[MR] Peerages and Ceremonies

[richardfitzgilbert at jcsussman.org]

Greetings and Felicitations from Richard Fitzgilbert!

I'd like to add a few thoughts to the wisdom put forward by several others
on the subject of Peerages and Ceremonies.  It should be clear to anyone
reading these posts that a peerage ceremony requires a juggling act on the
parts of the monarchs.  Proper handling of a peerage ceremony is anything
but straight forward.  I hope that these posts can give everyone a glimpse
into some of the difficulties faced by the crowns after negotiating the
complicated nomination/polling/decision making process.

One of the very special things about the Kingdom of Atlantia is that we are
willing to customize our most important ceremonies.  Our oaths of fealty and
our peerage ceremonies are just two examples of ceremonies that we customize
from person to person that are fixed ceremonies in other kingdoms.  There is
no need for us to argue about what kind of ceremony is better, we just need
to remember that the Atlantian way of doing things is to customize things to
fit the preferences of the individual case (within broad parameters).  

But, we should also remember that this puts even more responsibility on the
shoulders of the Crown.  This means that the Crown has to work with the some
responsible party (a peer, significant other, or some other person) to work
out the details of the peerage ceremony.  If it is determined that surprise
is supposed be a component of the ceremony then everyone has to figure out
how to maintain that surprise.  All of our orders leak information, some
more quickly than others.  So the Crowns have to decide when and where to
inform the orders that the ceremony is going to be performed.  Obviously,
timing and organization are important considerations in the planning.

The last thing I would mention is that the primary audience for the peerage
ceremony is not the peerage, it is the kingdom/populous.  I've actually
attended a knighting where there were only three knights present (including
the king).  If I were on the throne and had to make a choice between having
a larger general audience for a peerage ceremony and having a larger number
of the applicable peerage order in attendance I would opt for the larger
general audience every time.  Of course, the choice would never be that
simple, and (thankfully) there wouldn't be a choice like that.

Yours in Service to Atlantia,
Diccon