avout

Definition

Avout are members of the mathic world who reside within a Math (walled cloister) under the Cartasian Discipline (formal rule-set). Their life centers on study, liturgy, and work inside the walls; contact with the outside is carefully bounded.

Context and Usage

• Contact cycles: Formal contact with the outside world occurs during Apert (gates-open observance), when gates open under rules set by the Discipline. Outside authorities cannot enter the math except at this time.
• Legal status: Avout are described as existing wholly apart from the legal system of the Sæcular Power (outside civil authority). They are not recorded in that system, are outside its jurisdiction and benefits, and do not receive identity documents. As a practical consequence, crossing political frontiers that require documents can be difficult or impossible for avout. In some cities, constables explicitly note that incidents involving avout are administratively complicated by this status.
• Travel abroad: When sanctioned, avout may go extramuros (outside the walls) under Peregrin (sanctioned travel) or as part of a formal Voco (official summons). Groups often travel together to preserve the spirit of the Discipline while outside. In speech, avout commonly address one another with honorifics such as “fraa” (male title) and “suur” (female title).
• Status term (“Feral”): Some speakers use “Feral” to accuse an avout of abandoning sanctioned discipline while on peregrin—leaving the walls or continuing travel without authorization. It is reproachful in tone and may be cited in arguments over a person’s standing during a Convox or their placement at meals.
• Collective reference and recognition: Extras use "avout" both collectively and for individuals. A magister in a Kelx service speaks of “the avout in their concents,” and a lay passenger on a coastal vessel asks whether a traveler is “one of the avout,” treating a meeting as an honor.
• Perceptions and slang extramuros: The term “vout” is used by some speakers outside the walls as a derogatory label for an avout; in in‑world lexicography it is associated with iconographies that depict avout very negatively. In crowds, onlookers have been heard to shout “vout,” and some misinterpret an avout’s use of standard kit (e.g., the expanding sphere) as “sorcery.”
• Entry and access: Gatekeepers recite a traditional admonition that one may not pass the gates unless swearing a solemn Vow (oath not to leave). Speakers also assert that one on whom the Anathem has been rung (banishment rite; “Thrown Back”) may not reenter a math, and that an avout who has been Evoked (formally summoned out) to a Convox (mass convocation) should present at the designated host rather than at another math.
• Observed local variation (Ecba): At Orithena, a walled community on Ecba, residents present themselves as avout to outsiders but identify the place internally as the Lineage (ancient tradition) rather than a Cartasian math. Visitors are not made to swear the Vow, and residents indicate they can depart at will. The outward avout presentation serves as a cover for dealing with extras while maintaining avout‑like dedication to work; the community also avoids submitting to an Inquisition (mathic authority).
• Education and terminology: Instruction for fids (novice students) follows long‑standing traditions. Speakers note that different orders of theors (theoretical scholars) prefer different models and terms for quantum theorics; some avout mentally translate between an “old” vocabulary and a more polycosmic (many‑cosmi) phrasing.
• Emergency interaction with outside authorities: In a security response at Orithena, soldiers of the Sæcular Power fitted avout with numbered collars (tracking devices) and directed an evacuation by aerocraft. Avout on site sought to preserve time for learning from a visiting artifact even under pressure from outside authority.

Convox and rites

• Convox (large convocation of avout): Defined in mathic dictionaries as a gathering of avout from maths and concents across Arbre, typically held at Millennial Apert or after a sack, and in rare cases upon request of the Sæcular Power. Avout summoned to such a gathering treat it as formal duty.
• Inbrase (Convox induction aut): A ceremonial program that formally enrolls newly arrived peregrins into the Convox. It renews vows, includes processions, symbolic acts, addresses by hierarchs (senior officials), and musical offerings by contingents. Notices are dispatched to home concents recording each avout’s change of status.
• Orders and lines present: Distinct cohorts attend, including Thousanders (long-sealed line) and other orders with their own musical and ritual traditions. Some groups perform computational chanting (music-as-computation that permutes a theme by rule) and maintain sequences over centuries.
• Plenary (public session of a Convox): A large assembly in a nave where an interlocutor—styled a loctor—conducts an extemporaneous dialog with an invited avout before the gathered community. Host concents may stage such sessions with lighting, scaffolds, and a speely feed, and microphones are sometimes clipped to bolts so speakers can be heard throughout the nave. Sæcular officials and technicians may be present as observers and crew.
• Roles and authority: Avout belong to chapters within orders and recognize internal leadership positions. A senior figure may be styled “First Among Equals” of a chapter. During plenaries or messals, junior avout may be assigned as servitors to senior doyns according to local custom.

Attire and kit in practice

• Wide variation by math: At large gatherings, avout display diverse wraps and accessories—turbans, hoods, footgear, under- and over-bolts—ranging from austere styles to elaborately folded ensembles. Some orders inherit and reuse ancient bolts until they are reduced to minimal coverings.
• Standard personal kit: The classic limit of three personal tools—the bolt, the chord, and the sphere—remains a cultural touchstone; new kit items may be issued for specific circumstances (e.g., quarantine) but are treated as temporary.

Meals and conversation at a host concent

• Messal (small formal dinner): Meals are organized as small, seated conversations in messallans (private dining rooms). Each messal is hosted by a dowment or chapter house (endowed/residential houses) and aims to keep discussion cohesive.
• Roles at table: Junior avout serve as servitors (junior assistants), each paired with a doyn (senior mentor). Servitors help prepare and serve the meal and, when appropriate, may listen in or contribute. Customs observed include standing behind the doyn during service, folding the doyn’s napkin, and providing a warm damp face‑cloth on request.

Related Terms

• Math; Cartasian Discipline; Apert; Saecular Power; Ita; Peregrin.

Notes

• Personal kit and property limits: Speakers describe an ancient prohibition that limits avout to owning only three personal tools—“the bolt, the chord, and the sphere.” These are used ingeniously for daily life and problem‑solving.
• Bolt and chord: Made of related fibers that can coil into springy, short forms or relax into long, inelastic strands. Avout adjust them seasonally (warmth vs. length) and employ them for rigging, binding, and mechanical advantage (named tricks include “Saunt Ablavan’s Ratchet,” “Ramgad’s Contraption,” and “the Lazy Fraa”).
• Sphere: A porous, pump‑membrane that can be compacted into a hard pill or softened and expanded like a self‑inflating balloon. In practice it can wedge in confined spaces, serve as an air‑bed, or act as a movable anchor when combined with the bolt and chord.
• Observed speech habit: One avout narrator remarks on a “compulsion to state facts,” offered as a cultural self‑observation rather than a formal rule.
• Honorifics and veneration: Common forms of address include “fraa” and “suur”; “Saunt” is used in names of revered figures and survives in the titles of well‑known tricks.
• Comfort with hypothetical reasoning: An avout narrator notes that they are used to being presented with outlandish cosmographical hypotheses and, in theorics, assume them provisionally to see where they lead.
• Philosophical currents: Avout study and debate the Split between syntactic and semantic approaches (associated with Saunt Proc and Saunt Halikaarn) and the “Aboutness Problem.” Some frame these debates with reference to the Hylaean Theoric World. In casual speech, terms like “Procians” and “Faanians” appear.
• Dialog (formal disputation): Mathic literature preserves Dialogs that are studied, re‑enacted, and memorized by fids (novices); formats range from the classic two‑speaker exchange to the Triangular (savant, seeker, and imbecile), among others.