edricus

All in all it has been a good year. I did not get to travel as much as I wanted, but I still did manage to visit quite a few events.

This year saw the elevation of my first protogee Gele to the Order of the Pelican. I was however found by a new protoge in Louis la Roux, so now there are three, Þórólfr Mirielle and Louis. I am greatfull and proud of them and in awe that they find me a worthy mentor. They all work, create and do great things for their groups, themselfs and the SCA at large.

flic.kr/p/2quuWBq

I did step down from being on the BoD for the affiliation of Nordmark after about 10 years, oh how time flies. So I find myself with a bit more time on my hands. I was drafted into cooking meals for the May Count event in Holmrike wich was both challenging and fun. I was also involved in autocrating Nordmark Principality tournament, my first go at this role in over 10 years.

I did some outdoor cooking for our camp at Cudgel wars which was a great experience and something I really need to do more of.

As allways the camera was with me and a lot of photos were taken, not all are edited and up yet, but it is in the pipeline.

So plans for the future?

I want to cook more, I do really enjoy cooking so I need to find the time to do some more helping out in kitchens if I travel as well as find the oppertunity to do more camp cooking.

Mundanely work has changed with what looks to be for the better carrerwise, but it will probably limit my time and energy that I am able to spend on hobbies.

As allways I am inspired by my lovely wife liadethornegge.dreamwidth.org/ and her incredible skills att most things she sets herself to do. Love you dearest.

Yis

Edricus

I did expand a bit on my former post because of reasons..

Why travelling is important.

A question that surfaces every now and then is that about travelling when you are on the path to peerage and why that is important.

For me the short answer is that travelling will expose you to different situations and people. It is a tool to give you the contacts, abilities and knowledge to be a peer.

The long answer.

Peerage is a SCA wide rank, that means that a peer can go to another kingdom and be asked their opinion on matters, be invited to meetings with the crown of that kingdom etc. Peers are seen as leaders, peers are asked to “get things done”, peers are seen as experts, peers are expected to know how the kingdom and the SCA works as well as have an idea on who is who.

Travelling will give you exposure and make you known in the bigger pond outside of your local area. Travelling will give you perspective on your art, service or martial ability by meeting others and seeing what they are doing, in some way travelling will show you where you are in your field of interest, how your service is compared to what others do. I think that the easiest example to see this is in the martial pursuits, but they are the important for all activities in the society.

Travelling will show you the different “dialects” on how the SCA is done in different areas of the kingdom. You will get to know people and make contacts and friends across the known world. In one way you are building your pool of renown and gaining a better understanding of how the SCA and your kingdom works.

For me an easy litmus test to get an idea of how well somebody understands the SCA, how well connected they are to the kingdom, what exposure they have had etc is to ask “do they travel”. No it is not the only thing I look for, but this is why I look at travel.

If you are on the service path making contacts across the kingdom is important. Peerage is about leadership and perhaps especially so the order of the Pelican. The relationships you build is what in my mind gives you the currency to get things done. A good leader must also understand the organization and culture they are leaders in.

We need consider what we mean by travelling. For me it is absolutely necessary that people leave their home group, so that their service at least is known in their part of the kingdom as well as that they understand the wider kingdom and SCA. It is great (almost mandatory in my mind) if they at least once during their career visit one or more parts of the kingdom.

I believe that most people in the SCA are able to reach the level of doing some travelling, I am not looking for people doing every kingdom level event over several years, that is unattainable for most. But a level where a candidate tries to visit as many kingdom level events as possible in ones region is something I would like to see. So for a candidate from Nordmark, visit kingdom university, crown tournament or coronation if held in the northern region. Here is an advantage that they rotate between our different regions. For the same Nordmarker a visit every now and then to Double Wars or Cudgel Wars as well as Visby mediveal week also goes a long way. One or two visits to ID or and Knights Crossing on the ca 10 year journey should be doable.

A comparison with the martial arts association where I practice, to be able to test for black belt, you need a minimum of ten days at training camps between you started and you apply for the test. That is 10 days in about 7-10 years. These days can be at local training camps, they can be at the big 5 day long training camps, but they have to be where you meet other instructors and trainees so that you are out of your comfort zone, get to know people and create relationships over the years. It is not unheard of having these kinds of criteria for advancement in an organization.

