The Armour Archive

Donal Mac Ruiseart

The standard SCA joke for many years about Vikings counting was "One, two, many!"

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Concering the dress for the ceremony: I don't recall the origin of the term, but i do recall a writer of sometime within our time-frame of interest railing about "carpet knights." Seems to me that being knighted in a big, furred robe smacks of that label. Being knighted in armour, however,...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Impressive for many reasons.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

You know, I rather doubt if any of us know of the racial makeup of the Archive. Except for the people I know personally or have met (or whose avatar pics are self-descriptive), I have no idea of the actual ethnicity of my fellow Archivers.

Which doesn't bother me a bit.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

This will only work once or twice per fighter or per event, but it's a maneuver I've used with great sword and pole-arm against sword-and-shield fighters. When he charges, strike at his head, to induce him to raise his shield. When he does, sidestep to his shield side and turn towards him - essentia...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

I wonder a little about your blade. Is it serviceable? Is it pleasing to the eye? Has it served you well? If the answer to those questions is in the affirmative, I would say that abandoning it to have a new, finer one made is like abandoning an old below-the-salt friend when you get promoted. I woul...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Negative. You cannot get to the touch hole if it is way out in front of you. The tiller is for tucking under the arm, or resting on the shoulder, etc. An aiming aide, if you want to consider it that. I don't mean holding it at full length; I know you have to be able to reach the touch hole with the...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

RandallMoffett wrote: Hope the soldier who had it was not blown apart as well.

I think that's one reason they were mounted on long shafts. Hold it out far enough in front and you may survive when it explodes.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Per fess embattled sable and argent (or whatever the tinctures actually are), a decrescent (tincture) and a laurel wreath (tincture) in pale. If the upper half of the field is the same colour as the laurel wreath and the lower half is the same colour as the decrescent, it would be "a decrescent...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Richard. We'll have you wearing trumpets, yet! Actually, I hope not. [rant] I disapprove of wearing those trumpets on a tabard. Heralds (all of them) who serves a branch (at any level up to and including Kingdoms) should wear the branch's arms on their tabards. Free-lance heralds should wear a taba...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

@Richard: The last design, with the bear on a pale argent, is good. It would be much easier to deal with if you made the stripes along the sides of the pale the same colour as the field, which would make it a pale cotised. As it is, I would blazon it: Vert, on a pale argent a bear rampant between tw...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

It is the sort of thing a great lord might wear for a triumphal parade or some great pageant. It is strikingly beautiful.

Is it based on a particular work of art, or is the idea yours entirely?

Donal Mac Ruiseart

VERY darn lucky!

Donal Mac Ruiseart

I am most favourably impressed.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

The new Crown Prince of Atlantia is Michael of Bedford, who fought for Seonaid nÃ Fhionn.

Vivat princeps! Vivat Atlantia!

Donal Mac Ruiseart

You're being drawn in, Richard . . . you're even beginning to sound like one of us.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Adeliz, I called it "pily" because it was an equal number of both tinctures. A coat emblazoned "paly" or "bendy" or "barry" has to have an even number total, and an equal number of each tincture. Thus, the field of the US flag is not "barry" but &quo...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Here are the blazons (heraldic descriptions) of all three. I'm numbering from left to right, not using the "preference" numbers accompanying the images. #1: Per bend argent and purpure, a frog turgiant and a fleur-de-lis counterchanged. (In this case, "counterchanged" serves both...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

You might be interested in what I found and posted in a related thread in Historical Research.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Actually, it seems rather like the "Crusader" or "Christian Madu" style. I used to carry a short sword as a backup when fighting spear. And I used to have a buckler that I'd wear on my left hand. Both the sword and the buckler have gone away. But part of the idea was that if the ...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

I had this idea that a bannerer could carry a buckler, mounted on soft straps so the user could grasp it and the flagstaff simultaneously.

Any thoughts or opinions about that idea?

Donal Mac Ruiseart

I like it, though I've done it only a little. I think it comes closer to how a prudhomme would fight afoot rather than using a large shield.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

I do intend to acquire that book at some point, though I'm not currently in a state where I can run out and drop $65 . . . I did, however, find The Unconquered Knight online, and in it I found precisely the sort of instruction I was seeking: Well do soldiers know that all have their eyes on the bann...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Kilkenny wrote:Set your way back machine to somewhere between 1975 and 1965.

During that time frame you can use a real axe handle for your axe in the SCA.

In my first tournament in the SCA I borrowed a mace that was a lightweight BASEBALL BAT with a foam head on it. That was in AS XI (1974).

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Cliff Rogers wrote:Banners were _very_ important in medieval battle- I discuss the subject in _Soldiers' Lives through History: The Middle Ages_ 192-3 and 197-199, with refrences.

Where can one find this writing?

Donal Mac Ruiseart

A Related Question . . .

How big should a unit be before you can justify a bannerer?

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Donal Mac Ruiseart

I've seen the first two. I have not seen banners used for signaling. I'm thinking mostly of the rally-point banner, though - one that's part of an active unit, not one standing well behind the battle line looking impressive. I've seen a Kingdom's Grand Standard used in that way, with a bannerer and ...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

The short answer, of course, is â€œwith honour.â€

Donal Mac Ruiseart

If you're going have one of your team carry a flag into combat, what would be the best way to equip them? What weapon(s) should they carry? Should they carry a shield? Are there any other recommendations in this area? This includes the design and construction of the flag itself, and the staff. I'm m...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

I have a thread in Interpretive Re-Creation asking how a bannerer ought to behave in battle . That thread seeks practical advice for bannerers in SCA battles. This thread is asking for any historical accounts of the behavior of bannerers and/or any instructions that exist, telling a bannerer how he ...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

My first body armour was a leather corselet with a few hanging flaps as tasses. It was amazinly light. I kept it for some time after I retired it. At one point I augmented it with some pieces of conveyor-belting sewn into the sides. The leg harness was also leather - even the knees, single flaps tha...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Having seen that, I realize that the "mounted banderillero" I saw in the movie was the Portuguese style of mounted bullfight.

And though I'm not entirely a fan of the corrida, those horses and riders are amazing to watch.

Donal Mac Ruiseart

Hope it doesn't derail the thread to ask this, but . . . What little of Portuguese bullfighting that I know is all on foot. I've seen mounted banderilleros on one occasion, and of course the picadores of the classic Spanish bullfight, but I don't know anything about mounted Portuguese bullfighting. ...

Donal Mac Ruiseart

So, I've read all the accounts from my brothers in arms - ( . . . For he who sheds his blood with me to-day shall be my brother . . . ), and I reflect upon my own motivation and wonder if there's something I can say that hasn't been said. Or if I can say what I'm thinking without filling a whole pag...

It is Michael of Bedford

On the Conduct of a Bannerer, From The Unconquered Knight

A Related Question . . .

How Should A Bannerer Behave in Battle?

How Ought a Bannerer to be Armed and Equipped?

How Were Bannerers to Behave?