HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: Godfrey de Shipbrook <jlee@smylex.UUCP>
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
Subject: Re: You Know You're In The SCA......
Date: Thu,  5 Nov 92 22:55:55 EST
Organization: Shipbrook Software  (Tampa, FL)

Greetings from Godfrey!

Christofer de Hoyland writes:
> In article <1667@niktow.canisius.edu>, salley@niktow.canisius.edu (David Salley) writes:
> |> Kyalynne Hawkesborough writes:
> |> >    ...when you call the board meeting to order by shouting:
> |> >    "MY LORDS AND LADIES - PRAY ATTEND!"....  :)
> 
> |> I stood silent for nearly a minute because I had no idea
> |> how to start this kind of announcement mundanely.  My lady finally
> |> whispered, "Try 'Your attention please'".  ;)
> 
> It's amazing how a good loud "Oyez!" will stop people
> in their tracks mundanely. Seems to be a function of
> the unexpected....

What's really strange (at least, to me) is to hear a bailiff call the
court to order by shouting `oyez' -- and pronouncing the `z'...

+------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Net:  Jeff Lee / jlee@smylex.uucp / jlee%smylex.uucp@tscs.tscs.com     |
| SCA:  Lord Godfrey de Shipbrook / Wyvernwood, Trimaris                 |
|       Per pale azure and argent, a clarion counterchanged or and gules |
+------------------------------------------------------------------------+
  Please to remember the fifth of November / Gunpowder treason and plot.
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
From: schuldy@progress.COM (Mark Schuldenfrei)
Subject: Re: I am still bewildered
Organization: Progress Software Corp.
Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1992 18:40:24 GMT

Mikjal Annabjorn makes a few suggestions:
  1.  Names and Heraldry.
  [ . . . ]                      Plus, there is nothing wrong with
  establishing a higher standard of authenticity or documentation support for
  names and devices submitted by the Schwarzdrachen Herald than that of the
  other kingdoms in general, so long as the guidelines are clearly spelled
  out in the procedures for the kingdom heralds office.

Except that it would be unenforceable, as appeals of returns would be
sent to Lord Laurel, who would pass anything that met his guidelines.

  2.  Martial Activities.
  [ . . . ]                                                          And do
  away the the "traditional" SCA style of competitions.  No "King's Colors",
  no elimination tourneys - find the styles of period competitions, and use
  only those.

It would be interesting to see if an appeal to the Board would allow
such a ruling to stand.  Would the Board consider such a rule to be
within the spirit of Corpora?  I give it 50-50 odds.

  3.  Ranks and titles.
  4.  System of Rulership.

I think pretty much of what is suggested here would pass, although I
might only be able to argue for some of it, with a whole heart.


I would opine, however, that legislated authenticity might not be as
successful as the current model (success being defined in a handwaving
fashion, as the maximum number of happy campers).

	Tibor
--
Mark Schuldenfrei (schuldy@progress.com)
[I'm just showin' you my opinions: this ain't a gift]
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
From: schuldy@progress.COM (Mark Schuldenfrei)
Subject: Re: Patent revokation.
Organization: Progress Software Corp.
Distribution: na, world
Date: Thu, 5 Nov 1992 19:33:23 GMT

I understood what you meant Hal, and agree.  I just thought
it interesting that revising Corpora was never even brought
up as a possibility, either because of oversight, or because
it was obviously not necessary.

The Board didn't suggest that the Pelican's should be polled
(that's not their place).  They mentioned that it was a possible
outcome.

                                                            (I should
  point out in this context that I'm of the rather small camp that feels
  that Kings are obligated to listen tothe counsel from his Peers--but
  that doesn't require him to *follow* their advice...)

