Sunday 19 August 2012

The Braunstone Brothers

Builders. Everyone need them and Bodstonia is no different. They repair, mend and build the homes and workplaces of the population.
The town of Bodston has a team of builders, the brothers Emmet (37), Francis (36) and Peter (34) Braunstone.
When there´s no or not enough building or repair work to keep them employed, Francis and Peter work on the local farms whilst Emmett works in Jeremiah Coleman´s Sawmill.
All three of them are the Folks Militia, Emmet with the rank of Group leader.
From left to Right; Peter, Emmet and Francis

Here the brothers are preparing the ground for a log cabin, built on a plot of land recently aquired by the DeWitt family. As the project is out of town the brothers sleep in a tent next to the site. The clothes they wear are typical of Bodstonian manual labourers. Britches have been replaced by trousers as they offer more protection to the shins. The hats are of a simple design, but being made of thick felt they offer some head protection.
From a slightly higher vantage point we can see the staking out of the eventual position of the cabin on the DeWitt´s Plot of land. Posts are hammered in to mark the lines of the Log cabins walls.

The positioning of buildings upon a plot is  the owners choice, although a couple of basic rules need to be observed.
1. The outer wall of the building should be no less than 2 stick lengths (2 meters) near to the border of the plot.
2. The building should be no less than 4 stick lengths (4 meters)  from the track, road or thorofare.

These basic rules are to help prevent the spread of fire and if needed, give room to expand the width of any tracks or roads running along the property.
The measurement "the Stick" was first introduced to Bodstonia after the Lord Protector, Bartholomew Motesfont used it in a small land dispute. At the time there was no measuring device readily to hand and Bartholomew, in a rare fit of pique, threw his walking stick down onto the floor with the words "by the stick!!!" Since then his walking stick, known as the "Protectors Yard" is the basic unit of land measurement in Bodstonia. The "Protectors Yard" is roughly 1 meter in other world measurments)
The phrase "by the stick!" has been adopted as  the rallying cry of the Bodstonian Folks Militia, meaning "look to the standard".
Obviously in the town these rules do not apply as they were only brought in in the 6th year of Bodstonias existance and after a substantial part of the town had already been built.

4 comments:

  1. Excellent, full of character and atmosphere as usual!
    The Protector Stick is an original yardstick, but more perennial than the King's foot (changing every time a new king is crowned, even every year if the new ruler is young and still growing). Not to speak of the unwise choice of another member of the king's anatomy, the size of which is far more variable and, at some age, rather unreliable; well, never mind....

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  2. Thanks Jean Louis.
    I was going to use the length of his stride but then considered a couple of things, one being as you say, the actual length isn´t fixed and the next person elected would throw the whole thing into chaos..especially if they were exceptionally short or tall. Also it would alter throughout his life. In the case of a stride, eventually (if he kept being elected) he would hobble and the distance from any given landmarking would decrease in real terms.
    Shame that the song isn´t on CD.
    Cheers
    Paul

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  3. builders eh? I need some building done in Oronegro these bloody embassies have been all but forgoten! I must get on and work, if it was not for school... ah well next week end is study so not that weekend but perhaps the one after next.

    Log cabin my favourite! when I made my 1/160 (N) scale railway I set it in the rockies full of log cabins! I never got round to getting any, I was not the grand city maker back then.

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  4. hi-story, you find always something which is a real creation!
    Your imagination is perfect for your imagi-Nation!
    good use of the IMEX Pioneers! I'm sure that you have planed to use some more IMEX bods in the future!
    Honesty, your work makes me want to do an Imagi-Nation, but I imagine all the work must be necessary for creating such a world!
    (and I have no ideas now!)

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