of Paris" - nice bit of geographical context there. No date for when the work started, though, or indeed when Catherine bought the building (forgive me if this is just not known).
The sources don't tell me. I've added that du Bellay died in 1560. One can perhaps guess the rest: if de l'Orme came back from disgrace in 1563, one assumes that he worked on Saint Maur some time between then and his death in 1570. And we know that Bullant (or another architect unknown) took over in 1575, changing the design, but that Bullant died in 1578. qp10qp 23:53, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Hôtel de la Reine - do you know why it was demolished in the 1760s?
For a speculative building development. I just thought that was too boring to mention. I mean, what's new? (Heritier calls it an act of vandalism by the municipal authorities.) I might add this in a note. qp10qp 00:07, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
  • "She lavished vast sums on the chateau" - can you say, or give an idea, how much?
I can't find a figure. There are general figures for her expenditure on buildings overall per year—for example, in 1581, she spent 10,027 écus on building projects—but I haven't included that sort of information because I haven't a clue how much an écu was worth. qp10qp 00:07, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Do you know the date of the Ronsard poem?
About 1573. I've added that to the note. qp10qp 00:40, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

I'm off to suggest some history of science topics for you to work on! :-) Carcharoth 06:42, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Some excellent suggestions. Invaluable. I'm going to get to them in a few days, because I'm embarked on a mother-and-father of a copyedit and review of John Knox at the moment that I will never get done unless I stick at it. I'll drop you a line when I address all this stuff. qp10qp 14:27, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for those responses and changes. The lead in particular reads much better now. Just one thing - could you check the sentence and source I added at the end of the Montceaux section? I wonder if that paper has any scraps of information you could add to this article? The Montceaux section is a bit short... A drawing of the place would be great as well, but that might be too much to hope for. Hope the John Knox editing went well. Carcharoth 01:42, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Don't mention John Knox. Took me a week, and I'm now four years older. Catherine's more my cup of tea, a give-the-cat-another-goldfish sort. As opposed to the dancing-is-harlotry sort that Knox was (shudders). 03:43, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Mistake

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)

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)