"Lady fighters"

[LORNABAKER@aol.com]

Poster: LORNABAKER@aol.com

I intended to post this to the person who informed us about a new list for
lady fighters, but misplaced her address. The rest of you may enjoy this
anyway, so here goes.
This is a little SCA history lesson as I know it. Thought you might like to
know how "ladies" were first "allowed" to fight in the SCA. Douglas & I were
on the throne for the West Kingdom (yes, I know we were back near the "Big
Bang"). Many of the fighters (all male at that time) would not allow women to
fight. They recognized that women would defend the castle when their men were
off on the crusades, but did not believe that women fought in tourney's,
which is the most common setting we use in the SCA. Trudie Lacklandia
(forgive me Trudie if my spelling is off), now Countess, a knight, a laurel,
a pelican, a vicountess, a court baroness, well, you get the picture) came to
us with documentation to prove that there were women who fought in tournament
settings (for said documentation we have to attempt to contact Sir Trudie).
We gave the go ahead to allow women to fight. The diehards who opposed would
actually withdraw from a tournament rather than face a female opponent. Yes,
some simply could not feel that striking a lady, regardless of her wishes was
chivalric. Others I felt just couldn't face the possibility of being defeated
by a girl. (How embarrassing for the macho type). The good news is that
today, no one thinks twice about the ladies being on the field in armour. My
apologies to stephancm@juno.com as I already posted this directly to her, but
didn't think many of you knew this story. Hope you enjoy.
In Service,
Lorna
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