"Cardinal Richelieu"

[magistairs]

So in the last Tinto Flavour about France, we saw that the cardinal of Richelieu is named "Cardinal Richelieu" in-game.

I don't think it's right, his name is Armand Jean du Plessis, fine, and the nobility title he acquired was Cardinal of Richelieu (Cardinal in the place called Richelieu)

Then Duke, so officially, in France, his full name with titles is Armand Jean du Plessis, Cardinal-Duc de Richelieu (and he's still known by that name)

So I think he should be named Cardinal de Richelieu or Cardinal of Richelieu, wether we use the French endonym or we just translate to english, but certainly not "Cardinal Richelieu"

It's like saying "Phillipe VI de Valois, King France" instead of "King of France".

But Pavia said "Cardinal Richelieu" is more recognized in English:
Post in thread 'Tinto Flavour #30 - 4th of July 2025 - France' https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...4th-of-july-2025-france.1827693/post-30578482

What is your opinion?

 

[Eluchil404]

I only know him as Cardinal Richelieu, a well known villain from history and fiction. To me it's no stranger than calling 'Charles the Great' Charlemagne--perhaps not technically correct but certainly standard in popular history, school texts, etc.

 

[magistairs]

I only know him as Cardinal Richelieu, a well known villain from history and fiction. To me it's no stranger than calling 'Charles the Great' Charlemagne--perhaps not technically correct but certainly standard in popular history, school texts, etc.

Alright but not in France and the devs apparently chose to use endonyms for French characters, so it's a bit weird to have one exception.

Honestly it just sounds bad in French because Richelieu is not a name but a place.

What is your mother tongue?

 

[Thrudgelmir2333]

We will compromise. He shall henceforth be known as "Villain from Musketeers".

 

[magistairs]

We will compromise. He shall henceforth be known as "Villain from Musketeers".

Good point since in The 3 musketeers he's always called Cardinal de Richelieu

 

[Eluchil404]

Alright but not in France and the devs apparently chose to use endonyms for French characters, so it's a bit weird to have one exception.

Honestly it just sounds bad in French because Richelieu is not a name but a place.

What is your mother tongue?

I am a native English speaker from the US, who has never studied or used French (I formally studied Latin, Ancient Greek, and Italian and have used Spanish in work and life). My understanding was that the game's UI and flavor text was written in American English, so I think it make's sense to use the common American name in text, but not necessarily in the "name" field if those are localized based on a characters culture.

 

[magistairs]

I am a native English speaker from the US, who has never studied or used French (I formally studied Latin, Ancient Greek, and Italian and have used Spanish in work and life). My understanding was that the game's UI and flavor text was written in American English, so I think it make's sense to use the common American name in text, but not necessarily in the "name" field if those are localized based on a characters culture.

That is indeed about what the devs choose to translate or not, which is unclear based on the examples we have because "de Valois" "du Guesclin", "de Coucy" are house/family names, based on places but not linked to a title (Philippe VI is not Duke or Count of Valois, du Guesclin is not Duke of Guesclin)

While the Cardinal's family name is "du Plessis" and he acquired the title of Cardinal later

What is sure is that saying "Cardinal Richelieu" is like saying "Duke Burgundy", "Count Blois", "Archbishop Triest", etc... it doesn't make much sense

So it's fine if it's in English "Cardinal of Richelieu", at least it makes sense

 

[Aquila SPQR]

We will compromise. He shall henceforth be known as "Villain from Musketeers".

To be fair that's the only reason I know of him.

 

[A Pink Duck]

So it's fine if it's in English "Cardinal of Richelieu", at least it makes sense

But the "of" makes it sound weird. And everyone knows "making sense" is pretty low on the English language priorities list.

In any case, "Duke Salisbury" or "Duke York" are perfectly valid ways to refer to a person who holds said title. A hypothetical John Smith could be the Duke of York but would be called Duke York by other people who wanted to refer to him by his title.

