SR - Awards

Timothy A. McDaniel tmcd at crl.com
Mon Jun 8 22:13:31 PDT 1998


Some time ago, I promised some text on awards.  I should
redeem my promise.


There seems to be a notion of how to reward stuff in the
SCA.

1.  X-ing is a good and valuable thing.

2.  X-ers should be rewarded, so we get more X.

3.  The way to reward Xers is to create an award
    specifically for Xing, and it has some bizarre name
    (Award of the Sable Thingy), and it has a charter, and
    it has a scroll, and it has a dangly, and it has a place
    in the Order of Precedence.  Worse, it's an "order" that
    never meets.

4.  All this is done before any heralds are consulted as to
    period style and registerability.

I can agree with points 1 and 2 on lots of Xs without
agreeing with point 3.  Point 4 really torques me off.  As
noted in my previous mail, Ansteorra has roughly as many
awards as the entire United Kingdom circa 1900.

I think that any proposal for a new award for Xing should
get a Big Hairy Eyeball.  If any existing award can cover
it, then generally no new award should be created.  Instead,
the existing award should be given for Xing, with stretching
if necessary.

What are some period techniques for rewards?

One: largess.  Unfortunately, our crowns can't give huge
tracts of land, gold rings, and such.  However, they can
give cheaper jewelry (or expensive jewelry for good stuff).
Cloaks, tunics, hats, belts.  Food, drink.  Lots of other
stuff.  Simple wordfame.  

One of the arguments in favor of awards is that there's no
other way to reward people -- the crown doesn't have the
money.  Largess would indeed require donations.  On the
other hand, current rewards require donations too --
donations of time, effort, and money from a small subset, to
wit, "regalia" makers and scribes.  Spread the effort!

Two: honors, offices, titles, and franchises.  These are
free and neat and period.  Offices can be specific and still
period.  A notable dancer can be named a Royal Dance Master.
A good chirurgeon can be named a Royal Leech.  A notable
paper-pusher can become a Clerk of the Royal Chancery.  Is
"By Appointment to the Crown" a period phrase?  If so, that
can cover a lot of arts and services.  A good fighter can be
named to the King's Guard, the Queen's Guard, the Royal
Archers, or what have you.  Alderman.  Thegn.  Gonfalonier.

Offices without duties, or with nominal duties, are quite
period.  Say, a Royal Dance Master has to assist the Crown
in dancing one dance if they are at the same event, if
dancing occurs, and if the Crown requires their services.
Given how often dancing is squeezed off the schedule and how
busy the Crown is, that should happen about once every third
leap year.  The Clerks of the Chancery together give a
peppercorn to the Crown each coronation.  The Gonfalonier
holds a kingdom banner at wars.

Offices that originally had duties often had them devolve on
a lieutenant or deputy.  Proposal (with no chance of being
adopted): the most notable leader of soldiers in the kingdom
is not the "warlord", a term which in English dates to 1856
(though as a translation of German kriegsherr, for which I
have no date).  He's the Kingdom [Earl] Marshal.  Like a
period Marshal, he leads troops for the Crown as ordered.
The real SCA duties are mostly done by the Deputy Marshal.
The most notable artisan is the Minister of Arts and
Sciences, with the Deputy Minister doing the paperwork.

Franchises: a local group can reward a good inhabitant not
with the Order of the Flaming Purple Frog, but by making him
a freeman of the city.  A notable artisan could be given a
license to trade freely within the kingdom.  (The fact that
any else can trade freely too is simply not mentioned, or
maybe everyone else has to pay a peppercorn rent or five
pence to trade at a fair.)  The King's Bard and the Queen's
Bard have the right to perform satires on the Crown in
public without let or hinderance (ow!).  Or even entirely
nominal or amusing rights: the right to flog malefactors
within a barony, say, or give a herald full license to
mispronounce names.

Titles, offices, and franchises can also have a time limit,
which helps record-keeping, keeps the number down (so it's
more treasured), and also means you can reward them again
with the same thing.  (What do you give to the Robin who has
everything?)


So suppose you want to give awards.  First note: please
don't call it an "order" unless you want order meetings.
Also, the order should do things other than meet to decide
on candidates.  They should have banquets.  They should have
their own herald.  They should work together on projects.  I
recall reading that there were nominal orders in period that
didn't do these things, but there were many that did, and
the origin of "orders" were groups (as monks or knights)
living under a common rule, or a group subject to common
ordinances (the Garter rules, say).

Awards should be general.  The Sable Thistle is a lovely,
economical invention.  You can name specifically what they
did without having to create a new Sable Thingy.  I consider
the Motley Shash to be a Bad Thing.


But what about principality awards specifically?  It's still
in the kingdom, so any kingdom awards still apply.  If
they're doing work suitable for a Sable Thistle, then by
golly they deserve a Sable Thistle.  Or Sable Crane.  Or
Iris of Merit.  Or Centurion.  Or ...

