Home Again!!

I am home and I am safe!! I have some small bruises and one large one. Its par for the course.

Ok here is the long version…

The Society for Creative Anachronism or (SCA) is a non-profit educational organization dedicated to researching and re-creating the arts and skills of pre-17th-century Europe.

Anacronism - a·nach·ro·nism [uh-nak-ruh-niz-uhm]–noun

1. something or someone that is not in its correct historical or chronological time, esp. a thing or person that belongs to an earlier time: The sword is an anachronism in modern warfare.
2. an error in chronology in which a person, object, event, etc., is assigned a date or period other than the correct one: To assign Michelangelo to the 14th century is an anachronism.

So we are out of place and time when we go to these events.

There is dancing, singing, fencing, weaving, cooking, sewing, and of course heavy weapons fighting. We put on real armor and use wooden swords (they really did too…didn’t want to kill your knights practicing ya know) and play full contact fighting!!

The regional groups a split into Kingdoms and local groups are Shires and Baronies. Gulf Wars is a war each year between the Kingdom of Ansteorra and the Kingdom of Trimaris.

Ansteorra is effectively Texas and Oklahoma. Trimaris is most of Florida, Panama, Antarctica, and the Mars. Ok…Really we have some service people who went to Panama and Antarctica and claimed them for us and since there aren’t many people there the lands stuck. Mars….yeah we really got that. One of our people sent a Trimaris sticker on the Mars rover, he works for NASA.

We all meet in the middle in Lumberton, Mississippi and have a big war. A war with no enemies. And at the end of the week it is always declared a tie. (But we really did kick butt this year!!) and so it must be fought again next year. We compete in Arts and Sciences, Heavy Weapons, Volunteer points (things gotta get done somehow), light weapons (rapier etc), equestrian, and live weapons (archery and thrown at proper targets of course).

During the rest of the year we take part in much smaller events where any of the above activities may be available at the event depending on facilities, time of year, theme of event etc.

So….How did it go…well I only took part in the Heavy Weapons portions of the war. Trimaris was victorious in the Ravine Battle, the Town Battle, the Bridge Battle, the Field Battle, and the Fort Battle. YEA!! Our house!!!

Here is a picture of me at the fort battle. I am in the blue with the belt on the left. I am shielding an archer who is beside me and doesn’t show up in the picture. The army has lined up beside us and is ready to charge the sally ports and walls of the fort. HOW COOL IS THAT!!

I’ll try to post more pictures as they become available from people returning from War.

For those who would like more information www.sca.org is the best starting point. Then look for your local kingdom and that will direct you to your local group. Or e-mail me and I will tell you all about it.

Last night I went for a 3.6 mile run with FireGuy and it went pretty well. I was sore from war and that made it hard but my knee held up just fine. All the walking from last week did it a lot of good. So we are now going to start scheduling regular runs since the world has settled back down….for now.