Kingdom of Atenveldt
Heraldic Submissions Page
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Atenveldt Submissions (excerpted from the S.C.A. College of Arms' Letters of Acceptance and Return)
The following were registered by the S.C.A. College of Arms at its August 2008 meetings: Asha Batu. Device. Gules chaussé, on a chief Or a furison sable. Brénainn mac Láegaire. Name and device. Per chevron azure and argent, a weeping willow tree eradicated, its trunk the head and torso of a woman counterchanged, on a chief argent a Continental panther passant sable incensed gules. The use of a weeping willow is a step from period practice. The tree trunk being the body of a woman is not a step from period practice: Batonvert notes that "the mundane example that springs to mind is the harp of the arms of Ireland, whose fore pillar is often carved into the shape of a winged woman but the fact never blazoned." We are blazoning the presence of the woman here because if we blazon this simply as a tree, our modern heraldic artists would not reproduce this emblazon. Coileán mac an Báird. Name and device. Per saltire azure and sable, a sword inverted surmounted by a staff, headed of a roundel, bendwise argent. Submitted as Coileān mac an Bāird, Gaelic uses the acute accent, not the macron, to indicate long vowels. We have made this correction. The documentation for the byname, Woulfe, Sloinnte Gaedheal is Gall: Irish Names and Surnames, listed the byname with the substantive element lenited. However, the unlenited form, which was submitted, is also acceptable. Rowel notes a number of examples from the Annals of the Four Masters, including:
These spellings are consistent with Early Modern Irish spellings, which means that both mac an Bháird and mac an Báird are reasonable Early Modern Irish bynames. Constancia le Gode. Device. Vert, on a pale indented between two fleurs-de-lys argent, in pale a wyvern statant atop a tower sable. Submitted as Dominique de la Mer, precedent from September 2002 says: Dominica Maquerelle. Name. Submitted as Dominique Maquereau, both elements are modern forms. No documentation was found that these are plausible forms in period. Marie-Therese Morlet, Les Noms de Personne sur le Territoire de l'Ancienne Gaule du VIe au XIIe Siecle (vol. II, p. 42 s.n. Dominica), dates Dominica to various points in the 9th to 11th C as a feminine name...We have modified this name to use period forms in order to register this name. In commentary Wreath Emeritus cited grey area examples of Dominique from http://www.ancestry.com: the father of someone christened in 1613, someone who died in 1645, someone who married in 1641, and four people born in 1616, 1643, and 1646. However, she also notes "I can't tell if the names have been normalized or not." Current precedent allows the use of genealogical websites such as http://www.ancestry.com for documentation purposes only in cases where we know that the name forms in question have not been normalized or modernized: As genealogy sources routinely normalize spellings, they are not suitable for documentation of SCA name submissions on their own [Jörgen Unruh, LoAR 10/2004, Atlantia-A]. Heinemann was documented from ancestry.com. The April 2001 LoAR stated the following in regards to the submitted name Sueva the Short: The given name was documented from Roberts, Notable Kin: An Anthology of Columns First Published in the NEHGS NEXUS, 1986-1995. While we have no reason to doubt the quality of the genealogical research, the goals of genealogists are different from ours and their data is not necessarily applicable to SCA use. The same issue applies to documentation from genealogy Web sites including ancestry.com. They cannot be relied on for documentation for spelling variants. [Tatiana Heinemann, 08/01, A-Trimaris] Barring evidence that these ancestry.com citations have not been normalized, they do not provide support for Dominique as a grey-area spelling. Wreath Emeritus also cited a burial record for a Dominque Gallinier who died in 1661, aged 55, which she confirmed by looking at a scan of the original record. However, the case of names of people born in the grey area is not the same as those who were married or buried in the grey area. As precedent says: The purpose of the gray area is to provide the benefit of the doubt for names that are not found prior to the 17th century, but that may plausibly have been in use prior to 1600. For example, if a marriage record or a death record shows a particular name in use between 1600-1650, the name is registerable because it is plausible that it was in use prior to 1600. [Karolyne, called the Wanderer, 03/04, R-Caid] With a marriage or death record from the grey area, we can give the submitter the benefit of the doubt that the person in question was born