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Summer Knights Newsletter – August/September 2001
Unto
the populace of Summer
Knights patrons doth Lord
Magnus, Lady Branwyn and the Master
Knights send greetings! Once
again we send forth this missive informing the populace of deeds
both great and small and Knightly-News concerning the Summer Knights
program. As usual, we
extend an invitation to all whom are interested in our program to send
us their email address and, for those of you who already receive the
newsletter, forward it to others; let others know about Summer Knights!
Another Great Summer! We have reached the end of another great summer and indeed we have much to relay from the wonderful days spent in the pursuit of knighthood and Chivalry. This year proved to be very different from year’s past. As previously mentioned in the March/April Summer Knights Newsletter, we were graced with the gift of young Ladies among the Chivalry! The addition of our Lady Knights proved spectacular. In session one, Lady Bethany showed even returning knights a higher understanding of Chivalry and Honour. In session 2, Lady Elizabeth Cantu, whose little curls were always spilling out of her helm, courageously made it to the last rounds of the Broadsword Tourney and Lady Liz Beetem distinguished herself and honoured her knighthood by coming in second in the Broadsword Tourney and first in the Rapier Tourney! The Champions of the Grand Tourney: This year was a fantastic year for new additions to Summer Knights and great leaps in the History of Summer Knights as well. First and foremost, in addition to our test of Knightly prowess in the armoured, broadsword and shield Grand Tourney, this year Summer Knights expanded its Tournament to include a rapier tourney for all knights to demonstrate their skills in Renaissance swordsmanship. After great displays of swordsmanship and Chivalry, the tourney revealed the best swordsmen in each session. The Champions of the Tourney are: In our first session, (the English versus the French in the Battle of Agincourt 1415ad) the broadsword and shield tourney was won by: Sir Travis Brody And the Rapier Tourney was won by: Sir Victor Marmol, proving decisively that size does not matter! In the Second Session of Summer Knights, (the Viking versus the British 998ad) the broadsword and shield tourney was won by: Sir Max Bunster And the Rapier Tourney was won by: Lady Liz Beetem We
raise an earth-shaking “Huzzah” to the honour of our Champions of
the Grand Tourney and all the brave knights that made each and every act
of swordsmanship a thing of beauty, honour, courage and, most of all,
Chivalry!
The Quest!: A Knightly Questathalon! Each
year, Summer Knights sponsors “ The Quest” and each quest is
designed to test the skills of knighthood.
In Session one, the goal was to recover a kidnapped Lady Branwyn
and in Session 2, freeing the sequestered Princess Megan was the goal.
Each quest offered challenges in Swordsmanship, Archery,
Heraldry, Armouring, Chivalry and even included a trip to the Apothecary
and a cast of the Viking Runes! Competition
was intense but, alas, only a select group can earn the title “Heroes
of the Quest”. We
celebrate their victory and their success in Knighthood.
The Flower of Chivalry: Each Session of Summer Knights we keep a close eye on each Knight and make the extremely difficult decision as to who is to win the greatest award, the highest honour we can bestow, the symbol of perfect knighthood…The Flower of Chivalry Award. The Flower of Chivalry Award is named for both the literary heroes (Sir Lancelot) and the historical heroes (Sir William Marshal) that represented the highest achievements in Honour, Courage, Largess, Prowess and, of course, Chivalry. Thus, in the tradition of the greatest knights, by their example and our training, we offer the world a new generation of knights that truly exemplify a Chivalrous Knight, the Flower of Chivalry. In Session One, the Flower of Chivalry was: Sir Marcos Felix Perez, FC In Session Two, the Flower of Chivalry was: Sir Travis Brody, FC, Broadsword Champion We
congratulate these knights in the success of this high honour and wish
their return to Summer Knights so that they may show others the Path to
Chivalry.
Most Favoured Viking 2001: “Uff Da!” the Vikings have landed! The Most Favoured Viking Award was established last year when Lord Magnus and Lady Branwyn created this special award to distinguish the hard work of Lord Ulfkell. As is the way of this generous Viking, he has continued the tradition by awarding the Most Favoured Viking to those whom he believes have the qualities of a great Knight and a great Viking. This year, in Session One, the recipient of the Most Favoured Viking Award was: Sir Geoffrey Quinby, MFV And in Session Two, the recipient of the Most Favoured Viking Award was: Sir Michael Diaz de la Portilla, MFV On an interesting side note, all of the previously inducted Most Favoured Vikings, Sir Karl Patti, MFV and Sir Geoffrey Quinby, MFV along with Lord Ulfkell were on hand to present the Most Favoured Viking Award to Sir Michael! Congratulations
to all the Most Favoured Vikings as they continue to show, by their
example, the Way of the Viking.
