It just got harder

[dennis grace]

Greetings, Cosyns,

Lyonel ici, with sad news from the 20th century.  It seems chivalry has
suffered another potentially fatal blow.  Last night, in a boxing ring, one
and perhaps both of a pair of large, powerful, skilled combatants behaved
like ill-mannered children before an audience of millions.  In his rematch
bout with Evander Holyfield, Mike Tyson, after apparently losing the first
two rounds to Holyfield's reach, first head-butted (in the chest) and then
bit his opponent--twice.  A piece is missing from Holyfield's ear.  Tyson
has a cut over his left eye which he says occured (before the biting) when
Holyfield head-butted Tyson's face in a clinch.  After being disqualified,
Tyson attempted an all-out attack on Holyfield and ended up socking a police
officer.

Well, you might be thinking, that's what we love about the SCA. (Helmets!
No, I need to keep this serious.)  We love honor and honor chivalry, and
Tyson and Holyfield could learn a good deal from us.  I wish this were true.
I fervently _want_ this to be true.

A few years back, I watched a friend--let's call him Sir X, cheat his way to
the crown.  I was a young knight, and along with a half-dozen other knights,
I watched as he and his opponent battled on their knees in their last bout.
Sir Y struck Sir X a resounding blow to the breastplate, leaving a crease
four inches long and an inch deep.  A moment later, Sir Y struck a second
cross-body shot at a different angle, leaving a second dent across the
first.  Sir X shook his head.  We (the rpesent chivalry) all heard the blows
strike home.  We all saw, in the eyes of both combatants, that the blows
were sound.  Sir X persisted, and Sir Y accepted a blow to the spine.  After
the fight, another knight attempted to broach the subject with Sir Y, who
waved a forbidding hand and said, "It's just six months."  As they left the
field, two knights rushed to wrap a cloak around the sweating Sir X so that
no one would see the new cross hammered into the right side of his breastplate.

This was but a single instance of the sort of foul play I've seen over the
years in SCA tournaments.  One knight I knew well dropped out of the SCA for
six years after watching an unchivalrous attempt at King's Champion by a
young knight he admired.  Afterwards, "It's just not worth it," was all he'd
say.  The last coronet list I watched in Artemisia ended in a bout between
two unchivalrous louts who pounded one another repeatedly for twenty minutes
and through repeated warnings.  At an Estrella War, in a Champions battle
(30 champions from each side), I watched as one of the best known old dukes
in the SCA (from the West) refused to accept blow after blow.  In two of the
last three crowns in Atenveldt, the final round was nullified for poor
sportsmanship.

I saw similar behavior in the East Kingdom, where a king who had won his
crown with a pole-arm was being described by local fighters as "incapable of
feeling a blow."  In a practice melee, he demonstrated the truth of those
rumors.  A well-known duke from Atlantia used to wear (perhaps still wears)
an over-sized barbute, padded and balanced so that only a straight-line blow
perpendicular to his ear would register; a blow anywhere else on his helm
rocks the helm and he calls it light.

Now, if any of you Ansteorran natives are thinkin' about mountin' that high
horse--well, just pull yore boot outa that stirrup.  You have your share of
weebles.  Like every other kingdom, the old timers here are quick to
identify the counts and dukes who weebled their way to a crown, the fighters
who just won't take a blow.  

Often the problem might seem to be the prize.  Not that any individual
tournament offers a prize so enticing that a fighter should want to forego
chivalry and honor to attain it. Just the fact that there is a prize, a
title, a first place, and attendant word-fame:  these all seem to aggravate
the problem. Don't misunderstand, I'm not saying we should do away with
tournaments or stop giving prizes.  The problem isn't actually the prize or
even the competition.  The real problem is the attitude.

A few years back, when Charles Barkley was dubbed a member of the "Dream
Team," I saw where our problem originates.  We may think of ourselves as a
society, but in fact we--the SCA--are just a club, a recreational more than
a re-creational organization, a weekend outlet for the frustrations of
workaday life.  As such, we bring aspects of that wrokaday life with us when
we go off to play at our tournaments and feasts and courts and wars.  We're
a postmodern variety of medievalist, and as such we can't avoid slipping
inadvertent, often humorous references to the outside world into the game.
Who hasn't heard jokes about Air Kein sandals or how WE would have handled
the seige at Waco?  What warrior has never taken the field to tunes such as,
"Here she comes just a-walkin' down the street"?  We're wrapped in armor and
silks and our banners wave grandly over the field, but half those pewter
mugs are filled with Coke or Coors.

But back to Charles Barkley and his full-contact basketball games.  Back, in
fact, to Tyson and a mouthful of Evander Holyfield's ear.  Back, even, to
that royal salary ol' Troy's getting to throw balls for the Cowboys.  Back
to Air Jordan and his Ballpark Franks and Hanes underwear.  These men--and
their managers, no doubt--are setting the standards for what today's
youngsters consider sportsmanship.  New fighters coming in to the SCA will
have incorporated those so-called sportsmen into their archetype of the
hero, and it'll be a messy job scrubbing them out.  

I have always believed it the task of a knight to teach chivalry and honor
by example.  To that end, it is sometimes more important to lose the bout
than to win.  HRH Kein's last bout with HRM Mahdi makes for a splendid
example. From all reports, His Majesty's final blow was cobra-like in its
speed, delivery, and subtlety, all-in-all a brilliant example of martial
prowess. Still, the image of Earl Kein--despite his desires to the contrary,
despite his hard work and his desire to honor his lady with a
victory--accepting the blow with grace and dramatic flair:  this stays with
me.  It takes a lot of strength to allow a split second's action to erase
six months' work.  This is the sort of image we must impose over the mental
photo of Evander Holyfield's ripped ear.

We all know we're supposed to accept blows fairly and not fight when we're
angry.  Hey, that's the rules, right?  Still, quite a few of us have, at
times, broken those rules.  We know better.  I, for one, am ashamed when
that side of me has won out over my concerns for honor and chivalry.  But
I'm not writing to exorcise those demons.  You don't need me me to tell you
to accept blows.  You don't need me to tell you to leave the field when
you're angry.  The rules have already done that, and I hate being redundant.

My point, Cosyns, is that we have to remember to take a moment to honor the
defeated along with the victors.  Point out to your squires and students not
only the speed, accuracy, and power of the telling blow but also the grace
and strength with which it is accepted.  A gracious victor will often
attempt to honor his fallen opponent with a salute, but too often I see the
crowds on the sidelines ignore this gesture.  We should not allow this
gesture to appear hollow.  We should, rather, applaud and repeat this
gesture.  We, as an organization, are fighting a battle against a pervasive
worldwide attitude, an attitude that honors only victory, an attitude that
says, "Second place is just another term for 'loser.'" We have to deny,
forfend, and expunge this attitude. The next generation is watching.  We
_can_ have an effect.

Yours in Virtual Service

Sir Lyonel Oliver Grace
_____________________________
Dennis Grace
University of Texas at Austin
English Department
Recovering Medievalist
amazing at mail.utexas.edu

Things are more like they are today than they have ever been before.
                                                  --Dwight D. Eisenhower

(Don't Republicans say just the cutest things?)