[Ansteorra] WWSD? was: WWAD? was: WWMPD?

Theron Bretz tbretz at montroseclinic.org
Thu Apr 25 09:06:00 PDT 2002


> While I nearly gag when I hear the Artherian legend lines in reference to
the SCA, I must agree that I don't want to do in all situations what a 16th
century Spaniard would have done. So in reference to WWSD (What Would a
Spaniard Do):

Good for you.  If you won't gag over Arthurian references, I promise to try
not to visibly shudder every time I hear someone reverently intone The
Dream(tm). :-)

> I have no urge to conquer and enslave the native people when I travel to a
new place. I certainly don't want to force them become Catholic.   I'm not
real up on the whole burning heretics thing either.
>
> Too many of my friends have English personas, and I'd hate having to go
around killing them off. (Some of them shoot too well anyway.) Although it
might be funy to string up an occasional pirate now and again, I don't think
the police would be amused.

But you would do none of these things if you were in a foreign country for
non-military purposes.  The notion of nationalism is generally not germane
to the period covered by the SCA.  Nations interacting with other nations
was the business of heads of state, not the man on the street.  At least,
not until he was sent off to die for the cause.

[To head off objections and exceptions, I will note a fair amount of nascent
English nationalism in the second half of the 16th c.  This was engendered
intentionally by Elizabeth and her ministers and facilitated by the fact
that it's easier to create an "us versus them" mentality when you live on an
island apart from your enemies.]

For a look at the more common view of things, take the "Italians".  Apart
from living in the region we now call Italy, there were, in fact no Italians
as such.  Not to their minds.  They were Tuscans, Umbrians, Napoli, Veneti,
Florentines, Genovese, Pisani, Romans, Sicilians, Milanese, Papal, Imperial,
Guelphi, Ghibelline, and that's just barely scratching the surface.  Yes,
they shared a more-or-less common language (often less), and religion
(again, more or less - Catholics were QUITE capable of burning each other,
y'know), but for the most part, the differences were more important than the
things in common.  It's only when threats to the whole of the region come
down the pipeline that you see any sort of unity, and even that was
piecemeal at best.

Ditto for most so-called nationalities.  Would a Castillian soldier be safe
walking through the streets of London?  Possibly not (certainly not in the
1580s), and folks would want to know his business, but he'd probably be in
as much danger in Barcelona (the capital of occupied Catalunha) even with
reinforcements.  Put that same Spanish soldier on the streets of,
say...Ravens Fort and he's just another foreign visitor in a land full of
foreign visitors.  In such situations, without your Company to back you up,
you're going to be on your best behavior.  Hopefully, so will everyone else.

By treating Ansteorra as a place we've traveled to, it solves a lot of these
cultural conflict issues.  After all, it doesn't matter what I think of the
Turk, so long as he buys my oil.

Luciano Malatesta
Veneti - non Italiano




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