Could it be?  Is Hal Ravn (gasp) a closet Easterner? (crowd begins to
grumble).  (:-) of course.  East Kingdom Law does require that a gentle
have been polled for in the last year, once.  It doesn't say that the
gentle had to be polled for that award, or anything about the King
or Queen even reading the results...  And you think *your* king's word
is law.  (There was a recent Pelican given before the deadline for
polling letters to be returned had passed, I hear)

	Tibor
--
Mark Schuldenfrei (schuldy@progress.com)
[I'm just showin' you my opinions: this ain't a gift]
From: Andrew.Cookson@f4229.n124.z1.fidonet.org (Andrew Cookson)
Sender: FredGate@ocitor.fidonet
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
Subject: Bush Quoteline
Date: Tue, 03 Nov 1992 08:03:06

lo'
   I would like to appologise to anyone who noticed my quoteline on any 
previous messages.   I did not intend to provide statements on a person's
mundane political beliefs in a forum where it would be inappropriate for the 
to respond.   I meant no offence.
  I am afraid that I do not look at the quote line usually, & that included 
mine, so when I wandered into an SCA base...

   Besides, I was speaking about beer. <G>

                                               - Aindries


... Two most common elements in the universe: Hydrogen & Stupidity.
___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.10

 * Origin: Herald's Point * Steppes/Ansteorra * 214-699-0057 (1:124/4229)
From: Tim@f4229.n124.z1.fidonet.org (Tim)
Sender: FredGate@ocitor.fidonet
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
Subject: Re: archery thing
Date: Thu, 05 Nov 1992 08:07:37

 JS> It may be a mis-memory (i.e., something I read out of a questionable
 JS> source) but do Special Ops groups use bows and things as alternatives
 JS> to guns, because they're quieter?

 No, because bows are a pain in the ass to carry and use, and a gun using
 compressed air or some form of tension (like a spear gun) is just as quiet
 and builds on skills already present (unless the person using it is an
 archer already).

 (You may be remembering seeing a movie called "The Wild Geese", a
 delightful fantasy that bears about as much relation to real special ops
 as the SCA does to the real Middle Ages...)

 Besides, you're supposed to be able to get close enough to use a knife or
 (even better) a silenced pistol without them hearing you..... and the
 hydrostatic shock produced by a bullet is far more useful than putting a
 broadhead into a guy and waiting for him to either drown in his own blood
 (if you're good and got a lung) or bleed to death (if you slipped up). And
 anyone good enough to put an arrow through someone's throat can do the
 same thing with a silenced bullet at three times that distance - and which
 are *you* going to choose, if there are five of you and 200-10,000 of
 them? And there's no poison or anaesthetic that you can deliver by arrow
 in sufficient quantity to be quick enough to guarantee that the stickee
 will not be able to sound an alarm. (Exhaustive tests were done on this
 during Viet Nam.)

 The point is not so much the noise the weapon makes as what kind of noise
 the victim can make afterward....

    Tadhg
    (who didn't do any of this when he was in the Navy
     during the early 70s, of course...)

 * Origin: Herald's Point * Steppes/Ansteorra * 214-699-0057 (1:124/4229)
From: Suze.Hammond@f56.n105.z1.fidonet.org (Suze Hammond)
Sender: postmaster@therose.pdx.com
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
Subject: Re: Perceptions of the SCA
Date: Thu, 05 Nov 1992 20:15:00 -0700

MA>  From: bq434@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Michael A. Chance)
MA>  Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
MA>  Hallo!
MA>  [re: T-shirt...]

MA>  front, list of discussion groups on the back).  I wrote to the
MA>  originator of the ideas, Sarah Keefer, and asked if it would be
MA>  appropriate to include the Rialto in their collection of medievalist
MA>  discussion groups.

MA>  consensus
MA>  is that the SCA is NOT a medievalist group.

I don't think we ought to feel too rejected about this. Face it, you are 
comparing apples and andirons. On those groups you spend all your time 
discussing actual *history* and the manner in which to best explore it. On 
the Rialto we don't do that all that often. We discuss our *perception* of 
how we treat history, but when I fire up the computer to read Rialto, I 
don't expect to see a three page treatise on the derivation and usage of Old 
English verbs.

The discussion of whether a farthingale is within our period, (and what we 
might make one out of,) is not the same subject as the discussion of a 
farthingale belonging to the Queen of France and residing in the Ashmole 
Collection, and what it is made of.

The discussion of whether barbarians wore furs is not the same as the 
discussion of the results of an archeological find of a barbarian on a 
mountaintop in Switzerland.

