From: mittle@watson.ibm.com (Josh Mittleman)
Subject: Re: Heraldic questions...
Date: Tue, 22 Dec 1992 21:46:40 GMT
Disclaimer: This posting represents the poster's views, not necessarily those of IBM
Organization: IBM T.J. Watson Research Center

Greetings from Arval!  Godfrey, Landi, and Tadhg made comments to which I'd
like to reply.

Discussing the value of SCA-wide armorial uniqueness, Landi wrote:

> I'd really like to make it to Pennsic again, or one of the other big
> gatherings (is there going to be a Thirty Year Celebration?) and I'd like
> to be able to tell my friends to look for my banner without worrying
> about the possible dozen or so other banners with the same device...

I think this is a serious exaggeration of the potential problem.  First of
all, it is unlikely that so many people will design the same device.  I
think one can gauge the likely number of multiple-usages of a device by
considering how often a submission is returned for identical conflict with
another SCA device.  In my experience, that is rare.  It happens, but it is
rare.  Second, you are assuming that if we eliminate the current mechanism
for enforcing (or at least encouraging) SCA-wide armorial uniqueness,
people will make no attempt to achieve that goal on their own or
kingdom-by-kingdom.  I think that is an unlikely eventuality.  I suspect
that if Laurel and the College of Arms got out of the job of armorial
uniqueness, other, informal means of achieving the same goal would spring
up around the SCA.  They probably would not be quite as effective, but I
seriously doubt that practical conflict would become anything like as
common as you suggest.


Tadhg quoted Simon who wrote:

> What this says to me is that the Society ought to make an effort to find
> out / decide what we consider "useful" in terms of heraldry.  Which is one
> of the things Arval has been saying all along....

He replied:

> There IS a consensus regarding what is "useful" with respect to heraldry
> in the SCA; Arval just disagrees with it...  One of Laurel's oft-repeated
> maxims is "We follow the general practices, not the exceptions", and red
> bends and chiefs on blue fields were exceptions, not general practices;
> considered in the context of western European heraldry as a whole,
> regional practices such as green mounts on blue fields, however much they
> may have been the height of fashion in Hungary or wherever, were still
> exceptions rather than general practices. 

It is probably not necessary to point out that just because the Laurel King
of Arms says so does not define a consensus.  If this notion of "general
practice" were uniformly applied, I might not find it quite so
condescending, but it is applied most often to support the status quo.  As
you know, Tadhg, Laurel is not willing to ban the tinctures vert and
purpure or the more unusual furs, even though they are far less common than
either of the two practices you cited.  A single citation of a period
charge is almost always sufficient to allow its general use in SCA armory.
If our style rules actually reflected the most common armorial practices of
medieval Europe, then one could defend them.  The problem is that they do
not and that they are heavily slanted toward one culture.  If we could
ignore medieval history, then we could continue to develop an elegant
armorial system, embracing and rejecting whatever we pleased.  But that, I
think you will agree, is not what the SCA is about, and the College of Arms
is supposed to serve the entire SCA, not just the people who happen to be
interested in the narrow range that appeals to the members of the College.


Godfrey wrote:

> Unlike you, however, I feel that the CoA is doing a worthy job.

You mistake me: I think the College does a remarkable job.  I just happen
to think that a great deal of it is an unnecessary job.  That is not to say
that it shouldn't be done; rather that the same goals can be accomplished
with a great deal less work, time, expense, and bother.

> Certainly, the Society could get along if there were no registration
> of names or devices.  It would make calligraphers' lives hell, of
> course, and perhaps some of the pageantry would be lost if this
> alleged pressure to register devices were no longer present.

I think that, like Landi, you are creating unrealistic scenarios.  I don't
imagine for a moment that the SCA will ever be without compilations of
personal armory; that _is_ the job of the heralds.  However, it isn't
necessary to have a huge bureaucracy to accomplish that relatively simple
task.  Before the 15th century, heralds managed it somehow without any
formal organization at all.  To take your example, calligraphers would be
served just as well by an informal armorial as by a formal one; perhaps
better, since it would include all the armory being used, instead of just
the armory registered.

I wrote:

> I think we should find out what the populace really does want from the
> College of Arms, decide if we have the resources to provide those
> services and if they are indeed in the long-term interests of the
> Society, and then decide what services to provide.  No one has ever done
> that.

Godfrey replied:

> And yet, *without knowing the answer to that question*, you've already
> been proposing that those services which are currently in place should
> be unilaterally eliminated.

You are correct, though I think that I may have presented one point in a
way that led to you partially misinterpret my position.  I do not advocate
eliminating services unilaterally, and I think I said that pretty clearly
in the passage you quoted.  The ultimate decisions must be made by the
Board of Directors after some or all of the process I described.  However,
I do argue that we must consider eliminating services, up to and including
the total dismantling of the office of the heralds at the national level.
We must question the basic structure and the fundamental assumptions, and
subject each and every rule and procedure to the question "Does this serve
the goals of the Society and its participants?"  If we don't ask the
questions, we can hardly expect our governing officers to act on the
answers.  I have mixed my own answers to those questions with the
discussion of the need to ask them, and if that has been confusing I
apologize.

===========================================================================
Arval Benicoeur                                       mittle@watson.ibm.com