sandus.org

The Honourable Sôgmô Gaius Soergel Publicola has announced the creation of a new state organ tied to the seat of the Sôgmô and the royal family, Senepyard Court. This residence has been historically called “the Palace of State” when the Sôgmô lived in Kremlum Sandus province, but since 2017 the name for the Sôgmô’s residence has been simply “l’Appartement du Sôgmô” located in Quercus Candida. Senepyard Court will assume the name for the court tied to the Sôgmô, and will have additional functions not just as a sagamorial or royal court but also as a court of law. A future edict, the Edict of Senepyard Court, will be the first in the history of our country and will form the basis of the court’s community standards, rules, financial guidelines, and formulary rules of procedure as a court of law.

The court gets its name from Sandus’s strong Buddhist tradition. The name “Senepyard” comes from the Old English words senep (mustard) and ġeard (court, pronounced “yard”), a nod to our micronation’s roots as an Anglophone country. Since yard is not commonly known as a “court” in today’s vernacular, “Court” was added to the name for further clarification, even if etymologically redundant.

The mustard recalls the parable of Kisa Gotami and the mustard seed.

As a distraught mother whose son had died suddenly, Gotami went to the Buddha to ask him to miraculously revive her son. The Buddha, seeing the impossibility of her wanting, bid her to bring back a mustard seed from a house where no one inhabitant had a loved one who had died. Gotami searched and searched, but could only find mustard seeds from houses whose members had felt the grief of death and mourning. The Buddha taught Gotami that all sentient beings feel the misery (dukkha) of death.

Thanks to its linguistic roots, however, the name Senepyard can be translated into many other Indo-European languages in a way that captures its inner cultural meaning. Senepyard can be translated into Latin as Sinapium or Curia Sinapis, or the “Court of Mustard,” while in French Dôme-de-Senevé captures the Buddhist parable by translating yard as dôme, from Latin’s domus. The name can even be translated into Sanskrit as Sarṣapagṛha, an etymological cousin of Senepyard.

The name is meant to capture the mystery of the Sandum republic and its monarchy as a micronation. As a micronation, the Sôgmô’s house, þess court, is similar to any other person’s house. It is on the one hand entirely ordinary, just like anyone else’s house, and on the other meant to be filled with majesty and honour as the leading court of the land. At the moment, all aspects of the court are currently undergoing an intentional period of reflection and meditation as the Sôgmô prepares Sandus’s first edict that will govern the court justly and fairly.