Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Siege of Breteuil/archive1

Siege of Breteuil

Featured article candidates/Siege of Breteuil/archive1

Nominator(s): Gog the Mild (talk) 23:53, 10 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It has been 18 months since I nominated an article at FAC. Clearly time to get back to the grindstone. I am working up a couple of start class articles, but scratching around in my sprawling to do section I came across this article, which had made it to A class but then never got its moment here. I have looked it over, tidied it up a little and believe it may be ready. For a few weeks in 1356 the military focus of western Europe was an obscure fortification in Normandy. Then things moved on. I think I have pulled together the most comprehensive article there is on this mildly odd event and how it came to be. As ever, all comments, suggestions and complaints are most welcome. Gog the Mild (talk) 23:53, 10 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

HF

I'll try to take a look at this soon. Hog Farm _Talk 17:33, 11 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Link Black Prince's chevauchée of 1356 in the lead?

D'oh! Thank you. Done.

"was a walled town with a strong citadel, built some 300 years earlier" - is 300 years earlier referring to the town or to the citadel? The phrasing would suggest the citadel, but the dates in the footnote allow for at most 250 years

You are eagle-eyed. Could you check all of my articles please. The citadel, although one has to read the source closely. Now clarified. The footnote was somehow allocated to the wrong town. As soon as I reread it with an open mind I realised what I had done. Now sorted. (Breteuil - was "constructed ... in the middle of the eleventh century".)

"The town was close to falling, as the French had nearly succeeded in driving their mines under its walls." - the town or the citadel?

Not specified. If I had to guess, I think the source means the town but it is not completwly clear so I would prefer to leave it a bit vague in the article.

This seems to conflict a bit with where earlier in the article it is stated that "The town of Pont-Audemer fell to a French force commanded by Robert de Houdetot, but as with Évreux the citadel held out. Houdetot ordered assaults on the citadel, which failed; so he drove mines towards its walls in an attempt to sap them". It seems odd to me to state earlier in the article that the town had fallen, but they were trying to drive mines under the walls of the citadel, but when Lancaster arrives at Pont-Audemer on June 30, the town is only close to falling, and the French are trying to drive mines under the walls of the town. Hog Farm _Talk 23:05, 14 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Oops. So, Sumption, highly reliable IMO, goes into detail about the town falling (p 208) and the citadel still holding (p 220). Fowler, solid if a little dated (1969), is the one I mention above: he can be read as meaning just the citadel, but this is not 100% clear (p 152). Burne is not specific. It would be difficult to invent a more HQ source than Rogers, who has "the relief of the town, for the besiegers had dug mines to within four feet of its outer walls (p 344). So, a flat out disagreement between two HQRSs I have relied on in the two sections. Well spotted you. Looking at the primary sources they in turn rely on I think I see what has happened, but that is OR.

I have tried to reflect this uncertainty in both sections. What do you think? Gog the Mild (talk) 15:26, 15 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Wagner 2006a and 2006b have the same page ranges in the long citations

Too much copy and pasting. Fixed.

There is a citation to "Wagner 2006a p. 20", page 20 is outside of the page range provided for all four Wagner 2006 long citations
There is a citation to Wagner 2006c pp. 142-143, but that is outside the range of pages provided in the long citation for Wagner 2006c (160-164)

You have lost me here HF. Wagner 2006 runs from p 1 to 374. (Plus i to lv at the start *rolly eyes* .) The page ranges given each refer to that of the entry specified. How should I be doing it. (I have used Wagner in this way in at least 20 previous FACS.)

On Wagner - the article is specifically citing 4 chapters from Wagner. The p. 20 and the pp. 142-143 do not fall into any of the page ranges for any of the Wagner chapters currently used. Really the article needs to either just cite Wagner as a single book (assuming he wrote the whole thing) or include long citations to the two chapters that contain p. 20 and pp. 142-143, since those chapters are being cited but never explicitly identified. I think the second option is probably the more elegant one. Hog Farm _Talk 23:05, 14 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, got you. I was feeling lazy/a bit stressed, so have gone for the first option. If on examination you think it really needs the second, let me know.