The two things do not compare, even if the fellow who sees us as escapees 
from D&D *is* wrong about us...


Moreach NicMhaolain
reply ONLY to: trifid@agora.rain.com 
 
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
From: habura@vccnorthb.its.rpi.edu (Andrea Marie Habura)
Subject: Re: Subcultures in the SCA
Organization: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY
Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1992 13:08:23 GMT


Yes, I do think there are developing subcultures in the SCA, and have been
for at *least* a decade. I regard this as inevitable in a group as big as
the SCA has become. As long as the members of each subculture continue to
interact with people outside the subculture, everything's copacetic. If they
don't, it may lead eventually to the formation of splinter groups (which,
if the folks in the splinter weren't talking to anyone else anyway, would
hardly be a devastating blow.) Let's face it: in a national organization of
21,000+ people, you can't interact with everyone. Therefore, you interact
with the people with whom you share common interests. Poof: a subculture. 
Granted, some groups become more cliquish than others, but, on the whole,
I don't see it as a problem. Rather, these subcultures can serve as "hot
spots" for research/work in a particular area, and add spice to what might
have become a rigid, homogeneous culture.

Alison MacDermot
(A member of the heraldry-addicts subculture, the authenticity-is-fun 
subculture, and a nascent arts weenie)
From: whheydt@pbhya.PacBell.COM (Wilson Heydt)
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
Subject: Re: Group activity, 1650, Tangent, etc.
Date: 12 Nov 92 23:14:34 GMT
Reply-To: whheydt@PacBell.COM (Wilson Heydt)
Organization: Pacific * Bell, San Ramon, CA

In article <1992Nov12.193541.5461@athena.mit.edu> mcdonald@athena.mit.edu (Steve McDonald) writes:
[A good exposition on generational times and possible meaning. --whh]

>I'd be interested in other opinions on the effects of the current growth
>rate of the Society.  I don't think that many people have really paid much
>attention to that growth and its effects, either good or bad.  I am
>particularly interested because of the office which I currently hold,
>Magister of Carolingia, which is equivalent to Chatelaine elsewhere in
>the East Kingdom and serves to introduce new people to the SCA.

The 'conventional wisdom' value is 3 years--but 4 to 5 is sufficiently
similar to considered to be the same....

There are any number of people who have thought about--or even
worried about--rapid growth.  Not the least of these is the Steward.

I think you've hit a very valid point in your observation of a
hierarchy of increasingly more senior members of the Society as the
support and carriers of tradition for succeeding 'generations'.  To
that point, add that (I think) no one thinks of themselves as an 'old
timer' so long as there are folks around them that have been in the
Society even longer.  (For myself, I hold this to be true after nearly
23 years....  Especially as we have occasional comments here from
folks who have been in the Society a 'generation' longer!)

There is also a tenedency to develop a hierarchy of jobs that require
extensive experience.  One can move from a local (Shire, Riding) job
to a more regional (Baronial, Provincial), to Principality to Kingdom.
There is even a slight tendency locally to either move towards a
corporate office or to 'retire' and join the bottom of a different
'department'--though (I think) rising towards the top is faster the
second time around.  (This probalby couples to the fact that prime
Pelican candidates are *compulsive* 'doers'.  You just can't *stop*
them from pitching in and working.)

	--Hal

        Hal Ravn, Province of the Mists, West Kingdom
        Wilson H. Heydt, Jr.,  Albany, CA 94706,  510/524-8321 (home)
-- 
Hal Heydt                    |    "Boycott Time-Warner"
Analyst, Pacific*Bell        |         --J. Danforth Quayle
510-823-5447                 |    "... kill all the lawyers."
whheydt@pbhya.PacBell.COM    |         --William Shakespeare
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
From: Beth.Appleton@f4229.n124.z1.fidonet.org (Beth Appleton)
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
Subject: out-of-period dancing
Date: 2 Nov 92 20:55:34 GMT


