stulas.

John Hughes:
> > the differences between a stead's tula and a clan's can be of
> > central importance.

David Dunham:
> I completely agree with this. I just don't think there is such a
> thing as a "stead tula." It's called something else (and "stead
> holdings" is probably just fine for us English speakers, though
> Thunder Rebels leads me to believe it's called a "harsting" in
> Sartarite).

I'd suggest "steadland" or simply "stead". John doesn't define the latter term, but it might mean any of:- 1) the social unit, not infrequently (near-)synonymous with "bloodline"; 2) all the lodges of a stead (in sense 1); 3) all the cultivated land, permanent pasture, and other "occuppied territory" of a stead(1); or 4) stead(3) plus wildlands, summer pasture, and/or other "fuzzy" territorial resources.

So one might say "stead" is a "worse" term even than "tula". But I think it's at least clear that one pertains to the clan level, and the other a level "down". But candidly the Orlanthi are pretty hand-waving folk, so it would surprise me not in the least if the Sartarite word for "stead" could convey all of those meanings -- while equally they could be precise if they needed to be, if there was a lawsuit, a greybeard, a geas, or a meadhall argument over which of those sheep yonder was going to fall over that cliff first involved.

> There's also a fine distinction in that stead holdings are nominally
> assigned, not claimed.

It's a crucial distinction, I think in law. Your clan claims its land, essentially ex ego, with negotiation with your neighbours or meddling by your king being a second-order effect. Your stead(1) claims its stead(2, 3, or 4... argh, me heid...) on the basis of tradition, yes, and tactit threats doubtless, but in formal terms by being granted use of it by the clan ring.

> I'm also not convinced that stead holdings have boundary stones -- I
> think when I read that in your original message I assumed clan,
> because only clans have boundary stones.

Agree emphatically. If your neighbouring "clanmates" start with the boundary-building, eyebrows will be raised. (And the "clan too big, we wanna split, leaving you with a infeasible ratio of adults to children" requester pops up. <g>)

Cheers,
Alex.