Encyclopaedia Morningtonia: Codices

Comprehensive rulesets have not been around for ever. In the earlier years of IMCS, no one meeting was used to decide on the rules, as at Chalk Farm in 1984. Indeed, with the Underground system developing at the speed it was, this would have been wholly impractical. Instead, IMCS would publish regular updates and amendments in codices. There could be many of these codices current at one particular time, each giving information on a particular area of the rules and values. In 1910 there were 13 codices in concurrent use, the largest number ever. IMCS would have probably continued with this method had it not been for the 1930 crisis which spawned the first comprehensive ruleset: The IMCS/CAMREC Treaty at Mornington Crescent, 1931.

The Comprehensive Ruleset has now become the way things are done, but the use of the Codex is not obsolete. Indeed, the longevity of modern rulesets depend on them, as they are used to provide values, variables and constants used in conjunction with the rulset. For example, a Chalk Farm 1984 game played on the Podume and Cascade Values Codex 1981 will be a lot different from one played on the later 1988 Codex. The Codex is read avidly by the technical player keen on causing all sorts of mischief to their opponent, but it is important that any player knows his values. In International Competitions, a codex is prohibited from being taken into the play arena.

The Codices in current use are as follows:

Diagonals/Becks and Associate Values Codex 1994 (CLVIII)
Podume and Cascade Values Codex 1988 (CCI)
Coefficients and Supplementary Values Codex and Calculations Guide 2001 (LIX)
Electrical Values (SV and LV) Codex 1999 (CII)
Network Values Codex 1972 (IX)

All games are played with these values unless they are declared otherwise (which requires the permission of IMCS if it is a rankings competition).

Addendum

The most colourful codex ever to be published is the Network Values Codex of 1955 as amended 1956. It has been nicknamed the 'Snood Codex' as it brought [snood play]? to the cutting edge of Mornington Crescent play for its short 4-year life. (See also: Snood.) Some of its values and recommendations still have a residual effect today, but it is a far cry from the 1957 final of the World Championships where Trellis twisted the snoods by 265 degrees and used the centrifugal gravity this caused to suck her opponent from his winning position on the District Line and forced him to pre-empt an Ongar denial, thus allowing Trellis a cross-diagonal under-strile, drawing up to Mornington Crescent with a magnificently tidy line velocity of +1.0.

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