[MR] Re: Heraldry - why? (fwd)

[Craig Levin]

Mathilde:

> Thank you to everybody for your candid and helpful responses. The digests are
> coming faster than I can respond to each, so I'll put all of my thoughts in
> one message.
> 
> For starters, I think that the College of Heralds does a fabulous job with both
> the heraldry and the names. It's one of the few areas that we have that has
> good rules and regulations regarding what is period and what is not. Anybody
> who knows me knows that I'm all about having anything that increases the
> period-ness of anybody's impression. :-) 

You give us a lot of credit. I think that while the heralds have
done their part, heralds are, first and foremost, service types-
within the guidelines, we try to give people what they want, so
increased authenticity there is as much the work of the client as
of the herald. 

> > Besides, heraldry is cool.
> 
> :-D Certainly, I'll agree with that. I find it interesting how many people
> are out there encouraging people to get arms registered. I see it as a Good
> Thing (tm), if appropriate for your persona. I'm looking at it from this
> angle, there are a LOT of cool things that people can do to make their game
> more medieval. It'd also be cool if as many people encouraged others to, say,
> wear period shoes, or wear appropriate headwear. A part of me wonders, if I were
> ever princess (I can wax philisophical about it, because that event is *highly*
> unlikely ;-) ), if I would get a LOT of pushback/evil nicknames were I to
> require that entrants and/or consorts had/wore period shoes.

I don't think so, but I'm strange that way. There's a part of me
that says that such a demand might fuel orders from artisans and
requests for classes. Neither of those are bad things.

> >Having heraldry is just a little effort put forth to make the game better. 
> >It's like covering camp chairs near the list field, not wearing blue jeans & 
> >tennis shoes, standing for approaching royalty & allowing ladies to take your 
> >seat when you feet are screaming. 
> 
> > No one is being forced to do this unless you want to play at a higher level.
> 
> Actually, this is the only point which bothers me, somewhat. I find it somewhat
> insulting (? maybe not the right word) that one would think that I'm not
> taking the game seriously, or playing at a "high level", because I have not
> registered arms. I know that most of you don't know me, as since I've moved
> into the kingdom I've been playing lightly, but I have in the past given
> blood, sweat, and tears to this game, and I know many who have that do not have
> or use registered arms. To that end, I think it's valuable to think of the
> term "the Game" as nebulous as the term "the Dream". Both the "game" and the
> "dream" are different for all, and what is taken for a higher level by one,
> might not be considered a higher level by all. 

Very true. I think that registering arms is something that's up
to the individual. That being said, I also figure that one way or
another, people have always had ways of distinguishing one
person's stuff from another, and, in the SCA, we generally use
heraldry for that purpose.

<snip>

> Kwellend-Njal, thank you for your long, well thought-out answer. As I say above,
> I think it a good addition for the appropriate personae. Though the cheeky part
> of me also has to answer this:
> 
> >All that said, can you imagine a Middle Ages without heraldry?  
> 
> Nope, I can't. But *I* also can't imagine it without turnshoes, wool/silk, fur
> linings, and metal armour. ;-) I think it *all* should be encouraged!
> 
> Like I said, I'm feeling cheeky... (usually)

Well, yeah. It's all good. Someday, I'm going to update my
footgear, just like I've updated my note-taking gear (or should I
say outdate and outdated?). Then, I'll move forward (backward?)
on something else.

Pedro