GV's take on 'honours and awards' and how they can be reworked.

[GV]

My first foray into Talossa was my first Wittenberg post on or about 6 June 2000.  At this time, there was only one award of any consequence, Për la Naziun, and its awarding was rare.  When it happened, it was a big deal.  With 'awards and honours', I think Ben hit the right medium between outright stinginess and the sillier aspects of 'SCA-bling'.

According to the Big History (1992 corrected in 1994), the first honoree of PLN mentioned is Jorja B., the mother of Josh Forziun (M----t) followed by Josh's stepfather (whose name is not mentioned), and finally followed by Josh himself.  This was for taking Ben for stitches after Harry Woz. accidentally nailed Ben right below the eye on a lake-pier.

Years later, in 1994, the award was made again, this time to JJ, for services rendered as Seneschál and really to Talossan in general.  JJ was an enormous part of Talossa's development, and while he and Ben were best buddies, the objectivity of JJ's Për La Naziun cannot be in doubt: his award was richly deserved.

The deservedness of Kane dal Nava's Për la Naziun in 2000 has been proven dubious, but this is clear: Ben was the one person in Talossa empowered to make this award, and he always awarded Për La Naziun to those who, in his estimation, helped to save the Kingdom of Talossa, even if this rationale in the case of Josh Forziun and his parents was a bit over-the-top. 

In Jorja B.'s time on the Talossan stage, everything was far more tongue-in-cheek than everything has become since 2004.  My, how we take things so seriously nowadays...

That being said, Ben took Për la Naziun very seriously, and if someone got that award, it was a big f---n deal.

Then came 2003-2005 when the Kingdom was effectively rebooted.  The continuity of the culture of awards and honours inherited from Ben upon his abdication and departure from the Kingdom did not survive him.  In Ben's time, there was no 'Lord Q' and 'Duke JJ', and there were also no lesser awards than PLN, which admittedly could have been seen as a real defect in Ben's system.

The leadership under the illegal-and-mother-not-approved (?) Boy-King and King John both had to work the system from scratch.  The weirdness in our awards system started with the Boy-King's time, but it was the wake of the most stressful time in Talossan history, and everyone was going on the best information they had. 

That and the informal concept of 'SCA-Talossa' had fully caught hold.  Something had to fill the Kingdom's cultural vacuum, and think the heavens it was that and not something even stranger.

That being said, I say this again: the flowering of awards of arms in 2005-2007 was a pleasant sight to behold - the natural evolution of Talossa's heraldic past, and one which I will always approve of. 

A casualty of SCA-Talossa, however, was the seriousness and relative rarity of Për la Naziun. 

I take you all to http://wiki.talossa.com/Order_for_the_Nation  It is abundantly clear not all honorees of Për la Naziun have done things to 'save Talossa', while others have.  Yes, Ben would have survived his ordeal at the pier without the aid of Josh and his parents, but they did their good deed for the day.  And Ben was bad enough to have stitches, all things considered.

There is one person whose award is remembered by me clearly, but the record of which existed only on Wittenberg VI, which is irretrievably lost: Tomás Gariçéir's PLN (Order of the Purple Tongue) from the year 2000.

And that's just it.  According to the link above, PLN and the Order of the Purple Tongue are two separate award grades when in-fact, being a Knight of the Order of the Purple Tongue was something actually made a part of PLN.

The seriousness of PLN has been marred, but what about the Peerage?  Is the Peerage greater even than Për la Naziun, then?  What do we do with all this confusion?

Cont'd...

[GV]

Well, I'm realizing this is going to be more complicated than I thought - turns out, it will be enough content for an issue of Oraclâ!

[GV]

Well, I'm realizing this is going to be more complicated than I thought - turns out, it will be enough content for an issue of Oraclâ!

That Oraclâ will never be put to press.  It will simply take too long.

Suffice to say, there is ambiguity between the levels of precedence in the Peerage and Për la Naziun.  Additionally, PLN needs at least three ranks (more like five, actually), and in my opinion, the landed and hereditary aspects both of the peerage need to be abolished. 

Barons can be 'Barons to the Court of Vuode Palace', and Dukes can be made 'Dukes of Talossa'.

More to come...but this is a start at least.