Talk:Guillaume Du Fay

Anachronism: Why is Du Fay (Franco-)Flemish?

To me, it seems an anachronism (and perhaps unintendedly, a Flemish-nationalist claim) to call Du Fay "Flemish" or "Franco-Flemish". Du Fay was from Beersel, at that time part of the Duchy of Brabant (which it would remain to be until the late 18th century). There is a tendency on Wikipedia to attribute identities to historical figures that refer to current identity-marks. Those identity-marks had not only little meaning back then but are often also historically inaccurate. I'd say that's the case with calling Du Fay "Flemish". The County of Flanders was a neighbouring and competing entity of Brabant. It remained so until the late 18th century. Being Flemish referred to being an inhabitant of the Flemish County, being an inhabitant of Brabant meant you were Brabantian. Only in the 19th century did Flemish identity become a concept increasingly used for all Dutch-speaking Catholics. And only in 1970 did Flanders actually become a political entity that covered most of today's Dutch-speaking Belgium. But even today, the differentiation between Flemishness and Brabantness still echoes through many terms. The Province of East-Flanders is still in the east of what used to be the Flemish County, it is not in the east of today's Belgian region of Flanders. Dutch dialects in today's Brabant are still referred to as Brabantian, not as West Flemish or East Flemish. Either way, whatever your contemporary arguments may be to include Du Fay in the Flemish (again, perhaps unintentionally nationalist-Flemish) canon of history, he wasn't considered Flemish in his day. So I wonder why we should do call him Flemish today.--Zeiverklaos (talk) 16:59, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

Your logic is interesting and certainly makes sense. Unfortunately it's inadmissible for the article as we have to call him what reliable sources do. However—to your point—there seems to be inconsistency here as well; Britannica calls him Franco-Flemish, thought Grove calls him French. Since Planchart (the author of the Grove article) is probably the most respected scholar of Dufay in the last 50 years, I'm inclined to take his side; I'll look more at other sources and get back to you... I suspect the original rationale for scholars to call him Franco-Flemish is from the Franco-Flemish School which he is sometimes (rather dubiously) included in. Aza24 (talk) 23:28, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

The problem with much Anglophone academia until, approximately, the 1990s was the nationalist-influenced tendency to attribute current national identity-marks to historical figures and position them in certain national canons. In many of these cases, those historical figures didn’t live in a time when those identity-marks existed and, if they did exist, these terms rarely contained the contemporary meaning (Flemish only recently has come to mean “Dutch-speaking Belgian”). If one doesn’t want to call Du Fay Brabantian (because admittedly few Anglophone readers would understand what this means), one could also go for more general overarching identity-markers that are historically accurate (Lowlandic and Netherlandish were already in use at that time, or one could also simply use Northwestern-European). --Zeiverklaos (talk) 09:10, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

All this talk of identity-markers and political or geographic considerations is missing the point. Du Fay has long been known in musicological circles as Franco-Flemish because of musical style elements. That nomenclature refers to his work, which is surely a reflection of who he was. The word is Franco-Flemish because over the course of his life his music ranged from a more-Flemish orientation reflected in association with the prominent Flemish school, and later became more French (Franco) as his place and position in France became more prominent. There's good historical reason why Britannica says "Franco-Flemish". This is not to say that Grove is inaccurate with "French", only that there is a difference of emphasis there. I won't change the article back, deferring to Planchart, but it really should be noted that this is not some political issue, and it might be worth considering the restoration for greater completeness. There is no "anachronism" involved, just a scholarly preference. Is Wikipedia ever going to return to scholarship? 50.39.226.216 (talk) 17:24, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

IP, Du Fay being the first generation of the Franco-Flemish school doesn't seem to be universally accepted anymore—because his actual physical connection with the Burgundian School (the first generation of FF school) is extremely loose—hence why I put and was associated with the Burgundian School, as well as among the first composers, or at least a predecessor to the Franco-Flemish School in the lead, which I think explains it better than simply calling him "Franco-Flemish". Regardless, this article can certainly discuss the matter in more detail (and note the inconsistencies) at the beginning of the life section or in a later section, though I am still inclined to stick with Planchart for the lead, because I'm not sure if anyone else really has his level of authority. Also not sure how the comment Is Wikipedia ever going to return to scholarship? results in anything productive, considering you have not offered any specific scholarship yourself, but merely anecdotal comments on it. Aza24 (talk) 19:56, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

