Or and Vert

[This post was written in answer to Mistress Lissa Underhill’s “Down the Rabbit Hole” challenge in the East Kingdom Laurels Challenge event ( https://moas.eastkingdom.org/list-of-laurels-challenges/ ).] In the process of researching 14th-16th century Czech names for my own name registration, I realized that I didn’t know how Czech orthography had changed over the centuries. For nearly all languages, of course, there are shifts over time, but this question is particularly of interest in languages that use diacritical marks. Particularly for name submissions to the SCA College of Arms, where we register the period spelling whenever possible, it’s important to know what period spellings look like, both for submitting the most period-appropriate form and for evaluating sources in the research process. With Czech names in particular, post-period secondary sources have a frustrating tendency to normalize the spelling of names, which seems primarily to be because Czech orthography in SCA peri...

Here's a too-detailed list of the heraldry projects I've got on my docket at the moment. I'm putting it here for accountability, as much as anything else, and so I can look back at it later when I've finished all of them. (This list doesn't include the usual consults and commentary arguments in varying stages of completion, because those are constant.) Personal projects: Write up the research I did for my name into an article on Czech byname patterns. probably also do more research to flesh this out some; I mostly only did enough research to justify the name I wanted, and there are more patterns than just the ones I used. Possibly just split this into an article series instead of a single one, because otherwise it'll never see the light of day. submit this to Palimpsest for an edit to SENA Appendix A Pull out dated lists of Czech given names and bynames from the sources I already have. names (given, byname, construction) in Vepřeková names (given, byname, constr...

Since “make an SCA blog” has been on my to-do list for entirely too long now, here we are! I’m not planning to follow any particular type of structure or consistent posting schedule, but I do have a number of projects I intend to put here over time. At the moment, I expect to primarily post about SCA heraldry and historical Czech onomastics (particularly as it relates to potential use in the SCA), as those are my two main areas of interest, but I’m leaving it open-ended because (a) I have Opinions about a lot of different things, and (b) I’m still always discovering new things to be a nerd about, so I don’t want to limit myself unnecessarily. As for who I am - hi! I'm Anéžka Liška z Kolína, currently Golden Gryphon Pursuivant (baronial herald for the Barony of Carolingia in the East Kingdom), though that's likely changing in the next few months. I've been interested in heraldry and historical onomastics for about four years at this point, and have been spending the last cou...