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Atenveldt Submissions (excerpted from the S.C.A. College of Arms' Letters of Acceptance and Return)

ATENVELDT REGISTRATIONS by the College of Arms, January 2004:

Amy Marie MacCormack. Name and device. Per chevron inverted vert and purpure, a chevron inverted embattled-counterembattled Or between a harp argent and a spaniel statant Or.

Note: Amy is her legal given name and Marie is her legal middle name.

Angus MacGregor of Argyll. Name and device. Azure semy of annulets, on a bend sinister Or three bull's heads cabossed palewise azure.

Anna Carye. Device. Per chevron azure and gules, on a pall inverted engrailed between two natural dolphins haurient embowed and a lighthouse argent six escallops palewise gules.

Bryon l'Ours d'Argent de Bourgogne. Badge. Per pale sable and gules, two bears combattant within an orle argent.

Cecily d'Abernon. Device. Azure, on a pale between two turtles argent three damask roses proper slipped and leaved vert.

The damask roses proper are drawn as naturalistic pink roses. The Letter of Intent cited the Pictorial Dictionary, which states that "When blazoned as a 'garden rose' or a 'damask rose', the rose is depicted as found in nature, the petals overlapping and slightly spread... a garden rose may not be blazoned 'proper', but must have its tinctures explicitly blazoned. (The exception is the 'damask rose', a breed attested in Elizabethan herbals; this variety was always pink, so a 'damask rose proper' is pink, slipped vert)." The commentary was consistent in feeling that we should no longer blazon charges as damask roses, since damask roses are garden roses, citing the following precedent: "The commentary is in, with a clear majority of commenters in favor of adopting Baron Bruce's proposal that we continue to accept garden roses in SCA armory, but simply blazon them as roses. As a consequence, we will immediately and henceforth blazon a rose, whether the default heraldic rose or the garden rose, as a rose" (Cover Letter with the November 1994 LoAR).

The commentary also took issue with the statement in the Pictorial Dictionary that the damask rose was "always pink": both the commentary and the researches of Wreath's staff indicated that damask roses in the Elizabethan period could be found in both pink and white forms. If a "garden rose" is just an artistic variant of a heraldic rose, and a damask rose is a garden rose, then the "damask rose proper" has a problem because heraldic roses may not be pink, as pink is not a heraldic tincture. Some commenters suggested that perhaps the pink roses could be considered a "light gules" but the color of these roses is too far from gules to be considered a "light gules" (and is, moreover, too far from argent to be considered a "dark argent.") The SCA has only registered three damask roses in its history. Of these three registrations, only one of them is still registered: one of the registrations was really gules, not pink (and was later reblazoned as gules) and another one was released.

Because the pink naturalistic damask rose is not found in period heraldry, is not compatible with period heraldry, and is not found with great frequency in existing SCA heraldry, it will no longer be registered as of the July Laurel meeting.

Corwin de Harfleur. Badge. Azure, five annulets interlaced in saltire and a bordure argent.

Donngal de Buchanan. Device. Vert, a double-headed eagle Or and a bordure embattled Or ermined vert.

Duncan Silverwolf McTyre. Badge. Per fess azure and vert, a boar statant to sinister argent within an orle of oak leaves stems outwards Or.

This submission was originally pended on the July 2003 LoAR.

Fáelán Cameron. Name and device. Per bend sinister azure and vert semy of wolf's pawprints Or, in dexter chief a wolf's head erased Or. Hrafn Bloodaxe. Name and device. Per chevron sable and argent, in base a double-bitted axe all within a bordure gules.

Jonathon von Trotha and Deille of Farnham. Household name House Astrum Aureum.

Malise of Sundragon. Holding name and device (see RETURNS for name). Purpure, a rapier and a musket in saltire and on a point pointed argent an open book sable.

Please note that when blazoning items in saltire, the bendwise charge is blazoned first and the bendwise sinister charge is blazoned second.

Submitted under the name Malise Athelstan MacKendry.

Mariana Vivia de Santiago. Name change from Mariana de Santiago and device. Argent, a heart sable winged gules within a bordure embattled azure.

Her previous name, Mariana de Santiago, is released.

Nicholas Fletcher of Canterbury. Device. Azure ermined argent, a greyhound courant and on a chief Or an arrow reversed gules.

Tatiana Laski Krakowska. Alternate name Sancha Galindo de Toledo.

Good name!

ATENVELDT RETURNS by the College of Arms, January 2004:

Malise Athelstan MacKendry. Name.

This name has one weirdness for mixing the English Athelstan with an otherwise Scots name and a second weirdness for a double given name in Scots. As the submitter allows no major changes, we were unable to drop one of the given names in order to register this name.

Additionally, no evidence was found that the spelling MacKendry is a plausible period form. Metron Ariston found a spelling quite close to the submitted MacKendry: Under MacHendrie in Surnames of Scotland, Black notes Gilchrist Makhenry from 1480, which is very close indeed. His armory has been registered under the holding name Malise of Sundragon.

ATENVELDT PENDINGS until the July 2004 Laurel Meetings:

Jens Sveinsson. Device. Argent, a merman proper crined sable maintaining in his sinister hand a torch sable enflamed azure and on a bordure engrailed vert three escallops argent.

The merman was blazoned as proper crined sable. A proper merman has light pinkish Caucasian skin, as noted in the Glossary of Terms table of "Conventional 'Proper' Colorings" under "mermaid". However, the merman in this submission is drawn with dark brown skin (and long black hair and a small black Van Dyke beard).

The LoI stated that "Further correspondence with the submitter has determined that he would really prefer the merman not to be a typical 'Caucasian' merman, but rather brown-skinned (like an Islander, East Indian or Native American, population groups that Western Europeans were aware)." The LoI also discussed whether or not a merman proper (with Caucasian skin) had adequate contrast with an argent field. The blazon and discussions on the LoI caused the commenting College to believe that the merman in this submission had light pinkish Caucasian skin, not dark brown skin. This submission has been pended for further research and commentary under the correct tinctures.

The Cover Letter for the December 2002 LoAR discussed humans with dark brown skin found in period heraldry, which is to say, Moors and some Saracens (which do not represent the "Islander, East Indian, or Native American" ethnic groups mentioned in the Letter of Intent). This merman does not have the short curly hair and clean shaven features of the heraldic Moor, so he cannot be blazoned as a Moorish merman. He does not have the headgear (turban, torse, or crown) of the heraldic Saracen, so he cannot be blazoned as a Saracenic merman. This Cover Letter also mentions the fact that the default Saracen proper is Caucasian, and while we do know that there were occasional proper dark-brown-skinned Saracens found in period heraldry, the SCA has not yet decided how to blazon them.

When discussing this pended submission, please address the following issues

--Is a brown-skinned merman with long black hair and a small black beard registerable?

--If such a merman is registerable, how should it be blazoned?

We are not ruling at this time on the issue of whether a Caucasian merman may be registered on an argent field, as that issue is not applicable to this submission.
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