Talk:Rohese Giffard/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Johannes Schade (talk · contribs) 09:10, 1 June 2022 (UTC)

Welcome Good day User:Ealdgyth: I will be your reviewer for this, the first GA nomination of the article Rohese Giffard. As you know, I am an apprentice-reviewer, much much less experienced than you. Also consider that I have no prior knowledge of the subject. Please tell me when I go wrong. I see the article is rated "Start-Class" at present. The prose is 3142 B (536 words), quite short and sweet. I applied the Rater script to the article, which rated it only "C", with a low confidence of 33%. Nevertheless, I think this article looks very good.

I start a first traverse.

• I'm going to point out the instructions above "So that the review can be kept within a single section, please do not use level 2 headers (==...==) below to break up the review. Use level 3 (===...===), level 4 and so on."

Lead

• Only paragraph, 1st sentence: ...in the late 11th and early 12th century.... - The ODNB says Richard and Rohese had children before 1066, so I would believe she was most likely born in the 1040s. That can hardly be called "late 11th", thus perhaps omit the "late" before the "11th". The web site https://thesignsofthetimes.com.au/33/60077.htm says b. 1134, m. 1054, d 1113 in Colchester. I do not know on what authority.
  • I can only say when she was active. If I was wearing my historian hat, I could say "Because of the dates of birth of her chidren, she was likely born in the 1050s (not 1040s - it was not uncommon for noblewomen to be married at puberty and thus we can only assume that she was perhaps 14 or so at the birth of her first child - Margaret Tudor, mother of Henry VII, gave birth at 13.) So to avoid WP:OR (the bit about her birthday) we can only say when she was active - thus after the Conquest. We don't have mentions of her before that in secondary sources. And that website is a personal family tree .. utterly unreliable. Ealdgyth (talk) 21:33, 1 June 2022 (UTC)

• Only paragraph, 3rd sentence: Rohese was mentioned.... - I suggest "Rohese is mentioned ...". MOS:TENSES prescribes: "Generally, do not use past tense except for past events, subjects that are dead ...".
  • done. Ealdgyth (talk) 21:33, 1 June 2022 (UTC)

Early life

• I expected to be told when and where she was born. The ODNB says Richard and Rohese had children before 1066, so I would believe she was born in Normandy in the 1040s.
  • We do not know that, so saying that without a secondary source that says that ... would be WP:OR. And it could be wrong, as I've pointed out above. If her first child was only born around 1065, she could very well have been born as late as 1052 or 1053. We just don't know. Nor, absent a secondary source, can we say for sure she was born in Normandy - it's possible she was born in Anjou or Maine or even in some other location in France. We just don't know, and we can't speculate ourselves... that's what we need historians for. Ealdgyth (talk) 21:52, 1 June 2022 (UTC)

• Only paragraph, 2nd sentence: Her maternal grandfather was Gerard Fleitel.. - I was astonished to hear of her maternal grandfather, who is never mentioned again. I then realised that his name stands in for the name of her mother, which is not given here, but the article Walter Giffard, 1st Earl of Buckingham and the French article "Gautier Ier Giffard" calls her "Ermengarde".
  • I do not have access to the source cited in Walter's article - so I cannot judge the reliablity of it - but I'll point out that none of the authoritative sources in English give the name Ermengarde for her mother - If Keats-Rohan had any idea of Rohese's mother's name, she would have said it in Rohese's entry. Frankly, there's a lot of wild speculation out there about medieval genealogy - and it's very easy to be led astray. Ealdgyth (talk) 21:52, 1 June 2022 (UTC)
    • We do not need the Europäische Stammtafeln for this. Cokayne (1912), page 386 (https://archive.org/details/completepeerageo02coka/page/386/), gives "Ermengarde" as the name of the mother of Walter Giffard, 1st Earl of Buckingham. The 1st Earl of Buckingham was Rohese's brother, hence Ermengard is Rohese's mother. Cokayne describes her as "Ermengarde, sister of William, Bishop of Evreux, da. of Gerald Flaitel...". Don't you agree?
      • Uh. No. We cannot assume that Walter and Rohese were full siblings. The sources do not allow us to assume that. That's pure WP:OR. We need a source that explicitly states that Rohese's mother was Ermengarde, not one that says her brother's mother was Ermengarde so that we can assume that Rohese's mother was also Ermengarde. It's that "assume" that we cannot do. Ealdgyth (talk) 16:49, 2 June 2022 (UTC)
      • As further evidence - in Richard's entry in the CP (vol. III p. 242) the marriage is discussed "He m. Rohese, da. of Walter Giffard, the elder, through which match his descendants became co-heirs to the lands of that family." We just don't have sources that state that Ermengarde is Rohese's mother - yes, as a historian, it's LIKELY but it's not something we can say in wikipedia without violating WP:OR. Ealdgyth (talk) 17:02, 2 June 2022 (UTC)

