Society for Creative Anachronism
College of Arms
1194 Firwood Dr.
 Pittsburgh, PA 15243
 412-306-0416
 kvs+@cs.cmu.edu

April 5, 2001
Unto the members of the College of Arms and all others who may read this missive do Dame Elsbeth Anne Roth, Laurel Queen of Arms, and Master Pietari Pentipoika, Pelican King of Arms, send greetings. 
The January Laurel was held Sunday, January 14, 2001, and considered the following letters of intent: Outlands (July 29) (delayed due to late receipt of paperwork), Outlands (August 30) (redated to September 6 based on postmark), Middle (September 10), Caid (September 17), Atlantia (September 20), Drachenwald (September 25), Trimaris (September 28), An Tir (September 29), Ansteorra (September 30), and Meridies (September 30).
The February Laurel meeting was held Saturday, February 10, 2001, and considered the following letters of intent: Atenveldt (September 1) (redated to October based on postmark), Atlantia (October 19), Drachenwald (October 19), Outlands (October 19), Middle (October 25), An Tir (October 30), Artemisia (October 31), and Meridies (October 31). Pelican’s meeting was held Sunday, February 18, 2001.  The Meridies letter of intent was considered at a Laurel road show held at Estrella War February 18. The Atenveldt letter of intent was considers at a Laurel road show held at Æthelmearc Academy February 24. 
The March Laurel meeting was held Saturday, March 10, 2001, and considered the following letters of intent: Atenveldt (October 1) (delayed due to lack of paperwork), East (October 22) (delayed due to lack of paperwork), Atenveldt (November 1), Caid (November 10), Caid (November 15), West (November 15), Middle (November 18), Trimaris (November 28), An Tir (November 30), and Meridies (November 30). The Pelican meeting was held Sunday, March 11, 2001.
The April Laurel meeting is scheduled for Saturday, April 14, 2001, and will consider the following letters of intent: Drachenwald (November 16) (redated to December 28 based on postmark), Atlantia (November 25) (redated to December 28 based on postmark), Atenveldt (December 1), Caid (December 6), Æthelmearc (December 16), Drachenwald (December 18), Lochac (December 18), Middle (December 19), Atlantia (December 21), Outlands (December 27), An Tir (December 30), and Ansteorra (December 31). The Pelican meeting is scheduled for Sunday, April 8.  Responses and rebuttals to commentary must be in the College’s hands no later than March 31, 2001. 
The May Laurel meeting is scheduled for Saturday, May 5, 2001 (which affects the dates of commentary — see below), and will consider the following letters of intent: Artemisia (December 31) (redated to January 2 by kingdom), Atenveldt (January 1), West (January 15), Atlantia (January 21), Lochac (January 21), Middle (January 23), Drachenwald (January 27), Trimaris (January 28), An Tir (January 29), Meridies (January 30), and Ansteorra (January 31).  A Laurel road show is scheduled for Sunday, April 29, 2001, in An Tir. Original commentary on these LoIs must be in the College’s hands no later than March 31, 2001. Responses and rebuttals to commentary must be in the College’s hands no later than April 28, 2001. 
The June Laurel meeting is scheduled for Saturday, June 16, 2001, and will consider the following letters of intent: Æthelmearc (January 1) (redated to February based on postmark),  Æthelmearc (January 6) (redated to February based on postmark),  Æthelmearc (January 10) (redated to February based on postmark),  East (January 29) (redated to February based on postmark),  Atenveldt (February 1), Artemisia (February 11), Middle (February 12), Drachenwald (February 18), Atlantia (February 21), Lochac (February 21), Ealdormere (February 27), and Meridies (February 28).  A Laurel and Pelican road show is scheduled for Sunday, June 3, 2001, at the Knowne World Heraldic Symposium in Northshield. Original commentary on these LoIs must be in the College’s hands no later than April 30, 2001. Responses and rebuttals to commentary must be in the College’s hands no later than May 31, 2001. 
The July Laurel meeting is tentatively scheduled for Saturday, July 14, 2001, and will consider the letters of intent dated March.
Not all letters of intent may be considered when they are originally scheduled on this cover letter. The date of mailing of the LoI, date of receipt of the Laurel packet, or other factors may delay consideration of certain letters of intent. Additionally, some letters of intent received may not have been scheduled because the administrative requirements (receipt of the forms packet, receipt of the necessary fees, etc.) have not yet been met.
REMINDER: Until the packet containing the paperwork is received, the letter may not be scheduled.
A Scheduling Mistake
The cover letter for the December LoAR stated that one of the letters considered was the Caid letter of intent dated August 1.  There was not, however, a letter of intent sent out in August from Caid; that entry was in error.
From Pelican: Holding Names
Several people have expressed their surprise about the way I form holding names. It seems that I should have published my views on this issue when I assumed my current duties; please allow me to do so now. I am also opening discussion on two issues related to holding names.
The College started using holding names in December 1983, during the tenure of Wilhelm von Schlüssel. Holding names had already been proposed in the May cover letter: 