I think that's it from me. Hog Farm _Talk 03:49, 14 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hi HF and thanks for that. Very on the ball, and some slop from me. All addressed. Note the query re Wagner. Gog the Mild (talk) 22:14, 14 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

A couple replies above - I hope my reasoning on Wagner makes a little more sense now. Hog Farm _Talk 23:05, 14 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hog Farm, thanks for the explanation. Wagner addressed. Does the above do the trick? Gog the Mild (talk) 15:26, 15 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Supporting Hog Farm _Talk 22:14, 16 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Matarisvan

Hi Gog the Mild, saving a place here and will be posting my comments soon. As a drive-by comment, consider adding an inline map to the infobox? Also, is it not known who the leader of the Navarese knights was? Matarisvan (talk) 18:55, 11 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Matarisvan and thanks for taking a look at this. I was about to move the map in "First siege" up to the bottom of the infobox when I wondered what you meant by "inline". Could you elaborate? Thanks. "leader of the Navarese knights", *scratches head*. I don't mention "Knights" anywhere in the text and having just reread it can't see where you might mean for any force of mounted Navarrese men-at-arms. I am probably being slow, but could you help me out? Gog the Mild (talk) 20:38, 11 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hi @Gog the Mild, by inline I meant using the map_type and map_size parameters in the infobox so that the map shows up inside the infobox, and you don't have to move up the image in the First siege section which is ok where it is. About the Navarrese knights thing, I was reading an article on knighs before I commented here so I mixed up knights with garrison. Matarisvan (talk) 22:06, 11 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Cheers.

Map. No prob, just being doing similar for a different article.
Assuming you mean "were reinforced by up to 1,700 men from Navarrese-held fortifications during the following month" then sadly no sources mention local leaders. ORing I am pretty certain will be because they were made up of 100 from this town, 50 from that castle etc, each under "officers" too junior to be mentioned and slotted into the existing "command structure".

Gog the Mild (talk) 22:21, 11 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Map done. If it's not how you had envisaged it, let me know. Gog the Mild (talk) 22:56, 11 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hi @Gog the Mild, resuming my review:

"doubled the yield, to £113,420" and "entire annual income was approximately £30,000": add the inflation adjusted values for both sums?

I would rather not. I used to be an enthusiast, but these days I think it actively misleads a reader. So the £30,000 will come out as a bit under £40,000,000 today. Say the cost of a large luxury yacht or three main battle tanks. But that's not it. We are talking about the total government income of a medium sized nation state and that just doesn't translate (IMO) when you run it through an inflation converter.

"sacked": is the link to Looting necessary?

Woo hoo! Absolutely not in my opinion. But I get so much grief over it. See below in my discussion with Crisco. Link terminated with prejudice.

Link to Clifford J. Rogers on first mention instead of later on?

Bleh! I had managed to link him at first, second and third mentions.

"had not been arrested sent to": "had not been arrested were sent to" may be better?

It is meant in the sense, as Wiktionary has it, of "To dispatch an agent or messenger to convey a message or do an errand. " But as it is confusing I'll tweak it.

"... in central Normandy, was the ...": the comma doesn't seem necessary?

They creep in at night and scatter themselves across my articles. Expunged.

"concerned regarding a possible offensive": "about" may be better than "regarding"? The latter sounds too formal.

We are an encyclopedia. We are meant to sound formal. I am not wedded to "regarding", but "about" seems too informal for the war time deliberations of the highest body of a nation state. I am a bit stumped; we can't use concerning, with respect to just sounds silly to me. It may have to be "that", although I am not enthusiastic. Let me think on't for a while.

Add 9780236308125 as the ISBN for Fowler 1969 per [1]?

Done and hyphenated.

Add the archive URL for Madden 2014?

As it is a. stored by a university and b. never going to be amended my understanding was that it didn't need archiving. (Plus it won't auto archive and it's been a long time since I did one of these "by hand".)

Remove the author link in Rogers 1998?

Done.

Add page numbers for Rogers 2004, since it seems to be a chapter?

Oops. Done.

That's all from me. Cheers Matarisvan (talk) 12:07, 16 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Excellent stuff Matarisvan, all addressed; bar one which I will get back to you on. Gog the Mild (talk) 21:36, 16 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Gog the Mild, can support on prose. Btw, have you considered that you are half done with getting the Edwardian phase of the War to a featured topic? There are 20 FAs and 2 GAs in the campaignbox in this article (provisionally including this one), out of a total of 44, so that's half already done. Also, you should consider nominating the articles in the 1345-1347 subsection in the campaign box for featured topic, since all 10 of them are already FAs. :Matarisvan (talk) 18:44, 17 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for both the thoughtful review and the support Matarisvan, both are appreciated. Re the latter, you'll be thinking of this Wikipedia:Featured topics/Hundred Years' War, 1345–1347 which I am ridiculously proud of. (13 articles, not 10 :-) ) Re the Edwardian Phase campaign box and ditto for the Breton Civil War a glance at my To Do List - scroll right down for a relevant target topic box - shows that I am picking away at it. Sadly they will never all get even to GA: some entries are ridiculously trivial (eg Czadzand, with a mere five ships involved on one side) or too weak on contemporary records (eg Loire Campaign - which I created and added to the CB, so it is my own fault). That said, I hadn't realised I was that close; and there are two further entries - a truce and a treaty - that I am currently working on. I shall think on't, who knows. Gog the Mild (talk) 19:09, 17 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Gog, I hadn't noticed that 1345-1347 was a featured topic. Congratulations! I had asked because the FT list at Wikipedia:MILHIST/SHOW, which I refer to for MILHIST FTs, doesn't list this main topic, though it does list the Crécy and Gascon subtopics. I will add it there, I think other recent FTs are also missing there and I will have to check for them too. Matarisvan (talk) 19:26, 17 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Images are appropriately licensed. Nikkimaria (talk) 05:01, 12 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Support from Crisco

I've added {{nowrap}} to the monarch names, per MOS:NBSP. Please review.

