Ancient Artifacts of the Origin Museum, Part II

Hi again folks. What were meant to be a handful of articles posted over a couple of weeks became a couple of articles posted over a few months! Due to teaching responsibilities last year I had to take an unscheduled hiatus from writing.

I’m excited to get back to our regularly scheduled programming, and I’m proud to launch into the new year with the second article in our Origin Museum series. In this part of the series, Joe Garrity (curator of the Origin Museum) shares his story of giving Richard Garriott a very special gift during the University of Texas Video Game Archive Fundraiser at Britannia Manor in 2007. The degree of craftsmanship that went into the gift is reminiscent of Infocom and Ultima ”feelies” – the expression of an artist’s love for their work, and I believe demonstrates how games not only entertain and surprise us – but how they can lead to new works of art and relationships with those around us.

Joe writes:

“This one is not really an Origin artifact, but it’s related to game collecting — The Ultima Reagent Box.  A presentation we created ourselves, it’s a display case of all of the genuine real-world reagents that are used for spell-casting in the Ultima games.  It took quite a while to collect all of these items, but the end result was worth it.

After the wonderful meeting with Richard Garriott at Britannia Manor in 2001, Paula (my wife) and I wanted to do something nice for him, as a way of saying thank you.  We occasionally send him silly Christmas gifts, just to let him know that we’re still around.  [Knowing that he’s passionate about exploration, we once splurged 20 bucks, and  purchased for him an official deed to a square mile of property—on the ocean floor!]

The Reagent Box ended up to be a 2-year effort in finding the individual reagents and binding each to a velvet base with brass wire, presenting them with a 19th-century-scientific look.  The center item is a mortar and pestle, with the reagents surrounding it, and an identifying brass plaque under each one, (written in Ultima runic, of course).  Finding each reagent gave us little mini-adventures—each one more interesting than the next.  Some examples:

Mandrake Root — Never order anything from an online Wiccan shop….witches are the WORST spammers.  I actually had to abandon an email account because of this.

Nightshade — We happen to be fortunate enough to live in an area where Solanum Americanum grows naturally.  Armed with a bunch of Internet pictures, we went on many weekend hikes in our local nature preserves.  Although not a protected species, it was probably still illegal to take that snipped sample of our quarry (and we even included some berries from the plant!).

Sulfurous Ash — I acquired some natural sulfur chunks at a hobby shop (don’t ask me why they were there), and made the necessary preparations to burn it outside, and make some ash.  Note—Sulfur is an ELEMENT—it cannot be broken down into lesser components!  (I can be really stupid sometimes!)  By the time I had made this brilliant deduction, I discovered 2 more interesting facts.  

1. Sulfur burns extremely well, and extremely hot!  Had I not been insightful enough to burn this on a piece of flagstone, it could’ve very easily gotten out of control—nothing puts it out!
2. Sulfur fumes are TOXIC—I almost passed out in the back yard!  After this idiotic experiment, I ended up smearing some ashes on the sulfur chunk—it was as close as we could get.

Blood Moss — A quick search on the Internet reveals nothing about Blood Moss.  Was it made up for Ultima, and doesn’t really exist?  I had to find out.  I used to work for the Department of Agriculture, so I asked many of my co-workers (who dealt with grain inspection) about blood moss.  None of them had ever heard of a ‘red moss that attacks grain’ (according to Ultima lore).  Not wanting to give up, I scheduled an appointment at the Smithsonian’s Museum of Natural History.  I actually was escorted to the top of the Museum’s dome, where I spent almost 30 minutes with a dusty scientist, going thru dozens of sample drawers, looking for Blood Moss.  When we finally gave up, as he was apologizing for not being able to help me, another botanist was grabbing his coat, and leaving for the night.  My new scientist friend yells, “Hey Bob—do you know what Blood Moss is?”  The other botanist replies (without breaking his stride), “Oh—you mean Sphagnum moss.”  We both race to stop him and ask him more.  It turns out that Sphagnum moss was used in medieval times as an impromptu bandage during jousting, because of it’s naturally antiseptic properties, and it’s absorbency to soak up blood, hence the moniker ‘Blood Moss’.

Once completed, we had another brass plaque made, with the following message on the back:

Richard,
You enrich the lives of millions as your vision creates worlds. May your future endeavors bring you much success.

Evolve, Experiment, Enlighten, Explore, but…

Never forget your roots.

Joe and Paula Garrity
Curators of The Origin Museum

Once it was finished, I had a piece of framed glass made to complete the presentation.  I had also wanted to attach a tiny hammer on a chain to the side, with a runic message saying, “In case of Moongate—Break Glass”.  Paula thought it was overkill.

I presented it to Richard privately at the U of T Videogame Archives Fundraiser.  Although he was very busy that night, he seemed very appreciative, and called it ‘absolutely amazing’, and ‘a new piece of Ultima history’.  Many months later, someone showed me a picture from the Internet of the inside of the NCSoft offices, and there was our Reagent Box, displayed on top of a bookcase.”

- Joe Garrity
Curator, The Origin Museum

Editor’s note: Once again, I’d like to thank Joe for sharing this story with us. Given that most of us are satisfied in playing games (and sometimes writing about ‘em), it’s inspiring to see people as devoted to the Ultima series as Joe and Paula are. Since this article was originally written, Richard Garriott has left NCSoft to pursue personal projects. In a recent interview with the BBC, he announced that he is looking forward to developing a new medieval online game.