The following was originally posted to the Cormac Mor Facebook page on July 3, 2020. It has been reproduced in its entirety here.

There are a fair number of discussions going on about the use of titles in the SCA. Fortunately, I’ve got an easy-fix solution to at least of five of them!

Problem 1: The terms Master and Mistress make some members of the SCA uncomfortable, including members of the peerage (like myself) who avoid using them, preferring any other title we’re allowed to use.

Problem 2: The structure of titles in the SCA for any award below Royal Peerage is completely backward from period practice, with knights at the top and Lords and Ladies at the bottom. Throughout much of period, Lord was the highest title one might bear, short of Duke, Prince, King, or Emperor (or the feminine equivalent). Barons, Viscounts, Counts, Earls, and Marquises were all “Lord [landholding].”

Problem 3: Title-stacking (i.e. “Viscount Sir Stephen,” “Duke Count Sir Master Master Master Guilluame”) is not only ahistorical, but peers and coronet-wearing nobility uniformly leave off the titles Lord, Lady, or Noble (the armigerous titles), giving the impression to any whose highest award is an Award or Grant of Arms that their accomplishments are virtually worthless.

Problem 4: Outside of the titles “Noble” and “Armiger,” the College of Arms has not found a standard gender-neutral version of any of the titles recognized by the Board of Directors.

Problem 5: The Board holds exclusive power to determine and define new titles, and they are slow to act and reluctant to change that which appears to be working well for a large group of people.

Here’s my solution, which requires neither Board nor Heralds to act, is within the rules set out by the Governing Documents, improves historical accuracy, alleviates the pressure of using the troublesome terminology, and gives higher ranks a gender-neutral term for their personal use.

Solution: Encourage peers and coronet-wearing nobility to use their Armigerous titles, appended with their higher/highest awards at the end. That would make me, for example, “Lord Cormac Mor, Companion of the Pelican” (or Lord Cormac for short). Or, if I identified as nonbinary, “Noble Cormac Mor, Companion of the Pelican.”

What issues with titles and rank do you see in the SCA?