 LDH> Are there no period dances which fit this description?  By the 
 LDH> way, what is the period of the Gay Gordon (whoever says 2pi gets
 As Vashti says, Galliards definitely fit the description.  They're a 
 bit harder to teach than Strip the Willow, usually requiring a slightly 
 greater variety of steps, but just as exuburant.
    Gay Gordons?  Can't say for sure, but based on the position of the 
 couples (varsouvienne -- hands over the shoulders), appallingly post-
 period.  I also believe that the name refers to a specific troup of 
 Scottish soldiers in a post-period conflict.  Right now I'm drifting 
 back and forth in _A_Social_History_of_Scottish_Dance_.  I should be 
 able to give you a more definative answer later.
...
 LDH> Not intending to fuel a fire, but...  With Williams example
 LDH> of the two songs, and what appears to be the concensus argument
 LDH> of the knowledgeable dancers, it appears that current SCA
 No-no-no.  William gave a bad example.  A better example in terms of 
 dance would be being unable to tell the difference between one of those 
 early 20th century Irish rebellion songs we sing (you know, the ones 
 that specifically mention guns, and you know they're not talking 
 wheel-locks) and an Elizabethan ballad.   Most of us are quite willing 
 to teach and dance the SCA-correography.  The ones I'm aware of usually 
 missed the boat one way or the other, but we accept them anyway.
....
 LDH> Oh, weren't "peasant" dances rather lively?  Do we have
 LDH> any records (not lp's) of these dances?
 Nope.  We feel lucky to have the dance manuals of the noblity.  During 
 the time, dance was something you learned from someone else.  This was 
 much truer of the folk than the noblity.  We've totally lost the 
 Eastern European folk dances, because NOBODY recorded them.  Korobushka 
 is an early 20-th century construction.
      Gwenllian Cwmystwyth
         Steppes, Ansteorra

 * Origin: Herald's Point * Steppes/Ansteorra * 214-699-0057 (1:124/4229)
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
From: mittle@watson.ibm.com (Josh Mittleman)
Subject: Re: Perceptions of the SCA
Date: Mon, 09 Nov 1992 21:04:45 GMT
Disclaimer: This posting represents the poster's views, not necessarily those of IBM
Organization: IBM T.J. Watson Research Center

Greetings from Arval!  Alan Fairfax wrote:

> The SCA has created a culture that actually resembles the medieval
> culture. 

There are at least three highly questionable points in this statement: 

1) "The SCA has created a culture..."  Although it is frequently asserted,
I am unconvinced that the SCA has in fact "created" anything that does not
exist in dozens of other incarnations.

2) "...that actually resembles..."  Do you believe that the SCA's formal or
informal structures actually resemble anything that existed in the Middle
Ages? 

3) "...the medieval culture."  There is no monolithic "medieval culture".
One of the most frequent errors made by SCAfolk talking about our subject
is the assumption and assertion that a thousand years of history across
three continents was homogeneous.

===========================================================================
Arval Benicoeur                                       mittle@watson.ibm.com
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
From: SN=Carol_L+p_Smith%SU=SMITH%GI=CAROL%IN=CL%Monsanto@mcimail.COM ("Carol L. Smith")
Subject: What's the Kingdom done for me Lately?
Organization: The Internet
Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1992 19:21:00 GMT

-----------------------------
Application message id:  STLEDD 921111132003094721
Importance:  Normal
Grade of Delivery:  Normal

-----------------------------
    Greetings unto the Rialto from Caroline!

    Tibor asked (and I can't find the original post, so I'm
    paraphrasing), "What does the Kingdom do for the local branch
    that would require the local branch to repay it by holding an
    event?"

    Arval made a nice reply, as did another gentle  (Bertram?).  Their
    comments included perpetuating the bureaucracy and commenting that
    for some officers, one officer per branch is not always needed.

    When I was an officer on the Baronial and Kingdom levels I had one
    main objective: communication facilitation. Basically, I
    encouraged the people who reported to me (canton and branch
    officers) to tell me what's going on and what problems there were
    so that I could find someone to help them or to enable them to be
    a resource to someone else. It worked, sort of. When an officer
    told me about an issue, such as "how do I work better with the
    local University", I encouraged him/her to talk with the other
    branches that had great university relationships. I couldn't force
    the first person not to reinvent the wheel. But I tried to provide
    him/her with information and guidance.