• Only paragraph, 3rd sentence: Walter Giffard was the lord of Longueville-sur-Scie in upper Normandy. - His title did not include the "-sur-Scie". This does not tell the reader anything relevant as Longueville-sur-Scie is not an important place and the reader will not realise the important role of the County of Longueville. Should he not be told that her father fought at the Battle of Hastings? That name is not even mentioned in the article. According to the French article about him he contributed 30 ships and a 100 knights. Link Upper Normandy, the reader may not know what "upper" and "lower" means regarding Normandy.
  • We don't mention Hastings because she again, none of the secondary sources for her bring up Hastings in relation to her life. That is likely (putting on my historians hat again) because she was already married by the time of Hastings, and so any importance it would have had to her was due to her husband's situation, not her father's. As for "his title did not include "sur-Scie" ... well ... titles in this period are pretty much fluid. Mortimer's bio of Richard in the ODNB says "Richard de Clare married Rohese or Rohais, daughter of Walter Giffard, lord of Longueville-sur-Scie (Seine-Maritime)" So obviously some historians use that in his title... I've linked Upper Normandy. Ealdgyth (talk) 21:52, 1 June 2022 (UTC)
    • You are of course right. However, I believe Hastings should be mentioned somewhere in the article, even if only her father and not her husband and she herself were there (if I understnad you right). To a reader like me this is about the only reference point in older English history that I have heard about. The outcome of Hastings did change her life.
      • We can "know" that Hastings changed her life, but none of the secondary sources say that... so we can't say that here on wikipedia. I can mention that whether her husband fought at Hastings is unknow, but that strikes me as very coatracky - and we already struggle with that problem in the article - we should avoid just adding something about her husband or father (that's already in their respective articles) because someone thinks it belongs even though the secondary sources do not discuss Hastings in regards to Rohese's life. If you insist, I can put it in, but it's something I do think is a bit of a coatrack here. Ealdgyth (talk) 16:46, 2 June 2022 (UTC)
        • I do not insist. I just realised that you say in the lead "wife of another Norman noble, Richard fitzGilbert, who took part in the Norman Conquest of England". This, her husband's participation in the conquest, is not elaborated upon in the body.
          • I've rearranged slightly - removing the bit about the Conquest in the lead, but making the body a bit clearer. Ealdgyth (talk) 13:24, 3 June 2022 (UTC)

Marriage

• I would call this section "Marriage and children" as the children are discussed in detail and rightly so.
  • Done. Ealdgyth (talk) 22:09, 1 June 2022 (UTC)

• 1st paragraph, 1st sentence: Giffard was the wife of Richard fitz Gilbert, the son of Gilbert, Count of Brionne. - Would not "married" be simpler than "was the wife of"? I would expect here as well a date and a place if it is possible to give it, thus: "Before 1066 Giffard married Richard fitz Gilbert...". The reader, like me, has probably never heard of Brionne.
  • My source has "married" so "was the wife" is avoiding too close paraphrasing. And that source does not give a date. I've added the "before 1066" after this bit, with the correct source. Ealdgyth (talk) 22:09, 1 June 2022 (UTC)

