SC - King's taste comments/Crystal's defense

[Crystal A. Isaac]

Once again, your Grace, I must apologize for not expressing myself
clearly. When I first wrote this reply I had included a rather long rant
about the difficulty in judging contests when the innocent participant
is depending on a translation or authoritative redaction that is
incorrect. I deleted the rant believing it would not add enough to the
(then) current conversation on Sass' work. I neglected edit my line
"misleading to people entering contests" comment to reflect the more
general problems of redacting than the specific problems of judging
contests.  However, I might add that I would not presume to comment on
the authenticity of someone who did not ask my opinion. In this case,
"my opinion" was sought in the context of that individual's entering a
contest. Or are you really proposing I should wander through encampments
testing people's beverages and telling them how to improve their art?

I do not believe that authenticity is only for contests. However, I do
not want to re-open the discussion on what aspects of medieval
recreation is feasible to every individual. My original intent was to
ask how do we judge a contest entry when a (perhaps new) cook/brewer
relies on a translation or redaction that is wrong? How do we judge the
documentation for such an entry? Perhaps I am taking this question too
seriously, but a year ago someone entered Sass' hippocras in a contest.
The entrant had produced a reasonable beverage, but used Sass' mistakes;
what should I have done?

On another but similar note, what should I do when I know that the
entrant has plagiarized their documentation? 

Thank you, in advance, for your advice,
Crystal of the Westermark


david friedman (Cariadoc )wrote:
> 
> Crystal of the Westermark replied:
> 
> >It's just that her
> > hippocras recipe is misleading to people entering contests.
> 
> Would it be all right if it only mislead people not entering contests?
> 
> Or in other words, doesn't this way of putting it imply that the only
> reason to care about what is or is not historically accurate is in order to
> win contests? I'm sure that is not Crystal's actual opinion, but it is what
> her comment seems to imply--which may say something about SCA culture, at
> least around here and probably most other places.
snipped section on Elizabeth and currants
> David/ Cariadoc
> http://www.best.com/~ddfr/
============================================================================

To be removed from the SCA-Cooks mailing list, please send a message to
Majordomo at Ansteorra.ORG with the message body of "unsubscribe SCA-Cooks".

============================================================================