    So we (as Kingdom or regional officers) can do more than pass
    paper from one side of the desk to the other. One just has to take
    the initiative to see the job in another fashion and frame it so.
    This work, though, should be separate from encouraging a branch to
    hold 1 event published in the Kingdom newsletter per year. I
    certainly kept them separate.

    I remain, on a short soapbox,
    Caroline
**************************************************************
Carol L. Smith                 !Caroline Forbes of Oxfordshire
Business Systems Consultant    !          (insert office here)
The Agricultural Group of Monsanto!     Three Rivers, Calontir
St. Louis, Missouri            !"Just this chick from Atlantia
557-3321@mcimail.com           !                via the East."
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
From: vader@meryl.csd.uu.se ("]ke Eldberg")
Subject: Nature of the SCA
Organization: The Internet
Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1992 23:55:42 GMT

William de Corbie here.

Arval Benicoeur writes:

>[the SCA] is loosely controlled, ill-defined, poorly conceived,
>and proud of its structural weakness.  It is far more a group of
>people who have chosen to play together, rather than a set of
>rules by which people have chosen to play.
 
>Is it this very nature that confuses you? If so, why? Perhaps this is a
>distinctly American phenomenon...

There is certainly a lot of truth in that the SCA has developed from
what was actually done, rather than invented by people with a goal.
Corpora was not a set of rules that people sat down and invented, in
order to create a medieval society. Things have grown out of "accepted
practice" rather than pre-concieved ideas.

However, your description of the Society as "a group of people who
have chosen to play together" omits the fact that this was only true
about the first SCAdians, and it has grown less and less true over
the years, as SCA traditions and rules have become more and more rigid.

Anyone who joins the SCA today certainly has to play "by the rules".

William

Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
From: badger@wixer.cactus.org (Badger)
Subject: Re: visible inauthenticity of archery
Organization: Real/Time Communications
Date: Mon, 9 Nov 92 23:02:52 GMT

In article <1992Nov9.084611.11622@bsu-ucs> 00mjstum@leo.bsuvc.bsu.edu (Matthew J. Stum) writes:
>
>Which would you rather see?  A line of recurves and wooden arrows with
>"feathers"?  Or a line of competition compounds with shiny aluminum arrows
>with vanes?  To draw an analogy, it's like someone coming to an event with
>a SCA T-tunic rather than in mundanes.  Yes, the person could be garbed in
>_completely_ authentic Viking or Celtic garb... but perhaps the resources
>(time, money, knowledge, etc.) just weren't there.
>
>Gwydion
>
	Gwydion;

	I don't think any of the archers here have proposed that non-period
archery tackle be banned.  I myself, until quite recently, used a modern
fiberglass laminate recurve.  The only thing I have objected to is tournament/
scoring structures that discourage period tackle because modern tackle, with
its dacron strings, arrowrests, et. al. are more accurate than period tackle.

	I don't mind seeing a line of archers with modern recurves, the fact
that there is a LINE OF ARCHERS more than makes up for that.  But, we should
set up things so that people who find that they like archery are encouraged
to move, as they are able, to period tackle, just as newcomers who find that
they like the SCA are encouraged to move away from their basic T-tunic toward
more authentic garb.

	To answer you question... I much prefer to see modern recurves and
wooden arrows with vanes, to compounds with aluminum arrows... but it'd be
REALLY neat to walk out and see a line of archers with Self Longbows, hand-
made arrows, and flemish twist flax strings. But, if people are actively, 
or passively, discouraged from obtaining that kind of tackle, it'll never
happen.

<I hhappen to be fletching a new set of arrows as I do my newsscan>

-- 
| Kenneth W. Scott        | Lord Gunter von Wissenberg  | Azure, a badger's   |
| Badger                  | Collegium Turris Animarum   | head erased Or      | 
| (Meles meles)           | In the Barony of Bryn Gwlad | masked sable, within|
| badger@wixer.cactus.org | In the Kingdom of Ansteorra | an orle Or. (I hope)|
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca