Principality, Making a

(Keeper postings from the Steps, June 2005.)

---

steps-owner@antir.sca.org wrote on 06/01/2005 06:04:21 PM: > I have a query. How many numbers does a Principality make? > I know the minimum, but I would like to know what it is that works. What

> should you take into consideration? Should you take a ratio of Peers to > Population? How many fighters does it take to make sure that the caliber of > fighting for Crown insures fairness? > Curious.. > ~Zelina~

Hello Zelina,

Do you mean "How many memberships are required for a principality?"

The minimum branch requirements are defined in Corpora III.C.5, which you can find here: http://sca.org/docs/govdocs.pdf

Here's what that section says [my comments in square brackets]:

III. Branches
C. Branch Designations
5. Principality: A principality is a part of a kingdom which has the right 
to select a reigning Prince and Princess by armored combat. A branch or 
contiguous group of branches within a kingdom may petition for 
principality status if the resulting entity would fulfill the requirements 
listed below:
- At least 100 members. [I think this is the answer to the question you 
were asking.]
- Candidates for all Great Officer positions, each of whom is acceptable 
to the kingdom officer responsible for the direction of that aspect of 
Society activity, and such other officers as kingdom law and custom may 
require. [The Great Officers are Seneschal, Herald, Marshal, Arts & 
Sciences, Exchequer, Chronicler, and Chirurgeon.]
- A name and device registered with the College of Arms. [This can take a 
long time. If you're considering becoming a principality, explore your 
options to begin the name and device registration Right Now.]
- Consensus favoring advancement in branch status by the members in the 
proposed principality, demonstrated by procedures acceptable to the 
Kingdom and Society Seneschals. [This usually takes the form of a polling 
of the populace who are members. For a polling to be considered 
successful, you need to have at least half of the members participate, and 
of those more than half must support a principality.]
- A record of well-attended events together with regular study or guild 
meetings, demonstrations, and other educational activities for the benefit 
of the members and the community at large. [Save your newsletters, you'll 
need them to write a history of the events in your proposed principality.]
- Sufficient members of the orders conferring Patents of Arms to foster 
the development of those orders and the skills they represent within the 
principality. [You need to have Peers. Enough of each order to ensure an 
adequate bunch of leaders and teachers.]
- Sufficient fighters of such caliber as to provide appropriate 
competition for the Coronet. [You need to have enough fighters to make 
sure that the Coronet Tournament is a real challenge.]
- A body of principality law which provides for the maintenance and 
succession of the Coronet, and for any other matters delegated or 
permitted by the parent kingdom. Draft laws, in the form in which they 
will be presented to the victors of the first Coronet Lists, must 
accompany a petition for principality status. [Right from the beginning, 
you need to know what to do if either or both your Prince and Princess 
have to quit half way through their reign, or if either or both your Heirs 
quit before they are invested, or if either or both of your Heirs cannot 
make it to the Investiture Ceremony.]

A couple of things that Corpora doesn't mention:

• The Board is the final authority on the creation of a Principality
• The Crown can recognize an area/region/group of branches as a Crown Principality. Sort of a principality-in-waiting. The Crown then also becomes the Prince and Princess of the Crown Principality.
• The Board requirements are *minimums*. It's better if you have *more* members than you need, *more* officers, *more* peers, *more* fighters.
• The Board likes to see a minimum of two baronies in a principality.
• You need to define which branches will be in your principality. Which branches play together regularly?

Best,

E.B.
Who is proud to have played the role of midwife to the birthing of the Principality of Tir Righ.

---

Hello Zelina,

Zelina Silverfox <[address removed for privacy]> wrote on 06/02/2005 03:04:10 PM: > Thank you for the response. It is not exactly what I was looking > for. I know the requirements, ie the minimums. With with exception > of the Chiv, our Barony has well over the requirements. And with the > others in the area, member # is well over 200 with multiple Peers. > > What I am trying to find out is what the unforeseen obstacles are. > We have some here that do not want to see any change what so ever.

Ah. I understand better now... although not completely. Are you saying you want your barony to become a principality? Or that your barony alone, among the branches who would be included in the principality, has enough to satisfy the principality requirements?

> And some are misrepresenting the numbers of preference.

Re: Membership and Consensus

Did you see my comment regarding the poll? In order for a principality polling to be considered successful, at -least- half of the Members need to reply (indicating that people know about the principality and care enough about the issue to vote) and at least half (and preferably more) of those who reply must favour the principality (indicating that, well, they want a principality).

