I have been a member of the Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA) for over 30 years. The SCA is a worldwide medieval reenactment society that draws people in from all walks of life.
As a member of the SCA, I’ve put most of my focus into two areas – rapier combat (fencing) and voice heraldry (running/announcing courts).
Within the SCA, I live in the area called the East Kingdom, and am known by the name Malcolm Bowman.
I’ve done other things over the years. I’ve served as an officer on the local, regional, and Kingdom level, and I’ve been an archer, dancer, and even sous chef for dayboards.
As a court herald, I have had the privilege to improvise (Zen) scroll texts. And sometimes, I even write such texts for the amazing scribes that create our award scrolls. While many of the words I create are improvised or made with no source, some of the work I do is researched.
At the behest of my wife – I am sharing both the texts and their inspiration here.
Scroll Texts
Order of the Golden Rapier Text
These were the words I wrote for the scroll made for my friend Grim the Skald
Scroll text:
For all other guards in this art, guards that are similar are counters to each other – with the exception of the guards that stand ready to thrust—the Long Guard, the Short Guard and the Middle Iron Gate. For when it is thrust against thrust, the weapon with the longer reach will strike first. And whatever one of these guards can do so can the other.
Grim the Skald has come to observe these words with his practice of the two-handed sword.
Furthermore, Grimm knows that the sword can make the same three movements, namely stable turn, half turn and full turn, as taught by the masters of old.
Be it the powerful Iron Gate or The Stance of the Queen on the Right or Left; the stable Middle Iron Guard, Wild Boar’s Tusk, Shortened Stance, or the Stance of the Long Tail; or the fluid Stance of the Window, Extended Stance, Headband Stance called the Crown, or Two-Horned Stance – Grimm and his blade move swiftly in attack or defense.
Grim is not known for only skill with a two-handed sword. He has shown his prowess with other weapons, not insignificantly the sword and buckler, as well as service in teaching and marshaling at many opportunities.
Whoever wants to see fencing as one beautiful song should study this bard in his manner that could be called the Skald of Battle. It is for this reason that we, Tindal and Alberic, Consules of the Kingdom the East, do induct Grim the Skald into our Order of the Golden Rapier. Done in our Ethereal Court AS 55.
Text based (loosely) on The Flower of Battle by Fiore dei Liberi
Text research/source:
Source: https://wiktenauer.com/wiki/Fiore_de%27i_Liberi#Sword_in_Two_Hands
We are two guards that are similar to each other, and yet each one is a counter to the other. And for all other guards in this art, guards that are similar are counters to each other, with the exception of the guards that stand ready to thrust—the Long Guard, the Short Guard and the Middle Iron Gate. For when it is thrust against thrust the weapon with the longer reach will strike first. And whatever one of these guards can do so can the other.
And from each guard you can make a “turn in place” or a half turn. A turn in place is when without actually stepping[1] you can play to the front and then to the rear on the same side. A half turn is when you make a step forwards or backwards and can switch sides to play on the other side from a forwards or backwards position. A full turn is when you circle one foot around the other, one remaining where it is while the other rotates around it.
Furthermore you should know that the sword can make the same three movements, namely stable turn, half turn and full turn.
Both of these guards drawn below are named the Guard of the Lady.
Also, there are four types of movement[2] in this art, namely passing forwards, returning,[3] advancing,[4] and withdrawing.[5]
The Iron Gate (Powerful)
The Stance of the Queen on the Right (Powerful)
from this guard you can break the other guards with the strong blows you can make, and you can also quickly exchange thrusts.
The Stance of the Window (Fluid)
The Middle Iron Guard (Stable)
The Extended Stance (Fluid)
The Headband Stance called the Crown (Fluid)
The Wild Boar’s Tusk (Stable)
The Shortened Stance (Stable)
The Stance of the Queen on the Left (Powerful)
The Stance of the Long Tai (Stable)
The Two-Horned Stance (Fluid)
The Stance of the Boar’s Tusk in the Middle (Stable)
Silver Wheel/Award of Arms Text
These were the words I wrote for the scroll made for my friend Brienne of Buckland
Scroll Text:
If any ignorant person asks you what order you belong to – as you tell me some do, straining out the gnat and swallowing the fly – answer: Of The Silver Wheel, created for service to the Kingdom. If such an answer seems strange and remarkable to them, ask them what constitutes order, and where they found the service way of life more clearly described and explained.
But many people strain out the gnat and swallow the fly – that is, attach great importance to what matters least. But wherever a woman or a man is living on their own, as a hermit or recluse, or among loved ones, it does not matter much about external things – as long as they do not give rise to scandal – but for service to the good of all.
Thus it is that we, Tindal and Alberic, Consules of the East, recognizing her service and good nature, do induct Brienne of Buckland into our Order of the Silver Wheel, and further Award unto her Arms to be borne by her and her alone.
Done in our Ethereal Court, AS 55.
Text research/source:
The Ancrene Wisse c 1200.