This discussion doesn't really have a resolution. I'm wondering why Dufay is referred to as a French composer when he never really resided in France in any moment of his life. It seems weird and a better way to refer him to would be Franco-Flemish in my opinion, as this relates to the musical school he was part of. 213.124.169.240 (talk) 18:34, 23 June 2023 (UTC)

I've no adjusted it to match what I did on Josquin's page (i.e "variously described as French or Franco-Flemish"). Again, it doesn't matter where he was born, lived etc. Wikipedia is a tertiary source and we follow what secondary sources say, but they seem to be (like they are for Josquin's article) divided in their designation of his nationality. Aza24 (talk) 19:35, 23 June 2023 (UTC)

It seems to me that Wikipedia is following in many cases other tertiary sources, which makes one wonder about the added value. Having said that, I also disagree with what you just wrote: '...who is variously described as French or Franco-Flemish'. Firstly, you are talking about two different kinds of descriptions (nationality vs. musical style) and secondly Dufay is described as many more things besides French and Franco-Flemish (other examples include Walloon, Burgundian, Netherlandish etc.). Are we going to mention all of that as well? In my opinion 'a Franco-Flemish composer' would be best, because this refers to the style to which he belongs and you're avoiding the problem of nationality. If you want to say something about his nationality, then an extra paragraph could be added in the biographical part of the lemma. The same goes for Josquin. The current 'who is variously described as French or Franco-Flemish' doesn't read well in my view. 213.124.169.240 (talk) 21:20, 23 June 2023 (UTC)

Secondary sources do not generally make declarations of nationalities in such blatant manners, thus we are led to tertiary. The point is, we have to follow what reliable sources say, not what our own logic based on stylistic, geographically and ethnicity-related conclusions (that's called original research). In Josquin's article the discrepancy is explained in note #2.

And yes!—We will expand on this issue in the article, whenever I (or someone else) gets around to it. Aza24 (talk) 23:02, 23 June 2023 (UTC)

What makes you think I'm not following reliable sources? And I actually know plenty of monographs who do make declarations of nationalities. But apart from that, I am not necessarily against using tertiary sources, but apparently you're not against it anymore as well ('and we follow what secondary sources say' is what you said yesterday).

Having said that, you still haven't answered my question: are we going to mention all of the possible nationalities of Dufay? This seems slightly absurd. The current sentence: "variously described as French or Franco-Flemish" is really weird in my view. A better version would be: 'a Franco-Flemish composer from the Early-Renaissance'). 213.124.169.240 (talk) 21:41, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

IP nonsense

IP, the fact that you have neither heard of Planchart, do not have access to Grove music online and are continuously edit-warring, makes it difficult to take anything you say about a Renaissance composer seriously. You arguments are complete WP:OR, in that you are using no reliable secondary sources to support them, this a tertiary encyclopedia. You reference the 'Verifiability' page, but this page literally says Do not reject reliable sources just because they are difficult or costly to access. Some reliable sources are not easily accessible. For example, an online source may require payment, and a print-only source may be available only through libraries. The Grove article says "(b Beersel, Aug 5, 1397; d Cambrai, Nov 27, 1474). French composer and theorist. He was acknowledged by his contemporaries as the leading composer of his day. He held positions in many of the musical centres of Europe and his music was copied and performed virtually everywhere that polyphony was practised". I do not know why you think it is productive to continously revert something that is supported by reliable sources. On Wikipedia, I don't care where Du Fay was born, I care what sources call him, and here he is called French. Aza24 (talk) 23:16, 8 May 2022 (UTC)

instrumental participation in performance

The claim "instruments were certainly used for some of his secular music, especially for the lower parts; all of his sacred music is vocal. Instruments may have been used to reinforce the voices in actual performance for almost any of his works" is highly contested. It's true that by Dufay's time, this prctice seems to have been more common than previously, but there is still a lot of uncertainty here. You need to mention the alternative view of minimal instrumental contribution voiced most popularly by Christopher Page. 73.7.121.67 (talk) 19:34, 7 July 2022 (UTC)