The hard truth is that most people will not receive a peerage. I believe it will be harder if you cant travel and attend as many events as others. If your economy is bad when working on becoming a peer the journey becomes harder. It is not impossible, but it will be harder and take longer

We do not make a knight out of somebody who only fights locally, I personally believe that the same is true for Pelicans. Not that you have to do service at other levels or for other groups, but you have to see how others do things, talk “shop” with others doing similar things create networks etc. I find this easier to do face to face. Travelling is not the only way to gain experience, make contacts, get exposure, but it is in my mind the easiest to get the understanding, maturity and skillset I am looking for.

Edricus

A question that surfaces every now and then is that about travelling when you are on the path to peerage and why that is important.

For me the short answer is that travelling will expose you to different situations and people. It is a tool to give you the contacts, abilities and knowledge to be a peer.

The long answer.

Travelling will give you exposure and make you known in the bigger pond outside of your local area. Travelling will give you perspective on your art, service or martial ability by meeting others and seeing what they are doing, in some way travelling will show you where you are in your field of interest. I think that the easiest example to describe this are the different martial arts that are done in the kingdom. But it does apply to other areas as well.

Travelling will show you the different “dialects” on how the SCA is done in different areas of the kingdom. You will get to know people and make contacts and friends across the known world. In one way you are building your pool of renown and gaining a better understanding of how the SCA and your kingdom works..

But that is not the only thing that comes with it, and not even the most important aspect of how travelling relates to peerage.

If you are on the service path making contacts across the kingdom is important. The relationships you build is what in my mind gives you the currency to get things done, especially if you are an officer. But also to find people to assist you in your arts and sciences or finding training partners and teachers for fighting.

Peerage is a SCA wide rank, that means that a peer can go to another kingdom and be asked their opinion on matters, be invited to meetings with the crown of that kingdom etc.

For me an easy litmus test to get an idea of how well somebody understands the SCA, how well connected they are to the kingdom, what exposure they have had etc is to ask “do they travel”. No it is not the only thing I look for, but this is why I look at travel.

No travelling is not the only way to gain experience, make contacts, get exposure, but it is probably the simplest.

This post will probably go up on another blog as part of a communal effort, but I want to publish the text here, not that many ppl read it and it will be a back up for me as well.

What is service?

So to kick off my posts to this blog I thought I should start with a simple subject, what is service?

Now of course the question, what is service, is not a simple or easy subject to adress, and I do not think that we will come to the end of this question with only one post. Which is kind of the point with using a blog, to give the space to post more times on a subject.

As I see it this blog will deal with subjects relating to questions such as what is service, what is service in the SCA? And perhaps why is service important?

The SCA and its Known world is usually said to rest on three legs, Arts and Sciences, the Arts martial and Service. It is said that for a three legged chair to be level it needs that all of the legs are equal in length. In one way service is important to keep us level. But service for service sake is not really useful so we do also need the other legs to give meaning for the service.

Apart from being an activity I do enjoy in the Known world, service is important as it is kind of the oil that keeps the machine going. Service deals with organising, building, maintaining, cooking, cleaning, hosting, running, meeting, fetching, solving and much much more. Service is about doing something for somebody else and for the enjoyment of others.

Service involves skill, service comes naturally to a few but most of us need to practice how to do service and find the ways that we do service in a good durable way.

Service needs to be voluntary in the Known world, we are after all a hobby. We should do service because we want to, sometimes we need to do it out of obligation or duty, but we should always avoid having service done out of guilt.

Service is about failure, firstly because something will always fail, and secondly if we do not fail we do not learn. It is not that we should plan to fail, but we need to be aware that something will always fail and that how we deal with failure is an important part of how I view service. To do successful service you need to have a learning environment that does not look for blame when something fails but to improve how we do things. Most people want to do good things, if you encourage and teach they will continue to do service if you blame them they will stop coming.

Service is about people. You do service with people and for people. This involves among other things dealing with communication and expectations. But it also involves yourself and finding a good service - recovery balance. I know that doing a lot of stuff can be fun and exciting, but I know that I also need to do recovery so that I can continue to serve.

Service is about yourself, as I said service should be voluntary and durable. We often talk about the helium hand ( helium hand is an expression for when you have a habit of raising your hand when there is a call for a volunteer even if you perhaps already have too much to do ) but it is important to know yourself and your limitations, this is no different from any other activity in the Known world.

