[Ansteorra] Pentagrams now allowed in SCA heraldry

[Darlene Vandever]

Well, will wonders never cease?
Annes

On Tue, Jun 9, 2009 at 5:11 PM, Stefan li Rous
<StefanliRous at austin.rr.com>wrote:

> This is just out from the SCA College of Heralds via the Lochac list.
>
> So this shows that the College can be prevailed upon to change erroneous
> past rulings or perhaps that the SCA continues to evolve.
>
> Stefan
>
> Date: Tue, 9 Jun 2009 17:01:47 +1000
> From: Paul Sleigh <bat at flurf.net>
> Subject: [Lochac] Pentacles Are Registerable
> To: Shambles <lochac at sca.org.au>
>
> Posted just now by Tamsyn Northover to the Blazons mailing list, hot
> off the presses from the March Letter of Acceptances and Returns
> (LOaR).  Summary: the College of Arms have decided there's nothing
> offensive about pentacles, regardless of what Jack Chick may think, so
> you can register them in your heraldry.
>
> Next time someone tells you the Heralds are all bastards who make up
> rules to hurt people and never listen to sense, remind them of this.
>
> : Bat :
>
> "Ailis Linne. Badge. (Fieldless) A mullet of five points voided and
> interlaced within and conjoined to an annulet azure.
> There is a long history of rulings regarding the unregisterability of
> mullets voided and interlaced (also known as pentacles or pentagrams),
> beginning as early as 1973 by Ioseph of Locksley and including rulings
> or correspondence in 1976, 1978, 1979, 1990, 1994, and 1996. The ruling
> in 1990 was appealed to the Board of Directors, as reflected and
> discussed on the April 1991 Cover Letter. As specified in that Cover
> Letter, the primary argument against the registerability of this charge
> was that "the device was not returned for its specific religious content
> as perceived by the submitter and her co-religionists, but for the
> specific anti-religious content as perceived by a far larger number of
> people, both within and without the SCA." The 1996 ruling was an appeal
> of a return from 1994, and after considering the various arguments, the
> then Laurel King of Arms, Da'ud ibn Auda, felt "compelled to uphold the
> prior precedents disallowing the registration of mullets of five points
> voided and interlaced, whether within and conjoined to an annulet or
> standing by themselves. [Based on the evidence presented, s]uch charges
> still are perceived by a significant portion of the population as [a]
> "satanic symbol", and hence cannot be registered by the College."
>
> The current submission presents extensive documentation showing that the
> pentacle or pentagram is no longer perceived as a specifically satanic
> symbol. Instead, it has become more closely recognized as a symbol of
> the Wiccan religion. For example, the US military services have
> acknowledged the Wiccan religion in their Chaplain's handbook since at
> least 1990, and, more recently, the association of the pentacle with the
> Wiccan religion was acknowledged by the US government when the pentacle
> became the Wiccan religious symbol allowed on the government-furnished
> headstones of fallen US soldiers.
>
> We received a large amount of commentary on this submission from the
> College, and the consensus was overwhelmingly in favor of dropping the
> ban on this charge. We hereby overturn the ruling from 1996, and allow
> the registration of mullets voided and interlaced, both inverted and
> not, and both conjoined to annulets and not, so long as the overall
> design in which this charge is used does not otherwise violate RfS IX.2
> Offensive Religious Symbolism."
>
> --------
> THLord Stefan li Rous    Barony of Bryn Gwlad    Kingdom of Ansteorra
>   Mark S. Harris           Austin, Texas
> StefanliRous at austin.rr.com
> **** See Stefan's Florilegium files at:  http://www.florilegium.org ****
>
>
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