Your points about THRONES are well-taken, but I can attest that THE BORGIAS' noisy use of "Zadok the Priest" by Handel in its first episode was nothing like source music, Handel not having been born until 1685. This was just lazy. It seemed to me the series could have used some ACTUAL period feel - and there's great renaissance music to draw on - but no, it was all vaguely imitation Zimmer. And too often the first-rate actors were forced to drag out a few words over several minutes, and to try to make metaphors like "rats deserting a sinking ship" seem newly coined. I wanted to like it so much! It looked like a zillion dollars, but sounded like a buck forty-nine. It was sure better than CAMELOT, though. Sheesh.
