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There have recently been some questions about Society branches registering badges to generic names: e.g. a badge for the Stonemarche Scribes' Guild, or for the Keeper of the Regalia of the Principality of the Sun. How are such generic names protected? Why do we register them?
To my mind, these are not names, not in the same style as Order names, household names, heraldic titles, and the like. A better term might be "job-description:" a simple declaration of the intended use of the badge. As such, we haven't held these to the same standards of conflict as other group names: for instance, both Caid and An Tir have badges registered to the Office of the Lists, without any infringement. If every branch officer who may can register a badge, then no one Kingdom may claim sole use of the name of the office; otherwise, only the West could have a Constable. By extension, the same holds true for other branch functions: Baronial Guard, King's Champion, Brewers' Guild, etc. So long as the badge is associated with a purely functional name, it's neither checked for conflict during submission or protected from conflict afterwards.
The key is for the name to be unarguably generic. Lyondemere Baronial Guard is functional, generic, and thus not held to conflict standards. The Lyondemere Levy, a deliberately alliterative name, is not generic, and must meet the normal name submission standards; once registered, it is then protected equally with Order names. (Notice that there are no generic Order names.) Generic names may only be registered by SCA branches, for common branch functions; but such generic names need not be checked for conflict, any more than the names of officers. (28 March, 1993 Cover Letter (January, 1993 LoAR), pg. 2)
[The Caravan] The household name runs afoul of Rule III.1, which requires all names to have at least two name elements; group names must have a designator and "at least one descriptive element" (III.1.b). To put it another way, the name is too generic to be reserved to a single group. Just as we would decline to register The Household or The Group --- or, just as we declined to register The Buttery (Marion of Edwinstowe, LoAR of April 89) --- so must we return this name. If they add a descriptive element (and assuming no conflicts), it should be acceptable. (Taichleach Selwyn, March, 1993, pg. 25)
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Evidently, the Irish were often found on the Continent during the first millenium A.D., as clerks, missionaries, and scholars. Alcuin brought Irish scribes to the university at Aachen, sponsored by Charlemagne; and St. Gall, the founder of the model monastery in Switzerland, was himself Irish, a disciple of St. Columba. An Irish/German name is thus not beyond the bounds of reason. (Dallán Ó Fearchaidhe vom Kirschwald, July, 1992, pg. 9)
[Kresten] The byname was ...said to be a variant form of the German surname Kriesten, Kristen. However, without documentation, this is too great a change of pronunciation to accept as a mere spelling variant. [name registered as Kresten] (Anastasius Kriesten, October, 1992, pg. 16)
[Susanna Elizabeth Marie Wiegner von Kassel] With five name elements in three languages, we require some documentation that this is acceptable period style. Presumably (because of the locative) the primary language is German, so any resubmission should address period German naming style: are there period examples of German names with five elements? Without such examples, I must rule as I did for English names (LoAR of July 92) and Italian names (Sept 92), and disallow German names of five or more elements. (Susanna Elizabeth Marie Wiegner von Kassel, October, 1992, pg. 32)
Lady Harpy has provided documentation from Socin of the use of zu in its older form ze in locatives with the names of towns and villages: ze Froberg, ze Bernowe (p. 272) and ze Tattenriet (p. 277). (Anna zu Euskirchen, September, 1993, pg. 9)
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