ANST - Consorts' Tea topics

[Dennis and/or Dory Grace]

At 05:17 PM 1/15/98 -0600, you wrote:
>Greetins all, Jehanne here,
>At Steppes 12th night  I attended a meeting of the consorts of the
>chivalry which took place in the afternoon.   Her Ladyship Octavia
>called the meeting to discuss many topics and I would like to share
>the results of that meeting with you.

<snip>

>I'm sure I've forgotten some items, I hope that Aquilanne will be
>able to jump in and add anything I've forgotten.

One of the things we talked about that I feel is a very  important issue is
one of communication, primarily between fighters on the field. There seems
to be this prevailing attitude that questioning an opponent's blow-calling
is tantamount to questioning his/her honor. We need to work to change this
attitude. Questioning an opponent's blow-calling is just that--questioning
a call, questioning a judgement. Even the most chivalrous and honorable
people in the world are not perfect and are susceptible to making mistakes,
especially in a combat scenario where adrenaline is running high and
recognition of impact is dulled.

First, we do need to consider that what our fighters are trying to do--and
what we are expecting them to do (accurately judge the force of a blow and
act accordingly)--is not easy. As anyone with any kind of martial arts
background  will understand, judging whether a blow was hard enough to do
serious damage or mortal damage or ony just enough damage to slow you down
is not a simple, easy thing in the middle of moving through an adrenaline
clouded, very fast-paced activity with big sticks flying about your head.
Making judgements about what blow to call in which manner is a complex
process, and one that a fighter must resolve in mere moments. It's easy to
make an inadequate or incomplete judgement call.

Keeping this in mind, it's not the least bit unreasonable for a fighter  A,
having delivered what felt like a solid blow that isn't acknowledged, to
stop and say something like, "Are you sure that last blow I landed wasn't
good?" It gives fighter B an opportunity to re-think the interchange. Maybe
fighter B will stop and think, "gee, that's smarting more than I expected
it to, must have been a solid blow," or "no, I moved to the side and it
glanced off without any real impact," or "yeah, it hit, but it didn't feel
like there was any real force." Fighter B can then either confirm his/her
call or change the call. Questioning your opponent's judgement call doesn't
question a his/her honor, it gives him/her a broader  opportunity to be as
honorable as he/she can be. If, in the same situation, fighter A *doesn't*
question fighter B, then fighter A may very well leave the field feeling
cheated or believing that fighter B is a cheater. This is *not good*.

I can't count the times Lyonel has come off the field (whether in a tourney
or a war or even figher practice) and questioned his own blow-calling
("Geez, that was harder than I thought," or "that really wasn't hard
enough, I really shouldn't have taken that blow:). He's also come off the
field sometimes questioning his opponent's blow-calling, but didn't
confront his opponent at the time ("Geez, I hit him two or three times in X
spot and it didn't even phase him."). So, he doesn't know if his opponent
merely percieved the blow as glancing or if he/she would have re-thought
and took the blow or if maybe she/he had new armor she/he hadn't quite
gotten used to yet or get an idea that maybe the rattan in his sword had
started to broom and wasn't striking smartly enough, etc, etc,....you get
the picture, right?

Let me tell you a story. I'm gonna tell on Lyonel a little bit here to
illustrate what I'm talking about. When we went back to Artemisia this
summer for her first coronation, Lyonel fought in the King's Champion
tourney. In one bout, he fought a fellow  (let's call him Joe)  who has had
a reputation for ignoring blows. They were fighting great sword. Lyonel
whacked him on the forearm.  Joe kinda shrug/rolled his shoulder on that
side, and kept on fighting. Lyonel whacked him on the other forearm. Same
shrug/rolled shoulder thing on that side. Lyonel whacked him on the forearm
again. Same response. This happened--no kidding--four or five times. A
couple knights on the sideline laughed and made a joke about "Joe taking
full advantage of the five minute rule," a refererence to how sometimes it
could take up to five minutes before the blood loss from a substantial
wound would be felt while in an adrenaline-heightened state. Lyonel never
said a word to Joe on the field. Afterwards, when he was telling me about
all this, I asked him, "why didn't you say anything?" His replay was, "it
was Joe; what good would it have done?" My response was to jump all over
him for not questioning Joe to his face (poor guy--he's a very tolerant
man, he is ;-> ). I was also appalled at the easy tolerance and apparent
acceptance of this Joe's behaviour that was exhibited by the knights on the
sideline in their laughing off this  blatant display of cheating. My stance
is that you *have* to speak up, you *have* to take a chance and question a
situation that doesn't seem right. Otherwise, a blind eye to cheating only
encourages more cheating, opportunties for an opponent to justify his/her
judgement or make a better judgement go by the wayside, and opportunity for
fostering an more open and communicative atmosphere in what is supposed to
be an honor-based community is neglected.

And back to the consort part of this issue--it's our responsibility as
fighters' consorts to encourage our fighters to communicate with each
other, help them understand that judgement and honor are not interdependent
concepts, and to question situations when they don't seem right to them. As
consorts, our fighters represent us and our honor on the field as well as
their own; we have both the right and the responsibilty to counsel and
encourage and nurture the concepts of honor and chivalry and fair play in
any arena where we are represented.

Gotta get more coffee now.

Aquilanne



Dory Grace--The Inkwell
denouncer of Tytyvylus & warrior crone
amazing at mail.utexas.edu
============================================================================
Go to http://www.ansteorra.org/lists.html to perform mailing list tasks.