Taigh Moran Chat
RR 2, Northside Road
Wading River, NY 11792
27 March, 1989

Unto the members of the College of Arms and any others who may read this missive, greetings from Alisoun MacCoul of Elphane, Laurel Queen of Arms!

The "statistics" for the December meeting were accidentally omitted from the cover letter for that meeting. Of 286 submission actions, 231 were positive, 54 were negative and one resulted in a pended submission for an overall success rate of 81%.

The meeting of January 15 considered the letters from Atenveldt (10/1), Caid (10/2), Ansteorra (10/14), Middle (10/18), West (10/18), Calontir (10/29), Atlantia (10/30) and Meridies (10/31). Of 222 submission actions, 181 were positive, 35 were negative and 6 items were pended for a success rate of 82%.

The February meeting was held on Sunday, February 26 to consider the letters from the East (10/31), Atenveldt (11/1), Calontir (11/5), Caid (11/6), Ansteorra (11/15), Outlands (11/19), Trimaris (11/20), West (11/20) and Meridies (11/27).

The March meeting took place on Saturday, March 25. The letters included that from An Tir dated August, 1988, as well as Atenveldt (12/1), Middle (12/9), Caid (12/11), Meridies (12/14), Atlantia (12/15), West (12/20), Calontir (12/23), Outlands (12/24) and Middle (12/30).

The April meeting should be held on April 30. The letters scheduled for consideration at that meeting include East (12/30), East (1/1), Calontir (1/10), Caid (1/15), Ansteorra (1/20), Trimaris (1/20), Meridies (1/23), Outlands (1/23) and West (1/24).

The May meeting is still somewhat tentative for May 14. (Laurel has gone to contract on a house in Charleston and, all going well, will close on it at some point in the middle or end of May.) Whenever it is held, the meeting will consider the letters from Calontir (2/1), Caid (2/12), Atenveldt (2/13), Calontir (2/14), Ansteorra (2/16), East (2/25), Meridies (2/26) and East (2/28).

ROSTER CHANGES

Please add the Actuarius Pursuivant of Ansteorra, Tadhg Liath of Duncairn, to your mailing lists (Tiomoid M. of Angle, 659 Prestonwood Drive, Richardson, TX 75081; 214-783-8421).

At the same time, you should remove from both the mailing list and the roster Konrad von Greifswald and Wyndylyn Leanb na'doinnean. In their places, White Stag requests that you place the Palmer Herald, Saerlaith l'Estrangere (Snail Scott, 119 Princton SE, Apt. 1, Albuquerque, NM 87106; 505-266-1632) and the new Trefoil Herald, Stefan Laskowski (Steven C. Wilson, 4904 Gary Owen, Apt. C, El Paso, TX 79903; 915-565-3726).

The Dragon Herald Emerita, Fiona Averylle of Maidenhead, should also be dropped from the mailing list for non-commentary.

ON THE SUBJECT OF THE "GRANDFATHER CLAUSE"

Several recent submissions have suggested that there is a widespread misconception about the intent and function of the "Grandfather Clause".

This ancient and revered portion of the rules for submission serves two functions. It guarantees to a submittor that, once his name or armory has been registered, it cannot be "unregistered" because of changes in the rules which may occur subsequent to that registration. To take an excellent example, when it was determined some years ago that "colour on colour" badges were a Bad Thing and should no longer be permitted, those individuals who had registered "colour on colour" badges in previous years were permitted not only to continue using those badges but also to retain their "property rights" in the armoury, even though the badges would not be registered were the submitted after the modification of the rules.

As an extension of this principle, the "Grandfather Clause" has also come to mean that a person whose registered name and/or armoury exists in contravention of the current stylistic rules may register new items which contain all or part of the previously registered material, even though the submissions would not be acceptable were they wholly submitted for the first time today. This permission has sometimes been extended to the immediate family (typically the spouse or offspring) of the original registrant. Thus the son of Paul of Bellatrix could register his father's "grandfathered" byname, even though we would not permit someone to register that byname for the first time today. Similarly, were an individual to have registered arms with a fimbriated Lacy knot, we would probably registration of a badge containing the same charge, even though it would be a major contravention of the limits on fimbriation which have existed for some years.

However, the "Grandfather Clause" does NOT insulate a submission involving grandfathered material against conflict.

If the individual with the fimbriated Lacy knot had arms of "Sable, a Lacy knot gules, fimbriated argent, on a chief Or three Catherine wheels sable." and submitted a fieldless badge of "A Lacy knot gules, fimbriated argent." this would still conflict with "Argent, a Lacy knot gules." which had been registered to another member of the Society ten years after his arms were registered. By the same token, if a daughter of Paul of Bellatrix submitted the name "Paula of Bellatrix", the College might still return it as being too close to the name of her father, even though she would be allowed to use the byname.

Note that the standards for conflict which will be applied are always the current standards unless the submission is being made specifically under the terms of a "grace period" declared after a change in conflict standards. The "Grandfather Clause" may only be used to exempt submissions in whole or in part from current standards of style.

Your servant,

[Alisoun]