The Armour Archive

Donal Mac Ruiseart

I have a related question. I have always used a soft grip on my shield. I have a shield basket but I've rarely tried to use it. And I've always worn a hockey glove on my shield hand. A hockey glove has one real advantage on a shield hand: Its back is flat. I tuck it into the hand-strap and when I sl...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

I have a copy of Lull (somewhere) but nowhere have I found the Ordene in print, so it may be worth it.

What is the translation of Lull? Is it the Caxton or a modern one?

Donal Mac Ruiseart

D. Sebastian wrote:Hairs on my bottom,
I stand erect in a bed.
Sure to make a nun cry.

A flea

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Here's a clever one I found. No googling! Five hundred begins it, five hundred ends it, Five in the middle is seen; First of all figures, the first of all letters, Take up their stations between. Join all together, and then you will bring Before you the name of an eminent king. DAVID "D" ...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Alex Baird wrote:
Donal Mac Ruiseart wrote:Up I go, yet down I remain.

Hah! I just realized that this is a variation of the "lap" riddle. D'oh!

Actually, the answer I know for it is "A goose".

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Um . . . are any left?

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Do you consider it a bad practice to block thrusts with the basket because of the risk of a miss?

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Another mark agaisnt carrying a longsword as a backup is that one of the situations in which you might find youself needing a backup is when you have lost an arm. A mace, long dagger, or simple broadsword or short sword would be useable by a man with but one hand at his disposal. By and large, a lon...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Another mark agaisnt carrying a longsword as a backup is that one of the situations in which you might find youself needing a backup is when you have lost an arm. A mace, long dagger, or simple broadsword or short sword would be useable by a man with but one hand at his disposal. By and large, a lon...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

There's a lady in my Barony who maintains that doublet should be pronounced "doo-blay." Correct per French, but I doubt she'll succeed in that campaign.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

The problem with the correct pronunciation of "Cuirass" is that it sounds like an insult to those not versed in French. I think that could be the reason - beyond simple ignorance of the way it would be pronounced in French - that many people I know insist on pronouncing it "kyoorass&q...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Alex: Correct about the cow. The other one is not the answer I know but I would have to say it's correct in that much.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

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Two up, four down, four danglers, and a wig-wag.

Up I go, yet down I remain.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

I'm primarily a spearman anyway in war, and I suspect that when my stamina diminishes to the point that I can no longer be a viable force in tournaments, I will still amble out into the field with spear on shoulder to strike a few blows in support of my King. The image of a chain being only as stron...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

B. Fulton wrote:[W]e don't all ride around on horses wearing Stetsons.

Point of fact, I've never seen a horse wearing a Stetson in Texas.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Karen Larsdatter wrote:Linsey-woolsy, at least back to the 15th century[/url], probably to the 13th; wool-silk blends probably also to the 13th century.

Add those to the wish lists, then: Linen/wool and woo/silk blends.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

In 35 years as a fighter I've twice had to see a doctor about SCA fighting injuries.

Both were broken fingers. Inconvenient and uncomfortable, but in no way dangerous.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Silk heavy and light. . . . Banner silk, so to speak, as well as garment silk.

How far back do linsy-woolsy (linen/wool blend) and bombazine (wool-silk blend) go?

Donal Mac Ruiseart

To put the Pennsic question into perspective, consider that Pennsic is essentially a town of about 10,000 population. In any given two-week period, how many deaths might one expect in a population of 10,000? Pennsic doesn't have the traffic-related danger to the extent most towns have because there ...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

If the bones become so brittle that a regular blow would break them . . . If the muscles grow so weak that they can no longer strike a telling blow no matter what sort of workout regimen I maintain . . . IF the eyes become so dim that I cannot make out ally from adversary (initially wrote "frie...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Part of the confusion may be in the definition of rape. I believe (this is from something I read a long time ago) that having carnal knowledge of (in modern language, having sex with) a married woman could have been considered rape in the statutory sense because a married woman had not the power of ...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

marcus the pale wrote:That is epic, too bad there isn't an action shot of it happening. Envisioning the actual moment in my head is almost like a movie. If shields could earn a place in Valhalla...

I suspect that they do. Are not the stories full of descriptions of shield-hung halls?

Donal Mac Ruiseart

In Spring I look gay,
Decked in comely array,
In Summer more clothing I wear;
When colder it grows,
I fling off my clothes,
And in Winter quite naked appear.

(I didn't write it; I found it on a web site.)

Donal Mac Ruiseart

This one gets pretty good reviews for literary if not historical validity Knights of the Round Table And this one I've seen but once, yet it seems to capture a fair amount of the legend while looking reasonably authentic Sword of Lanceleot I thought JosÃ© Ferrer starred as Lancelot in that one but s...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Did you think they were morons because they were fighters, or because they were morons? There are fighters who are morons, and there are morons who are fighters. And there are representatives of darn near every intelligence level probably up to genius. No one has a lock on any of those categories..

Donal Mac Ruiseart

InsaneIrish wrote:A friend of mine built a wheel for a wagon. It worked really well for a short while, then the hub exploded and the wagon go BAM, CRASH, SMOOSH, OUCH! Not fun.

Well, it's obvious what part of his problem was. All the weight of the load on a single wheel.

He should've built at least two.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Queen by Right Of Arms = "King", but we still call Her Queen. Not in Atlantia. When it became apparent that ladies could enter Crown Tourneys, Atlantia's Great Book of Laws was amended to read "Sovereign" and "Consort" rather than "King" and "Queen."...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Nah, both of them have too much hair.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

hmmmmmm, SCA-legal trident. Can it be done? Possibly. This is entirely speculative, but if I were going to try it this is how I'd proceed. I'd find the thickest piece of rattan that I could, and very carefully cut along its length to about a foot from the end. This end I would soak in warm water fo...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Dmitriy wrote:[Y]ou should hear of the kinds of shenenigans a bachelor King who's not at Pennsic can get up to at Pennsic..

How can a King who's not at Pennsic get into any shennanigans at Pennsic?

Donal Mac Ruiseart

So, logically, in the West Kingdom becoming an authorized fighter implies a willingness to serve as Crown. Is that really what is intended ? I'm generally ok with interkingdom anthropological differentiation, but I'm curious whether there's a logical disconnect here, or if in the West people really...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

I use Windrose's architectural foam cut to the shape I want, and their black close-cell for the required padding. The shape is straight on one side with a triangular projection on the other serving mostly as a hook. I use Windrose thrusting tips fore and aft, and sometimes, when the tape is new, I u...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

In my mind there is but one valid reason to enter a Crown Tourney: To make the attempt to win and gain a Crown for oneself and one's consort. The motivations behind that are many, and could be the subjects of a whole series of threads. But again, in my mind the most valid of those motivations is a d...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

I communicated with the company and asked about black or gray ones.

They said they had no plans to make black or gray because there wasn't enough demand.

I asked how much would be enough, and they said around 30,000.

End of dialog. I didn't know they made such vast quantities.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Because I've been around so long, I've probably forgotten some of the best and some of the worst. That said, however; the best one I recall in anything like recent memory was the Pas du ForÃªt MystÃ©rieux, in Windmaster's Hill last June. It was the first true Pas d'Armes in which I had had the chanc...

As a side note . . .

A Riddle in the Classic Style

No black KONG heads anytime soon . . .