Look good. Thanks.

Meanwhile John II felt the need to stand ready to personally intervene in Normandy if needed. But commitments had been made that a royal army would succour south-west France and so a second army was raised at Bourges and John's third son, the fifteen-year-old John, Count of Poitiers was given nominal command. - Two things: 1) meanwhile generally uses a comma, and 2) it feels awkward to start a sentence with "but". Would it be possible to refactor these sentences?

Not in the style of commaisation I use. And, as I am sure you are aware, there is no grammatical nor stylistic reason why a sentence should not start with but. I note in passing that between GA and ACR this prose has been formally reviewed four times without mention of these. But of course anything can be rewritten if it comes across as awkward. I have had a go, see what you think.

another younger brother of Charles of Navarre - Worth going simply "another younger brother of Charles"?

@Crisco 1492, apologies, I forgot to comment on this. Probably not, in the two preceding paragraphs I introduce and then re-mention a different Charles. I think there is scope for reader confusion if this one is not re-differentiated. Gog the Mild (talk) 12:18, 15 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

St. Vaast la Hougue - I thought the full stop was omitted in BrE?

Oh dear. Several of the sources are in American and they have beguiled me. See a similar complaint from Tim below. Thank you. Fixed.

Is the usage of "Men" in this article compliant with MOS:GNL?

It is.

anyone who it was considered might be worth a ransom. - Would "whom it considered" work better?

My first thought was yes, but that would make 'The English ... took prisoner anyone who it considered might be worth a ransom' which can't be right. I think the present construction may be the least worst.

I'm seeing two links to "looting" in the body; is that much linking necessary?

Not in my opinion. For some reason "sack" attracts reviewer requests for a link. For which there is only the inadequate loot or plunder. Then they want a separate link for "loot". (I probably need to write an article on sacking.) And it is easier to give in than argue over trivia. I would cheerfully remove both links but have settled for expunging the second. I shall refer any complainants to this exchange.

Some time around 20 August he offered the garrison of Breteuil free passage to the Cotentin, a huge bribe and permission to take their valuables and goods, to persuade them to vacate the town. - Did they take the offer?

I have tweaked the wording to clarify. Better?

Overall, quite an easy read. — Chris Woodrich (talk) 21:09, 12 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Crisco 1492, and for the review. Much appreciated. I have addressed all of your comments above. Gog the Mild (talk) 23:04, 14 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, Gog. Happy to support. — Chris Woodrich (talk) 04:02, 15 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from Tim riley

Not much from me. There are a couple of points I wouldn't mind a little more detail on, but the article seems to me eminently suitable for elevation to FA, and I'll be supporting. Meanwhile:

Background

"Do we know how the English got from "financially exhausted" in 1346 to "an unusually favourable financial position" in 1355?

It is nine years Tim. Anything can happen in nine years. Note the use of the word "unusually". I am loath to get into nine years of profit and loss accounts, including references to the Black Death (1346-48), a truce which was repeatedly extended and which I have already milked a full FA out of, a major change in how the customs duty on wool exports was collected (which may be worth another article) and goodness knows what else. You will be the death of me. I have stuck in a footnote on what the sources written by wannabe cost accountants more or less agree was the proximate cause. What do you think. It probably needs fine tuning, so feel free to suggest better wording.

Lovely. Most informative. Tim riley talk 00:45, 15 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

"largely due to lack of money to recruit more men – in AmE "due to" is accepted as a compound preposition on a par with "owing to", but in BrE it is not universally so regarded. "Owing to" or, better, "because of" is safer.

I know. You keep telling me so. I even have it on my pre-nom checklist. I have no idea how it got through, but it has now been expunged.

First siege

"Normandy as Count of Évreux and Charles took personal command" – I had to read this three times before I got the gist. I kept reading "as" as meaning "when" rather than "in the capacity of" and Évreux and Charles taking personal command. If you replace the "and" with a semicolon or full stop I think all will be immediately clear.

Yes, it is messy. Broken into two sentences and mildly reworked. Thank you.

Relief

"Attempting a pursuit was clearly hopeless" – it isn't obvious why a pursuit would be hopeless.

Tweaked a little. Does that suffice?

