SCA Minstrel Homepage

-- The Vagrancy and Poor Relief Act of 1572

This is a homepage for the performing arts as practiced in the Society for Creative Anachronism. The arts include songs, filk (new words to an existing tune), story-telling, and juggling, but generally don't include consort music. The SCA covers (theoretically) mostly Western Europe from the fall of Rome until 1600. For information about music that isn't mentioned here, see the SCA Music Homepage. If you have any suggestions or contributions for this page, please write me at lindahl@pbm.com.

What's New?

Bibliographies

• A bibliography of a-capella music (mostly 16th century)
• A short bibliography of early music-related materials
• A Singer's Guide to Medieval/Renaissance Music

Primary Sources / Transcriptions

• "Hearken to me": Middle English Romances in Translation
• The Laborde, Mellon, Copenhagen, and Wolfenbuettel chansoniers (all late 15th century)
• The Dowland Lute MS (with transcription)
• A collection of music/lyrics from the Middle Ages
• The Cantigas de Santa Maria (13th century)
• Medieval Melodies for Filking
• The Music of Thomas Ravenscroft (1609, 1611, 1614)
• Thomas Deloney's Works (d. 1600)
• Robert ap Huw's manuscript (16-17c)
• Bringing Live Music back into the Living Room (about 1/2 pre-1600)
• Sixteenth-century jokes, from two English jest-books
• Download a djvu client to read the following:
  • ____ Wine, Women, and Song: Mediaeval Latin Students' songs; Now first translated into English verse by Various
  • Shakespeare's jest book; a hundred mery talys, from the only perfect copy known. Edited, with introd. and notes, by Herman Oesterley by Oesterley, Hermann, 1834-1891
  • Shakespeare jest-books; reprints of the early and rare jest-books supposed to have been used by Shakespeare. Edited with an introd. and notes by W. Carew Hazlitt (vol 1) by Hazlitt, William Carew, 1834-1913
  • Shakespeare jest-books; reprints of the early and rare jest-books supposed to have been used by Shakespeare. Edited with an introd. and notes by W. Carew Hazlitt (vol 2) by Hazlitt, William Carew, 1834-1913
  • Shakespeare jest-books; reprints of the early and rare jest-books supposed to have been used by Shakespeare. Edited with an introd. and notes by W. Carew Hazlitt (vol 3) by Hazlitt, William Carew, 1834-1913
• Lyrics of the Troubadours (with a few English translations & melodies)

Articles and Information

Poetry

• Early Period Poetry
• Forgotten Ground Regained (alliterative poetry; Sir Gawain and the Green Knight)
• Medieval Irish Poetry

Storytelling

• The Codex Fabliauum (sources indexed by geo and century)
• Medieval Narrative Performances (video clips!)
• Elizabethan Storytelling
• Tahira's SCA Storytelling Page
• Period Sources for Story Telling (Cariadoc)
• A large number of online books with stories can be found in the Languages and Literature section of my book list.

The Modern Middle Ages

• But does it sound period? (a checklist)
• How to run a Bardic Competition
• On Bards, and Bardic Circles (Ioseph of Locksley)
• On Filks And Music In The SCA
• Music in the SCA: A Case Study of Folk Song

Music and Instruments and Etc.

• Medieval and 16th Century Theater
• Search CDs to find composers/tunes, at medieval.org and freedb.org
• Early music MP3s on Classical Guitar -- and Early music recordings on lute and early guitar
• The pre-1600 Highland Bagpipe
• Troubadours and Trovères (excerpt from New Grove)
• Sixteenth Century Ballads -- and a
• Compleat Anachronist on Early Child Ballads
• Do you sing french? (About french, but in french)
• Early Music Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) (good discography)
• The Saxon Lyre: History, Construction, and Playing Techniques
• Troubadours & Instruments (an article)
• How to play the Celtic Harp (Ioseph of Locksley)
• The Guitar pre-1650 (Ioseph of Locksley)
• The Hurdy-Gurdy Homepage
• How to build a portative organ (advertisement)
• Papers on the history of Juggling
• Stefan's Florilegium Sections: Performance Arts, SCA Stories.
• Popular Music Of The Olden Time (famous book, now online)

Kingdom Guilds and Related Stuff

• Troubadours in Atlantia
• Ansteorran Bardic Guild, and the Bardic Fire
• Mid-Realm Bardic Community
• AEthelmearc College of Bards
• Bardic Guild of Ealdormere
• Bardic Guild of Lochac
• Minstrels Guild of Drachenwald
• The Meridies College of Bardic Arts
• Northshield Bardic College

Collections of lyrics & stories & stuff

• Early Italian Plays in English Translation (14th through 16th century)
• Good King Henry Stories
• Cantaria ("A learning library of bardic music")
• Sir Brand's poetry
• Mikal the Ram's Homepage
• Digital Traditional Folksong Database (almost all post-1600)
• Auntie Sit-By-The-Fire
• Stories about the SCA from the Rialto (rec.org.sca)

Vendors

• The Medieval Lyric (inexpensive resource with accompanying audio CDs)
• see the Juried Merchants List Music & Dance Index

Random information

• Juggling Information
• Music copyright information

Return to the Society for Creative Anachronism Arts and Sciences homepage.