The story behind why I started the Challenge of the Iron Ring is…
By Lord Rodrigo de Montoya, July 2004
A couple of years ago (long before I became the Baron of Nordskogen), I was having a conversation with Master Warder Alexander de Seton at an event in the Midlands regarding there not being enough emphasis on just prowess in rapier. It was always expected to be there, but many tournaments, awards, and overall character assessments incorporated the entire aspects of a courtier (honor, courtly graces, chivalry, teaching, etc.) All this being very good, but I felt that recognizing and rewarding ability was almost to the point of getting ignored. Master Alexander suggested that if I saw this as a gap in the rapier community that I should think of a way to help solve it (in other words put my money where my mouth was :).
That day he was giving out hematite rings to those people who he had had good fights with as a token, he gave one to me and said maybe this will spark some ideas. Well it did, on the way back from the event I figured out the entire rules for the Challenge of the Iron Ring. That very night I posted the Challenge of the Iron Ring on the rapier lists and by morning Warder Uadahlrich emailed me. He had also received a hematite ring from Master Alexander and being from completely on the other side of the Middle Kingdom, he thought 1 Iron Ring for all of the Midrealm including Northshield would not be enough to provide the opportunity for many to Challenge for it. He asked my permission to start the Southern Iron Ring. So the very firs Iron Rings were the two hematite rings given out by Master Alexander de Seton. (Unfortunately hematite is brittle and did not fair so well when struck by a rapier, so now the rings truly are Iron Rings.)
And as it sits now there is a Northshield Iron Ring (former Northern Ring,) a Midrealm Iron Ring (former Southern Ring, as it will remain within the Midrealm borders drawn in October, a Merides Iron Ring, and there may be Iron Rings of Ealdormere and the Principality of Glenn Abhann already or very soon.