SC - Peasants and Nobility

[Kathleen M Hogan]

I have been in the SCA since 1980, and when I was working out my
personna, no one ever told me that I HAD to be nobility.  My primary
personna (I have one for fun) is the legitimate daughter of the bastard
son of our clan's laird.  I was raised in my grandfather's, and later my
uncle's household, though not necessarily as a noble daughter would.  In
Scotland (my period is mid 13th c under King Alexander) not all lairds
were rich nobility.  My clan, MacKinnon, was a very small clan on the
Isle of Skye, mostly fisher folk and fairly poor. While my uncle may have
had a title, he was NOT eexcessively wealthy.  Much of my research into
my personna was in family records, as I am descended from the MacKinnons
of Skye.   Because of certain....events.....I was sent to England to live
with a distant relative, and thus began my education into the habits of
the nobility.  I was considered a companion and servant to my cousin, and
later was married off to one of her men-at-arms.   I was widowed, and
after I remarried several years later, I received an award of arms for
service to the realm.  

I usually wear my plaid to events, though I actually have TWO fancy
dresses (wow am I rich). My lord is an Irish mercenary,  so we tend to
have surges of money with stretches of poverty in between.  I can cook
both fancy dishes for when we have money to entertain and plain stuff for
everyday and stuff that stretches every grain and jot of food in between
times.  Many of my recipes are not actually period or researched, but
made in the fashion that I imagine my ancestors did....you work with what
you have at hand and the methods available and see what you come up with.
 When working to create "period" dishes for potlucks, etc, I try to work
with only ingrediants that would have been available and the methods and
equipment that were available.  I use my modern oven to bake bread
because I don't have a fireplace or brick oven.  I use a mixture of whole
grain flours and cake yeast.  I use my own fresh herbs from my garden and
what veggies and fruits I could get fresh or have preserved myself
(usually dried during the summer and fall). 

I agree with some of the comments I have seen posted....IMHO, the best
does not necessarily exclude those folk not fortunate enough to have been
born rich.  Not all peasants or serfs had miserable lives.  Many people
can find joy in simple daily life without brocades and titles.  The way
the SCA was explained to me many years ago,  is that we were trying to
recreate the middle ages as they COULD HAVE BEEN.....nothing was said
about limiting our interest or recreations to a very small group of
people who could have lived then.  What is wrong with looking at the best
parts of the lives of other folk?  Personally, I find the politics and
backstabbing of the nobility of the middle ages to be something that I
want nothing to do with.  Not all nobles were all that "noble".

  To my dismay, this is being recreated right along with the rest of the
"noble" persuits.  I have seen rudeness and vicious backbiting and
plotting and maneuvering in the so-called nobility of the SCA that has
driven many of my old friends to leave.    I have seen kings that had no
idea what chivalry means and ladies who were anything but.  Maybe we
should get back to what the SCA was formed to be....a recreation of what
should have been or could have been instead of spending quite so much
time worrying about what was.  In other words...re-create rather than
re-enact.

Just my two pence in remembrance of THE DREAM

Caitlin NicFhionghuin
House Oak & Thistle
Shire of BorderVale Keep, Atlantia
Augusta, GA

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