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Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Italian War of 1542–1546

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 04:36, 22 January 2008.

Italian War of 1542–1546

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This is the result of my first attempt at producing a real article in more than a year; it's slightly shorter than its daughter FA, but I think the narrative presentation is a bit tighter here. The article has been through a MILHIST peer review and A-Class review. Any and all comments will be very appreciated! Kirill 05:15, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comments. I would like to congratulate Kirill on all the excellent work he has put in on this tricky subject. This is a very accurate article (I have carefully fact-checked it), but I have a few reservations about the rather distant way in which the material is presented. Much of the information is "named" rather than elucidated, if I can put it that way. There is a heavy dependence on links to provide background information that might better be placed in the text: this applies particularly to named individuals and to geography. The result sometimes verges on the inaccessible, in my opinion.
  • Take, for example, the following passage, which I will use to show what I mean but which also contains an example of what I would consider good encyclopedic writing:
The French immediately launched a two-front offensive against Charles. In the north, the Duke of Orléans attacked Luxembourg, briefly capturing the city; in the south, a larger army under the Dauphin and Claude d'Annebault unsuccessfully besieged Perpignan. Francis himself was meanwhile dealing with a revolt in La Rochelle. ¶ By this point, relations between Francis and Henry VIII had collapsed. Henry—already angered by the French refusal to pay the various pensions, which were owed to him under the terms of past treaties—was now faced with the potential of French interference in Scotland, where he was entangled in the midst of his "Rough Wooing".
  • We are never told the strategic importance of Luxembourg or Perpignan, nor specifically where they are (Perpignan is an interesting case because one would normally assume that it was French, so explanation is needed). This is the first mention of the Dauphin: the term is not explained, and it cannot be assumed that the reader knows that the Dauphin is the oldest son of the king of France and is called Henri (or Henry). We are told that Francis is dealing with a revolt in La Rochelle but not what about or how that relates to the overall situation. We are told that Henry VIII is entangled in the midst of the "Rough Wooing" but no other information is given about what that is. On the other hand, the pension issue is given a phrase of explanation which puts us nicely in the picture: I much prefer articles to help me unobtrusively in that way rather than expecting me to look everything up.
  • On the naming of individuals, I think a greater fullness and consistency would help. We are given the full titles of Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk, and Charles Brandon, 1st Duke of Suffolk, but then we have the "Earl of Hertford" or the "Earl of Hereford" (that last one bothers me: are they the same guy?). I favour the full name and title or role at first mention: Edward Seymour, Earl of Hertford; Ferrante Gonzaga, Viceroy of Sicily—that sort of thing. This will give the readers more of a chance to get their bearings. On the other hand, I do not believe we should go overboard and enumerate whether people are 1st, 2nd earls, or what have you: history books rarely do this—we have those numbers in article titles only to distinguish an article on one earl of so and so from another earl of the same title.
  • Similarly, with geography: it would be nice to have more markers for places. One has to peer at the map to discover that Vitry is Vitry-le-François: the link only goes to a Vitry disambiguation page; it is somewehat the same with Villefranche, whose link goes to a confusing disambiguation page, though with some difficulty I think I identified it on the right of the illustration at the top of the page: a phrase of explanation would have saved me the search time and eye strain.
    • Fixed Villefranche. Vitry is not, in fact, Vitry-le-François (which was the city as rebuilt by Francis after the war); I'll see if I can find the original name, but I'm fairly certain we don't have an article on the old one anyways. Kirill 04:01, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The following are some places where I feel a phrase or note of explanation would help:

