New Opinion: On “Banderole” and Why the Board Should Listen to Their Heralds

Plenty of people have had questions about the poll that was recently released by the Board of Directors. Why is Leopard an option? What the hell is a Banderole? Why do none of the names, badges, and regalia feel like they’re one cohesive concept?

This article provides the truth behind the Board’s false claim that the items on their poll were all approved by the College of Arms. It describes where the name “Banderole” came from, outlines the (lack of) communication between the heralds and the Board, and briefly describes the reasons every other item on the poll was found unsuitable by the College of Arms’ workgroup.

On “Banderole” and Why the Board Should Listen to Heralds

Updated Article: How the Order of Precedence Works

The original article was written in 2011, for the Kingdom of Caid, and had several biases in the text. Obviously, the most prominent of these biases was that of the kingdom itself, describing all considerations of who goes where based on the traditions of Caid. The new article features An Tiri customs, but also goes out of its way to be more cosmopolitan in its discussions of other kingdoms’ practices.

The second bias is that of gendered language. The original article made a lot of assumptions about the genders of the Crown, Coronet, and Baronage, because at the time it was written, all of those positions were required by Corpora and kingdom law to be held by people of opposite genders. This is happily no longer the case, and those references have been written out. Beyond that, though, there was a lot of unnecessary gendering of hypothetical individuals, which have been edited out.

Beyond the updated language, the biggest struggle was to include the precedence order and accurate dates of the Shires of An Tir. It turns out that there was no consistent record available anywhere in An Tir’s records that provided the dates when Shires were made official by Royal proclamation. For this project, I scoured the back catalog of the kingdom newsletter, The Crier, to discover the closest approximations of these dates. I’m proud of my work, but saddened that this information has not been better kept by the Society.

How the Order of Precedence Works

New Articles: The Order of Esperance

New articles up at Poore House!

The following articles discuss the name, badge, and regalia for the newly proposed Order of Esperance. This information is developing quickly, and these articles may be obsolete by the time you read them. I will do my best to keep them up to date, or else link to more relevant information.

“Esperance” and Peerage Order Names

How to Create a Badge for a Peerage Order

Depicting the Esperance Badge

New Article: Marshalling in the SCA!

New article up at Poore House!

Today we’re discussing the heraldic practice of marshalling, or combining two or more sets of arms to create a new mode of heraldic display. This article discusses three different methods of marshalling, including dimidiation, impalement, and quartering.
If ever you’ve wanted to express love for someone through heraldry but didn’t know where to begin, this is the primer for you.

Marshalling in the SCA

New Article: An Tir Armory

New article up at Poore House!

This page contains all of the armory (royal arms, badges, etc.) registered to the Kingdom of An Tir. In exploring this project, I discovered several gems from An Tir’s history!
Regional populace badges! Ancient guilds! Privateers!

An Tir Armory

New Article: Court Layout for Peerage Elevations

New article up at Poore House This one is a bit of a logistics discussion, focusing on the layout of courts to improve the flow of movement during peerage elevations. It’s definitely targeted towards those in charge of organizing and running courts, but I trust that the issue it’s trying to solve and the logic of the proposed new layout will be of interest to more than ceremony wonks.

Court Layout for Peerage Elevations