On 12/8/2014 12:15 PM, Marguerite D.A. Reed wrote:
> /Please/  don't tell me you subscribe to that theory some people
> espouse, that the fighters make the SCA and everyone else is just
> window dressing.

No. Heralds are what make the SCA - because fighters without a
herald are just a vulgar brawl of thugs. :-) :-)  (Sorry:
too many years as a professional authentic-tournament herald.)

More seriously - if you look at the actual and well-documented
origins of the SCA (history.westkingdom.org is accessible and
a good start), it's clear that the original party, and MUCH
of the impetus that came afterward, came from the romantic
and romanticized ideals of the period and the role the
Chivalric man of arms played in that.

It was as much movies and trouvere poems and chanson as it
was actual history, but it was what got people out of the
house, into costume, and to events.

Everything grew up from there.

That's not to say that we haven't grown from there.  But at
the very core of the SCA, there is the silly romantic notions
of chivalry (and Chivalry) and inspirations and poetry and
so forth.

The rest is not "window dressing", because the rest is what most
people actually do.  But the role of combat and the artful
idealism around combat, is more of what makes us what we are
than many people like to credit.

	Tibor

--
Manage your subscription at  http://listserv.unl.edu.
listserv.unl.edu lists do not accept incoming email from Yahoo.com, AOL.com or Dropbox.com due to their DMARC policies.