But well before you hold the polling there must be a general agreement among everyone involved that this is a Good Thing. Tir Righ went through an *extensive* talking-among-ourselves stage (years long) and by the time the polling arrived, everyone had had the chance to learn what being a principality meant, what the pros and cons were, ask questions and receive honest replies. The Principality Committee did huge amounts of travelling, talking, and most importantly, listening.

I suppose you could force a principality through against opposition if you pushed hard enough, but why would you want to? You'd be far better off to go to the "don't change" people, ask them why they oppose a principality, and (here's the hard part) *really* listen to their replies. Then you have the opportunity to fix things to satisfy their concerns and turn them into principality believers.

> If you knew then what you know now, what would you change when the > work was being done to elevate Tir Righ.

I'd get the name and device into the registration process as soon as possible. It can take the better part of 18 months sometimes and we had to do our principality polling twice because our first results became stale while waiting for the name and device to be registered. (Warning: registering a name and device *also* requires a populace polling AND the approval of the Crown.)

Make *sure* your officers have a record of reporting regularly.

Things I think we did right:

- We talked about principality a *lot* before the movement actually began to get underway. The concept wasn't a surprise to most people. We also had Avacal and Summits to point to and say "we think we should be like them".

- We had a committee of wildly divergent people who represented most of the populace. In nine people, we had men and women, peers and newcomers, core and hinterlanders, officers and partiers, supporters and opposers, and fighters, artists, and servers. Early on we set a tone which valued and respected each others' honest opinions. That respect and consideration got us through a lot of heated... uh, discussions.

- We got the people involved. We had a registered badge that anyone could wear. We recruited many people to be on sub-committees (Regalia, Laws, Ceremonial, US/Canada Concerns, ... there were others). A lot of discussion was held on our regional/principality mailing list. We made a concerted effort to hold our regional events in remote branches as well as downtown principality.

- We didn't hurry the process. The Kingdom Seneschals were telling us "You're so ready to be a principality, it hurts." Avacal and Summits were each borderline and had a big job convincing the Board that they should be principalities. (Their principality petitions were each over 200 pages long.) Our submission was... 17 pages. (AND I heard a comment back from one Board member saying "Who wrote your petition? It was perfect. Keep them in mind when you want to write your kingdom petition." I'm very proud of that.)

[A Clarification: the issue with the length of the Avacal & Summits petitions was not for convincing the Board, it was due to requirments from the Kingdom & its various officers. Since this was the first time An Tir had approached the topic of creating a Principality there was confusion, chaos, and many, many opinions on what was required. Avacal & Summits were forced to satisfy ALL those requirements, plus anticipate any possible others. I am happy to hear that the Kindgom learned from the experience and allowed the next Principality to be formed with far fewer hoops to go through, and saved many trees in the process. ---Aelfwyn the Irresponsible... formerly Sapphira of Sherwood.]

- We stayed on good terms with the Crown and Kingdom Officers. We consulted with them and drew on their expertise.

- Keep your old newsletters. You're going to want to track officers, events, and champions.

> I understand that Corpora > states the min. but what is the preferred. What is a good number > to ensure that Coronet Tournament is a challenge?

You won't ever get a solid number. The best you'll get is "enough". It's like when a good cook is at work. Experience tells them when enough of an ingredient has been added.

You need enough fighters so that when half of them don't compete in the Coronet Tournament, there are still enough to hold a decent tournament.

You need enough fighters so that in the half that do compete, there are enough *good* fighters to make the Coronet Tournament a real challenge.

You need enough *good* fighters so that the same two or three aren't just handing the Coronet back and forth to each other.

The results of a Coronet Tournament should never be foregone. You should be able to expect least three to five obvious contenders to show up at every Coronet Tournament* and enough up-and-comers to provide a surprise winner every so often.

above * "three to five obvious contenders to show up at every Coronet Tournament": I don't mean the same 3-5 very good fighters in your principality who show up to every Coronet Tournament. I mean a pool of very good fighters from which a minimum of 3-5 show up for the Tournament.

Does that help?

Elizabeth
|*> Gaudium est in Factione (The joy is in the doing.)
| Mistress Elizabeth "E.B." Braidwood,
| Principality of Tir Righ, An Tir

---

Hailsa:

Here are few of the unforeseen obstacles that, if I remember correctly, Tir Righ encountered in the two years plus I think it took for them to transform from a Crown Principality to a full-fledge, stand alone, principality headed by its own royalty. Creating a principality can be a time-consuming and arduous process. I would recommend getting very clear and concise instructions from the current Society Seneschal, since the SoSen may have a preferred method or things they like to see happen that aren't necessarily spelled out in corpora.