At the round-table discussion, the suggestion was made that we try to save good devices whose names fail to pass the rules by registering the device to a “holding” name. This holding name would consist of the mundane given name of the submittor with the submittor’s branch name used as a place name. Thus, if I were submitting my device now and my name conflicted but my device was acceptable, my device would be registered under the name William of the ‘Mists. Such names automatically satisfy the rules except for possible conflicts. Obviously the second William from the Province of the Mists who submitted and had the same problem could not also be William of the Mists, but he could be William of the West. This holding name would remain until the submittor later submits an acceptable name to replace it. As the holding name is a valid Society name that is a correct name for the person, some members may just adopt it as their Society name, thereby saving the time and effort of resubmitting. This procedure would only be followed in those cases where the device or badge was good heraldry and was acceptable, but the name was not. If there was something wrong with the device or badge, this procedure would not be followed. The person would not be stuck with the holding name because a more desired Society name could always be submitted to replace the holding name. What do you think? Should we try it?
Wilhelm appears to have used the originally proposed construction <given name> of <home group> exclusively. However, the next Laurel, Baldwin of Erebor, apparently tried to preserve as much of the submitted name as possible and used the home group as a byname only when the submitted byname was not registerable.
If I am wrong with the more recent history I will no doubt be corrected promptly. However, from the letters it looks like this is what Alisoun MacCoul of Elphane did as well. Da’ud ibn Auda, during his first tenure, seems to have followed suit. Bruce Draconarius of Mistholme, however, used the <given name> of <home group> format exclusively, and so did Talan Gwynek during his term as Pelican. Jaelle of Armida returned to the policy of trying to preserve the submitted name, and Elsbeth Ann Roth, during the first part of her tenure when she made the name decisions, again returned to the <given name> of <home group> format.
I have, again, changed the policy. This is, in part, because I see no benefit in using a standard form for holding names. Contrary to what some people have claimed, it does not make it any clearer that the name is a holding name — there are already many holding names that do not follow the format outlined by Wilhelm, and there are even more names that do follow this format that are not holding names. Even more importantly, I feel that we should try to minimise the changes to the name, except when the submitter specifically requests changes. I am doing just that: when forming a holding name I try to keep as close to the submitted name as possible, even when that means making changes that the submitter would not allow in registering the name. This is, in fact, what Baldwin seems to have done (for instance in the September 1984 return of Irania Murdoch Fockxworth when he formed the holding name Irene Murdoch Fockxworth).
This brings me to the second issue of holding names, namely, what they are. Again, there are two competing views. One, published in the Administrative Handbook, claims that a holding name is a “purely administrative label”, formed by the Laurel office for the sole reason of being able to file the registered armory. The other, set out in the original cover letter by Wilhelm and later listed in precedents by Bruce and Jaelle, claims that “the holding name is indeed a submitter’s registered name, until such time as a corrected name is resubmitted”.
Now that we are in the process of revising the Administrative Handbook it might be a good time to clear the matter of holding names as well. I am, therefore, opening a discussion on both these issues: how holding names should be formed — and whether there should be fixed rules on the form of holding names at all — and what a holding name is. I, personally, do not have strong feelings in either of these issues as such, except for one: I do not like the combination of considering the holding name the person’s registered name and disregarding their wishes altogether when forming the name. This seems unnecessarily arrogant.
The discussion is now open; please send in your comments by the end of June.
Financial Reports
This years financial report is included with this letter.  My thanks to Master Alaric MacConall for compiling it.
Administrivia
Send roster changes, roster corrections, to Lord Symond Bayard le Gris, Bruce R. Nevins, 2527 E. 3rd St., Tucson, AZ, 85716-4114, (520) 795-6000, (520) 795-0158 (fax), bnevins@nexiliscom.com. College of Arms members can also request a copy of the current roster from Symond.  Send all other administrative requests or payments to Laurel.
For subscriptions to the paper copy of the LoAR, please contact Symond, above. The cost for an LoAR subscription is $25.00 a year.  Please make all checks or money orders payable to “SCA Inc. – College of Arms.”  For subscriptions to the electronic copy of the LoAR, please contact Laurel at herald@sca.org.  The electronic copy is available free of charge.

Until then, I remain
In service,

Elsbeth Anne Roth
Laurel Queen of Arms