 

[Ekyman]

Good point since in The 3 musketeers he's always called Cardinal de Richelieu

Not in English. The devs are using the standard English form (which 99% of people only know from Three Musketeers); arguably using the current form is "translating to English." Whether that form is unique to him or works for other titles doesn't really matter - for him specifically, that's the form typically used in English.

It's more a general question of whether exceptions should be made for people with standard, well-known English names that don't match their endonyms or whether everyone should use endonyms even if it means using less recognizable English names.

 

[AntarcticRanger]

I only know of him from the 1632 books, I never really read or watched three musketeers stuff.

For my two cents as a native monolingual English speaker, the present situation is how I have seen his name, it is the primarily English translation of his name. That said I would not mind it personally if it was changed.

 

[livebythecreed77]

You could have it both ways with his proper name and the introductory text in brackets stating, otherwise known as Cardinal Richelieu, might be a good comprising?

 

[hjarg]

While you're technically correct, most of us have been ruined my Mr. Dumas. So, when you say Arnand du Plessis, most of us would go meh?, but when you say Cardinal Richelieu, most of us get their musketeers senses tingling.

It's one of those names that is so deeply entrenched to our culture that it would be as pointless to fight as it would be for me to ask d'Artagnan out for a duel.

 

[MasterPaw]

As long as it's Cardinal de Richelieu in french, English speaking can keep their weird translations

 

[Sirbab]

I only know of him from the 1632 books, I never really read or watched three musketeers stuff.

For my two cents as a native monolingual English speaker, the present situation is how I have seen his name, it is the primarily English translation of his name. That said I would not mind it personally if it was changed.

I was going to say I was surprised to find someone else that read those books, took two seconds to think, then realized this is *exactly* the place where one would find another fan of that series lmao.

 

[Nostalgium]

As an avid hater of exceptions to otherwise established use of endonyms, "Cardinal Richelieu" can go on the list next to "Mark Antony". Either he gets his proper French stylings, or we translate everyone's names into English.

 

[P.Quirinius]

I am a native English speaker from the US, who has never studied or used French (I formally studied Latin, Ancient Greek, and Italian and have used Spanish in work and life). My understanding was that the game's UI and flavor text was written in American English, so I think it make's sense to use the common American name in text, but not necessarily in the "name" field if those are localized based on a characters culture.

I wonder how decisive should these habitudes of native English speakers be relevant (unless it comes to hard fixed rules and super weird sounding stuff obviously). My native language is not English so I don't really remember what is the English convention for calling the cardinal, but I always play paradox games in English, because this is the standard language to talk about them. I would not play them in my native language even if the translation was available, honestly, I don't even know if it is available. I would maybe switch to French for playing France or to Italian for playing an Italian nation for flavour reasons, but I never did it. For me naming consistency is relevant, but I absolutely don't care how Richelieu is called in the English translations of Dumas, I would read Dumas in French or my native language, but not in English anyway. I imagine there is quite a few people like me who always play paradox games in English even though it is not their native language.

 

[BrokenSky]

It's like saying "Phillipe VI de Valois, King France" instead of "King of France".

This is actually a completely reasonable, if archaic, way to refer to a Nobleman in english - you see it sometimes in Shakespeare for example.

I agree that 'Cardinal de Richelieu' is probably better for understanding in the modern context though (especially for a game where a lot of people might play in English as their second languauge).

 

[TheDeaconBosco]

Honestly it just sounds bad in French because Richelieu is not a name but a place.

An absolutely staggering amount of surnames come from place names.

Virtually all European noble houses have names derived from their ancestral holding.

 

[Birchinjaro]

I only know him as Cardinal Richelieu, a well known villain from history and fiction. To me it's no stranger than calling 'Charles the Great' Charlemagne--perhaps not technically correct but certainly standard in popular history, school texts, etc.

It's an article they want to add, do they really make that much of a difference?
Is it like with Perry the platypus apparently, remove the hat and it becomes unrecognizable, only instead of a hat it's an article