I’m not interested in the Society in order to play out princess fantasies. I don’t want to wear satins and velvets (ick! hot! not to mention the drycleaning!), and I’m still rather intimidated by actually trying to speak forsoothly.
I was also a little intimidated by all these SCA websites that say to beginners, "First, you should come up with a name, and persona." Come on guys, ‘western civilization (and then some) until 1600‘ is a big, BIG, field! I did know a couple of things.
- I want to make the Working Flemish Dress, as researched and detailed by Drea Leed and Jennifer Thompson, respectively. I want to play around with all the parts – the smock, the back-laced sleeveless kirtle, the front-laced sleeveless overdress, the woolen sleeves for winter, and the two partlets: one linen for summer, and one woolen for winter. Love the versatility. Also love that all this is well-documented online, with patterns and instructions.
- My husband’s family geneology is documented to 1640’s Zeeland. Flanders. That goes with #1. Easy peasy.
- I’d like to know more about my own cultural history – my grandparents refused to teach us much about their Hungarian roots, and it seems to me that the SCA is a good means to that end. How to make this go with #1? (Answer: the Crusades. More later.)
- I want to use a name similar to my own, so I’ll answer when called. Nothing against the Celts, or the Welsh, but I live my mundane life trying to teach the world how to pronounce N-A-G-Y (it’s naadj), and that’s rather enough instruction to be going on with.
So off to the name sites. Here‘s a medieval Hungarian name site, by a SCAdian, no less (my intuition scores again!) that says Sára Margaretha is perfectly acceptable as a medieval Hungarian name. What about Flanders? This SCA site says both Sara and Margareta are fine, for the period 1259-1530. But this one has no Sara. Furthermore, this one, says that ‘Greet’ or ‘Griet’ is a short form of Margareta, and as I really don’t feel like a Margareta (ooh la la!) or a Sara without the H (more mundane world edification fatigue), I’ll be a ‘Greet.’
Okay, so what if Sára Margaretha, born in Hungary between 1100 and 1300, met and married into Flemish culture, moved there and changed her name to fit in? This isn’t so hard after all.
But how – and why? – would she meet a Flemish guy? Go back up to #3 – the Crusades. Here’s the route (thanks to the Met):
See? Clearly people from Northern Europe could trek down along the Danube and pick up a local. Or, from Greet’s perspective, a local could hitch her wagon to a ticket out of the sticks.
At any rate, now I can introduce myself at fighter practice, and log in to our local forum. Long dance Greet!