before 1600. When we have clear evidence that the person was born within the grey area, then we can no longer can give that benefit of the doubt. Lacking clearly non-normalized examples of Dominique either in our period or in grey area records which are not birth records, the spelling Dominique remains unregisterable. The submitter indicated that if Dominique was not registerable, she preferred the form Dominic, which Withycombe, Oxford Dictionary of English Christian Names, s.n. Dominic(k) indicates was used by both men and women from the 13th century. We have changed the name to Dominic de la Mer in order to register it. Submitted as Francésca Marchési, the accents used in De Felice, Dizionario dei cognomi italiani and Dizionario dei nomi italiani, are pronunciation guides and are not part of the name. We have removed them. Iamys MacMurray de Morayshire. Device change. Azure, three mullets argent and a bordure argent semy of hands gules. While we protect both the Red Hand of Ulster and the augmentation for British baronets, what we protect in each case is a single hand. Per the August 1992 precedent, "the use of red hands, gloves, gauntlets, etc., on white backgrounds is not, in and of itself, cause for return." This ruling was not overturned on the January 2008 Cover Letter, the definition of what is protected was merely clarified. One commenter noted that the arms of the Murrays and the Province of Moray in Scotland are Azure, three mullets argent, later augmented to Azure, three mullets argent and for augmentation a double tressure flory counter-flory Or. While the combination of the submitted name and the uncadenced form of the submitted arms (without the charged bordure) would likely be considered presumptuous, we do not currently protect the Moray/Murray arms. The submission is also clear of them, with CDs for the addition of the bordure and the addition of the hands. His old armory, Argent, on a bend azure cotised vert three mullets palewise argent all within a bordure azure, is released. Kassah bint Badr. Name change from holding name Leslie of Twin Moons. Maredudd Browderer. Badge. (Fieldless) In saltire a holly leaf vert and a sewing needle argent. Mederic de Chastelerault. Badge. (Fieldless) In cross a sword fesswise reversed argent, hilted and quilloned sable, and a sickle inverted argent. This would normally have been returned for excessive allusion to the symbol commonly used by the rock band "Blue Öyster Cult" (which can be seen at http://www.blueoystercult.com/main.html) except that this exact motif is used in his registered armory and its use is grandfathered to him. Mederic de Chastelerault and Ameera al-Sarrakha. Badge (see RETURNS for household name). Argent, on a fess cotised between a sword fesswise and another fesswise reversed sable, a pair of drinking horns argent. Please instruct the submitter to draw a thicker fess, so the horns can be more readily identified. Michiel Martel. Name and device. Per bend sinister gules and argent, a bend sinister between a mallet and a cross formy counterchanged. Submitted as Michiel le Martel, the documentation, Aryanhwy merch Catmael, "Late Period French Feminine Names", listed the byname as Martel without the definite article. No documentation was provided for the addition of the definite article le. We have dropped it to register the name as Michiel_Martel to match the documentation. The only documentation provided for the byname was an Encyclopedia Britannica article discussing the history of the city. This is inadequate documentation because it does not show that the city was called Ansbach in our period. Blaeu's 1645 atlas of Territorium Norimbergense (http://www.library.ucla.edu/yrl/reference/maps/blaeu/norimbergense.jpg) mentions the Marckgraef von Anspach; this map pretty consistently spells modern -bach as -pach. However, Aryanhwy merch Catmael, "German Place Names from a 16th C Czech Register", shows various place names recorded with both spellings interchangeably, so the Blaeu citation supports Ansbach as a plausible period form of the place name, and hence Ansbacher is a plausible adjectival locative based on this place name. Rollo of Mons Tonitrus. Holding name and device (see RETURNS for name). Or, on a bend sinister cotised between two Thor's hammers sable a sword Or. Please instruct the submitter to draw the bend thicker. Submitted under the name Rollo the Walker. Ryon of Sundragon. Holding name and badge. (Fieldless) A cock within and conjoined to a mascle Or. Submitted under the name Dubhghlais Brocc, that name was returned on the July 2008 LoAR. Terrance of Granite Mountain. Name and device. Sable, on a triangle inverted argent a bow fesswise drawn and nocked with an arrow inverted sable, all within an orle of plates. Terrance is the submitter's legal