Service like any good tool needs to be tempered to be durable and not break. It needs to be maintained and mended so that it can continue to serve for a long time.

Yis
Master Edricus Filius Offae

Greetings all

Here is a youtube from the Service sympsium held by the West Kingdom early in 2021. It is kind of a panel discussion on how the BOD (board of directors) for the SCA works, what it does, what roles it has and who are on it.

I did find it quite interesting to show a side of the SCA that one usually is not in contact with.

youtu.be/--RI5puPH1Y

To understand the organization of the SCA is a bit tricky especially in Drachenwald. A lot of this depends on that we have something like seven affiliations and that you can be a member in several different ways depending on if you are in affiliated area or not and if you are a member in a local group or in the main affiliated group, or if you are a member directly to the SCA.inc. Another issue is then that the game also follows different paths depending on the subject.

These are some sketches I made years ago when trying to understand Nordmarks realtionship to Drachenwald and the SCA.

So if you feel that it is a bit difficult to understand how the Princiapality of Nordmark, its afilliation SKA Nordmark, Drachenwald and the SCA comes together, well, it is not that easy to understand. But this might help a bit.

The way that the affiliations work in the different parts of Drachenwald differs so what goes for Nordmark might not be true for Knights Crossing etc.

photos.app.goo.gl/B5L6b7hasaHTmSLA6

photos.app.goo.gl/w144Gfg1bLfmeKPw7

I have been thinking that it is perhaps time to realise that I need to put the idea of doing heavy fighting in the SCA on the shelf and move on.

Over the past 8 years there have been a bunch of injuries, foot, tendinitis, blew some musles in my right shoulder 6 years ago. Most have healed quite well but the shoulder while quite good, still somehing that worries me. and I do not seem to find the energy to do both good and decent training for my body also as time goes I find that recovery takes longer. This makes it harder to find the joy to do HF.

I have never been a tournament fighter, I simply do not enjoy them, my favourite thing has allways been melees especially leading, commanding and getting units to work together on the field, As the oppertunity to do melees with a team has become less in my event going, the joy to spend time doing HF has decreased as well.

Perhaps this is something I should have said earlier, but this is were the sunk cost falacy comes in, the hours of practice, the going to events, the spending of funds and making armour does create an emotional connection to an acctivity. I have at times seen HF as what I am doing in the SCA but to be honest I have mostly been doing other stuff, autocrating, organizing, holding offices, cooking and slacking, a most important activity.

So where does this leave me, an advantage with the SCA is that it is quite easy to shift your focus and maintain your friends, also there is a plethora of stuff to do. I might pick up fencing, I like martial arts, but I find HF to take to much of a toll on my body, there is archery, cooking, dancing etc etc. I can sell off some armour to fund some other activities - see the sunk cost. Now I would love to join in the Drachenwald army if it ever goes on another adventure. So I will have to see what to do for the future.

Ed

So I have started doing strength training again, in june I was feed up with getting lazy, soft, and feeling lethargic from working and staying at home. I did some research from swedish sources and the conclusion was that hitting the gym is a safe activity as long as there is distancing, hygien and that kind of stuff.

As a friend asked me what kind of a program I was doing, and I do get those questions every now and then I figured I might as well write it down and keep it so that I can just link this post.

So what do I do for workouts. Well it is free weights and mainly the big lifts. Squat, Deadlift, Benchpress, Overhead or military press, with barbell rows as a extra back/ sholder workout. I follow the Stronglifts 5*5 program (see link below) which basically means that you have two sessions A and B, you do 5 sets of 5 reps per lift and you add 2,5 kg per session (except for deadlifts where you do 1 set of 5 reps and add 5 kg per session).

You start your first session with an empty barbell at 20 kg and do a session with at least one day of rest between the sessions. In the begining this might seem to be kind of odd but when you are up about session 10 - 15 you will understand why. The two sessions are A Squats, Bench press and barbell row and B Squats, military press and deadlifts.

This is a linear progression of weights and since you squat every session you add 10 kg of 20 lbs in 4 sessions, or about every 10 days. It does get heavy quite fast. At my 13th session I did 50 kg squat, 35 kg bench and 45 kg barbell rows after having started at 20 kg squat, 20 kg bench and 30 kg barbell row.

