[antir-heralds] A couple of questions

[Ursula Whitcher]

Paul Jeffery wrote:
> Greetings everyone.
> 
> I have a couple of people that have come to me for help with names 
> and devices. As I am a very new herald I am coming to you all for 
> help. The first client would like to have a sun conure (type of 
> parrot). I am not sure if this is possible as they are from central 
> america. If it is possible when I do a conflict check would I have to
>  check against all birds?

I used the search form at http://www.morsulus.org/ to look for
precedents (comments from prior registrations).  Here's one from the
January 2004 Letter of Acceptances and Returns that looks useful:

> Drogo Rabenwald.  Device. Per bend sinister azure and sable, an 
> armadillo rampant argent.
> 
> The armadillo is a New World animal. The Oxford English Dictionary 
> dates the word "armadillo", referring to this animal, to 1577 and
> 1594. Armadillos are also found in several regions occupied by the
> Spanish long before the end of period. As armadillos were known to
> Western Europeans in period they may be registered, albeit as a step
> from period style (a "weirdness"). Per the LoAR of August 1999, "New
> World flora and fauna... are a discouraged weirdness, but
> registerable." Armory with a single step from period style may be
> registered, and there are no other steps from period style in this
> device.

So you need to show that Europeans could have encountered the sun conure
in period.  What part of Central America are they from?

There's a long precedent on conflict-checking birds which you should
probably read.  It's in the cover letter of the November 2003 LoAR:

http://www.sca.org/heraldry/loar/2003/11/

There's also a bird posture table in the same letter, which gives
information about the expected posture of various birds in period heraldry.

The precedent has a special note on parrots:

> Not all period birds are found in the categories above. For example, 
> while many popinjays (parrots) are drawn as "regular-shaped" birds in
>  period (often indistinct from a green crow with red legs and bill), 
> some of the more naturalistic drawings of popinjays have such 
> pronounced tails that popinjays, for the moment, been left out of any
>  of these categories.

So exactly how you conflict-check your parrot will depend on how the
parrot is drawn.  I would recommend researching the question of whether 
it was known to western Europeans in our period first, and then sending 
this list a link to an image of the proposed device (post it to any of 
the popular photo-sharing services, or your own website).

> The second client would like the name Agdta Xalbadora de La Coruña. 
> She provided me with this documentaion: 
> Agdta is a form of Ageda was 
> taken from here 
> http://www.ellipsis.cx/~liana/names/portuguese/fem1565.html.  Agata 
> is another variation.  The English variation is Agatha. 

I'd recommend asking your client why she thinks Agdta is a period spelling.

> Xalbadora 
> means "saviour" in Portuguese so I'm not sure if it needs to have 
> documentation as the society was Catholic at the time of my personas
>  life. 

Yes, the element does need documentation, because naming practices 
change over time.  The classic example is Ireland: we think of Mary and 
Patrick as quintessential Irish Catholic names, but in fact forms of 
these names were very rare in Ireland in our period, because Mary and 
Patrick were considered too holy to name children after.  Instead you 
find names meaning "servant of Mary" or "servant of Patrick".

Juliana de Luna has studied Spanish names in detail, and has some 
information on Portuguese names as well.  I'd recommend asking her about 
this name.  She is currently AEstel herald, in charge of consulting at 
events, so if she doesn't answer your question on the list, you can try 
contacting her at aestel at antir.sca.org .

> La Coruña is the province my persona is from. Now this seems 
> good to me and ready for conflict check.

We need to look into the history of the province and find out how its 
name was spelled in period.  Of course, for an authentic name you'd also 
want to know whether Portuguese women used names identifying the 
province they were from.

Ursula Georges.