The Archery Campaign: The Archery Campaign at the Everglades Archery Club is a tradition for the Summer Knights. Each year the Summer Knights travel down south to the Everglades Archer’s Club and spend a full day shooting at this spectacular range. Knights compete against each other by doing their level best to rack up as many points for their kingdom as they can. The majority of these points come from the excursion on the field course where each small group of knights, led by a Master Knight, attempts to make some very difficult shots. This year (as with last year) the Summer Knights were fortunate enough to have one of the best traditional archers on earth (no, not Lord Magnus) spend the day with us. Of course we are referring to none other than Sir Dana Chatoo. (Three weeks before our archery campaign, Sir Dana took part in the International Field Archery Association’s (IFAA) and National Field Archery Association’s (NFAA) world archery competition in Strasburg, Illinois and place third in the world and first in the nation in longbow!) Sir Dana and the Everglades Archers’ Club have become an integral part of Summer Knights yearly events and have our utmost respect. Truly, it was an honour to shoot with Sir Dana, and his commitment to our traditional archers is greatly appreciated.
The Elks Lodge: As those of you who attended Summer Knights this year already know, we had a new location for the summer of 2001. And, if you were already aware of that fact you know it was a fantastic location to host our noble program. The space, both inside and out, afforded to us was perfect for Summer Knights to teach the gifts of Chivalry. We
would like to thank the Miami Elks Organization, especially Frank Cobo
and the Exalted Ruler, for taking a chance with our unique program and
helping us make our dream of Chivalry for all, a reality.
We hope that next year we will be back at this magnificent
location and offer a rousing “Huzzah” to the Elks!
The Summer Knights Corporate Round Table Now is the time to make a difference in the world today with the Chivalry of the past! Through corporate sponsorship Summer Knights can grow in its capacity to bring Chivalry to the youth of today and help keep the cost low for young knights to attend our noble program. Last year, we made our modest corporate sponsorship dollars stretch to aid in lowering the cost of the program by $52! This year, our goals are even loftier. We are searching for corporate sponsors to help us keep our price down while aiding us to grow. With your help, we can do just that! Our Summer Knights Corporate Round Table offers Sponsorship packages that allow businesses and individuals to sponsor a single knight, an archer corps or even a whole kingdom! These sponsorship dollars also translate into a partnership with Chivalry. With sponsorship, our sponsors receive special recognition in our newsletters, space on our website to define Chivalry and logo space on our brochures at large community service events and even the Italian Renaissance Faire; last year we reached over 5000 people at the faire alone! These events, newsletters and web presence allow our sponsors to connect with the most chivalrous group on earth, the Masters of Knightly virtue, the Summer Knights! For information please contact us at:305-609-6048 or email us at: As it is the end of our Sponsorship year, we would like to take this opportunity to once again thank our devoted corporate sponsors that have helped Summer Knights with financial contributions during the 2000-2001 year. The Summer Knights wish to thank: Zuleica
Perdomo & International Training Careers Robert Mendes and E-Basics.net and With
their help and the help of future sponsors, Summer Knights can grow to
help other learn the path to Chivalry! Although
not yet official sponsors, we would also like to thank some good friends
of Summer Knights: Chivalry
Sports The
Crimson Hammer Armory Ultra
Products Archery Triplette
Competition Arms Sir Jess Galan Lady Christine Brillant And Sir
Dana Chatoo
Helms
for the Master Knights: The great catalan
philosopher Ramon Llull said in his landmark treatise “The Book of
the Order of Chivalry” that a Knight’s helm was to cover his
head from shame. In the
biography of William Marshal it is clear that losing one’s helm in a
tournament was considered extremely shameful.
Thus, so as not to cause our Master Knights shame, we armed them
all with new helms! Six of
the helms were, as per the Knight’s preference, conical helms from Chivalry
Sports. The last helm,
for Lord Ulfkell, our senior fight director, was a custom-made Viking
helm from Crimson
Hammer Armoury.
You will be able to see both styles of helm on our new,
redesigned web-site in the coming months. If you are interested
in a helm from Chivalry Sports, you
can visit their website or call 1-800-730-KING and speak with the
manager, Jake Stirler, and tell him you are a Summer Knight! The Crimson
Hammer Armoury is owned and operated by Alan
Bauldree, Master Armourer. The
Crimson Hammer website has many examples of Alan Bauldree’s fine work
but, for those of you familiar with our armour, Lord Magnus’ helm and
Lord Ulfkell’s helm are both from his Armoury.
Although he takes very few orders, if you are willing to wait a
little longer (it’s worth the wait!) the results are always
spectacular.
Summer
Knights CD-Roms contain nearly 1000 pictures! Yes,
for the first time ever Summer Knights is offering a collection of
pictures from both sessions of the 2001 summer.
For a mere $10 (plus tax and shipping) you can see every picture
taken throughout both sessions of Summer Knights.
Each picture is full size and color corrected and each CD
contains more than double the pictures posted on the Summer Knights
website! Although they
won’t be available until late September, you can pre-order them today!
Get your own copy of a summer worth of memories!