You wil most likely want to add some warming up sets to your work, the program starts every session with 2*5 with an empty barbell (20 kg) but I also added in 1*3 at 40 kg before I did the work of 5*5 at 50. The warming up helps your body acklimatise to the weight, which is important when you are starting to lift. It also helps you to get warmed up and get the technique training in.

So this is a beginners strength program, depending on how strong you are when you start out you will reach plateaus sooner or later. But this is a marathon way of training, the goal is to get strong, and you can get from zero to deadlifting your own body weight in a few months. You need some basic working out stuff, and a notebook with pen to keep track on your progress, a stop watch is usefull to keep track on the rest between sets. I usually start at 60 seconds in the beginning and then go to 90 seconds and now I am looking at 180 seconds between sets. This is to help with the recovery between sets.

Now here is the thing, you will fail, you will reach a plateau but, you are going to keep working out to get over that plateau, in the begining you add weight every session, after a while you add weight every week and later you can add weight every couple or weeks or month.

There are other options for similar programs the other common one is Starting strength by Mark Rippertoe, which is similar but a bit different, se link below.

The great poet Henry Rollins has written a pice about the benefits of working out with Iron.

https://www.artofmanliness.com/articles/henry-rollins-iron-and-soul/

https://youtu.be/sXI3lzLhddw

I have also added a 15 - 20 minute stretching session after the work outs which is really nice.

https://youtu.be/L_xrDAtykMI

https://stronglifts.com/

https://startingstrength.com/get-started/programs

As the Board of Directors has asked for feedback on this change I did my thinking and wrote this:

First: A few notes on the format of how this proposal is communicated. The proposed changes should be presented in a way where you can read both the current and the proposed text next to each other. The work done by the East Kingdom Gazette should be the standard for how this is presented, with both a web view and a pdf. https://eastkingdomgazette.org/2020/07/21/bod-proposes-change-in-corpora-introduction-wording/proposed-changes-to-corpora/

Second: In order to help the reader assess the proposed changes there should always be a description of what the SCA is trying to accomplish by the changes. Is it for clarification or modernization of language, is it for recruitment, is there some specific problem that needs to be addressed or is it to change the basic understanding of what the SCA is doing?

On a side note be aware that changing a policy or mission statement will not do much to change the culture of the SCA and the current focus on medieval and renaissance europe. Unless you are prepared to do some serious change management and legwork the proposed change might very well be an empty gesture as culture eats strategy for breakfast.

Now my views on the proposal.

The text does not feel finished. This is not a good introduction to a group, it feels more like a user manual for a toaster than an engaging text for a lifestyle hobby.
The mission statement should set the tone for the journey, to be a hero, to become the master of a craft etc. In some ways we might need more of the Larp-SCA than the Reenactment-SCA here.

I think that we are doing ourselves a disservice when removing this sentence “Most of its activities take place in the context of a social structure adapted from the forms of the European Middle Ages, which allows participants to take a first-hand look at various aspects of the life, culture and technology of the times under study” from the mission statements first part. I believe that it should be kept possibly rephrased but it should be clarified by adding that it is a romanticized version of the European middle ages, or middle ages and renaissance courts and life since the SCA nowadays is doing so much more than courtly life.

To me the point is not if we focus on Europe or not but that we understand that our, the SCA’s, rites, rituals, awards, tournaments, hierarchy etc comes out of a context of literature and art rather than historical correctness. We do in some ways have more in common with the Tolkien and Harry Potter societies than we do with reenactment and living history groups. We simply mix and match too much to pull that off.

If we forget that it is the romanticized version of courtly life and the middle ages that we deal with, we will end up with somebody reenacting a warrior from the shogunate insisting that all the people they beat on the field seppuku in court or the human sacrifices of prisoner from Aztec and Inca, simply because it was a part of courtly life. I cherry pick these two examples to illustrate what leaving this fundament of how to interpret the game out can lead to if we do not have a common ground for our understanding of the game.

The part about what is expected by those who participate is ok, but could perhaps be moved to the end of the document.

When it comes to areas covered by the SCA US and Canada could be replaced with North America and Australia could be replaced by Australasia since New Zealand is a part of Lochac. This will make the text more coherent and relate to continents rather than some nations and some continents.

Well I do not know.

A few years ago I got an injury in my right shoulder a small muscle that f-d up and has been bothering me ever since, 5 years or so. I got some physio therapy for it and did try fighting but basically it hurt a bit and the shoulder area was tense and not really enjoying it.