Tir Righ is a bit of a special case, since Tir Righ encompasses an entirely Canadian province.

The committee polled the membership of the Crown Principality of the North (which later ended up as Tir Righ, for reasons I will explain later) as per instructions in corpora, to see if it really was the consensus of those living in the area to actually become a principality. This was a tougher sell for the principality committee than normal because in order for votes to be counted, the SoSen declared that those participating in the poll had to be members of the American corporation, the SCA, Inc., as opposed to just holding membership in the NSCA, the Canadian non-profit corp that allows SCA activities to happen in British Columbia. Well, lots of Canadians don't bother to buy SCA, Inc. memberships unless they want to hold office in the SCA. Otherwise, the perception is that they get very little in return for that $30 dollar fee to the American Corp.

So the principality committee needed to convince people to actually purchase memberships in the American corp, the SCA, Inc., in order to satisfy the requirements of corpora, as interpreted by the SoSen. And people did. The committee had enough money to send out postcards (not a small cost), the correct number of people participated in the poll, and the numbers showed that a majority of SCAdians in the area wanted to belong to a principality.

So that's all well and good. Then the committee went forward, created subcommittees for all the other projects that are part and parcel of becoming a principality. For instance, the new principality would have to have a name and a suitable heraldic device before elevation. The subcommittee in charge of dealing with name and heraldy did their best to poll the populace to find out what name they liked, what arms they thought looked cool, and the committee needed to have a process that included as many people as possible to avoid ruffled feathers, complaints, hurt feelings, etc. So that exercise took many months. Meanwhile, the other committees were developing principality laws, for instance, again, trying to be as inclusive as possible and listen to everyone's ideas. More months go by. The committee for ceremonies develops rituals and pageantry for elevating future prince and princesses, whatever champions the principality wants to have, etc. Then the regalia committee goes to work on getting ideas for designs on coronets, but since the heraldry hasn't been decided yet, they can't make cloaks or banners or whatever. More time passes.

Eventually the name and heraldry committee felt they were ready to submit a name and device to the Society College of Heralds and the Laurel Sovereign at Arms. The name they submitted was The Principality of the North, and I think the heraldry they submitted was as you see it today. But here's a warning, and perhaps an unforeseen problem: For whatever reason, things move through the Society College of Heralds at what seems like a glacial pace to non heraldry people like myself. I'm sure someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I think it took eight months or so for the Society College of Heralds to mull over the proposed principality name and device. Result: Device passes; name is rejected. Apparently the College of Heralds believed the "Principality of the North" was unacceptable because it conflicted with the American Civil War, with its references to "North" and "South." Now, I wouldn't have anticipated that reasoning about the American Civil War, and I'm even an American. Imagine how discouraged the Canadian NPC feels. Alas, back to the drawing board.

Name committee goes into overdrive, and an alternate name is selected for submission. Meanwhile, much of the other committee work is on hold, because it's hard to finish up laws or write ceremonies when you don't know what the name of the principality will be.

Finally, the alternate name of the principality, "Tir Righ" passes muster with the College of Heralds! Much rejoicing! All the committees hurry to conclude their business. The Crown Principality already has the requisite compliment of officers and administrative infrastructure, so that's ready to go.....and soon the NPC (Northern Principality Committee) hands a submission package to the Kingdom Seneschal (who's been advising them the whole time), which the Kingdom Seneschal will then present to the SoSen. Everyone's hopeful, thinking they're getting close to the goal line.......

And then the SoSen decides that the original Crown Principality poll, the vote of confidence from the people that they actually want to be a principality, has gone "stale," since over a year has passed since the poll was conducted. Apparently the SoSen fears that the populace may have changed its mind in the last year. That's one of those unforeseen issues, since I don't think corpora says anything about an expiration date on the confidence poll. Like I said, you gotta know what your particular SoSen wants or interprets is needed. You can't just go by what it says in corpora. So once again, the NPC has to convince Canadians to go purchase American corp. memberships, since most of the memberships from the year before have lapsed, and many Canadians haven't bothered to renew. Many Canadian An Tirans feel like this is just a trick from the American corporation to get some extra membership dollars.....much grumbling ensues. Still, battered but undaunted, the NPC presses forward, shells out hundreds of more dollars to conduct another mailing poll, sits white knuckled, waiting for the results....and the numbers are good. Big sigh of relief. Much rejoicing!

