Re: Ceremonies of property transfer

[edh@ascc01.ascc.lucent.com (Alfredo el Bufon)]

Poster: edh@ascc01.ascc.lucent.com (Alfredo el Bufon)

El senor Alfredo el Bufon ha escrito:
>   [...] to make sure that for years afterward
>   there would be witnesses who could attest that
>   the transfer had taken place [...]
>   they'd get a healthy young boy who seemed to have
>   a long life ahead of him, and give him a good
>   box in the ears to make sure he'd remember the
>   day.

Tibor affirmed:
> One gentle around here as documented several practices along those
> lines, including thrashing a child, having two knights exchange buffets,
> or inverting the children and thumping their heads on the ground...

Lady Caitilin Cheannlaidir objected:
[...]
> the idea of a big-city mayor choosing a child from among the
> population to have his ears boxed publically makes me think this
> may be one part of the ceremony that will be hard to replicate.
> Although I like the image of having all the parents in the audience
> pick their children up by the feet ...

I imagine that the children would have to be volunteers, or rather
be volunteered by their parents, motivated by the honor of the position,
or some sort of consideration.  Using more than one child is a good way
to increase the chances of a witness being around when you need one,
but I don't think you should use _all_ the children to witness one
ceremony, because there's got to be a limit to the number of such
ceremonies a child could retain before events start blurring together.

-- Alfredo
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