  • who faced a rebellion in the Low Countries. Why? What was the situation?
    • This is perhaps a personal minimalism in my writing style, but I don't think that trying to discuss—even in an over-simplified manner—the complex relationship between Charles and his Burgundian subjects is really within the scope of this article. The matter is tangential to the war itself, in any case. Kirill 04:01, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Charles came to terms with Francis by the Treaty of Crépy in late 1544, but the death of the Duke of Orléans made the treaty moot less than a year afterwards.. This is explained later, but in the lead it is inscrutable, because we have been told neither who the Duke of Orléans is nor that the treaty depended on his proposed marriage.
  • The war arose from the Truce of Nice at the end of the Italian War of 1535–38. But peace arises from a truce, not a war: we need a hint as to why the truce did not hold. (Clearly, it lasted four years before the next war started.)
  • "Rough wooing". A word of explanation is required to show why the French were an issue; the article never tells the reader that Mary, Queen of Scots's mother was French and a protegée of Francis, for example.
  • "Treaty of Madrid". The reader needs to know the background here: the fact that Francis had been imprisoned by Charles and railroaded into this treaty may explain his unwillingness to ratify it. A mention of that background might help a reader grasp the personal history between the two men.
    • I don't know; is it really helpful to go into more detail regarding the entire history between the two? I can certainly add some details about the circumstances, but the meat of the matter—the entire chain of conflicting territorial claims between the two—would require quite a bit of text to cover in any comprehensible manner. Kirill 04:01, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • promised not to declare war. Why did Francis promise not to declare war while Charles was fighting in north Africa?
  • Francis himself was meanwhile dealing with a revolt in La Rochelle. Further to what I said about this above, it might be worth a sentence or two of context: for example, the revolt may have been planned for when Francis would be distracted by the war; it was about increased taxes that related to his need for money for the war; it took place in a spot with a long history of English involvement and therefore was vulnerable to an English intervention.
    • Added an explanation of the cause of the revolt; but its eruption just as the war began was mostly incidental (except in the overall sense that Francis's constant wars necessitated tax reform, which seems too far-reaching of a point to explore in great detail here). Kirill 04:01, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Enghien: worth mentioning that he was a Bourbon and a prince of the blood, with a brief mention of the significance of that? His title in the article disguises him slightly.
    • I'm not sure that it's worth mentioning, considering his status as such played no role in the war beyond the typical presence of the high nobility in command posts. Kirill 04:01, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Nice, Savoy, Piedmont: The article says that Nice is an imperial city. What does that mean? Were Savoy and Piedmont separate or one polity?
  • Ceresole: what is the strategic context? It seems to be mentioned out of the blue.
  • Serravalle: Where is it precisely? Neither the disambiguation page nor the battle article tells me.
    • I don't know, actually. There are at least a half dozen cities in Piedmont and Lombardy by that name, but the only sources that mention the battle don't indicate which of them is meant; all I've been able to determine, at this point, is that the battle was fought at a place called "Serravalle". Kirill 04:01, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Wilhelm of Cleves now openly joined the war and invaded Brabant, and fighting began in Artois and Hainaut.[23] Antoine de Bourbon had captured Lillers in April; by June, d'Annebault had taken Landrecies as well.[24] Francis inexplicably halted his own advance near Rheims; in the meantime, Charles attacked the Duchy of Julich and captured Düren. Very dense, in my opinion: er, who? where? One assumes that the duchy of Julich is something to do with Wilhelm of Cleves, since he is given a combined title higher up the page. I got lost here. And who is Antoine de Bourbon (I know, but someone might wonder)?
  • St Dizier: what is the significance of this town? It says that Charles was prevented from crossing the Marne at Jalons, but a look at the map shows that he would have been on the west of the Marne at St Dizier. The map appears to show that he was following the Marne (to meet up with Henry before moving on Paris?). The article seems to chide Francis for not doing much to stop Charles, but strategically was he doing the right thing by staying back? (Looks it to me, but this is original thought, I admit.) The comment that the French response was "nearly non-existent" seems to clash with the fact that the French prevented Charles crossing the Marne at Jalons.
    • I've tried to clarify this a bit—Charles couldn't move along the far bank of the river due to the French position—but I'm not sure if that's at all apparent from the text. The sources I've used here (Knecht, in particular) don't really consider passive garrisons to be a "response"; but I've reworded that anyways. Kirill 04:01, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Charles had meanwhile reached an understanding with the princes at the Diet of Speyer, and the Electors of Saxony and Brandenburg agreed to join his invasion of France. What was the basis of the understanding, given Charles's religious differences with the rulers of Saxony and Hesse? What did he concede?
    • As with the rebellions in the Low Countries, I don't really think this article is the best place to go into the details of Charles's religious policies in Germany. Kirill 04:01, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • "massive": Henry's army is described as massive—and it was by English standards—but Francis's army is described as 70, 000, and that isn't decribed as massive. (Later we are told that Henry's army was outnumbered.)
    • Hence the "in his various armies" aspect; Francis never managed to assemble his available manpower into a single body. I'm not sure how best to clarify this. Kirill 04:01, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • The treaty had been promoted at the French court by the Queen and the Duchess of Étampes. We need a little more, I feel. Who is this duchess and why is she important (I know, but not all readers will)? Why does the queen want peace: presumably because she is Charles's sister, which we have not been told.
  • The Dauphin's army descended on Montreuil, forcing Norfolk to raise the siege. When was this?
  • An army of more than 30,000 men was assembled in Normandy, and a fleet of some 400 vessels prepared at Le Havre. Why? Were they intending to invade with troops or to use the troops to attack the English in France (or both)? What was the strategy? I lost track of the tactics here. Was the idea for a Scottish invasion in the north and a French one in the south, as with Harald Hardråde and William the Conqueror? (Not a bad idea, either.)
  • the Emperor would relinquish his claim to the Duchy of Burgundy and the King of France would do the same for the Kingdom of Naples, as well as renouncing his claims as suzerain of Flanders and Artois. This is the first we've heard of these dimensions to the war. Is Charles's claim to Burgundy the reason why he attacks Francis in that part of France?
    • See my comment above regarding the details of the territorial claims; I'm not sure how much of this needs to be rehashed in each of the war articles in this series. Kirill 04:01, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That's it for now. Some more bits and pieces tomorrow. qp10qp (talk) 02:11, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've taken the liberty of interleaving my responses with your comments. Thank you very much for the review; it's rare for me to encounter someone who knows enough of this period to comment in such detail! Kirill 04:01, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.
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