The Guide

Verifications are marks on your profile that say something about you has been checked. The Cellars uses a small ladder of marks so that members can see, at a glance, what level of confirmation another member has chosen to seek. Verifications are optional beyond the initial adult attestation. For the wider philosophy, see Trust within The Cellars.

Manage your verifications at your verifications.

During onboarding you confirm your date of birth and that you are an adult. This attestation is required to use The Cellars at all. It is the baseline every member carries and is the foundation of the other verification levels.

From your verifications page you may request a higher level. Requests for Adult Verified are handled by the Chamberlain (or by any member holding the verification permission). Cellar Verified is reserved to the Châtelaine and the Ivy Regent and is never granted by the Chamberlain. The materials you provide are never published — only the resulting mark is shown. Either you or staff may withdraw or refresh a mark over time.

1. You request Adult Verification from your verifications page. A unique Verification Code is issued and your request enters the Chamberlain queue.
2. A Chamberlain accepts the request. Its state moves from Pending to Assigned.
3. The Chamberlain sends you the standard instructions through Correspondence. The state moves to Instructions Sent, and then to Awaiting Member while you prepare your evidence.
4. The instructions name the Chamberlain's Mailbox and give you its present operational address. This address is never displayed on the site itself; it is given to you personally.
5. You send only the minimum evidence necessary to establish that you are legally an adult. The subject of your email must contain your Verification Code exactly as issued — if it does not, your evidence will be set aside until the discrepancy is clarified, so that material is never associated with the wrong request.
6. The Chamberlain marks the request Under Review and inspects your evidence.
7. The Chamberlain records a decision and confirms that the evidence has been reviewed and permanently deleted. Only the administrative outcome — granted or declined, with the reviewer and date, plus those two confirmations — remains on your record.

Please do not send any document until your Chamberlain has written to you. Material received before instructions are issued cannot be reviewed and will be discarded unread. This protects both you and the institution.

The Cellars verifies adulthood. It does not certify identity, reputation, or experience, and it does not endorse anyone. Storing the documents we use to reach a decision would turn The Cellars into a repository of personal identity material — something it deliberately is not. We record the decision; we do not retain the paper that led to it.

This separation reduces privacy risk for members, reduces legal exposure for the institution, and frees The Cellars from a long-term dependency on any one provider for the safekeeping of personal documents.

For the same reason the Chamberlain's Mailbox is described as an institutional Office rather than as the email address that presently serves it. The address may change over time; the Office, and the doctrine it embodies, does not.

• Adult attested. You have confirmed at sign-up that you are an adult. Every active member carries this.
• Adult Verified. An additional check, reviewed by the Chamberlain, that confirms you have demonstrated legal adulthood. Useful where members want a clearer assurance before private contact.
• Cellar Verified. The highest mark of institutional trust The Cellars confers, granted only by the Châtelaine or the Ivy Regent. It always includes Adult Verified and speaks to standing in The Cellars itself — never to authority over other members.

A higher mark does not grant power over anyone. It tells other members what has been seen and confirmed. Some areas of the site may be reserved for verified members; where that is the case it is shown plainly on entry.

If the Administration has reasonable grounds to question whether a member is legally an adult, The Cellars may flag the account as Verification Required and ask for Adult Verification as a condition of continued membership. This is an administrative safeguard, not a sanction. Failure to cooperate may result in suspension or removal. See Trust within The Cellars for the reasoning.

• Visibility of the mark on your profile.
• Access to any verified-only spaces the site offers.
• Other members' ability to judge for themselves how to engage.

Verifications never grant moderation power, never override consent, and never substitute for the judgement of the people you speak with.

An Honorific Title is a recognised standing — a name a member carries within the community. Titles and verifications are different things: a title is not a verification, and a verification is not a title. Both are described under their own sections of the Guide.

Ask for the mark that is true now. A verification can grow with you, and any mark can be set aside.