What
Art Thou Reading? Perhaps
the question most asked of our Knights is where we learned our vast
knowledge of the Medieval Knight. Most
of our historical knowledge comes from books (and lots of them!) about
the Middle Ages or the Renaissance.
As a consequence, the Summer Knights website is going to have an
extensive reading list with staff recommendations as well as book
reviews from our ever-growing number of graduated knights.
In addition, we have added this new department of the Summer
Knights Newsletter to bring you up to date reviews of books that we come
across during the year. This
month Lord Magnus is reading: 1)
The Year 1000: What Life Was Like at
the Turn of the First Millennium By
Robert Lacey and Danny Danziger 2)
William Marshal, The Flower of Chivalry By
Georges Duby 3)
Become the Arrow By
Byron Ferguson 1)
The Year 1000: What Life Was Like at
the Turn of the First Millennium is one of the most
fascinating books on early Medieval life that we have come across.
It carefully flows through a historical piece called “The
Julius Work Calendar” and offers great insight into life during each
month of the year in the year 1000.
“The Year 1000…” offers a depth of social understanding
that comments on and details the nature of politics, warfare, economics,
medicine, socio-economic structures and any other facet of Medieval life
at the year 1000 that anyone could want to know.
We have given this book to several our Master Knights and highly
recommend it to anyone who wants a finely detailed picture of life in
the middle ages told in an amusing and compelling style. 2)
William Marshal, the Flower of Chivalry
is a magnificent account of the period biography of, arguably, the
world’s greatest, historical knight.
The depth of Georges Duby’s knowledge is only outshone by the
depth of his passion for the subject.
This was truly a pleasure to read and should be on the reading
list of any who take knighthood, and Chivalry, seriously. 3)
Become the Arrow by Byron
Ferguson was lent to me by Sir Dana after a discussion we had on the
intricacies of tuning a longbow. After
a day of shooting out on the range, Sir Dana reached into his car and
produced a thin little book with an archer (Ferguson) pictured at full
draw on the cover. He made
me promise my first born that I would return it (you have the word of a
knight Sir Dana!). I
proceeded to tear through the book (it’s written in a very simple
style) and from the first ten pages alone myself and Lady Branwyn gained
insight that helped our shooting almost immediately!
Although laden with a section on bow hunting in the last
chapters, the book is as good as gold for those who wish to take
traditional archery to the next level.
A must-have for the traditional archer!
If you are reading something about Knighthood, Chivalry,
Swordsmanship, Archery, Armouring, Heraldry, History of the Middle Ages
or the Renaissance or any other book you think knights would find
valuable, please email us
with the book title and your review; we would love to share your find
with the rest of the Chivalry.
The
Wars! The
wars the Summer Knights fought this year were the best we’ve ever had!
This year session
one fought the battle of Agincourt (1415ad) with the French matching
their skills with the British and session two fought the Battle of
London Bridge (998ad) with the Vikings paired off against the Brits of
London. Each battle proved
to be a brilliant effort of knightly prowess and teamwork.
This year many flags were captured, many shores were taken and
knights even had sea adventures in a Viking Longship (landship?!)
In the end, it was unanimously agreed that great merriment and
mirth was had by all. One
should remember, fun is not the usual outcome of war, but in this case
it certainly was!
Sir
Richard is granted his Lordship! As
many of you know, the Master Knights staff are hand-picked from the many
knights that have been through the Summer Knights program for several
years and demonstrate great skills in Knighthood and Chivalry.
Each chosen Knight volunteers his great talents and dedicates
year round service (not just the summer) to further their skills and
train in the arts of knighthood. Their
training is then passed on to new and returning knights that attend
during the summer. However,
Master Knights work very hard to prove their worth to Lord Magnus and,
most importantly, to themselves. It
should be known, all Master Knights work extra hard to earn both titles
of distinction and honour among their noble household.
Thus, when Lord Magnus, Lady Branwyn and the Master Knights feel
a young Master Knight has earned the title of “Lord”, it is bestowed
with great fanfare. The
word Lord in Anglo-Saxon means “Loaf-giver” and refers to a Lord
taking care of his own and making sure each of his vassals and subjects
is well taken care of, and well fed. Thus,
unto the populace we pronounce that this summer of 2001, Sir Richard
Devon earned the title of Lord Richard Devon. In
addition to Lord Richard, other titles were bestowed this summer upon
some of the other Master Knights. These
titles include: Lord
Ulfkell, m.f.v. and Senior Fight Director has been appointed Protector
of the Realm and bears with this title all the rights and duties
therein. Lord
Mathias Bloodaxe, Master Armourer has been appointed High Counselor and
Chief Advisor to the Throne and bears with this title all the rights and
duties therein We
congratulate all of our Master Knights for the fine work they have done
training tirones (new knights) this summer and are eager to start
training for the 2001-2002 year.
Until
next time M’Lords and M’Ladies. Yours
in Chivalry, 305-609-6048
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