• 1st paragraph, 3rd and last sentence: Their children were Roger, Gilbert, Walter, Robert, Richard,[4] Godfrey,[2] Rohese (or Rohais), and Adelisa. - I would separate the girls from the boys in two sentences or lists to make it clear that birth order is among boys and then among girls but all girls are listed after all boys. There is of course a lot of overlap in the treatment of the children between this article and that of her husband Richard fitz Gilbert. The lists differ. Her husband's article lists two additional daughters. With the creation of separate articles about the wifes of men that already have articles, this problem becomes more and more frequent. How should this be handled? Should the list of children be repeated and contradictions tolerated? Or should the children be only listed in one of the two articles, probably the wike's and the husbands article should refer to it in some form?
  • Those two "extra" daughters are likely spurious. One is sourced to Dugdale - that's William Dugdale who died in 1686. While he's amazing for the records he collected, his actual ability to separate spurious genalogical information from real information is quite suspect, and he's outdated. The other source for that daughter to "Falconer Madan M.A. - The Gresleys of Drakelow, Toeni pedigree page 223 and Chapter 2, page 16 (Oxford, 1899)" - which is likely a family geneaology from the late Victorian era, when it was very fashionable to "find" links to famous medieval people, most of which links didn't actually exist. Not reliable as a source. I'm not sure where the heck the Isabel comes from .. Keats-Rohan does not name a wife for him on page 275 of Domesday People nor is an "Isabel" listed in that work as a daughter of Rohese and Richard who married a Humphrey. Eventually I'll get to the rest of the Clares and will sort that out also. I'll note that Richard's ODNB article says "They seem to have had six sons and two daughters", which matches our article on Rohese. I only ever worry about the article I'm working on... if I fretted about the linked articles, I'd never get anything done. And we're not sure of the birth order at all - I've just listed the children in the order Keats-Rohan did, while inserting Godfrey which Mortimer includes but Keats-Rohan doesn't (likely because he didn't do anything and her listing is of what the children did, which I've condensed down). Mortimer just says "Concerning a further son, Godfrey, nothing is known except that he was buried in the cemetery at Clare." ... so thus that's why he isn't mentioned in Keats-Rohan, who tends to list only charter evidence. Ealdgyth (talk) 22:09, 1 June 2022 (UTC)

• 2nd paragraph, 5th sentence: A daughter of Richard, who is unnamed, is said... - Which Richard is this, the father or the son? The father should probably be called "fitz Gilbert" or "her husband".
  • Added "fitz Gilbert" Ealdgyth (talk) 22:09, 1 June 2022 (UTC)

Landowner

• Give us the names of the lands she owned rightaway at the beginning of the section. It seems she owned Eynesbury in Cambridgeshire and Standon, Hertfordshire [1]. Tell us also when the book was written or the survey was made so that we can understand which state is reflected.
  • I didn't add the exact locations because the secondary sources I'm using don't state them. I've added in 1086.
    • I still believe you should add them. There are only two of them. You mention Eynesbury later on. Do you feel that you are not allowed to cite the Domesday Book directly because it is a primary source?
      • I don't mention it because I rely on secondary sources. Partly its because I AM trained as a medievalist, so if I don't look/touch primary sources, I won't be tempted to stray into actually doing the historian's job instead of the encyclopedist's job. And partly because we should be relying on secondary sources to give some idea of the weight of information that we should include. Eynsbury is mentioned in connection with events later by secondary sources - so it's fine to include. The other property is not mentioned by secondary sources... so I don't see what the name adds to the article. Ealdgyth (talk) 16:52, 2 June 2022 (UTC)
      • As a further note - we don't list all of Richard's properties (either here or in his article) so why should we list all of Rohese's? Ealdgyth (talk) 16:55, 2 June 2022 (UTC)
        • Richard is not our subject. I thought that giving the names of the only two properties that Domesday mentions for Rohese would be a good introductory sentence for the Landowner section of Roheses' article. In the 2nd sentence you mention "these properties" as if you had named them before. You mention Robert son of Wimac and Archbishop Stigand; was he the previous owner of both these properties of only one (which?) of them?
          • I don't see what it gains us and I'm leery of it since the secondary sources don't consider the names important. Ealdgyth (talk) 13:24, 3 June 2022 (UTC)

• 2nd paragraph, 1st sentence: Richard died between 1085 and 1087, as his son Gilbert... - I suppose this Richard is her husband fitz Gilbert. Does not the MOS tell us not to call people by their first name outside of the family context?
  • fitz Gilbert is not his surname. It's a ... patronymic and not a last name, although it can be used that way often. The MOS does not deal well with medieval naming practices - which reuse the same name for multiple people and where surnames aren't yet really in use. I'll throw a

• 2nd paragraph, 2nd sentence: Rohese survived him and was still alive in 1113... - I suppose the subject of the article and not her daughter. You called her Giffard at the beginning but now she is married. What should she be called?
  • Rohese here. Her daughter is called "Rohais" in this article for a reason - and to be honest, a lot of names are very fluid in this period - they probably had one they used, but the people recording them had .. varied ... spelling, and often how they chose to Latinize a Norman French name varies between documents. I settled on "Rohais" for the daughter and "Rohese" for the mother. LIkewise, I prefer to IAR on the MOS for this period, as strictly speaking "Giffard" isn't a surname either - she likely would never have used "Giffard" at all - folks during her life would have likely said "Rohese daughter of Walter" until her marriage, and then she was "Rohese wife of Richard fitz Gilbert" (which indeed is how her entry in Keats-Rohan is done - "Rohais Uxor Richardi Filii Gilberti" is how she's called there - but that's Latin so ...) and then after she became a widow, it'd have been "Rohese widow of Richard fitz Gilbert". Hell, medievalists can't even decide if it's "fitz Gilbert" "fitzGilbert" or "FitzGilbert"! Our MOS just can't deal with this... Ealdgyth (talk) 22:18, 1 June 2022 (UTC)

