Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Borlet

Borlet

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Single, non-publicly accessible source. Googling to find other sources only results in sites which link back to this same page. No WP:NMUSIC or WP:V Athanelar (talk) 09:01, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: People, Bands and musicians, and Music. Athanelar (talk) 09:01, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of France-related deletion discussions. WCQuidditch ☎ ✎ 10:55, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Minor but notable figure, with highly authoritative source. A web-only search will not produce acceptable results in this area. It should not have been included in Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Artists which is for visual artists only. Johnbod (talk) 12:34, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Can you elaborate a little more as to how it meets our notability standards? Is there really WP:SIGCOV? The very short stub essentially says "We know very little about him, including his name and identity. We can confirm he composed between 1 and 7 compositions." Is this really enough to support a stand-alone article? I'm struggling a bit to see the encyclopedic value of a short stub so devoid of substance. Sergecross73 msg me 13:04, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
We don't normally apply exactly the same standards to medieval and earlier figures as to contemporary ones. The article probably contains everything that is known about him, which obviously is very little indeed. He was considered important enough to be included in the standard reference work, which in itself is probably enough for notability. There are thousands of comparable examples. Johnbod (talk) 13:10, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I understand that its not likely to come across a 2025 New York Timess feature on a subject like this, but I'm also not convinced that mere mentions like that are enough to establish notability in the Wikipedia sense. Are you alluding to some guideline I'm unfamiliar with or something? Sergecross73 msg me 13:22, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
His own entry in the standard encyclopedia on the subject is not a "mere mention"; it's just that next to nothing is known, so the biographies there and here can't be any longer. Johnbod (talk) 18:14, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for the clarification. I'll reword my stance accordingly: I don't believe an entry in a standard encyclopedia is enough to establish any sort of notability standards, particularly when said entry is devoid of any real substance because nothing is known. Sergecross73 msg me 19:23, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think notability is substantiated here. I checked GScholar just now and the mentions for Borlet are essentially all the same as the mentions for Trebor (composer) because they're believed to be the same person. Therefore at the very least I think a merge with Trebor is in order, but given that even the sources I can find for that article are essentially "some compositions exist which are attributed to someone called Trebor" I don't think we have notability in a Wikipedia sense here at all, so I think deleting both Borlet and Trebor (which I've also made an AfD for) makes sense. Athanelar (talk) 15:26, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, this is where I'm leaning too. I could technically see creating a redirect to Trebor, which pretty much already covers the (very little) verifiable information about Borlet, but the argument for Trebor's notability is pretty weak too. There's definitely not enough here for 2 standalone articles, though at least Trebor has verifiable information in it... Sergecross73 msg me 16:15, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not against a merge, but you popular culture types need to understand that notability is not affected by whether there is information online or not. Johnbod (talk) 18:12, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Please don't cast aspersions - no one has asserted sourcing needs to be online thus far in the discussion. That's not the reason you're getting pushback. You're getting pushback because you aren't actually citing or invoking anything. You just keep making WP:VAGUEWAVE WP:ITSNOTABLE WP:ATAs. Sergecross73 msg me 19:20, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Keep: There is the entry in the references section; there are books mentioned in Further Reading. Google Scholar has a considerable number of books with significant coverage on him; they include https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/early-music-history/article/abs/an-episode-in-the-south-ars-subtilior-and-the-patronage-of-french-princes/4F5EA81CC0345A850C971836859832A6 ; https://search.proquest.com/openview/d9810dfdb21e258c9b6bc2f87da5f874/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=18750&diss=y The polyphonic virelai "He tres doulz rossignol" attributed to him is one of the most notable pieces of the genre. Plenty of other sources exist; https://www.persee.fr/doc/caief_0571-5865_1979_num_31_1_1185 and so on. e.ux 20:04, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
WP:SIGCOV necessitates that the sources in question address the subject 'directly and in detail.'

The first source is about how these Medieval French sources have been preserved, and the latter literally says its aim is only to transcribe the unpublished chansons of the Chantilly manuscript.

To my eyes, the only relevance of these sources to Borlet/Trebor are that he is passingly mentioned within them as composer of some of these pieces, which is pretty plainly trivial coverage. The third source you've linked is a French-language source which I'm not equipped to assess.

