anastasiav | Scroll Text for Syr Marcus Blackaert

Two notes:

Justin did an amazing job reading this, really hitting the meaning of
the text exactly.

Marcus was Ivan's squire. Of Ivan's five squires, he now has one
Pelican, one Laurel, and one Knight. Through the generous flexibility
of the Crown, we were allowed to send Marcus to vigil from Saturday
court, and then hold his vigil and ceremony by candle-light on the
battlefield. This is a reproduction of what we did when Ivan was
knighted, and it really did go just exactly as we imagined it.

I still have not seen the scroll; it was done by the entire
Malagentian scribal community, including a portrait of Marcus by
Mistress Carolyne.

Here's the text:

Unto all who view the present letters, I, Kenric of Warwick, King,
Prince, and Knight, together with my faithful and well-beloved wife
Avelina, Queen and Baroness, for ourselves and in the name of our
heirs, Edward, Earl, Knight, Prince, and defender of Tir Mara, who
stands together with Thyra, Princess of Tir Mara, in perpetuity,
greetings.

Since human weakness is unstable and inclined to harmful things and
does not stand up to confusion, it is useful that those things that
are known to be earnest deeds carried out by honorable people are also
prudently preserved in written testimony. Therefore may both present
and future people know that, we, on the advice imparted of upright
men, do declare directly and publicaly that at our command the
renowned man Lord Marcus Blackaert hath fought valiently both by our
side and by the side of many and sundry other great and noble knights,
squires, and yeoman and further that as he hath served the court of
our ancestors as defender of the Queen, her majesty Aikaterine of
happy memory, and as he has, at many times and in diverse places shown
ready willingness to serve with all promptitude our pleasure,

Thus do we with pious consideration confer freely and absolutely on
the said Lord Marcus the accolade and rank of a Knight, charging him
in fealty to uphold the rights and duties of this his estate, and in
token of this we have here in the presence of these sundry noble
lords, barons, knights, counts, earls, dukes and personages of esteem
invested him with those outward tokens of his estate as are customary,
and further do we decleare directly and publically that he hath every
right to our aid, and to all those customary rights, promises, debts
and obligations and anything else which is by right due to him.
Further, do we grant unto him the sole and unchallenged right to bear
these arms by letters patent, namely Sable, a lion rampant argent
charged on the shoulder with a heart sable, in chief three
fleurs-de-lys argent.

These things we do give in fealty to the same lord Marcus, with all
rights and with all right things to be possessed peacefully and
quietly by him, provided that he will act as defender of justice, and
that he will likewise pay homage to us and our heirs born and to be
born, as through our own oath, solomnly sworn, we oblige ourselves and
our heirs and their heirs to observe all these things firmly and
faithfully.

In testimony and proof of this deed made fuller with perpetual
strength of certainty we have caused the present document to be
confirmed by our signatures and consigned with the protection of our
seal.

Granted at Malagentia, in the year of our Society XXXXVII, on the
fourteenth day of July, being the day of blessed Heraclas, On the
field of the Great Northeastern War.