Once again, the Kingdom Seneschal approaches the Society Seneschal. Everything looks good, the second poll was just as successful as the first...but wait! Now the SoSen says that she wants to see proof that Tir Righ is complying with the new Non Member Surcharge requirements. Another unforeseen consequence, not outlined in corpora! At this moment, Callista, Davin, myself, and all the extremely hardworking NPC "midwives," including Elizabeth Braidwood of the Iron Constitution, are ready to lay down and weep. The SoSen has stated that she wants to see two fiscal quarters of records demonstrating NMS compliance. We point out that that isn't possible, since the Board only instituted the NMS one quarter ago. Some negotiating ensues between the Kingdom Seneschal and the Society Seneschal, and I think the NMS requirement is ultimately reduced.

And so the principality of Tir Righ was born, some two plus years after Skepti and Asa created the Crown Principality of the North. It took the concerted effort of a large principality committee, two kingdom seneschals, three or four sets of An Tir Crowns, and untold numbers of Tir Righ volunteers to make the whole thing happen. And Elizabeth Braidwood has earned my undying respect for the superhuman effort of chairing the NPC committee.

Lessons learned?

1. Well, the polling thing is a Catch-22. You don't want to bother with name and device submission unless people want to be a principality. But that College of Heralds process, and the time that takes....well, what can I say? I don't know how the current SoSen is handling things, but I'd make sure you have enough money to conduct two confidence polls, if necessary.
2. Don't underestimate how long it takes to get names and devices through the College of Heralds.
3. Start keeping excellent records demonstrating that the people of your area are paying the NMS surcharge.

Oops. Sorry about the length of this post. And I'm happy to be corrected on anything I've put down....this is my memory of just part of the Tir Righ experience, and I may have got a few details wrong or out of sequence...

Good luck,
Groa

---

Hiya from E.B.

Groa of the Amazing Memory writes:

steps-owner@antir.sca.org wrote on 06/02/2005 03:39:09 PM:
Here are few of the unforeseen obstacles that, if I remember correctly, 
Tir Righ encountered in the two years plus I think it took for them to 
transform from a Crown Principality to a full-fledge, stand alone, principality 
headed by its own royalty.
[...]
new principality would have to
have a name and a suitable heraldic device before elevation. [...] So 
that exercise took many months.
[...]
More months go by.
[...]
More time passes.
[...]
Eventually the name and heraldry committee felt they were ready to submit a name
and device [...] Result: Device passes; name is rejected. [...] Alas, back to the
drawing board.

Every word is true. Registering the name and device was an frustrating and gruelling exercise in two steps forward, a step-and-a half back.

Gosh, I'd forgotten about the American Civil War conflict part. The mind blanks out both the unpleasant and incomprehensible, it seems.

Finally, the alternate name of the principality, "Tir Righ" passes muster with
the College of Heralds!  Much rejoicing! [...]  Everyone's hopeful, thinking
they're getting close to the goal line.......

And then the SoSen decides that the original Crown Principality poll, the vote
of confidence from the people that they actually want to be a principality, has
gone "stale,"

I cried when they told me.

[...]
of more dollars to conduct another mailing poll, sits white knuckled, waiting
for the results....and the numbers are good.  Big sigh of  relief. Much rejoicing!
[...]

The numbers were flippin' TERRIFIC, as I recall. Of 461 ballots sent out, 300 were completed and returned, with 291 For and 9 Against.

first...but wait!  Now the SoSen says that she wants to see proof that Tir Righ
is complying with the new Non Member Surcharge requirements.

Ohmyghod! I'd totally forgotten about that. Probably because at that point we were able to step back because you and Davin and Callista went to bat in a big way for us.

And so the principality of Tir Righ was born, some two plus years after
Skepti and Asa created the Crown Principality of the North.
[...]
Groa

Only one tiny quibble with your narrative -- we never had a problem with SCA membership numbers. Before it all started we had nearly 300. More than 400 ballots were sent out in the first poll and more than 450 for the second. But there certainly was squawking about having to buy a Membership in order to be able to participate in the polls.

I'm terrifically proud of all the people who worked on making Tir Righ. Thanks for the journey down memory lane, Groa.

E.B.

---

Just remembered...

If you're researching stuff about becoming a principality, also check out the Kingdom Seneschal's Handbook on the SCA, Inc. site: http://sca.org/docs/seneschals-hb.pdf It talks about the Kingdom Seneschal's role in the creation of branches -- principalities included.

About registering a Device or Badge. The Kingdom can register a populace badge on your behalf. A populace badge can be terrifically useful for encouraging proto-principality unity. But the submission has to be signed by the Crown, so you better make sure They approve of your principality activities beforehand. AP (After Pincipality) the badge is transferred to the new principality.

E.B.