May 20, 2005

How I developed My SCA name

Friday, May 20, 2005
12:03:44 AM EDT Feeling Frustrated
Rhiannon -- Change your name!

To make a short story long: I think it is time to contact a pursuivant to get my name officially changed.

Back when I started the SCA in mumble mumble 1990, I was delighted to find out Rhiannon was a period name. And as a college student immersed in the hard rock college music culture and classic rock DJ on the campus radio station WEIU "rockin the Embarras River valley with 2 watts" OK the 2 watts isnt true, but geologically speaking we were in near the valley of a creek by that name. But I digress. So being that Fleetwood Mac was among my fave top 20 bands of all time, and you know, they had a rather obscure song by the title of "Rhiannon", I picked that as my SCA name.

Additionally, being the bookworm I was in college, I spent some additional time in the library researching other period names. I found my actual maiden name in some Oxford Book of English Names or such and such and found that a medieval form of it was Jocelyn. Ta Da-- there was my last name. Rhiannon Jocelyn was born into the SCA in 1990.

Rhiannon Jocelyn had fun as an unmarried maiden in her early years of the SCA, roaming from town to town downstate as school and first job took her. Lo and behold she meets a kind young man, who offered his heart and hand and she returned home to the lands of her birth to marry. As she found new folks to meet in the Shires of the north there seemed to be quite a few Rhiannons, 2 even in some shires. Her new friends needed a way to name their new friend so as not to confuse anyone, so she became Jocelyn. Just Jocelyn, or Lady Jocelyn to be exact, because before she moved north Jocelyn did recieve her AOA and Willow and there scribed upon these documents was RHIANNON JOCELYN.

Lady Jocelyn and her new husband did go forth and travel to the Debatable Lands in the east, to Pennsic, where she did pay her tax and have her name and arms entered into the great books of the Known World.
Many years went by and she grew to be a goodwife and mother and Jocelyn was a good name to carry with her into middle age. Rhiannon was a name for a maiden, no longer a maiden was she. But she still signed her name and art with her full name, but it never seemed like enough name.

She studied the stories and wills of her forbears and discovered they once lived in a town in England named Lutterworth. Lutterworth, whose name appears in the mighty Domesday Boke and whose great cathedral once protected Wyclyffe and his work. To honor those in her fathers lineage, she now signed her name Lady Rhiannon Jocelyn of Lutterworth.

But now it seams that her missives have caused confusion among her shire neighbors. Who is this person who signs her name Rhiannon Jocelyn? Is she new among us? She has been here five years and we havent seen her once!?

Harumph. OK so the face says Jocelyn, but nobody seems to know my full name. Using my middle name apparrently just confuses people. Well, am I ready to put the past Rhiannon behind me for good and just be Lady Jocelyn of Lutterworth? I have started signing my documents and letters in this way only. I will see how it feels.
Sincerely,
LADY JOCELYN OF LUTTERWORTH

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