Some weeks ago I started with the 5*5 stronglifts again but added on a decent stretching program and after a bunch of sessions I am finally beging to see some progress so perhaps I might be able to do some fighitng again. I will give it a few months of this training and stretching and see how it feels and perhaps start working on some stuff at home as well. We will have to see.

The stretching routine takes about 20 minutes

https://youtu.be/L_xrDAtykMI

As I remember it my first event took place sometime about mid november - mid december 1996 - I might be off a year here, it was the first, and perhaps the only, Champions tournament for the then Crown Principality of Nordmark.

About a year before the Barony of Nordmark (Sweden) had been approved as a Crown Principality and for the second reign Marcus and Katarzyna had won and now served as Viceroy and Vicereine. So this event was a local small event to give them the opportunity to practice as well as for a bunch of us new to the society to get our first experience. I think we might have been max 20 people attending, it was a small and cosy site that Lady Emma had arranged through some relatives, and the atmosphere was great.

I had first seen the SCA some years before at a roleplaying convention in Malmö and got interested but it took a few years before I found my way to the local group the Shire of Attemark.

As it turned out the new Vicereen was a friend at our local student pub which led to me joining for an event. I managed to borrow some garb and found enough stuff at home to work as feast gear, had a sleeping bag and off we went.

The weather was grey and boring as is typical for that time of the year in that part of Sweden, but as mentioned before the site was nice and cosy with candles and warmth, the singing rang through the darkness and entered my soul filling the heart with joy. The smell of medieval food hit my sense of smell for the first time and a completely new world of spices and flavours showed itself. It is now so long ago but It was a transformative experience. I was helping out in the kitchen and have a memory of carrots with butter and honey that was a marvelous dish.

Her Excellency the Baroness Nordmark Estrid, or was it Edela at that time, held a short introduction for us who were new, covering a bit of history, courtesy, the chivalric ideals. I often wish that I could give such a good introduction to the SCA as I got at that first event. For it was a great way to get hooked in society.

The champions tournament was as I recall it a mix of several aspects of the SCA heavy combat, a form of duello archery and perhaps chess. I no longer remember who won, but I believe that Matthew, Sigismund and Rhys participated.

There was a court even if I can't say that I remember much about it, more than it was wonderful. As time has passed I have since been to countless more courts, I have held offices, run events, cooked feasts, fought in tournaments, sewn garb, travelled to other groups near and far made many friends and I still smile when I meet the others from that first event at different gatherings across the known world.

As I recall bits of memory from that first experience of the SCA some 20 years ago I think that I am still trying to find my way back to those moments when I went to my first event.

From the outside the activities of LARP, HEMA, SCA, BoTN and Reenactment look similar, and in many ways they are similar. But at times I found it good to be able to make some kind of typology to explain some of the differences between them. Mainly because from the outside of the hobbies they all look the same. People wear garb and armour, camp in canvas tents, eat strange food etc.

I made this rather simple "typology" in order to try to understand and explain the differences a few years ago, and even if it is simple, basic and very general I find it to be usefull especially as a starting point for discussions or to clarify what seems to be missunderstandings.

My starting point was trying to find or decide on a "driving" force or motivation for those who play in the different hobbies, as so much else seems to be similar.

LARP: To play a character, to be part of a story, partake in an adventure

HEMA: To study historical manuals.

SCA: To be in a social setting with mediveal attributes

BoTN: To whack people, competition

Reenactment: To recreate a particular pice of history.

I was thinking a bit about renown today.

Perhaps it is not only that people know of you but kind of a "currency" that exists in our society. I am looking on this from the officer/ service/ pelican view there are others but just so that you understand my reasoning a bit better. Your renown is what makes you being able to do stuff as an officer, it is the time you have put in working with others, building relationships, helping out so that you have a cashbox of renown.

When I was kingdom seneshal for Drachenwald I reflected on that it was by communicating and travelling for a few years before that I was appointed that gave me the contacts, relationships and work that I had done befor as well as during my tenure then gave me currency to work with, rather than the title of the office.

I also think that as a peer the currency changes a bit, it goes from being a personal currency to a collective currency. By that I mean that since peers are recognized across the society, even among people you may never have met before, you are tapping into that common pool of currency. That means that if you do good stuff you fill the common pool and if you do.. not so good stuff you take away from it and also lower the value of the currency.