It does indeed. Tim riley talk 00:45, 15 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Second siege

"destruction being wracked in south-west France" – I think you may mean "wreaked"

Actually I didn't. Honest. But I am being too clever for my own good, so changed.

Notes

"one of John's closest advisors" – unclear why the AmE "advisor" rather than the traditional BrE "adviser".

Because two of the main sources are written in American and once I read the AmE version it settles down into the vast empty space between my ears and makes itself at home. Now evicted.

That's my lot. Tim riley talk 12:31, 13 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Many thanks to you Mr riley. Some thoughts and comments in response above. Gog the Mild (talk) 00:27, 15 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Wholly satisfied with Gog's comments, above, and now happy to sign on the dotted line and support the elevation of this article to FA. As the proud recipient of The Queen's Award for Cowardice I am not in the least interested in war or people killing each other, but Gog's articles always hold my attention. Meets all the FA criteria in my view. I hope there will be more in this series. Tim riley talk 00:45, 15 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for those kind words Tim. I am trying to get back in the swing of things and hope to be bringing further accounts of High Medieval derring do here. My cowardice threshold permits me to mildly criticise nasty men who are 600 years dead. Gog the Mild (talk) 12:01, 15 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Borsoka

...in possession of all of their territorial conquests Some more details?
...the inveterately treacherous... I would delete.
Note 2 suggests that Charles the Bad plotted only because he loved plotting and murdered somebody just for fun. Actually, he had a strong claim to France or at least Champagne.
John III?
...another younger brother... Another?
...English King... Why is king capitalised? Borsoka (talk) 02:43, 16 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Ceoil

Hi Ceoil, really good to see you here. Although I fear that I may come across as awkward and unresponsive. If so, apologies, I do not wish to. I appreciated your copy edit, some nice changes to flow and you picked up a couple of howlers. But here there is a reason for each choice of phrasing. I feel that the reasons are good ones, but am of course more than willing to discuss whether any or all of them are good enough - I don't think I am unreasonably wedded to any of the current wording. Gog the Mild (talk) 17:51, 19 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Excellenty written as usual. One gripe form a brief read - the Black Prince is a romantic title, better for a mil-hist article to refer to him as Edward. More gripes to follow. Ceoil (talk) 00:50, 17 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I see no reason to confuse the readers. He is universally known as the Black Prince. Including in every HQ RS I use, and every one I can recall reading. I take your point, but to refer to him throughout as Edward would be similar to referring to Meat Loaf as Aday throughout their article. Honest. (And reference the articles I created, and took through FAC, Black Prince's chevauchée of 1355 and Black Prince's chevauchée of 1356.)

"The French king, John II"; why not just "John II of France"

Well, me and thee might grasp that John II of France is a reference to a king, but I see no harm in helping a reader along. (Rereading, I also think it flows a tad better, but that may just be me.) And it is not always obvious - the next in my queue for FAC features a French John III, who is not a king.

but Lancaster marched away - would replace "marched away" with "retreated" if that is what is intended

I am not sure that it entirely is. Retreated may, or may not, be technically correct, but it has connotations that don't apply here.

At some point in August . Vague....that August

Gone with 'that month', we have told the readers it is August in the previous sentence.

The French army promptly marched south. remove the outdated term promptly

What is outdated about "promptly"? I would want to replace it with a synonym and I am struggling to find a word that so accurately describes what happened. Eg, see this N-gram, the use of Promptly has declined slightly over the past 50 years, but less so than, just for purposes of comparison, the near-synonym "rapidly".

The French were defeated with heavy casualties - suffered heavy casualties and were defeated,

That makes it 'The French suffered heavy casualties and were defeated and John was captured.' and the two and's reads clumsily to me.

Source review

"The Black Prince at War: The Anatomy of a Chevauchée" is a PhD thesis, is it often cited and/or are the people involved reputable historians? Otherwise, didn't notice anything else untoward. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 09:41, 17 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

PhD thesis' tend to cite their sources, so should be easy to dig from there. Ceoil (talk) 09:46, 17 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

True, but academics tend to cite to primary sources, which doesn't much help me. :-) Gog the Mild (talk) 12:32, 17 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Jo-Jo and thanks for the prompt attention. Madden's PhD The Black Prince at War: the anatomy of a Chevauchée was expanded and lightly tweaked to become the well received The Black Prince and the Grande Chevauchée of 1355. So of the three references to Madden I have switched two to the book and the third - a more general point - to a different source. [2] Gog the Mild (talk) 12:32, 17 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

SC

Putting down a marker for now. - SchroCat (talk) 09:42, 17 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Less than a week in and this already has nine reviewers. It is surely going to be the most thoroughly reviewed FAC for some time? Gog the Mild (talk) 12:35, 17 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]