[antir-heralds] quarters n cantons n laurel wreaths

[Leslie Schweitzer]

[I've been pretty swamped lately so if I'm saying things that have been said by others, I probably missed 'em... sorry I cannot give the appropriate degree of credit...]

> I personally think that it would make sense to give the Documented 
> Exception rule a wider play: for instance, it would be reasonable to 
> allow a group to use the documented exception clause to register a 
> branch device without a laurel wreath.  But I'm not in charge of the 
> rules :)

I'd personally rather see the laurel wreath requirement go bye-bye altogether - it gets in the way of good heraldic design. Can a branch have (field) a (charge) for its arms? Nope, because of some Order or another. Can it have (field) 3 (identical charges)? Well, yeah it can, but most branches find it pretty boring with that particular charge, even if they want simple armory, they'd rather have some sort of item that "uniquely" (for the local area) says "this branch!" to the viewer - a totem critter, or striking geometric design, or some such. How unique can you be with if the only charge on your arms is the same one that every other branch in the SCA uses?

Any heraldic rule which takes two of the most common heraldic designs in period, and makes them impossible or difficult for branches to emulate, contributes significantly a situation where SCA branches don't do a good job of emulating period style.

(I'm ranting. Sorry. Well, I've never been in charge of the rules, either... although for quite a while, that's been my #1-sacred-cow-to-roast if I had the ability to pick one out of the air, with an automatic magical acceptance of the thing I picked by the general SCA populace.)

> 
> The client in question found an example of a design in a period roll of 
> arms which involves a charged canton/quarter (but not an augmentation), 
> and prefers authenticity to registrability.

I gotta side with the folks who believe that a canton and a quarter were not clearly distinguished from each other through a reasonable chunk of our period - and are not clearly distinguished from each other visually in our time. It depends on the design. "Azure, a pale argent and a canton Or" can visually be told from "Azure, a pale and overall a quarter Or" - in the one case the square at the top left doesn't overlap the pale but in the 2nd it does. However, "Azure, a lion rampant argent and a canton Or" is hard to distinguish from "Azure, a lion rampant argent and overall a quarter Or."

And when it comes to pretense and offense, it's a matter of appearances to a large number of SCAers, not a matter of period practice. So, if they look similar enough to be confused, and if the look is presumptuous, I think there's a presumption problem.

After all, it's pretty clear that the use of a crown in period heraldry usually had nothing to do with the rank or status of the owner. But I don't think we'd have any luck in today's SCA trying to argue that crowns and coronets should cease to be reserved to Kingdoms, Principalities, Royal peers, and Baronial status folk. I suspect that if one elected to use at SCA events, unregistered, "Azure three crowns Or", without the appropriate personal status, a bunch of SCAers would be offended. Some of the offended SCAers will probably have great skill with duct-taped rattan blunt implements, and don't care a lot about the smaller details of period heraldic practice.(Swedes might not like it, either ;-)

I suspect fewer people would have strong pretense reactions to a charged canton being used by someone without an augmentation, than to a crown being used by an "everyday person", because augmentations aren't as obvious to the average SCAer as pointy hats. But I do think that enough charged cantons are period augmentations that - if we want to have something in the SCA that visually says "look! an augmentation!" a charged canton is a pretty good choice.

Now, the whole "quarterly in dexter (or sinister) chief, a single charge" design is certainly period. Would that kind of design meet your client's needs?

Zenobia Black Stag