[Ansteorra] Can someone confirm/deny for me?

[SoldierGrrrl]

On Wed, Aug 18, 2010 at 11:43 AM, mikea <mikea at mikea.ath.cx> wrote:

> Master Ivar is a friend of 30 years' standing, and I support his choice
> to pass his song only in oral tradition, but I have wondered for a long
> time if he considered that:
>
> o       Different people learn best by different routes; some are auditory
>        learners, some kinesthetic, some visual. Some are mixed, or learn
>        certain categories best in one way, but others in another. As a
>        modest example, I advance myself: auditory when it comes to song
>        tunes, but visual for memorizing words.
>
> o       A great many things from the Middle Ages and later have been lost
>        because "everyone knew them", and so they "didn't need to be written
>        down". Gerald of Wales wrote that in England, everyone in the fields
>        was singing, frequently rounds or in harmony. Nobody wrote most of
>        those songs down, and they've been lost because oral transmission
>        failed. Similarly, nobody now knows how to dance the estampie, a
>        dance form for which we have loads of good music, because oral
>        transmission failed and nobody wrote the steps down.
>
> Oral transmission is _great_ so long as the material is transmitted, but
> men die. The invention and use of writing has permitted _RELIABLE_
> preservation of the knowledge of men past their deaths, something we
> have and (as far as I know, anyway) other animals don't.
>
> --
> Mike Andrews        /   Michael Fenwick    Barony of Namron, Ansteorra

Also, I would love to learn it, but have never actually heard it.
Having it written down would at least allow me to teach it to myself,
or have my Godmother help me learn it.

Helene Dalassene
Hellsgate


-- 
I've asked forgiveness from the Lord, now take my soul, and bring my sword.