I guess the old saying from when I used to go camping still rings true.
" Leave the world a better place than you found it"

Ed

Sometime during last week a member of the order of Chivalry in the East kingdom made a really unfitting post on FB.

This was the response from the order:
"We, the undersigned members of the East Kingdom Order of the Chivalry, condemn the recent speech, made on social media, by a member of our Order, Sir Sichelgeita von Halstern (Sichel). As we, the members of the order, condemn these actions as unacceptable and see a necessity for consequences, we request that the Crown and Heirs of the Kingdom of the East Banish her from the Presence for this Reign and the next, or to hold a Court of Courtesy by request of this Order to determine another sanction.

At the urging of the Order, in addition to the above condemnation and request for sanctions, Sir Sichelgeita has expressed a commitment to:

Submit her regalia to the Crown until such time as the Crown determines she has made amends for these actions.
Author a detailed formal apology in the same space as the offence.

We Knights and Masters are not a monolith; we hold diverse social and political opinions. We also collectively place great importance on the modern freedom for individuals to speak their minds, but we accept that such speech is not free from consequence. The post by Sir Sichel this past weekend went beyond expressing her beliefs and extended into wishing harm on others. In that post, she not only failed to represent the Society, Kingdom, and Order as we are all called to do each and every day, but dishonored the Crown, Kingdom, and the Order of Chivalry through her words. We recognize that these unacceptable words were shocking and hurtful to all who read it, but particularly to families who have experienced such personal loss. We also recognize our obligation to act when one of our numbers so fails.

The Crown has seen fit to elevate us to the Order of Chivalry. This elevation carries with it an expectation of honorable conduct in all aspects of our lives. Our responsibility to carry ourselves in a manner befitting Peers of the East does not begin and end at an event, but extends to our modern lives.

We live today, in the modern 2020, which is an increasingly technologically connected world. We commit ourselves to conduct that befits a Peer of the East in our language and bearing, in person and online, regardless of screen name, page, etc. We commit ourselves to honest self assessment and to the improvements such assessments call for. Most of all, we commit to holding one another accountable to a standard that will allow both the Crown and the populace of the East to have faith in this Order."

It is also signed by many members of the order, and more importantly by the person who made the comment, that persons name is first on the list of signatures. As peers we are accountable for our actions, words etc, with social media there is no longer a veil between the inside and the outside. The idea of leaving values at the door can no longer hold true. (and yes there is a difference between the value of humans and "normal" political views)

https://eastkingdomgazette.org/2020/06/26/petition-to-the-crown-from-the-order-of-chivalry/?fbclid=IwAR1N21oTnHDFo8ZeqhhtJU7W_8H8F6hh_9reWGXB3a2iw4g5rsivyyjgAfM

Some of my friends on FB write about that the SCA is falling appart and that E-SCA is breaking the fun.

In my mundane life I work with organizational development and at times with Change management which also means trying to understand why certain responses show up.

My feeling is that many of us who are a bit older in the SCA feel that the discussions that are being held are emotionally difficult, we might not be consious of the respons or why we feel the way we do. Now of course discussions about racism and sexism are difficult subjects to get to grips with. We have most likely allways has had the problems but that is a different issue, I am trying to understand the respons to the situation.

So in a way I beleive that the SCA (or any hobby) has been a place where you actually could turn off the outside world and not have to care about it. The problems of everyday were simply left at the door, everybody could leave their luggage, come in rest and recouperate and then go back to the outside world feeling a bit refreshed.

But now suddenly this calm haven of life has left the door wide open and all of the problems from the outside come into this in someway sacred space. You suddenly encounter the discussions you have at work and read of in the newspapers and hear on the news, in this part of your life that before you saw as safe.

I believe that the discussions happening now are necessary, but I understand that they will be painfull. I wrote this down in order to have an idea of why certain responses show up. It is not that people disagree on the issues as much as they most likely have an unconcious emotional respons to a difficult question and most people act on change and problems with a form of denial.

Change takes time, it is not just a matter of changing a policy, this deals with culture, and in general culture eats strategy for breakfast.

A question was asked in a FB group "The Circle - chivalric discussions" about what does prowess means for different peerages.

"Question for all peers.