Could you be more specific about how you feel these sources demonstrate in-depth, specific coverage of the subject? Athanelar (talk) 20:17, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
They analyse his work -stylistically-; some dwell on his possible identification with other musicians -various authors support more or less assertively and with different arguments the Trebor hypothesis. These are no passing mentions, nor trivial coverage, and plenty of other sources exist. But as creator of one of the most notable virelai of the time, he could, one could argue, meet the specific notability guidelines anyway -like Wikipedia:CREATIVE; it may remain a short article -but it is not that short-;- if everyone agrees a redirect and merge to Trebor is better, it might be an acceptable solution too, but things are clearer this way -and fairer- imv; outright deletion would be absolutely inappropriate, I think; coverage on him in various other languages abounds, fwiw- and please also check the information in https://www.lib.latrobe.edu.au/MMDB/composer/COM065.HTM e.ux 20:53, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Also meets WP:COMPOSER..."Appears at reasonable length in standard reference books on their genre of music." e.ux 20:55, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Merge to Trebor (composer). I came to this discussion via Trebor, who I strongly believe is notable: see my comments at that AfD. I think Eva's point on WP:NCOMPOSER carries some merit given the inclusion in Grove, so I'm somewhat opposed to outright deletion. However, from my literature review, Borlet clearly receives much less coverage than his doppelganger. There is also a lot of overlap – they may be the same person after all, and as such the vast majority of potential sources with more substantial coverage speak about Borlet in relation to Trebor. I do note the fairly imposing further reading section but, of the Chantilly scholars that speak of Borlet, Plumley, Brown, Goméz, and Reaney all treat him this way, while Earp and Apel (1 and 2) only give scarce passing mentions. So I end up here offering a middle ground with a merge: not on notability grounds or as an ATD, but per WP:OVERLAP. UpTheOctave! • 8^va? 22:25, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Here's a quote from A Ballade for Mathieu de Foix: Style and Structure in a Composition by Trebor

"On Trebor/Robert/Trebol/Borlet, see especially Maria del Carmen Gomez Muntané, La Música en la casa real catalano-aragonesa durante los años 1336-1432, vol. 1 : "Historia y Documentos" (Barcelona, 1977), pp. 99-101.[1] The Chantilly manuscript attributes only a single realistic virelai to Borlet ("He tres doulz roussignol"), whereas Trebor is assigned six ballades and no virelais.

Since stylistic differences between genres are at least as great as stylistic differences between individual composers, it would be virtually impossible to make a convincing argument that the composer of "He tres doulx roussignol" was or was not the same as the composer of the six ballades on stylistic grounds alone. No music is known to be attributed either to Robert or to Trebol."

So two scholars say Borlet and Trebor are different persons. A merge wouldn't be appropiate. 23:41, 22 October 2025 (UTC)~ — Itzcuauhtli11 (talk) 23:41, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I disagree. As noted above, I took both the Brown and Goméz sources into consideration when drafting my !vote. The justification for my arguement is not identity, as you infer. Most scholarship on Borlet is related to the possibility they were the same person: this shows they are "related subjects that have a large overlap" (WP:OVERLAP), which is enough reason for a merge on its own. Also, you are misreading the sources. Brown claims it would be virtually impossible to make a convincing argument that [Borlet] was or was not the same as [Trebor] (emphasis added). His phrasing leaves open both the possibility that they are connected or are not, which your conclusion incorrectly parses. Thanks, UpTheOctave! • 8^va? 00:05, 23 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed. We don't need hard confirmation on this to warrant a merge or mention there, just that reliable sources cover them together, which they clearly do. The complexity of the situation can be covered in the prose. It'd be pretty easy to cover at the forefront of the article too, considering the lack of content. Even the sloppiest of merges wouldn't escalate the resulting article out of stub status... Sergecross73 msg me 00:34, 23 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Keep This is just clearly a case of consulting Google over subject-matter expertise. Any merging that might arise can and should be handled separately from this discussion on the talk page, based on scholarly consensus. Chubbles (talk) 05:51, 23 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Merge and redirect to Trebor (composer) - basically I agree with UpTheOctave!'s analysis of the sources, and think that readers will be best served by a single article that covers the composer(s) and the scholarship surrounding whether they are the same person or not. Cheers, SunloungerFrog (talk) 08:17, 23 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Merge or Keep?
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, jolielover♥talk 18:52, 29 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Merge with Trebor per previous discussion.

Athanelar (talk) 15:55, 31 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Merge with Trebor (composer): Users UpTheOctave!, Eva UX, Sergecross73 and others have made good arguments about enough scholarly debate (although not enough historical evidence), so I think a deletion is not warranted. i agree that a merge with info on the identity controversy would be much better. — Itzcuauhtli11 (talk) 19:18, 31 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]