If any ignorant person asks you what order you belong to—as you tell me some do, straining out the gnat and swallowing the fly—answer: of St James, who was God’s apostle and called God’s brother because of his great holiness. If such an answer seems strange and remarkable to him, ask him what constitutes order, and where he could find the religious way of life more clearly described and explained in Holy Scripture than it is in St James’s canonical epistle. He defines religious life and true order. Pure and immaculate religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their need, and to keep oneself unspotted from this world; that is, �Pure and immaculate religion is to visit and help widows and fatherless children, and keep oneself pure and unspotted from the world.� This is how St James describes religious life and order. The second part of what he says applies to recluses; because there are two parts, corresponding to the two different kinds of religious. Each kind has its own part, as you may hear. Some people in the world are good religious, especially prelates and true preachers. The first part of what St James said applies to them; they are, as he says, those who go to help widows and fatherless children. The soul is a widow who has lost her spouse, that is, Jesus Christ, through any mortal sin. Those are also fatherless who through their sin have lost the Father of heaven. Going to see such people and comforting them and helping them with the nourishment of holy instruction— this is true religion, says St James. The second part of what he says applies to your kind of religious life, as I said before, keeping yourselves pure and unspotted from the world more than other religious. So the apostle St James, describing religion, mentions neither white nor black in his order. But many people strain out the gnat and swallow the fly—that is, attach great importance to what matters least. Paul the First Hermit, Antony and Arsenius, Macarius and the others, weren�t they religious and of St James�s order? Likewise St Sarah and St Syncletica, and many others like them, both men and women, with their coarse mats and their harsh hair-shirts; didn�t they belong to a good order? And whether white or black—as ignorant people ask you, thinking that order consists in the outer garment—God knows; nevertheless, they were certainly both, not, however, in their clothes, but as God’s spouse sings of herself, I am black but comely. �I am black and yet white�, she says: unsightly outside, bright inside. This is how you should answer those people who ask about your order, and whether it is white or black: say that you are both through the grace of God, and of the order of St James which he described next: To keep oneself unspotted from this world-–that is, as I said before, to keep oneself pure and unspotted from the world. This is what the religious life consists in, not in the wide hood or the black cape, or in the white rochet or in the grey cowl. Where many people are gathered together, for the sake of unity importance must be attached to uniformity of clothing, and of other kinds of external observances, so that the outer uniformity should symbolize the inner unity of one love and one will that they all have in common. With their uniform habit, which they all share, and also in other things, they proclaim that all of them together share one love and one will (take care that they are not lying!). That is the nature of a community. But wherever a woman or a man is living on their own, as a hermit or recluse, it does not matter much about external things as long as they do not give rise to scandal. Listen to Micah: I will show you, O man, what is good and what God requires from you: to judge rightly at all costs and walk carefully with the Lord your God.
Silver Brooch Text
These were the words I wrote for the scroll made for my friend Ellynor Redpath
Scroll Text:
A brief content of certain Acts of Ellynor Redpath, against the inordinate use of apparel.
None shall wear silk of the color of purpure, cloth of gold, but only the King and Queen, except Dukes and Duchesses-to-be may wear in sleeveless doublets and sleeveless coats. Cloth of gold-silver, tinseled satin, silk or cloth mixed or embroidered with gold and or silver, no fur or sables, except Earls, and all degrees of Viscounts, and Barons, in doublets and sleeveless coats only. Woolen cloth made out of the realm, but in bonnets only velvet, furs, embroidery, except Dukes, Earls, and Barons. Silk, other than satin, damaske, taffeta, or sarcenet in doublets, and the same or velvet in sleeveless coats, jackets, jerkens, coifs, caps, purses or partlets being not of color scarlet, crimson, or blue.
Ellynor Redpath’s research into the apparel of Elizabethan England has not gone unnoticed, nor has her work in recreating garb of the period. Thus is it is that we, Ozzur King and Fortune Queen, do name Ellynor a companion of the Order of the Silver Brooch. Done this 7th Day of September, AS 54, at Brennan & Caoilfhionn’s Ducal Challenge in our Beloved Barony of Settmour Swamp.
Text research/source:
Elizabeth I’s Proclamation Against Excess, 1577
http://www.bl.uk/learning/timeline/item102766.html
Baronial Bardic Champion’s Text
These were the words I wrote for the scroll made for whoever would win that year’s Baronial bardic champion’s competition (it happened to be my friend Mabel Fortune)
Scroll text:
Shall I compare thee to a most skilled bard?
Thou art more verbal and more triumphant:
Rough words do no justice upon this card,
A winter’s tale of victory most resplendent.
Timely performance before Baron and Baroness,
Thou hath strived through song and story.
Your hold upon audiences in mirth and stillness.
Impressively humble despite such glory.
Settmour Swamp a champion named,
Of the bardic arts thine praise most fair.
Proclaim this victor and be not blamed,
This sweetest day most grand and rare.
insert name here be proclaimed Settmour Swamp Bardic champion,
Done this 22nd Day of February, AS 48 at Black Gryphon Inn
In the Swamp’s most adored Gryphonwald Canton,
Baron Erec and Baroness Jehanine upon thee do grin.
Text research/source:
William Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18
Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed,
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature’s changing course untrimmed:
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st,
Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st,
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
Proclamation
I’m putting this here because I’m rather proud of it. Original – kind of. The King wanted a proclomation that all things Princess Bride be considered period during the reign. I got to write this and declare it in court for him.
Text:
The dread King Konrad, having braved the terrors of fireswamps and cliffs of insanity, avoiding getting involved in land wars in Asia, defeating Spaniards with steel, giants with strength, and Sicilians even with Death being on the line, has come forward in a most inconceivable manner to declare that the film Princess Bride is period during the duration of the reign, in support of the Prince of Northshield. As such, all documentation based upon the Princess Bride, be it cited by men with six fingers on the right hand, or ladies with perfect breasts, or the owners of rodents of unusual size, or any less or more colorful characters, is hereby period. Let any man who may stand against this declaration hear the fearsome cry…his name is King Konrad von Ulm…you have insulted his brother…prepare to die! As you wish, this sixth day of November, AS 44, so it is decreed.
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