There is always the discussion of prowess with fighters of rapier and heavy fighting.....
Knights and MODs can you explain prowess in your own words?
Pelicans and Laurels....if you were to use prowess to define something in your peerage what would it be any why?"

My response:
As has been mentioned prowess is skill or mastery, as a pelican it is a bit more difficult to judge the skill of service. It is not like you stand and watch people make the dishes and can judge how good their service is.

I think that it is important not only to look at the what but also the how of the individual. So the event was good but how did the individual work with others, lead, coach, solve disputes, deal with problems.
We must be carefull not to equate sucess with service, yes service needs to be sucessfull but if we only look for sucess we might reward the wrong behaviour. In heavy if you only go for winning then you might very well turn into somebody with a reputation of being a rhino. A person who only looks for sucess and award might produce very sucessfull events but step on everybody they work with. Also somebody might do a big work of service, but due to no fault of theirs it was not sucessfull.

Another aspect is that service is not sacrifice, I know kind of a paradox for us pelicans, but a person needs to have the skills to know themself and others so that they do not sacrafice either.

Also prowess is not enough

Edricus (OP) Drachenwald

The group in question, the questions in this group are interesting and the discussions are at the moment usually quite good.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/306122960422599/?multi_permalinks=310672623300966¬if_id=1593145103137661¬if_t=group_activity

This text on my FB got a big discussion going. Kind of interesting to see what people do for interpertations and what holes they fill with their own extrapolations. I mainly wrote this for me, but the responses made me realize that FB is really bad for this kind of content so. I am leaving it here as well.

Now I write that I am dissapointed, and yes I am but it is not a scary bad dissapointment, more of a "sigh - I thought we could do better.

"Thoughts and words on the current situation in the SCA regarding bigotry, racism, sexism etc.

The SCA and similar groups have over the years been a place for socially awkward people to gather and geek out, try new things, learn new skills and grow as individuals. Which in many ways is really good. We see people enter our society with the behaviour and energy of young people and who grow and change to become better versions of themselves.

In the SCA we speak of leaving the outside world, the mundane, behind as we go to events. We see the events as meeting our extended family, our chosen kin - our equals. Perhaps we also see it as a bit of a sacred space where one can be oneself and leave the stress and problems of the outside world behind. But we do also speak of taking the good things from our society and bring it with us to the outside world to be better individuals in that world as well. Because we see each other as a chosen family we provide a place for people to make mistakes and learn.

As a society we speak of the chivalric ideals and about how they are missing from the mundane world and that we in our society see those ideals as guiding principles. We speak of courtesy, chivalry, honesty, franchise, courage, loyalty, generosity and prowess and how they can be applied in the ordinary world.

In one way, we close the door to the world outside, but when we exit we bring the SCA with us into that world where we mundanely live so that we can be better individuals and bring the idea of chivalry, in its good and nice way, back to the world.

We have a low bar for entering into the society and the world we play in, but we have the hope that all who come will try to do things better, improve themselves and bring a bit of the magic to the real world.

So I guess the word I am looking for is disappointment…

I am disappointed that some people do not see all humans as equals

I am disappointed that some people have chosen not to grow and change over the years.

I am disappointed that we as a society have failed.

Even if we want to keep the real world outside of our society, we know that it will get in and affect us, we are not in a vacuum, we are all connected to the outside world. My hope is that as we work to improve our society we all bring a little more of the magic to the outside and work to make it a better place for all as well.

Master Edricus Filius Offae (OP)
Drachenwald"

Aparently I had an old livejournal that I have not been using for 10 years or so. But I felt the need for a digital platform to write stuff and avoid the hassle of FB.

Here are the pictures from Raglan Fair 2009

www.flickr.com/photos/lord_edricus/sets/72157623694157449/

Went to the UK this summer mostly to visit Vitus and go to Raglan Fair in Wales. But I did get one day to go to Hampton Court and I did spend quite a few hours there.

I took all of the photos in RAW which means that I have to convert them into jpgs which takes more time than I like to spend editing pictures. A funny thing is that I started editing these pictures several months ago and then suddenly I got an email from an on line tourist map of London asking if they could use one picture. I answered yes and now this picture

Hampton Court

Is in the Schmap London Tenth Edition
www.schmap.com/london/activities_southbank/#p=859&i=859_128.jpg

Ohh I almost forgott, here are the rest of the pictures.
www.flickr.com/photos/lord_edricus/sets/72157622869989010/

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