[Ansteorra-archery] A short treatise on heraldry.

[Lothar Wildehaer]

My Lord, it has been my experience that the Heralds seem to believe that total butchery is allowed as "minor change". My name was presented with documentation and allowing minor changes, the end result is unrecognizable and unuseable.

Rumil Fletcher <rumil at sbcglobal.net> wrote:OK, I can see I touched a nerve with my invitation to get busy with 
arms registration. Allow me to offer some suggestions and comments 
on this process.

First of all, things have changed a lot over the years. Once upon a 
time, local and regional heralds could halt or change your submission 
before it went up the chain. That is no longer the case (as far as I 
know). Each submission has to go to kingdom and get commentary from 
a number of experts before it is "yea'd" or "nay'd" on its way to the 
Laurel King of Arms. And I can tell you from personal observation 
that they will tend to err on the side of letting it go on up and let 
Corporate make the final decision. They will not, however, let a 
non-documented name or device go up so it needs to really be a period 
submission. The current forms also have a check box which allows you 
to indicate whether you will allow minor changes or not. Most people 
wisely allow minor changes, because this can allow minor changes like 
"Harold" to "Hearold" without kicking your submission all the way 
back down.

*** REALLY IMPORTANT PARAGRAPH ***
Where most people get in trouble is in trying to take a name or 
device that is manifestly NOT period, and trying to document it as 
period. This is the wrong approach. A better way to do it is to go 
look at period materials and find something that is already period 
that is fairly close to what you want, then use that. Believe me, it 
streamlines the process enormously.

The other area that people get in trouble is in not listening to the 
advice of their consulting herald. That herald generally knows a 
thing or two about what is likely to be passed. If you say, "Here is 
what I want. Make it pass." they will do their best but you can't 
expect them to work miracles. But if you way, "Here is what I want, 
can you help me to find something similar that is period." then you 
are much more likely to go through without problems.

OK, some practical ways to make it happen.

NAMES
A private Medieval Names Archive is at: 
http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/ This site is the combined work 
of about 60 name heralds (some not in the SCA) from a group called 
The Academy of St. Gabriel. There documentation is extensive and 
includes names from every part of Europe, Arabia, and even some 
oriental names such as the Mongols. While they make no claims about 
the passability of these names, my experience has been that if they 
list it, it will pass. So if you want a name that is sure to pass, 
look here.

ARMS (The term device is actually an SCA invention, and I don't care 
much for it.)
You can get started looking at basic word usage stuff at the Heraldic 
Primer site at:
http://www.sca.org/heraldry/primer/
Unfortunately, there is not, to my knowledge a comprehensive on-line 
library of arms elements. There is a print version, but it is not 
cheap and is quite large. You can check with your local herald to 
see if it is available. Your local herald is also likely to have 
some other books with already documented arms elements. Or you can 
just look around and see what people already have.

Another on-line source of passed armory is the Ansteorran Gazette. 
It is full of names and arms that are on their way to being passed, 
along with listing of those that were passed. You can look at these 
at:
http://heraldry.ansteorra.org/gazette/

There are also consulting tables at many major events where they can 
help you document your name and arms.


So here is how I would do it if I were starting over:
1) I would find a period name either from one of the on-line sources, 
or from a book provided by your local herald.
2) Do the same with arms.
3) Don't try so hard to make something clearly not-period into 
something period. Instead, start with period elements to begin with 
and go from there.

It takes about a year for the process to go all the way through the 
Kingdom level, to the Laurel King of Arms and back again to you, 
unless your stuff is very well documented. Then it can "fast track" 
in about 8 months.

I can assure you that if you follow basic period guidelines, you will 
not have much trouble. The vast majority of name and armory 
submissions go all the way through without any trouble.

Rumil


P.S. By the way, a coat of arms is properly displayed to show the 
owner of the arms is present. If you are going to put your arms on 
your property, a badge is more appropriate.


P.P.S In regard to an earlier comment about "holding names," here is 
how that works. You can't submit arms without a name too. You can 
either already have a name passed, in process, or submitted at the 
same time as the arms. If you submit name and arms together and the 
arms passes but the name does not, then they return the name for more 
work while passing the arms. The arms are listed with the unpassed 
name as a "holding name" until you can get a proper name passed. If 
you look in the OP and see some names with a "D" next to them to 
indicate the device is passed but there is no "N" to indicate the 
name has passed, it is usually not because the name is a holding 
name. It is almost always because the name that was passed is not 
the name that person goes by and they requested that their "nickname" 
be used in the OP instead of their real name. In those cases, you 
will see a note that says something like "Registered name is Harold 
Hardradda."
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In service,
Ld. Lothar
Aliena Optimun Frui Insania
(It's a good thing to profit by the madness of others.)

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