given name. Granite Mountain is the name of an SCA branch. Please inform the submitter that charges in orle should be equidistant from the edge of the field. Given the wide variance in art skills displayed in period armorials, however, the submitted emblazon is acceptable and registerable. Zedena Lyschka. Name change from holding name Zedena of Tir Ysgithr. The following were returned by the College of Arms for further work, August 2008:Margareta Marrian. Device. Per bend sinister argent and Or, in bend a hummingbird rising contourny vert, beaked, winged and tailed sable, throated gules and argent, maintaining in its beak a threaded needle sable, and an arrow bendwise sinister inverted proper fletched vert. This is returned for being excessively complex and for the unblazonable posture of the thread. With four charge types (bird, arrow, needle, thread) and six tinctures (argent, Or, sable, vert, gules, brown), this submission has a complexity count of ten. While we routinely register armory that exceeds our suggested limit of eight, we require that the armory in question have good period style. The use of a hummingbird is a step from period practice, per the December 2007 Cover Letter, which means this design is not good period style. The position of the thread in the submission, depicted as wound around the arrow, cannot be blazoned. The Rules for Submission, section VII.7.b, states that "Elements that cannot be described in such a way that the depiction of the armory will remain consistent may not be used, even if they are identifiable design motifs that were used before 1600." On resubmission, the charges in the primary group should be centered in their sections instead of crowding the line of division. Mederic de Chastelerault and Ameera al-Sarrakha. Household name House Steel Fang. This is returned for lack of evidence that it follows period patterns of household names in English. The LoI justified the name as following the inn-sign pattern of household names and meaning 'noose, trap made of steel'. However, no examples of similar type sign names were provided; all of the provided examples were much simpler and used the every day terms for items, e.g. the Hamere 1426, the Bell 1307, 1522, the Shippe 1423, the Sword 1380, 1470, all found in Mari Elspeth nic Bryan, "English Sign Names". Based on these examples, we'd expect an inn whose sign had a noose on it to be called the Noose, not the Steel Fang. The submitters noted that if House Steel Fang was not acceptable, they'd accept House Steel and Fang. However, by the same argument as given in the previous paragraph, an inn whose sign had a noose and a fire-steel on it would likely have been called the Steel and Noose, not the Steel and Fang. Finally, we note that none of the examples of household names based on signs that were provided on the LoI or in commentary support the pattern House [of] X. Instead, the documented patterns include X (with no designator; note that this pattern is not registerable as it violates RfS III.2.b), X Inn, X Tavern, X Brewhouse, and Sign of X. This is returned for conflict with Rollo the Walker, one name under which Hrolfr gangr, the founder of the duchy of Normandy, is commonly known in modern times. Hrolfr is effectively a sovereign ruler, and is thus automatically protected. RfS V.1.c Historical Personal Names says that "Protected historical personal names are protected in all of the forms in which they commonly appear." While a significant number of the websites cited by the commenters call Hrolfr Rollo the Walker because Wikipedia does so and they have derived their content from Wikipedia, this is not an argument that Rollo the Walker is not a name under which the duke is commonly known. In fact, given the high access rate of Wikipedia, and the fact that so many sites copy their information from that site, we would not be surprised if name forms used in Wikipedia become, in the future, perhaps the only form under which a historical person's name is known, for at least some people. Additionally, a number of commenters noted that this name immediately brought to mind Hrolfr. His device has been registered under the holding name Rollo of Mons Tonitrus. Varsonofii syn Zakhar'iashev Olyechnov. Badge. (Fieldless) A mullet voided surmounted by a spider inverted argent. As drawn, there are difficulties with identifiability of the charges. This is a violation of RfS VIII.3, which requires that "Elements must be used in a design so as to preserve their individual identifiability." Neither the spider nor the mullet can be distinguished. It may be impossible to emblazon this design in a fashion that allows both charges to be recognized. The fact that the two charges share tinctures adds to the problem. |
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