Jan-11-2011, 11:28 PM (UTC)
We know that the Rooster Crown contains the anmas of past minstrels via the feathers they were honoured with/individually crafted. While I still have heaps of other things to make comment on re who does the honouring etc, I have suddenly found I have a slightly different take on the role of "minstrel" after my re-reading of AA, and also after reading Tintaglia's view of Selden in SOM.
In Chapter Nineteen, "Journey", the Chyurda sent out minstrels to meet the Six Duchies wedding delegation. The role of these minstrels or "hospitable ones" was to "greet guests and to make them glad they had come even before they arrived". As well as this, they told the history of their people via song, but this latter task is as much as we would traditionally expect any minstrel from within the realm to do.
I don't have SOM with me (my son has it down with him!) but Tintaglia called Selden her "little minstrel" due to the flattering, often sing-songy praise he tended to bestow upon her. When I first ever read this, I thought it an odd title, given that Selden wasn't really playing a musical instrument, truly singing or composing songs such as someone like Starling or Cockle etc did.
Putting the Chyurda definition into the mix, Selden seems to fulfill the role of minstrel well in that he greets Tintaglia and makes her glad she has come before she even arrives? He also sees her off with great flattery, making her glad that she had been?
It may be, then, that the minstrels in the Rooster Crown are not all "singing and dancing minstrels" but some may simply be those who flattered their dragon kin and that is why they were so honoured with the crafting of their feather?
In Chapter Nineteen, "Journey", the Chyurda sent out minstrels to meet the Six Duchies wedding delegation. The role of these minstrels or "hospitable ones" was to "greet guests and to make them glad they had come even before they arrived". As well as this, they told the history of their people via song, but this latter task is as much as we would traditionally expect any minstrel from within the realm to do.
I don't have SOM with me (my son has it down with him!) but Tintaglia called Selden her "little minstrel" due to the flattering, often sing-songy praise he tended to bestow upon her. When I first ever read this, I thought it an odd title, given that Selden wasn't really playing a musical instrument, truly singing or composing songs such as someone like Starling or Cockle etc did.
Putting the Chyurda definition into the mix, Selden seems to fulfill the role of minstrel well in that he greets Tintaglia and makes her glad she has come before she even arrives? He also sees her off with great flattery, making her glad that she had been?
It may be, then, that the minstrels in the Rooster Crown are not all "singing and dancing minstrels" but some may simply be those who flattered their dragon kin and that is why they were so honoured with the crafting of their feather?
"I am the Catalyst, and I came to change all things. Prophets become warriors, dragons hunt as wolves."
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