Best regards, Johannes Schade (talk) 20:47, 1 June 2022 (UTC)

Dear Ealdgyth, thanks for all your intelligent and patient explanations. I apologise for quite a few hair-raising misspellings in my comments. I understand what you say about medieval names. What matters is that the readers can find their ways through the article. I had not picked up that you use Rohese for the biographical subject and Rohais for the daughter. Perhaps you need to make this explicit in an aside. I find also that calling her Giffard does not pass very well. She never was Mrs. Giffard. As you say IAR. Calling her Rohese all through is probably the most satisfactory.

Please see my comments higher up, especially with regard to Ermengarde.

Landowner

• You seem to range the deaths of the protagonists under the title Landowner. I feel the deaths, successions inheritances, the denouement merits its own section even if short. A biography goes from the cradle to the grave.
  • I've changed the heading to "Landower, death, and legacy" Ealdgyth (talk) 17:12, 2 June 2022 (UTC)

• 2nd paragraph, 1st sentence: Richard fitz Gilbert died between 1085 and 1087, a... - The sentence is not very clear. To which of the two mentioned dates refers "that year"?
  • 1087. Fixed. Ealdgyth (talk) 17:12, 2 June 2022 (UTC)

• 2nd paragraph, 2nd sentence: ... Priory of Bec... - The reader probably does not realise that Bec is over the water, I therefore suggest "Bec, Normandy,".
  • Linked Bec Abbey and added "in Normandy" Ealdgyth (talk) 17:12, 2 June 2022 (UTC)

• 2nd paragraph, 3rd sentence: ... lands of her father ... - The lands of her father are mentioned here for the first time. Should not Rohese inherited something from her father? This is difficult to understand. Elaborate or remove.
  • We don't know if she inherited lands or not. Her brother likely got most of the lands, but after his line died out, the Giffard lands ended up in Rohese's descendants hands - but after her death. We cannot remove this, but there is nothing to elaborate - we have no clue whether she got a few lands on her father's death or if she got something on her marriage or what the situation is. Welcome to Medieval History ... where much remains unknown. Ealdgyth (talk) 17:12, 2 June 2022 (UTC)

• 2nd paragraph, last sentence: ... Richard's father, King ... - Have we ever heard of this before? A surprising fact introduced in extremis? elaborate or remove.
  • I've inserted dates to make it clear this is well past Rohese's lifetime. We need a tiny bit here to indicate that her descendants claims to the lands came through her, but not during her lifetime. The details should be in the articles on her descendants (which, someday, I'll get to... but I'm concentrating on the actual Anglo-Norman period mostly - not the Angevin). Ealdgyth (talk) 17:12, 2 June 2022 (UTC)

I think we are almost there. Best regards, Johannes Schade (talk) 08:52, 2 June 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for the new title of the last section. What about Cokayne's citation for Ermengarde? Have you seen? Is it unconvincing? Besides, I wondered about the name Rohese or Rohais and found https://www.behindthename.com/name/rohese, which gives Hrodoheidis as an older form. Silimar to how Adelaide or Alice stem from Adalheidis. Hrodo means Rose like in the Greek Rhododendron. Just chatting. Best regards, Johannes Schade (talk) 08:32, 3 June 2022 (UTC)

I replied above about Ermengarde - I've got the CP and have seen both the Giffard entry and (more importantly) the Clare entry that we use here. I note that Cockayne does not mention Rohese in the bits about the Giffards, and where he does mention Rohese (with her husband) he doesn't mention a mother for her. As I noted above, given that fact, I cannot break WP:OR and combine the two and make a novel conclusion that Rohese and her brother were full siblings and that we can assume that Ermengarde is Rohese's mother. Ealdgyth (talk) 13:24, 3 June 2022 (UTC)

Sorry, I has somehow missed it. I had obviously not thought of this possibility. I will now promote this article. It has been a pleasure. Best regards, Johannes Schade (talk) 15:11, 3 June 2022 (UTC)