1: The Crown delegates to the Coronet the ability to give
AoA-level kingdom awards to their subjects.  If this doesn't
work somehow, the Crown can yank it for a particular
Coronet, or require previous consultation.

2: The Crown delegates to the Coronet the ability to give
GoA-level kingdom awards to their subjects, if the Coronet
consults with the Crown first.  This works just like
baronial armigerous awards: I understand the Baron/ess makes
a case to the Crown, and the Crown is pleased to consent
(and if they don't there's a Big Muckin' Fuss).

2: The Principality doesn't have its own arts & sciences or
combat awards.  It gives the kingdom ones.  If it's good
enough for the kingdom award, give it; a principality one is
then redundant.

3: The Principality doesn't have service awards either,
except specifically for service to the principality.  Sable
Comets, for example, not principality equivalents.  For
exceptional services at large, the person gets a Star of
Merit.

HOWEVER, for service specifically to the Principality, the
Coronet can freely give two awards.  So as to not prejudice
names, I'll give working names:

   The Award of the Ya Done Good: AoA-level
   The Award of the Ya Done *Real* Good: Grant-level

"But Corpora says principalities can't give grant-level
awards!"  Actually, it doesn't.  The Crown can delegate
"armigerous" awards, which includes grants.  Only a later
clause says "As membership in Patent Orders is bestowed by
the Crown", thus restricting peerage.

*Just those two awards*.  You did a decent job as principality
officer?  Ya Done Good.  Your predecessor left a mess and
you made major efforts in cleaning it up?  Ya Done Real
Good.  You were retinue?  Ya Done Good.  You were retinue
who stood up to royalty routinely to allow you some freedom?
Ya Done Real Good.  You set up the principality army?  Ya
Done Good.  You led them heroically and organized them well?
Ya Done Real Good.

Exercises for the student: You ran a principality college.
What do you get?  You set up a system so principality
colleges are easy to run.  What do you get?

And don't forget largess, offices, and other honors!

"But non-comparable things get the same award!"  Not so:
levels of effort can be roughly estimated.  Also, I think we
need more of the period attitude of dealing with ambiguity
and special cases.  This didn't bother them as much.  The
Abbot of S. Alban's was a mitred abbot because, well, he
was.  "His man" could mean the relationship between the Duke
of Normandy and the King of France (equals except that the
Duke swears fealty to the King and the King does not swear
fealty to the Duke), and the King and his lowliest serf.

4. If the principality goes kingdom, *just keep the two
awards*.  Just award them for arts&sciences and fighting
now.  Talk about "unicos et singularis" -- unique and
singular!

"But fighters getting the same awards as artisans?  Ewww
yuck!"  Well, the Garter was given to notable soldiers and
to notable servants of the realm.  Deal.

OK, so you *insist* on separate arts and fighting awards.
At least keep one fighting award.  "But wire weenies getting
the same awards as real fighters!"  Deal.  "How can you mix
stickjocks and rapier fighters?  You can't compare them!
How does a rattan fighter recommend the other?"  How does a
costuming Laurel judge a calligraphy Laurel candidate?  They
judge what they can: do they hold offices?  does their work
seem scholarly?  do they teach?  can they debate points and
concede error?  How does a heraldry Pelican judge a great
treasurer?  Likewise.

If you have separate rattan and rapier awards, then you get
an archery award 'cause it doesn't fit, and then other
projectile weapons, and then boffer weapons are allowed and
THEY need their own award, and what about knife / axe /
spear?, and ...    Besides, separate but equal is unequal.

Utterly heretical thesis that will get me burnt at the stake
at the next event I attend: the White Scarf was useful when
rapier desperately deserved special recognition and support,
but in Ansteorra it's no longer needed, and insofar as it
leads to proliferation of awards and ghettoization /
separatism it's harmful.  Similarly, an Ansteorran
principality going kingdom should not sign the White Scarf
treaty: treat them like all other fighting / combat people.
The Centurion is for rattan combat, no?  If so, the same to
them.

Retreat position: the White Scarf and Centurions and such
are jobs / offices -- divisions of the Royal Guards that
simply use different weapons, have high qualifications, and
have especial duties and an especial bond with the Crown.
Like the King's Musketeers versus the King's battalions.

Luckily nobody will read this far, so I'm safe from burning.

The kingdom awards I'd keep:

Sable Thistle
Iris of Merit
Sable Crane
Star of Merit
AoA-level general combat
GoA-level general combat

Probaly Sable Comet, simply because shires can't have their
own awards.  For kid's activity that deserves an AoA or
better, give them what they deserve; otherwise, maybe keep
the Rising Star for lesser but worthy effort.

That's it.

Not that there's a snowball's chance at Steppes Warlord of
any of this coming to pass, of course.  We'll keep having
awards proliferate for special cases.  Each principality
will have their own elaborate hierarchies.  And neat period
practices like offices and titular honors and franchises and
largess will be utterly neglected.

Daniel medium rare
-- 
Tim McDaniel (home); Reply-To: tmcd at crl.com; 
if that fail, tmcd at austin.ibm.com is my work address.
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